Rehearsal Dinner Venue?

I got a ton of quotes from nearby places to the ceremony venue where we had rehearsal. We didn't want the rehearsal dinner to be too far away. We went with a place that had a pre fixe menu and a private room.

We're getting married in the town we live in, so we had a good feel for what restaurants we were interested in. We ended up picking an Italian place that we originally contacted about catering. It's one of our favorite restaurants downtown, and they had large group dinner packages with set prices (or price levels) that include shared apps, a soup or salad, and a choice of three entrees that we pre-select for the menu. They also have beverage and dessert packages. The price was good, and we already knew we loved the food, so it was a no-brainer for us.

My in-laws cooked a shrimp boil at our venue for our rehearsal dinner.

My venue is ours for the whole weekend so we’ll just have it there. Publix is delivering catering.

Our wedding was also a 4 hour drive. We tried a few restaurants when we were in the area for other vendor appointments and noted the ones we liked. However, all of the frontrunners ended up saying they don't take group reservations during peak season. We ultimately booked a covered picnic area at a regional park and worked with a catering company. The per-person cost ended up lower than the quotes we received and we were able to invite all our wedding guests.

We are getting married locally so we chose our neighborhood pub. It's on Halloween, and they will let us decorate. We were looking for something casual so we went with pizza, pasta, salad, breadsticks.

I'd start with budget (if you are hosting/paying) and "feel" for the night.

We're getting married at our church and booked our rehearsal for there too! Afterward we'll have pizza and drinks.

Is there a restaurant near your venue? If there is, after the rehearsal everyone could go to the restaurant!

We are getting married in our hometown, which is about 45 minutes away from where we live now. But we'll be going there for the whole weekend to get set up and ready, so we just picked our favorite restaurants in town, and talked about which ones we liked best. FH is so sweet, he knows my favorite is Chinese food, so he thinks we should do it at my favorite Chinese place!! It's not for sure, because we're still weighing the costs, but that's where we're leaning. But we also may end up in a public park having a less expensive BBQ!

We chose one about 5 mins from the venue which worked out perfect because it had everything we needed:

-Close to the venue and hotels

-Space for 30-40 people

-Could accommodate to kids and those with allergies

-And had MD crab cakes on the menu. A few of our CA guests are really looking forward to an authentic crab cake lol.

-The best part? It's on the water and has magnificent views!

Rehearsal Venue

We got married about 2 hours away so I pulled up our hotel on google maps and looked at all the restaurants within walking distance from the hotel. There was a small BBQ place right next to the hotel which we thought would be perfect. We really like BBQ and we wanted a more casual, relaxed vibe to contrast with our formal wedding. Then when we visited the venue we ate lunch there to see if we liked the food. We loved it so we talked to the owner about using his restaurant as our RD venue. It was small enough that he agreed to close it that evening so it would just be our group (about 25 people). Worked out great!

We’re getting married in FH’s home town but we want a rehearsal dinner closer to the hotel people will be staying at- only 20 min away from the venue but far enough that we don’t really know the food places well enough. Correction, we LOVE. A few places but my family is INCREDIBLY picky on what they like. We have a 14 month long engagement so we started doing date nights once a month at one of the places we’re looking into with his parents- they’re paying so they ultimately get to decide. So far we’re leaning towards an Italian place or a steak place. I’m personally hoping for Italian, seems more romantic than people using the terms “bring it out still bleeding” or “the darker the better” 😜

We have our venue for 3 days so we’re doing the rehearsal dinner there. My FMIL is gettinf BBQ pork catered in with mac & cheese, baked beans, and potato salad. Her and my FH’s grandmother are also making a lot of homemade desserts. I saw you’re getting married in Nashville! I live in Nashville so let me know if you need any restaurant recommendations. 😊