Weddingbee Blog

So, does having your rehearsal dinner at a restaurant called Stripburger set an appropriate tone for your wedding? Mr. Mole and I think so. (Its name refers to the Vegas strip, hive, not strippers! Of course, the latter would be more appropriate to the bachelor/bachelorette parties.)

Image via Las Vegas Sun

Mr. Mole and I decided to have a rehearsal dinner, even though we aren’t having an actual rehearsal. (We’re hoping that the first time’s the charm when it comes to performing wedding ceremonies.) We figured that a dinner was a nice way to welcome all of our guests to Las Vegas and spend some time with them before the wedding. Deciding to have the event, however, was significantly easier than deciding where to have it.

Maybe it’s just me, but I completely underestimated how much a rehearsal dinner would cost.

Or maybe I didn’t want to think about it? Anyway, the original numbers blew my mind and our budget. When we first started looking at different restaurant options, we were receiving food and beverage quotes that rivaled our reception cost. I wanted to find something that was cheap (under $20pp for food) and casual.

We first thought about ordering pizzas or picking up In N’ Out and serving the food in our hotel suite. I also looked into some catering packages from California Pizza Kitchen, which is one chain restaurant for which I have an irrational love. Going with one of these options would have allowed us to spend between $15-18pp, even if we picked up some beers and some bottles of wine. But I was feeling pretty “meh” on the idea of just having people over to our (admittedly very nice) hotel room.

Then, on a scouting trip to Vegas, we noticed Stripburger across the street from the Wynn. I emailed them and received a list of packages, which started at $25pp for food. I was able to negotiate a bit with the restaurant and knock off $5pp. We are also electing to serve some pitchers of sangria, buckets of beers, and sodas on the tables. If people want anything else to drink, there’s a bar right around the corner.

Our Rehearsal Dinner Menu:

• Little Green Salad
• Choice of hamburger, cheeseburger, blue cheese burger, vegetarian burger, or chicken sandwich
• Fries, onion strings, and fried pickles to share
• Chocolate fudge cake

Mr. Mole, his parents, and I went to Stripburger over Thanksgiving to check out the place and its food. Thumbs up, all around.

The Vegas strip is behind us, FFIL is behind the camera

How did you decide where to have a rehearsal dinner? Did you budget appropriately for it, or did you experience some sticker shock like I did?