3 Unfussy Dinner Party Recipes For People Who Are Allergic To Hosting

There are a million reasons why entertaining at home shouldn't have become as popular as it has, and tiny apartments and huge expense on the host's part are just two of them. And yet, for some reason, it is far more fashionable these days to say, "Oh please, come for dinner," rather than, "Let's meet in a mutually convenient eatery where someone else will handle literally every stressful part of the evening from preparing the food to the washing up afterwards."

If hosting a dinner party is the sort of thing that breaks you out in a cold sweat then you're not alone. In fact, you're actually in very good company; Alison Roman, she of Bon Appétit and New York Times column fame, also hates hosting dinner parties. "I have always been allergic to the word 'entertaining'," she says. But having people over with food? "Well, that's just making dinner but, you know, with more people."

Her new recipe book Nothing Fancy is an ode to this mindset. It's full of simple (but very fancy-looking) recipes, from sides to small plates to mains to desserts, which are perfect to serve when there just happen to be a few hungry people over at your place.

Click through to find three simple dishes with not very many ingredients that even you can rustle up.