Food is served family-style, is affordable, and importantly, is delicious. Plus, there was something fun about it foreshadowing our upcoming honeymoon destination of Italy.
We expected about 20 people total for our dinner and made our reservation a few months in advance. This was a smart move, because it turned out Buca is a popular destination for wedding rehearsal dinners. (I believe there was actually one or two more rehearsal dinners that same night, in addition to ours!) We also chose to order our menu in advance which helped greatly in knowing what our costs would be for the night. The only wild card would be the drinks in the bar before we sat down at our table for dinner. Our friends and family like to drink, whether it is a celebration or not!
In hindsight, if knowing we'd be in a public area for a period of time, I'd give out drink tickets to our guests to turn in to the bar when placing their drink order. Start everyone out with one ticket and if they needed more, let them get more from us. This way, the bar can keep accurate record of what was ordered and Joe Stranger doesn't get to get drunk on our tab.
Lesson Learned: In the bar, while waiting for our table to be ready, the bar staff had told us to have our guests let the bartenders know that they were there for the Miller-Camarillo party when putting their drink request in, since we wanted it all to go on our master tab. However, we found out later, after the fact, that folks in the bar whom were not with our party, had put their drinks on our tab as well. Why? They overheard the instructions to our party guests and pretended to be a part of the party.
In hindsight, if knowing we'd be in a public area for a period of time, I'd give out drink tickets to our guests to turn in to the bar when placing their drink order. Start everyone out with one ticket and if they needed more, let them get more from us. This way, the bar can keep accurate record of what was ordered and Joe Stranger doesn't get to get drunk on our tab.
Our guests were a mix of omnivores and vegetarians, so we made sure to have something for everyone. Two salads (one vegetarian, one not), a couple types of pizza, two pasta dishes. Pre-ordering simplified the process for the night and let us know where we'd be on the bill at the end of the evening instead of letting folks order off the menu. Plus, in pre-ordering, the food could come out to the table around the same time and made it more efficient for the restaurant and our night to flow smoothly. And, there were enough leftovers that we were able to take them home and throw them in the freezer for a couple future meals once we returned from our honeymoon.
