A Private Chef
for New Year's EveYour Table · Your Guests · No Reservation
The dinner that beats every restaurant in town on its busiest night: a course-by-course menu cooked in your kitchen, served at your pace, and the kitchen clean before the toast. Across Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and Wyoming, ski house or city home. 24-hour proposals.
New Year's Eve Private Chef and Catering
New Year's Eve 2026 falls on a Thursday. We do it three ways: a chef-made dinner delivered ready to heat from $100 a person, a private chef cooking a multi-course dinner in your kitchen from $150 a person, or full-service catering for a house party from $150 a person. Every option is all-inclusive and quoted in writing within 24 hours. The best New Year's Eve dates go by December 1. We can book closer than that, and often do.
Dinner at Home. On Purpose.
Restaurants on December 31 run a fixed menu, two seatings, and a room full of strangers. A private chef runs one table: yours. The menu is built for the people at it, the courses come out when the conversation is ready for them, and nobody is watching a clock for the second seating.
The chef arrives with the groceries in the late afternoon, most of the long prep already done the day before, finishes every course in your kitchen, and serves it plated or family style. Dessert and a late savory bite are timed to your evening. By the toast the kitchen is wiped, the dishwasher is running, and the leftovers are labeled.
When the Dates Actually Go
How the calendar moves: the best New Year's Eve dates go by December 1. Ski towns go first, Aspen, Vail, Park City, and Jackson Hole, because December 31 sits inside their busiest week and many chefs are already on multi-day Christmas bookings. Denver, Scottsdale, and Salt Lake City hold open a little longer. We can book closer than that, and often do, but December 1 is the date that still has a choice of chefs.
Doing Christmas week in the mountains too? Book both in one conversation. Christmas week's best dates go by November 15, and a chef already in the house for the week is the easiest New Year's Eve you will ever host. The holiday page has the whole calendar.
Menus Built for a Long Evening
Three directions come up most often on December 31. All of them are written for your table, and every one ends with something that holds while the room slows down toward midnight.
Course by Course
Five or six small courses paced over the evening: a crudo, a warm starter, a pasta or risotto, a main of dry-aged beef or whole roasted fish, cheese, then dessert near the toast. The format most people mean when they say New Year's Eve dinner.
Plated, paced to your tableSeafood Forward
Oysters and crudo to start, a pasta with brown butter, lemon and crab, whole roasted branzino with charred lemon and salsa verde, a citrus panna cotta or olive oil cake. Fish flown in twice a week, never frozen.
Light enough to last till midnightThe House Party
Passed bites for the first hour, a grazing table that gets refreshed, a late-night savory course around eleven, and a dessert table at midnight. Built for twenty to sixty people who move around the house.
Stations and passed, staffedBar and midnight. We can staff the bar, pair the courses with what is in your cellar, or set a sparkling wine service for the toast. Kids at the table get their own menu on the same schedule. Dietary restrictions are built into the plan from the first call, not handled at the stove.
Three Ways to Do New Year's Eve
Same kitchen, same chefs, three levels of done-for-you. Every one is all-inclusive and comes back as one written number within 24 hours.
Drop-Off, Chef-Made
The New Year's Eve dinner cooked from scratch in our commercial kitchen, chilled, packed with a reheat sheet. Free pickup, or one flat delivery fee on the Front Range and to Colorado mountain towns.
From $100 a person, $500 minimumPrivate Chef in Your Kitchen
A chef arrives with the groceries, cooks the whole dinner in your home or rental, serves it course by course, and leaves the kitchen clean before the toast.
From $150 a person, most $150 to $250Full-Service Catering
For the house party: chef-led team, service staff, bar staff, rentals when the room needs them, and complete cleanup. Passed, stations, or a seated dinner for forty.
From $150 a person| Format | Best for | Chef on site | Service staff | Starts at |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Drop-off, chef-made | 6 to 20, you host it | No | No | $100 a person |
| Private chef in your kitchen | 6 to 20 at the table | Yes | Optional | $150 a person |
| Full-service catering | 20 to 100 plus | Yes | Yes | $150 a person |
One Number, Everything In
Chef and culinary team, ingredients and sourcing, staff and service, rentals coordination, and complete cleanup in one written number, stated up front. December 31 carries a holiday rate for the chef and the team, and it is in the number you see, not added at billing. Full tiers by headcount are in the full private chef pricing guide.
From the First Call to the Toast
The last night of the year rewards the people who plan it in November.
Pick the format
Tell us the market, the headcount, and whether it is a seated dinner or a house party.
Menu and proposal
The all-inclusive number in writing within 24 hours. Deposit holds December 31.
The week before
Dietary needs, timing, bar, rentals, and the kitchen scouted if it is a rental.
The night
Chef arrives late afternoon, courses run at your pace, the kitchen is clean before midnight.
New Year's Eve in the Mountains
Aspen, Vail, Breckenridge, Park City, and Jackson Hole run the busiest New Year's Eves we cook. Most of those tables are a family already in the house for Christmas week, with a chef who has been cooking for them since the 24th. If that is your week, one proposal covers the whole stay. If it is just the one night, we still scout the rental kitchen ahead of time and bring what it lacks.
New Year's Eve Private Chef, Wherever You Ring It In
Every market below has its own page with local venues, local menus, and this season's holiday details.
More on New Year's Eve and the Season
Asked Every December
Two Ways to Start
We respond within 24 hours, every time.
Most clients prefer a 15-minute conversation. Chef Steve answers personally.
For full proposals or detailed inquiries.
"Whether you start with a form, an email, or a call — every inquiry comes directly to me. I'd love to hear about your event."