Ready for the Holidays

By Naperville Magazine
November 2024 View more Featured

By Jeff Banowetz

Expert tips for creating memorable gatherings

Hosting holiday festivities is meant to be merry. But merrymaking can be anything but if you’re struggling with all the details of party prep. Whether throwing a big blowout or an intimate dinner soirée, proper planning goes a long way to ensuring a memorable gathering. We talked to hospitality pros—caterers, party planners, designers, and sommeliers—who shared their expert tips with us.

1. Set the tone

Decorations are a vital part of any party, but for the holidays, they really take center stage. Claudia Merlo, who has run her own Naperville-based event design company for the last nine years—Claudia’s Sweets Events Stylist—suggests you begin by considering how your guests will enter the space and plan from there. “It all starts from the very entrance,” she says. “You can do a beautiful garland at the door to set the mood as they come in.”

From there, think about other opportunities to enhance the space to reflect the holiday you’re celebrating. For parties at home, Merlo focuses on two additional areas for Christmas. “A nice, beautiful tablescape will take you a long way,” she says, “And then, of course, there’s the Christmas tree, which for most people is the center of the holiday party.”

For party planner and designer Debbi Haas, holiday party decor should reflect a host’s style. “Don’t be afraid to mix patterns, colors, and textures that create a unique look to showcase your personality,” she says. “Creativity is helpful for a good host, and a tabletop design is a good way to showcase that.” Look for stylish objects to display that reflect the holiday. For Thanksgiving, consider using fall produce and foliage. Or you can make a luxurious statement by opting for design elements styled up from traditional items—say, pumpkins created out of soft fabrics. “And candles are my go-to items for most holidays this time of the year,” Haas adds.

Both Haas and Merlo say that recent trends have been leaning toward luxury in party design, with an emphasis on things like long table runners, glass, patterned flatware, and other high-end design elements. Linens have scaled back in color; shades of whites or stark blacks are popular—which offers the opportunity for some pops of color with things like napkin rings. And one birthday party classic has found a holiday niche—balloon displays. “You can do a lot of creative things with balloons to add to the festive atmosphere,” Merlo says.

In some ways, holiday parties are easy from a design standpoint, since you already have a theme. The creativity comes in running with that theme in fresh ways without getting too far away from what people anticipate. “If you’re going to a Christmas party, there are just some things that people expect,” Haas says. “But there’s lots of different ways you can approach it. For one, you can go very lux with traditional reds and greens. But I’ve noticed more people are also leaning into the rustic elements. One client wanted an Aspen ski lodge theme, and that worked well.”

2. Plan your space

If you’re hosting the party at your own digs, consider whether your usual furniture arrangement is best for the gathering you have in mind. “I love taking out my dining table,” Merlo says. “It’s easier to move around the space, and then you can set up a cocktail table or a table for hors d’oeuvres.”

Think about the number of guests and how to best use the space. “If it’s a home party, you don’t necessarily have a place to sit down for all of these people,” she says. “Instead, you can have different areas of the house for different uses. Maybe food is in one area and drinks are in another. Give people space to move around.”

But make sure your nosh and beverage stations have their own real estate since they will be popular places. “In parties at people’s homes, we’re usually setting up a table for appetizers or a buffet,” says Dominick Scafidi, who heads up marketing and public relations for My Chef Catering, based in Naperville.

One of the biggest trends for parties is a photo booth or photo wall for pictures. Corporate events and larger gatherings have leaned into this, providing a designed place for photos to be shared on social media. “I’d say almost every party I do now has a place designed for people to take pictures,” Merlo says. “A photo area is a must at any holiday party. We have seen different trends with them. We have flower walls. We have drapery. Balloons have been a huge hit.”

3. Leave the libations to the pros

When hosting a large gathering at home, hiring a bartender can be an easy way to serve your guests without being stuck filling glasses all night long. There are many ways to handle this, from a traditional caterer to a service that provides experienced bartenders while you provide all the alcohol and amenities.

Windy City Mixers, a mobile bartending service based in Montgomery, is flexible in services and scope. Sonya Flores does the decorating and design for the two-year-old company, while her husband, Eliud, tends the bar. “We work with clients to help them decide exactly what they want,” she says. “We can set up a cocktail table with some kind of signature drink, or we can be a full-service bar.”

And who doesn’t love a creative and custom cocktail? “Signature drinks are one of the biggest trends we’re seeing right now,” says My Chef’s Scafidi. “People will have one or two signature drinks for an event, and then beer, wine, and soda. It’s something that makes it unique—plus it’s easier than providing all the alcohol necessary for a full bar.”

Creating a specific bar for a favorite drink—say, old-fashioneds or margaritas—is also popular, no matter the season.

Perfect Pairings

How to serve just the right wine for a holiday gathering

Matt Williams knows his food and wine. The certified sommelier oversees all the wine purchasing for Naperville’s SixtyFour Wine Bar & Kitchen and several other sister restaurants. But he’s also a culinary school graduate with lots of experience in the kitchen as well. He’s just the type of person who can help you find the right wines to pair with your holiday meals.

