9 Easy and Elegant New Years Dinner Ideas
New Year’s can be a time for exciting parties, but it’s also an excellent opportunity to step it up with elegant dinners to impress family and friends. The best high-quality dinners prepared at home taste delicious but are relatively easy to pull together to enjoy the celebration all night long.
Whether you want a fish-based meal or something more unique like fondue, there are so many easy and elegant dinner choices for your New Year’s celebrations. Keep reading to learn more about a few premium meal selections.
1. Lamb and Caviar
Lamb and caviar are an excellent combination of flavors and quality. The caviar begins the meal, providing a quality appetizer that tastes incredible with creme fraiche and a small blini to carry the product.
The star of the show, of course, is the lamb. The chops are succulent and will garner any food critic’s attention at the table. These two items pair together for a complete show at your New Year’s gathering. We recommend finishing with a dessert, such as Valrhona Chocolate Molten Lava Cakes.
2. Duck Confit and Caviar
Lamb and caviar are an excellent duo, but you can’t go wrong with duck confit and caviar. Ideally, you’ll eat the caviar first as a warmup for the main dish. Those who want extra fancy should consider serving escargot as an appetizer even before the caviar.
Like the lamb, duck confit provides an incredible flavor profile and appearance at a luxurious dinner event. Slow-roasted duck will go well with some vegetables and potatoes if you don’t feel the meal is enough. Again, the meal will pair well with a chocolate dessert.
3. Feast of the 7 Fishes
The Feast of the 7 Fishes is a tradition in Italy, offering a time to celebrate a tradition harkening back to the early Irish immigrant settlers in the United States. It’s a tradition deeply set in the Catholic church, relating to their abstaining from traditional meats on Fridays.
The trickiest part about the Feast of the 7 Fishes is there are multiple dishes to pull together at one time. This selection includes South African Lobster Tails, sea bass, Smoked Salmon, and more.
4. Smoked Salmon
Most people have smoked salmon and bagels in the morning, but who says things must remain traditional when ringing in the New Year? Salmon, bagels, and whipped cream cheese are the ultimate combination to make all your guests happy as they snack the evening away.
There are typically traditionally seasoned salmon selections and hot salmon options, depending on the desired flavor profile for the meal. Consider setting up a bagel bar where people can serve themselves, or craft the bagels together ahead of time for an unforgettable and elegant experience.
5. Japanese Wagyu A5 and Caviar
Wagyu, especially Japanese Wagyu, is one of the most tender meats on the market. Thus, it’s an excellent contender for an elegant New Year’s dinner. Open up with caviar on blinis and creme fraiche, and consider throwing in some smoked salmon to prepare the palette for the delicious meat.
Japanese Wagyu is firm, yet remains tender, and is heavily marbled for a melt-in-your-mouth bite every time. The cows are raised specifically for an incredible final product, so your guests won’t be disappointed.
6. Pâtés, Terrines, and Tourtières
If you want a gathering that's more finger-food-oriented, consider having meat pies and other delicacies at your gathering. Pates are savory fillings typically baked inside a terrine, and tourtieres include meat, fruit, and greens wrapped inside a flaky crust. They look gorgeous on a plate and taste even better.
Pates, terrines, and tourtieres are ideal if you want your elegant New Year’s dinner to focus on several smaller dishes instead of one large, main concoction. Typically, these products are filled with beef, pork, or another similar meat of a high quality and incredible flavor profile.
7. Surf & Turf
Surf and turf dinner kits offer the best of both worlds, which could be ideal for a New Year’s dinner. Individuals can focus on new versions of themselves while testing cuisine from the land and sea. The combination of flavors, like in other dinners, is best complimented by starting with some caviar.
An example of a delicious surf and turf dinner option includes a lobster tail and premium Wagyu beef. The flavors meld together, especially when served with butter and other tasty accompaniments. Of course, you can’t forget the dessert at the end of the meal.
8. Paella
Paella is a more involved dinner selection, but it’s a simple way to impress your guests with elegance at your New Year’s party. Paella is straight from the cookbooks of Spanish cuisine, and the base recipe pairs well with nearly any protein added to the cooking vessel.
Ingredients in quality paella include saffron, Chorizo, Bomba rice, Piquilla Peppers, and more. It’s luxurious and offers a unique plating opportunity to work with appetizers and potential proteins to serve on top.
9. Fondue
Finally, if you want to have some fun with your elegance, consider fondue as a dinner option. Most think of sweet fondue, but there are savory options made with cheese. You can then dip bread, meat, veggies, and more into the world-class melted cheese.
Once you’re done with the savory fondue portion, switch to the sweet with melted chocolate. You can dip marshmallows, chocolate, cookies, fruit, and more into the chocolate base to finish off your New Year’s night.
Where Can You Find Quality Meals?
Oftentimes, things are easier said than done when pulling together an easy and elegant meal. Some can take a long time to create, from searching for quality ingredients at the grocery store to creating the dish from scratch. It would be easier to have all the ingredients necessary for the meal sent right to your door.
If you want boxes packed with everything necessary for an elegant New Year’s dinner, check out Kolikof Caviar & Gourmet. Here, you’ll find dinner kits filled with the best ingredients from quality sources, ready for you to cook and pull together for your guests. It’s the best, delivered right to your doorstep.