Dinner after the wedding??

I would find a restaurant that has a private room.

Agree with PP. Without renting out a room, most restaurants aren’t going to take up their table space to display your cake.

I agree with what the other two of said. I also want to add that depending on where you live, a lot of restaurants aren't allowing people to dine in right now because of the pandemic.

As someone who works in the restaurant industry - this is a private room event. It won't be as expensive as a large wedding venue, but this way you'd be promised enough space, you could have the cake (and they might have rules about outside food being brought in, so be sure to discuss that), and you wouldn't run the risk of the restaurant not having the tables for you. (A large group, of that size, walking in would send most places scrambling.)

That said, if you're still doing June, I doubt most restaurants will be open for large groups like that, at all.

Do you have access to a backyard or park where you could have a small catered affair?

We're doing something like this for our rehearsal dinner (restaurant dinner for 16 people). We're doing a private room rental and when discussing the pricing with them, they actually mentioned multiple discounts we're getting because we're doing a "large party event" as opposed to just making a reservation for a large group of people. I'm not sure if budget is a concern for you, but it may have benefits to it.

I also agree with Rebecca though - depending on where you are, you may not be able to get a restaurant option. Have you considered other ideas?

I agree with everyone on the private room, it would provide some more privacy and make your dinner more intimate for you and your guests.

I did a private patio outdoors for my rehearsal dinner and it was fabulous! you get to be in your own space and not have to deal with the noise of other patrons. the only caveat is the cost can be a bit higher than what you may think because often times they have minimums but i think in the end it's still pretty worth it.

I would either find a restaurant that has a private area indoors or outdoors and or can you be separated from other guest. And they can bring out your cake once dinner is over if you don't want it displayed the entire time.

We did basically this for our legal ceremony. We rented a private area in a restaurant next to the ceremony location. We didn’t have cake at the restaurant but invited our family back to our house after to have cake and bubbly. They had all traveled to be there so we didn’t want to rush things. It was very low key and informal but we wanted to spend time with our families.


Private dining spaces are more common and easy to find than you might think and lots of places will have different set ups in terms of pricing (flat fee for rental, just have to spend a minimum). Sounds like the perfect situation for what you’re envisioning!