Eighty people in a garden is the same operational job as a wedding, with a quarter of the planning and none of the pressure. It is one of the most enjoyable things we do and one of the least well served in this region.

The shape of a good one

• Drinks and canapés for an hour while everyone arrives and finds each other
• Then either a sharing table people help themselves from, or bowl food carried through the room so nobody sits down
• Something later — fish and chip cones, churros, a cheese table

Seated three courses works too, and for a sixtieth it often suits better. But for a fortieth, seating the room usually ends the party.

In a garden with nothing in it

This is our normal starting point. We bring the field kitchen, so a lawn, a paddock or a courtyard is enough. A marquee company puts a roof over it — we work regularly with Events Under Canvas, Chelmer Marquees, Anglia Coastal Marquees and Great Events, and we are happy to talk to yours directly.

For anything outdoors we agree a written wet-weather plan in advance, with the decision taken on the morning rather than the night before.

What to serve

Bowl food for a party that stays standing. Afternoon tea for a daytime celebration in a garden. A seasonal three courses for a smaller, seated evening.

Or come to ours

If you would rather not host at home, The Outlook at Fox’s Marina in Ipswich is our own waterside restaurant and can be taken exclusively.

Menus

A fortieth, a fiftieth and a sixtieth are three different parties, and the food is most of the difference. These are the starting points:

• Bowl food menus — for a room that is standing, mixing and not sitting down
• Buffets and sharing tables — generous, informal, and properly staffed
• Dinner party menus — for a smaller, seated celebration at home
• Canapés — for the first hour, before anyone makes a speech
• Evening and street food menus — for later, when the dancing has started

If there is a speech, tell us when. It is the single thing most likely to move the food, and we would rather plan around it than react to it.

The thing nobody plans for: the speech

Almost every milestone birthday has one, it is almost never at the time anybody said, and it is the single thing most likely to move the food.

Tell us roughly when it is meant to happen and, more usefully, who is giving it. A son-in-law who says he will speak for two minutes is a different planning problem from a brother with notes. We will build the service around it either way, but only if we know it is coming.

The age of the room changes the format

This is the part that gets missed. A fortieth is usually a standing party that runs late and wants bowl food or something cooked in front of people.

A seventieth or eightieth is a different event entirely. There will be guests who cannot stand for three hours, cannot hear across a loud room, and would genuinely rather sit down and be served. Seating is not a formality there, it is hospitality, and a caterer who arrives with a standing-only plan has misread the party.

A fiftieth or sixtieth is usually the mixed one — some of both — and the right answer is a room with enough chairs for the people who need them and food that works either way. That is what a well-run buffet or a sharing table does better than anything else.

At home, or somewhere else

Most of these happen at home or in a garden, and that suits us — we bring the kitchen, so the house does not become one. Nobody should be washing up at their own party, and nobody should be plating food while their guests are in the next room.

If the numbers have outgrown the house, The Outlook at Fox’s Marina can be hired exclusively, which suits a number too big for a dining room and too small to justify a marquee. If it is a marquee in the garden, see what we bring to a field — it is the same kit.

Surprise parties

We have done a fair number and they are straightforward, with one caveat: tell us it is a surprise. It changes where the vans park, when we arrive, and whether anybody is setting up in view of the front door. It is an easy thing to get right and an obvious thing to get wrong.