Finding A Birthday (or anniversary) Venue - and BYO
I have used three methods for choosing a birthday venue.
1 Book a special gourmet restaurant..
Ask them what they can offer for a birthday. They might charge extra for Champagne, or a birthday cake. If they won't do something special for birthdays, take your own table decoration or d\birthday card or birthday girl or boy badge or hat.
2 Check who is open and has availability on the day.
3 Pick a location and ask all the restaurants
I did this walking up and down Hatch End high street, called The Broadway.
4 Keep a birthday restaurant list in your diary
(Write on the birthdate and a week or month before). Note venues you visit where you see a dessert and candle presented and hear the music or singing of happy birthday.
5 Celebrate at home and buy wines for the dates of the birthday or anniversary
You could be doing this years in advance. For example. buy wines in the year of the birth of a baby. Save wines for their coming of age, confirmation or barmitzvah.
Storage of wines
You might need to store wines in a cool place. Place bottles on their sides if there is a cork.
BYO
Some restaurants offer BYO (bring oour own - a term used in New Zealand). Or 'no corkage on certain days This is useful if ou stock wines or have guests who have stores of wines.
Weddings
You might add a wine fridge as a wedding present. Or look for a house with a wine cellar.
Similarly buy in your wedding year, for your wedding anniversy.
For the couple who have everything, and don't know what to ask for, suggest guests buy bottles in the year of your wedding, for you to store and drink the wine for the future anniversaries. Write the name of the donor, the date the wine was bought, and the supplier if you know it.
You can search on wine searcher and other sites for particular years of wines. Also ask your local restaurants and wine merchants. We found a restaurant in Mill Hill had odd bottles which were not on the menu.
Why hide the special wines?
Because they only had one of two of various years, and the price was beyond the budget of most diners, which would either put them off ordering anything, or could cause an accidental order of an expensive wine which the customer who ordered in a huarry was not willing to pay for when presented with the bill.
In previous years we have had a lot of birthdays overseas. In Singapore, Raffles hotel has several restaurants.
This year I have had two birthdays in London The first time we went to the restaurant in Grimsdyke hotel, home of Gilbert, who wrote the words for the Gilbert and Sullivan comic operas. (Do you remember, 'I've got a little list - tjey'll none of them be misssed', and 'A Policemna' lot is not a happy one?)
To my surprise they offered nothing for birthdays. However, we had gifts and cards. And I carried a cake topping to add to the dessert for a photo memento of the occasion.
Chain Restaurants Or Pubs
Chain restaurants are usually well equipeed for birthday parties. The larger the restaurant, the more likely. You might not be the only birthday party of the evening.
If you want to take a photo of the flame being carried in, ask the waiter or waitress to alert you.
All You Can Eat
If you want to avoid guests running up extra bills on food, choose an all you can eat restaurant. For example, such as El Vequero in Mill Hill and Whetstone in London, England. Many more are in the USA and worldwide.
Special Themes
An alternative is to pick a gourmet experience. A top restaurant.
Or a chocolate evening run by a chocolate shop or museum.
Or a favourite cuisines
Or a favourite wine or spirit.
Favourite Wines & Spirits
We have a birthday event at a Japanese restaurant. One of my favourite drinks is sake. Also Japanese plum wine.
Group DIY
You can have an alchol free event in many temples and church halls in the hall where you meet, or another room to hire, or be given free, or the corridor outside the meeting room. At a Toastmasters meeting in a church hall in Harrow on the Hill in London, England (not London in Canada) our President organized a cake which was collected from Costco.
MAILING LISTS
Many restaurants have themed evenings throughut the year. Get on their mailing lists.
They ask your birthday for two reasons. They might want the year to ensure you are over 18 or the local minium age for drinking in your country or US state. They might want the month to send you a birthday voucher. The day should not be given, to prevent hackers from knowing verification for banks.
For several years we were on the mailing list for Cafe Rouge. We had two nearby branches in Pinner and Ruislip in London, England. They used to send a voucher for a free bottle of Prosecco or siilar house wine in white or red with any booking of four diners. We took our parents.
We picked the nearest weekend when the restaurant offered availability. The menu was large enough to find something to suit everybody.
More expensive gourmet dinners were offered in central London You often get the advertisments in mailings, or at the restaurant you see ads in hotel lifts, in leaflets, and on the back door or walls of the public rest rooms in the restaurant or hotel.
You can order birthday cakes from supermarkets and big suppliers such as Costco. They may need from 3 days to a week's notice. You may need to allow time to collect the cake, and if collecting the day before a cool place, large enought to store it, maybe overnight, (unless it says eat the same day). Some restaurants allow you to bring your own cake but make a charge for serving on plates with forks. Check their requirments. Some like to serve the cake after you have ordered desserts, so that they dont miss out on making a profit from desserts.
Usefull Websites
Costco
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