My daughter, her new husband and his mother will be staying in our house for two weeks over Christmas. Hubby and his mother are from the Netherlands and it’s her first time in the US. She has been amazing to my daughter and a very gracious hostess the evening we spent with her. My other college age kiddo and a friend will also be here. While I’m thrilled, I’m already getting nervous about how to plan meals for 7 people (3 meals a day for two weeks) plus helping my Mom host our Christmas Day meal with extended family, presents, etc.
I think we’ll do a couple of meals to let our guests from the Netherlands experience Texas… grilled steaks, smoked brisket and home-made tamales. Rest of the meals will be primarily vegetarian. My daughter is a vegetarian and has to avoid spinach due to kidney stones.
I think it’s breakfast that will be the trickiest especially if everyone is waking up at different times. I’ll set up a coffee/ tea bar but I can’t tell my daughter’s new mother-in-law to dig in the fridge and fend for herself!
Joy of Cooking basic breakfast strata is amazing. I just googled and it’s online. I make it with bacon but you can modify it for vegetarians. You assemble it the night before and then pop it in the oven for an hour in the morning. (It’s a cheese/bread/egg thing).
If you are regularly up around the same time, you could just make a general statement that you’ll make eggs and bacon or whatever for whoever is up at 8am (or whenever is good for you) and people who would rather eat earlier or later are welcome to help themselves to cereal or yogurt.
You could get a couple of coffee cakes and put them out with the coffee/tea when people get up, maybe with some fruit. Tell them yogurt is in the fridge.
To save yourself some wear and tear, you should just stick up on breakfast things such as yogurt, fruit, cereal, etc. and make breakfast a meal that everyone grabs for themselves when they wake up.
It would be nice if you asked what type of beverage your guests want in the morning. I know I like my coffee a certain way and I would be very happy if the ingredients were handy.
Or maybe some of those overnight oats dishes trendy now a days. Breakfast is so easy with all the bagles, toast, easy egg dishes, fruit, yogurt and cereal. Maybe one of those breakfast casseroles found online I make for brunch on Xmas.
I usually make a large fruit salad for guests which can be eaten at any meal. Fruit can also be put on top of oatmeal, cereal, yogurt, etc. Having a variety of toppings for oatmeal/cereal/yogurt would be fun and easy for guests to create their own breakfast. Do you have a panini press? You could make breakfast sandwiches with bagels or croissants.
Thanks for the reminder about beverages. You reminded me that was very important when we visited in Amsterdam.
Breakfast casserole sound delicious…most of my recipes have meat so I appreciate the vegetarian option.
I’m not a great baker but coffee cakes is a great idea.
Several people mentioning yogurt made me think that if I put it in a cute dish/jar rather than the Walmart container will make it more company worthy. We have a garage fridge so I could put together a breakfast tray with yogurt and fruit.
Kiddos would enjoy the overnight oats and I have plenty of small mason jars. I may try an instant pot oatmeal one day.
I have one of those egg cookers that makes fabulous hard boiled eggs. I can’t think of what to serve with hard boiled eggs.
Is it possible to find out whether your guests will want breakfast every day? Though I know it is most healthy, a lot of people don’t like to eat breakfast every morning, or at least not necessarily anything more than a piece of fruit, or toast, etc. if you find out what their preferences are, it might help you plan accordingly. Maybe have some mornings with a big breakfast and other days with lighter offerings, depending what their plans are for the rest of the day.
This is one of those times when I’d ask D to ask SIL what his mom eats for breakfast. It could be as easy as an egg, roll or bread or cracker, sliced ham or cheese, or yogurt, or what I’d assumed was a joke until I saw an entire section in the grocery store - bread and butter with sprinkles on top. (Literally a section of different kinds of sprinkles, not for cupcakes, but to put on bread.)
Breakfast is my meal for consistency, and while I love eating whatever is being served when we travel, I still do my best to eat my normal at-home foods for the first meal of the day where ever we are. All my husband wanted when we came home from our 6-wk trip was a bowl of Cheerios for breakfast.
Half of our family is Dutch; we’ve visited Holland over a dozen times and have visitors from there every year.
The Dutch typically eat open-faced sandwiches for breakfast and lunch. If you provide a variety of savory and sweet sandwich toppings and spreads, your guests can take care of themselves. I usually provide a couple of mild cheeses that they can slice themselves (e.g. gouda, edam), some cold meats (e.g. ham, smoked salmon, rillettes), some sweet toppings (e.g. jams, sugar sprinkles, even brown sugar), and lots of spreadable butter or margarine - the Dutch often coat their bread with butter before adding cheese, meat, sweet topping etc. Extra points if you can find raisin or currant rolls/bread or round rusks (“beschuit”). The Dutch also typically eat thin crepe-like pancakes covered/imbedded with sweet or savory additions. Sweet toppings would be fruit, syrups, icing sugar, brown sugar, etc.; savory would be cheese, ham, mushrooms, onions, etc.
