what to cook for houseguests

'tis the season!

If you’re hosting houseguests over the holidays, you’re not only brainstorming a meal for the holiday itself (like the Thanksgiving feast or easy-but-fancy holiday menu) — you also have to come up with breakfast, lunch, and dinner ideas for a whole long weekend or more, for a house full of people! If you’ve done it before then you know: that takes A LOT of mental energy and planning.

So today, I’m sharing a framework for meals I make when I’m hosting houseguests. You can pick and choose from the ideas below to create a “menu” for the weekend/week — but I typically don’t do all of my grocery shopping ahead of time to allow for fluidity. Inevitably, we’ll want to try out a new recipe someone saw on IG, or cook with some veggies we bought that day at the farmer’s market, or decide last minute to go out to eat.

I also always plan for a few meals out. Specifically, when George’s or my parents and/or siblings come to town, we:

• Get a sitter for an adults-only meal out.

• Grab pizzas and go to the beach for a picnic dinner. You could go to a grassy park or playground, if there’s not a beach near you!

• Have lunch at a local vineyard or someplace where the kids can run around while we eat.

But that still leaves a number of meals to make at home! Keep reading for what I cook!

I wanna know: what are your go-to meals or snacks for houseguests? And if you have any fun houseguest hosting tips, share ‘em!

• A frittata or strata. These are so easy to whip up using whatever you have in the fridge! You could make my Starbucks egg bite copycat frittata, or, if you have What to Cook the book, the sausage & pepper frittata (p. 129). In the book I also share my base equation for frittatas plus four other variations I cook all the time. If you’re trying to stretch the meal to feed more people, you can add hash (here’s a recipe), a simple side salad with mixed greens and a homemade (or store-bought) vinaigrette, and/or fresh fruit. Oh and this strata is SO GOOD!