Cheers to planning

Just a few smart ideas can make a cocktail party special

To be among the first cocktail party guests at Jennifer and Peter Beckman's home is to be greeted warmly, relieved of your coat, steered to the living room and offered a drink.

"We try to keep people in the living room until we have critical mass," says Jennifer, 32, a lawyer-turned-cooking teacher who learnt to entertain from her very social parents. "Eight people give a room energy; 12 to 15 and the party is hums."

The Beckmans take their cocktail fetes - two or three a year - quite seriously. They expanded the first floor of their Falls Church, Virginia home, connecting a new kitchen and family room to the dining and living rooms. Great flow, as they say.

Although she prefers hosting intimate dinners, "the energy of a cocktail party cannot be beat", she says. "I think the 'twinkle factor' is much higher than that of a smaller, more intense gathering."

In December last year, she and Peter - he is 32, a tech consultant and onetime pastry-chef intern - welcomed about 50 friends for drinks and hors d'oeuvres.

"Everything is finger food that will be set out in several places, except one that will be passed. I am not a believer in the cocktail plate. I use black cocktail napkins a lot; they are as sophisticated a look as you can get with paper," she says.

The bar, tended by Peter, goes on the peninsula between kitchen and family room. "It is imperative that it not be at the end of any space, nor should it be right inside the door. It will stop traffic," he says.

On party day, he will arrange four dozen of their inexpensive Target wineglasses alongside 36 rented martini glasses.
Beer is served right in the bottle. There is always plenty of bottled water or homemade ginger iced tea for non-drinkers.

The simplest morsels - raw veggies, cheese - go by the sofas, where occupants tend to settle in and "eat a ton", she says. "Save the wild mushroom tartlets you spent all day making" to be passed on a tray.

Jennifer shops two or three days in advance and likes local markets. One day before, Peter will mind daughter Saskia, 17 months, while Jennifer cleans. They may hire a neighbourhood kid to take coats and clear napkins and dirty glasses.

They will try to snatch two hours just before party time "for a shower and a cocktail", he says. "That way you may actually get an hour to yourselves."