A 4th of July buffet is the easiest way to get festive with your favorite summer holiday. Just use the items from around your house and add a little red, white and blue to make it feel patriotic and proud!
I think most of you know by now that I’m a buffet kind of girl. I showed off my Halloween Buffet, my Super Bowl Party Buffet and my Holiday Book Party Buffet this year alone! For one thing, it’s a style I know well. I’ve been setting up buffets my whole life because that’s how my family entertained. We’d put everything out on a table and guests would help themselves. Over the years I’ve learned to improvise and add some color but the essentials are always the same. In fact, if you scroll through those other posts you’ll see that I’m essentially setting up the same kind of style over and over. That’s because, when you figure out what works, you just keep adding to it!
I like to add a little color onto my table to start since my kitchen table is white. I didn’t have any red or blue linens so I improvised. I used one of my favorite aprons as a kind of runner. It adds a splash of color and gives guests something to chat about.
You’ve probably seen me use this little trick before with paper napkins! I just string up some yarn or kitchen twine to create a little backdrop and then add themed napkins on top like pennants. They’re so light they just stay in place. This time I added in some favorite American quotes with clothes pins. If you like this style you could ask your guests to bring their own quotes or even hang pictures of past 4th of July parties. Use my easy steps for making a clothespin garland.
To display my hot dogs on the 4th of July buffet I went with a galvanized bucket and some foil. Just put a couple of towels in the bottom of your bucket so the hot dog supply looks plentiful.
In fact, that’s a great secret of mine for anything. For something dry like chips or hotdog buns, add kitchen towels or paper towels under your food so it sits up near the top of it’s container. It makes everything look prettier. When it’s something went, like that grilled guacamole or say, grated cheese, I’ll turn a smaller bowl upside down in the bigger bowl and then cover it with the topping. It basically cuts the size of the bowl in half.
If you have more than one kind of dog or burger up for grabs just take a sharpie and mark which is which.
This cutie pie condiment display? That’s just mason jars on top of an old pie plate. And guys, yes of course you could just leave the condiments in their containers but this doesn’t take that much extra time but it really shows that you put an effort in.
A s’mores display is super cute and easy to pull off. It’s basically just a bunch of different s’mores toppings in cute little containers. Want more ideas for setting up one? Check out this whole post on the ultimate s’mores buffet!
Last but not least, the star of my 4th of July buffet is this American flag snack tray. It’s so simple to make you guys! Grab your trusty cookie sheet and layer white chocolate covered pretzels with red fruit and put a little blueberry square in the corner.
