With Oscar at an all time fever pitch, FOX News Latino decided to get some Oscar viewing party tips from design lifestyle expert, bilingual television personality and all-around home enthusiast and proud Puerto Rican Evette Rios.
After all, she’s been called the “Mobile Martha Stewart”, has appeared for years as Rachel Ray’s design buddy on her hit daytime show, and is now a Correspondent on ABC’s “The Chew” making her one of the few Latinas on a daytime talk show on English-language network television.
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One of Rios recent assignments for "The Chew" was doing a behind-the-scenes piece on the Governor’s Ball preparations, the celebration that will follow the 84th Academy Awards presentation on Oscar Sunday, February 26, 2012.
"It was my first time meeting Wolfgang Puck the original Celebrity Chef " Rios told Fox News Latino, Puck is in charge of all the food for the grand event "he taught me how to make a new Lamb Chop recipe".
But if you didn’t get one of those invites you can have your own Oscar Viewing Party at home.
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Here are Evette’s top 5 tips:
1) DECOR. Use neutral colors like white and grey with pops of red. “I would do red napkins, red placemats, red plates” said Rios “red is a powerful color that can make things look fancy”. "Use gold and silver accents on the table" added the lifestyle expert.
2) FREE INVITES. Rios suggests using the site www.postmark.com . The company Evite Postmark teamed with the Academy to introduce "The Oscar collection" an array of elegant Oscar Themed evites that you can personalize and impress your friends with. They're free!
3)EASY COCKTAILS. “Rather than deal with lots of drinks, have one cocktail already made, put it in a big pitcher so people could serve themselves” Rios added “you don’t want to play bartender the whole night “. Suggestions: a big pitcher of Sangria, or Margaritas!
4)BITE SIZE FOOD. “Make miniature portions of food so your guests could have fun eating without getting messy” said Rios. “You can make something like lasagna and cut it into small squares and put a cute toothpick in it so people can just take it and mingle".
5) ATTIRE. How to dress? Evette suggests having fun and picking an Oscar nominated movie and using it as a theme for your party. “That will make the party a lot more fun and engaging" she added. If “The Artist” is the theme guests could dress in classic 20's syle or perhaps in Hawaiian shirts if you go a la “The Descendents”. Pick a movie and let your imagination go wild.
Although Evette’s adventures on “The Chew” have taken her from the streets of Hollywood to the White House kitchen , she told us it was her mothers home cooked Puerto Rican dishes that sparked her love of food, and her father who was a maintenance worker who inspired her to use a little creativity to change her surroundings without a big budget, "he would just find stuff on the street and fix them up" Rios added.
Now Evette publishes a weekly blog at evetterios.com providing tips on everything from food, entertaining and lifestyle to design and home improvement themes
Evette 's Oscar segment on "The Chew" where she goes behind the scenes at the Oscars and joins renowned chef Wolfgang Puck as he readies the menu for the post-awards Governor’s Ball airs this Friday, February 24 at 1 PM ET/12 PM CT on ABC.
Naibe Reynoso is a freelance reporter in Los Angeles, California.
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