Q: You’re having a traditional Thanksgiving dinner with all the trimmings. What are your usual recommendations?
A: Personally, on my Thanksgiving table, I like something like a Sauvignon Blanc or a Riesling—slightly more aromatic whites. If I’m going red, it’s a lighter style of red. Pinot Noir or Grenache. I feel like wine and food in terms of pairing can be a little overthought sometimes, but Thanksgiving is the one time when you can really nail some of these pairings.

Q: What are your best tips?
A: I have a couple of rules. First and foremost, you’re generally looking for, on the white side, a lighter kind of aromatic style; as I mentioned, Riesling, Sauvignon Blanc, or a dry rosé works really well. Try a sparkling wine, Champagne, and even something a little lighter and a little more sharp like a Crémant de Bourgogne. Even Prosecco can tend to work pretty well. And if you’re going to the red side, you want to avoid something big and oaky. You definitely don’t want to do a Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon for Thanksgiving. Choose something lighter in style.

Q: Let’s move on to a Christmas ham.
A: With pork, you can go a bit heavier on the red. So maybe start getting into the California Merlot and some Cabernet Sauvignons where you don’t see as much oak, maybe like Bordeaux, like a French-style Cabernet Sauvignon or something from South America.

Q: How about if you’re cooking prime rib?
A: Then it’s time to open up that big Cabernet you’ve been sitting on for years. You can even get into Brunello and other Italians…My rule of thumb for the holidays is that you want to go light. You want light, you want fresh, you want a little bit less oak, a little bit more acidity, and a little bit lower alcohol. Those things tend to work a bit better with holiday dinners. But if you’re doing a big fat juicy prime, bust out the cab.

Q: Besides wine, what else do you like to drink over the holidays?
A: I think it’s fun to explore different liqueurs around the holidays. St. George, a distillery out of Alameda, California, makes a spiced pear liqueur that I really like. All of your creams start to come out around the holidays—your bourbon creams, your rum creams, that sort of thing. I’m a big fan of Negronis, and all of these classic cocktails are making a big comeback.

4. Food for hire

Sure, cooking can be fun, but it can be a burden to worry about the food as well as entertaining guests. While common for larger events, caterers are getting more and more requests for smaller gatherings and holiday meals. “We do a lot of business over the holiday season to provide people with smoked turkeys, deep-fried turkey, spiral hams, and roasted leg of lamb,” says Robert Bailey, CEO of Bailey’s Catering in Bolingbrook. “I think people expect to get a traditional meal this time of year.”

Hosts are often happy to forgo the shopping and cooking. “Our business has really grown for, I guess you’d call them boxed meals, this time of year,” My Chef’s Scafidi says. “You can get the traditional turkey dinner for your family, but we take care of it all for you. You can have the traditional Thanksgiving meal at home but don’t have to prepare it.”

The trend started during the pandemic, but many people decided not having to cook the meal on their own made for a more enjoyable holiday. “It’s definitely continued, and the trend seems to be growing,” Scafidi says.

Premade, highly curated offerings from specialty food services also are highly sought after for parties this time of year. Think of things like charcuterie boards, crudité trays, hors d’oeuvres, and baked goods that can be prepared in advance.

While passed hors d’oeuvres and buffets are popular for large events, more intimate dinner parties are making a comeback. A dinner party allows a smaller group to connect and enjoy a meal in a cozy setting. And many hosts are outsourcing the food prep. “For those who can afford it, hiring a personal chef is a fun way to hold a party like his,” Merlo says. “You can have people come to your home over the holidays and just enjoy the company.”

5. Divine desserts

This time of the year is prime dessert season, and you can’t go wrong at any party with a table full of sweets for your guests. For fall and Thanksgiving, bring out a variety of pies for every taste. “Apple pie, pecan pie, banana cream pie—there are just so many,” Bailey says. “I think everyone has their favorites that make the season feel right, so you just need to talk to your client and find out what’s special to them.”

And don’t be afraid to go beyond pies. “I love having a dessert table,” Merlo says. “Everyone loves a dessert table. It’s fun to decorate, and giving people choices makes everyone happy.”

Of course, Christmas parties also mean embracing the Christmas cookie (see sidebar). Pull together all of your favorites or try something new. Variety is the key to a good dessert table, so go for a gamut of favorites: chocolate, creamy, fruity, nutty, baked, candied, etc. Use a variety of heights in your serving trays to give the dessert table added depth (and allow people to better inspect the goodies). If there’s an outdoor element to your party, consider a hot cocoa bar or s’mores station to help set the mood.

Top Cookies

A new cookbook highlights some of the best recipes from nearly four decades of submissions from Chicago Tribune readers

Since 1988, the Chicago Tribune has been holding an annual holiday cookie contest, inviting readers to send in their favorites and tell the story about what makes them unique. Over the years, the dining staff at the Trib has baked—and tasted—a lot of cookies to find those standouts. If you’re looking to up your cookie game, you’ll find more than 130 of the best collected together in a new volume published this fall, Holiday Cookies: Prize-Winning Family Recipes From the Chicago Tribune for Cookies, Bars, Brownies, and More.