When our Dutch relatives visit, they like to make their own breakfasts and lunches during the week, but for dinner they really enjoy “typical” American meals. Some of the dinners they’ve really liked are when I prepare all the home-made fixings and they put together their own burgers or tacos. Burgers are pretty plain in Holland so a fresh grilled patty topped with cheese, bacon, egg, and then with all the fixings - it’s a treat for them. Mexican food is also not big in Holland so our relatives really love the novelty of the flavors. They have also really enjoyed going to buffet restaurants (such as Chinese or Indian buffets) because those are so rare in Europe and they can sample a lot of flavors. Weekend lunches are bigger - we usually either make Dutch pancakes or omelettes (which our Dutch relatives eat on top of a slice of bread).
If you want to purchase some Dutch staples, I like thedutchstore dot com. The sweet bread toppings are called “hagel” for sprinkles and “vlokken” for flakes, and the most common are fruit-flavored hagel and chocolate vlokken.
One of the Dutch Christmas traditions is to give chocolate letters as gifts - these are chocolates molded in the first letter of the recipient’s given name. Another typical Christmas treat is chocolate covered marzipan bars; a typical New Year’s treat is a marzipan log covered in pastry. These should be available online in a month or two.
I was thinking of purchased coffee cakes. But do agree that open faced sandwiches are common from when I had a home stay with a family in the Netherlands many years ago.
I think lunch is the throw away meal. Depends on your habits but I prefer to make a great brunch (that can be eaten all together or as they wake up - but a more leisurely hearty meal - and then a really nice dinner. Middle of the day (lunch) people may be leaving to do other things,not be hungry because of your great brunch or just be happy grabbing some light snacks from the refrigerator.
So I would plan brunch items (protein, dairy, fruit, grain at minimum - combination of sweet and savory)
Stock up on mid day snacking items like ready made soup (Costco has great options in the winter), cheese/fruit,dips, crackers or something like a bowl of chicken salad.
The suggestion above of a panini press is excellent - the Dutch also love their “tosti” - toasted sandwiches. For our Dutch tostis, we use spreadable butter, gouda, ham, and fresh herbs.
We are hosting a big group for Thanksgiving. I am planning on stocking the fridge with a mishmash of stuff. Fruit, yogurt, english muffins, cream cheese, smoked salmon, granola, and then croissants and baked goods (from the bakery). I will do a cheesy egg casserole one of the days but the others will be “self serve”.
I’m more worried about dinners as I have different food allergies to accommodate.
I’d do more continental breakfast fare for most mornings, especially if people will be waking up and eating at different times.
Good artisan breads for toasting with nice jams, yogurts with optional toppings like granola, fresh fruit. Maybe one day an assortment of bagels and cream cheese. Hard boiled eggs. Oatmeal and toppings one morning. Coffee cakes or quick breads you can make ahead and freeze or just purchase.
One weekends, I do brunch and that counts as two meals. Traditional American stuff like buttermilk or blueberry pancakes with real maple syrup, egg casseroles, etc. I also like to do an assortment of quiches which are easy to tailor to vegetarians.
Some suggestions for dinners:
Chili both vegetarian and con carne, corn bread and toppings
Tex mex options like a taco or fajita bar with black beans, rice, grilled veggies for the vegetarians.
Give yourself a break and order in pizza, Chinese, Thai, Indian takeout some nights.
Pots of soup. Things like baked potato soup are good for vegetarians and non. You can have toppings to add like crumbled bacon, shredded cheddar, cubed ham, sliced green onions.
Cheese fondue is always fun for a group.
Vegetarian or mushroom lasagne you can make ahead and freeze.
Breakfast burritos can be made vegetarian (although I do like my bacon!) I had a vegetarian daughter and I’d just make the batch without meat, prepare half the burritos, and then put the bacon in and make the rest. She didn’t like them spicy, so I’d also add more salsa to the second half.
Europeans don’t do big eggy bacony breakfasts on a regular basis (just like we don’t). Stock up on artisan bread, the jams mentioned, nice cheeses, lots of cold cuts, fruit, and individual yogurts and you should be good to go for breakfast and lunch (great idea on panini). Bagels and donuts would be a fun American treat as will a big bacon/egg breakfast (maybe once).
Sweet and savory seemed to be important when we met his family. It was our first time to meet and it was Christmas.
I definitely will do 3 course meals for Christmas and New Years Eve (appetizers, main meal and dessert). I’ll do special sit together breakfast first morning after they arrive, Christmas and New Years Day.
I am a little confused as to how the sweet and savory applies to breakfast. I can’t manage two course breakfasts. Do you set out the sweet and savory at one time?
But do agree that open faced sandwiches are common from when I had a home stay with a family in the Netherlands many years ago.
Traditional American stuff like buttermilk or blueberry pancakes with real maple syrup, egg casseroles, etc. I also like to do an assortment of quiches which are easy to tailor to vegetarians.