Ideas for an Italian Themed Party
Passion! If there's one word that sums up the Italians, and their love of
football, food and parties, it's passion. Just think of the dramatic scenes of the partisan crowds when
AC Milan play
Inter Milan. Think of the way Italians get animated just talking about food. Italy is a nation born to
enjoy a football party!
Now, the simplest way to throw an Italian football party is to invite your mates round, order in a crate of Peroni and a few pizzas, and enjoy.
And there's nothing at all wrong with that!
Italy Party Decorations
Decorate yourself and your room with Italy shirts, flags and scarves
(see links, right, or
search Kitbag.com for Italy kitg(512634)a(1759159))
).
If you're serving food, search for red, white and green table covers, napkins, plates, cups and
cutlery on our general
Football Party Decorations Page
For bunting, flags, balloons and more
Italian Party Decorations Ideas,
visit our
European Football Party Decorations Page
As for colour schemes, in addition to the above ideas, anything else you can find in red, green and white will help create the right atmosphere.
Food for an Italian Themed Party
Italians tend to eat their evening meals late, but many enjoy
aperitivo in the bars on the way home from work in the early evening.
This is not dissimilar to the Spanish
tapas concept, but in Italy acts as a kind of "happy hour". When a bar is offering
aperitivo, a customer orders a drink
and can then help themselves to small portions of many different dishes that are available in the venue in a "buffet" style. As long as you are ordeing drinks, and the
"happy hour" is still operating, you can continue to help yourself to the food. To most Italians, this is an opportunity to relax over a drink and a small snack
on the way home from work. To us, with our
football party heads on, there's an idea for a party here. Invite some friends round for the game, set up the buffet featuring
some pizzas and some of the recipes below, let people help themselves to drinks and food before the game, then again at half time, and then again after the final whistle.
It is perhaps misleading to think of "Italian food", as many dishes popular in the area around Milan
are more closely related to the cuisines of alpine neighbours such as Switzerland, Austria and Slovenia, than they are to southern Italian cooking.
Here are a few Milanese recipes as examples:
Savoury Recipes
Risotto with Bacon & Cheese - Risotto alla pilota
Milanese Chicken in Mushroom & Ham Sauce - La Piccata Milanese
Milanese Veal Cutlet - La Cotoletta Alla Milanese
"Woodman's Mushrooms" - Pappardelle alla Boscaiola
Sweet Recipes
Milanese Biscuits - Biscottini di Milano
Drink for an Italian Themed Party
Italians are big coffee lovers, so if you're in a non-alcoholic mood, Italian coffee would be a great place to start. However, don't drink too much of it, as they like it very strong!
If you're serving Italian coffee, you can buy
Italian themed Espresso cups and saucers from Amazon
For beer lovers, the obvious choices are Peronig(16698058)a(1759159))
or Moretti, which are widely available bottled.
However, there has always been a preference amongst Italians for wine over beer,
and you should have no trouble at all finding good Italian wines, as they are one of the world's largest wine producers.
Search for Italian wines online at Tesco.com.
Just as an aside, if you look up "Italian wine" on Wikipedia,
the first thing you learn is that "Italian wine is wine produced in Italy"! Whatever next?! Anyway, I'm not a wine expert, so I'm not going to try to give you detailed advice.
Suffice to say, Italy produces large quantities of good quality white (of which the best known is probably pinot grigio) and red (e.g. Valpolicella) wines.