“We’re not necessarily looking for the most complicated cookie recipe, where you have to have all of these fancy kitchen tools,” says Kayla Samoy, the Tribune’s dining editor, who’s running this year’s contest. “We look for recipes where this is someone’s go-to cookie, and there’s a great story behind it. They may have been baking these for 30 years, and it’s what they bring to every family gathering. We love to find recipes with a kind of history behind the cookie.”

Readers won’t be disappointed by the variety of recipes, ranging from simple drop cookies to Gingerbread people and more complicated sandwich cookies. Many recipes have traveled from around the world to Chicago, where they became part of a connection to a family history. “It’s so interesting to try these recipes that mean so much to people,” Samoy says. $30, store.chicagotribune.com

Talking Turkey

Naperville is home to the Butterball Turkey Talk-Line, a free service that helps home cooks with the biggest meal of the year

Everyone wants that Norman Rockwell moment when the perfectly cooked, golden-brown turkey is delivered to the table among a chorus of oohs and aahs. Of course, in the real world, getting to that point is sometimes easier said than done. Home cooks are often flummoxed by the steps necessary to go from the rock-hard bird covered in plastic in their freezer to the juicy finished product they hope to serve to a house full of hungry guests.

Chances are you’re going to have some questions.

The good news is that Nicole Johnson has the answers. She’s the director of the Butterball Turkey Talk-Line, a free service that the turkey producer provides to answer people’s questions and guide them to cooking a beautiful, delicious—and safe—turkey. Most years, more than 100,000 people call in, with more than 15,000 reaching out on Thanksgiving Day alone. Established in 1981, the hotline has helped generations of home cooks across the country with their holiday meals. While it gets its fair share of media attention each year, people may not know that it’s based in Naperville, in a recently renovated office on Diehl Road.

Johnson, who was raised in Naperville and now lives in Elburn, started with Butterball in 2001. She says that cooking a turkey isn’t difficult, but it involves several steps that can cause trepidation. “Ground-turkey turkey is cooked and consumed year-round,” she says. “But a whole turkey can be intimidating. It’s something we don’t do year-round. Maybe there’s a thought process where you remember your mom or your grandma waking up at 2 in the morning to get started. That’s why we’re here at the Talk-Line, to take that stress level down,” Johnson says. “We provide really good tips and tricks—but the earlier you call us, the better we can help you prepare.”

That advice can include selecting a turkey—“There are so many different options out there,” she says—and avoiding common pitfalls in cooking. Top questions they encounter involves thawing a frozen bird, which might take longer than you think.

“If you have a large turkey—a 20-pounder—it can take a good five days to defrost,” Johnson says. “So we get a lot of calls where they’re panicked because they didn’t start the thawing process soon enough. You can still safely thaw your turkey using a cold water bath. And we walked them through those food safety measures.”

Other common issues include determining doneness and handling last-minute emergencies, like when an oven stops working. “They need to come up with a different option to cook their turkey, so we’ll ask them, can you fire up the grill?” Johnson says. “It’s become a bit of a joke, but can you prepare a turkey in the microwave? Yes, you can. It needs to be a smaller turkey, and it’s a little bit tedious. But when you’re in a jam, sometimes that’s what works.”

Her favorite tip for those looking to improve on their cooking technique? “Definitely use a meat thermometer,” she says. “It’s the only way to know when it’s done.”

In the age of Google and YouTube, finding the answers to common turkey problems might seem easy. But while the Talk-Line offers online resources and advice on social media, talking to a live person remains the focus of the service. “We like that there’s a human connection over the phone,” Johnson says. “Sometimes, we have been called turkey counselors. We sort of take the stress out of the day for just a bit. We can hear the kids in the background, and we know, we’ve all been there, what that person is going through.”

The team of 52 turkey experts at Butterball is trained at its onsite test kitchen, and most come from some kind of culinary background. But most are there because they enjoy helping people. “[Team members] come back year after year because of the human connection,” Johnson says. “This is a seasonal position for them. A lot of them work other full-time jobs. They’re dedicating their Thanksgiving; some even take time off from their regular job. It’s a pretty phenomenal group.”

As for Johnson, her favorite method of preparing a turkey is a time-honored way—an open pan in an oven, stuffed, just like the way her mother made it. “As long as it’s fully thawed, it doesn’t take that long,” she says. “I like the traditional feel of it.”

As her Thanksgivings are spent at the Talk-Line, her family celebrates a week later. But last year, her 19-year-old was home from college with a group of friends and prepared a full-size turkey without her.

Did he need to call the Talk-Line?

“He did not,” Johnson says. “He’s had very good instruction—and he knows how to use a meat thermometer.”

The Butterball Turkey Talk-Line is open from November 1 to December 24. Call 800-288-8372 or visit butterball.com.

Photos: shironosov/iStock; Debbi Hass (table setting); SolStock/iStock (photo booth); golero/iStock (Christmas decor); DenisMArt/istock (Negroni cocktail); SixtyFour Wine Bar & Kitchen (Williams); lenakorzh/iStock (food); Mizina/istock (pie); Agate Publishing (cookbook); Butterball (turkey, call center)