Farm dinners & meals

You've probably seen farms and organizations offering farm-to-table dinners at high ticket prices. Perhaps you've heard stories about how quickly these can sell out. Farm dinner organizers and regulators tell us it isn't as easy as it may look.

For many, offering a farm dinner can be a great way to diversify income and better connect with current and future customers. It can also open you up to many risks, involve different staffing, food safety and marketing plans, and probably a major farm clean-up to get ready for guests.

In 2018, UC SAREP published this guide that examines the Farm Dinner model, helps you determine whether it's suitable for your farm and gives examples and suggestions for planning, budgeting, marketing, organizing and offering a dinner or meal on your farm.

Download guide (pdf): Hosting Dinners on Your California Farm

Here is an adjustable budget template for a farm dinner, in an Excel spreadsheet with formulas already entered.

Farm Dinner Budget template (Excel): Farm Dinner Event

Other resources:

"Host Dinners on Your Farm", published by University of Vermont Extension
How to Develop Successful Farm-to-Table Dinners, by Mary Stewart, Oregon Farm Loop
Farm Dinners: Some stories from the field - Blog post by Penny Leff, March 2016