Friday, January 23, 2009

Estimating How Much Food for a Party the Easy Way

By KC Kudra

Cooking is great fun if you do it right and planning which recipes to make for a party can be very enjoyable. Unfortunately, many people end up panicking and worrying about the food, rather than enjoying the experience of planning it. They worry that the guests will not enjoy their cooking. They think they will make too little or too much food.

How Much Food for a Party?

Forget about using a scientific formula to find out how much food for a party because there is not one. The more parties you cater for, the better you can judge the right food amounts. Here are some tips, which will allow you to better estimate the right food quantities for your party without becoming stressed!

Whom have you invited to your party? Will there be only adults or will you need to prepare a few child-friendly recipes too? How many hours will the party last? Of course, you would need much more food for an event such as an afternoon BBQ than for an after dinner cocktail party.

Make more of the potentially popular dishes. Almost everyone loves boneless chicken recipes, so make a lot of those because there will be other dishes, such as international recipes or seafood recipes, which will not appeal to everyone.

If you make many different recipes, your guests will have less of each. If you have only five dishes, your guests will eat quite a lot of each. If you have a buffet of thirty dishes, your guests will probably only take a small spoonful of each dish.

You can guess how much food for a party by multiplying the number of expected guests by the amount they will probably eat. Always round your estimates up rather than down because it is better to have some food left over after the party than run out of it before everyone has finished eating!

Make sure you have some bulk food items too, such as bread if you are having a sit-down dinner or nuts and olives for a cocktail party. People will nibble on these foods before starting on the main dishes or if they are still hungry between courses.

Portion Sizes for Party Food

With appetizers, you should allow six bites per person. With the main meal, you should allow about six to eight ounces of meat or fish, an ounce and a half of grains, five ounces of potatoes, four ounces of vegetables and an ounce of undressed salad per person. For dessert, you should allow one slice of cake, four ounces of creamy dessert or five ounces of ice cream per guest. These measures are approximate because different people have different appetites of course.

More Party Food Tips

* Never repeat the main ingredient at a dinner party. You should not serve a shrimp appetizer followed by a shrimp main course for example.

* Have both warm and cold foods on offer if you are serving a buffet meal.

* Mix different textures, such as soft vegetable purees and crispy fresh bread.

* Make sure you have a good variety of colors, so the food on your buffet table or dining table looks attractive. - 14915

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