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Following on his unusual dinner on Wednesday with a dozen Republican senators, President Obama will have a bipartisan lunch on Thursday with Representative Paul D. Ryan, the Republican chairman of the House Budget Committee, and the panel's senior Democrat, Representative Chris Van Hollen.

Mr. Obama's recent spate of meals and phone calls with Republicans is a new outreach strategy to work around party leaders, especially in the Republican-controlled House, who have dug in against any more budget talks. And the lunch comes as Mr. Ryan is preparing to bring a new budget plan to a vote in his committee next week.

Since Mr. Ryan's House budget is expected to be contrary to Mr. Obama's plan, it is unclear what might come of the luncheon parlay. Mr. Ryan, as in the past three years, is expected to propose balancing the budget by cutting projected spending only, especially for the fast-growing entitlement programs Medicare and Medicaid. Mr. Obama wants a deficit-reduction package that is a balance of spending reductions and further tax increases by closing some breaks for the wealthy and corporations.

Mr. Obama's two-hour dinner with Republican senators at the Jefferson Hotel in Washington on Wednesday apparently covered more subjects than the budget, including immigration and gun safety legislation – two of the president's other second-term priorities. As they left, Senators John McCain of Arizona and Tom Coburn of Oklahoma each gave waiting reporters a thumbs-up.

Perhaps their gesture merely expressed gratitude that the president had picked up the tab — out of his own pocket. Given the near blackout on information and the security cordon surrounding the hotel near the White House, Washington will be digging for days for more substantive reports about what progress, if any, was made on bringing the two sides together.

The White House confirmed the list of those who dined with Mr. Obama only after everyone had left the private dining room, reflecting in part its sensitivity to the fact that identification with the Democratic president carries a political risk for many Republicans back in their states.

(Proof of that: Influential conservative activist Erick Erickson on Wednesday night circulated on his Twitter account another conservative's Twitter warning: "Seriously, if you are a Senator up for re-election in '14, the smartest thing you can do right now is BAIL on the Obamadinner.")

Besides Mr. McCain and Mr. Coburn, the diners were Senators Bob Corker of Tennessee, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Dan Coats of Indiana, Richard M. Burr of North Carolina, Mike Johanns of Nebraska, Patrick J. Toomey of Pennsylvania, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, John Hoeven of North Dakota, Saxby Chambliss of Georgia and — the only woman — Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire.

"The president greatly enjoyed the dinner and had a good exchange of ideas with the senators," said a senior White House official who would not be identified.

Thursday's lunch is a departure from much of Mr. Obama's outreach lately, which has mostly engaged Senate Republicans to counter the paralyzing antipathy toward him in the House. Next week, at his request, he will go to Capitol Hill to separately meet with both parties in both the House and Senate.

The president's overtures follow phone calls to Republicans since Saturday, after across-the-board cuts – known as sequestration — took effect for military and domestic programs because Mr. Obama and Republican leaders could not agree on alternative deficit-reduction measures. The president insists that any alternative package must combine a balance of spending cuts and new revenues, while Republicans generally oppose new taxes on the wealthy and corporations.

In the Senate, however, a number of Republicans are known to support higher tax revenues if Mr. Obama and Democrats agree to significant long-term savings in Medicare, Medicaid and also Social Security — just the trade-off Mr. Obama supports. Mr. Coburn and Mr. Chambliss, for example, were members of a bipartisan group that supported a deficit-reduction plan with more additional revenues than the president has proposed.

The thinking in the White House is that with Congress's Republican leaders — Speaker John A. Boehner and Senator Mitch McConnell, the Senate Republican minority leader — refusing to bargain with Mr. Obama on higher revenues, the president's only route to a so-called grand bargain for deficit reduction is to go around the leaders to build a bipartisan consensus.

And if such a bargain can get through the Democratically controlled Senate with a few Republicans' help, that will put pressure on the Republican-controlled House to follow suit — even if House Democrats' votes provide the margin of passage. That is just the dynamic that in the past two months has allowed Congress to send to Mr. Obama bills raising taxes on wealthy Americans, providing aid to victims of Hurricane Sandy and reauthorizing a law on violence against women.