Need help with portions per person

[CanadianBakin']

I have 3 jobs coming up. Two are for groups of 55 where someone else will be doing the savoury finger food and I'm doing miniature sweets. At least one of those will be in the afternoon after an informal "celebration of life" (memorial). I'm taking a guess here but I was thinking 3 pieces per person would be about right if I assume that 60 will come just to be sure. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

The third one is for a group of 75, mostly ladies, after an anniversary service for their organization, which begins at 9am so I imagine they'll be eating 10 - 10:30. They asked for sweets and savoury so I figured I could do an assortment of items much like you would get if you ordered "High Tea" like the one Joie pictures in her post in the Vancouver forum. So I could do savoury, semi-sweet and sweet items. The only guidelines she gave me were no seafood, sandwiches or something, no mufffins, must have scones. I can probably figure out the menu but have no idea how many pieces per person for each "tier" to count on. Can anyone please help? If you have a tired and true menu combination that you would like to suggest, I'm open to that as well.

[Pam R]

I can't really help you with the tea ... but for the memorial 3 is a good estimate. That's what I always go with.

good luck!

[Trishiad]

the picture that you linked to looks like a scone plus 3 different savory items and 3 dessert items. That's alot of food midmorning but it makes a nice look.

[CanadianBakin']

Just bumping this up to see if there's any more input.

[Betts]

This is the sort of thing I do often.

The last "tea" I did had this menu...for 17 people and it was a light meal but there was really enough for 20

2 dz Sun dried tomato and chicken tartlettes ( finely chopped chicken, chp SD tomatoes, Alfredo sauce, parmesan and a bit of egg to bind in a mini muffin sized pie crust) .. none left

2 dz Miniature quiche Lorraine - half remained

2 dz of each Sandwiches - smoked salmon on wheat with lemon shallot butter, curried egg and cashew on white, cucumber on wheat with herb cream cheese a few of each remained

2dz chocolate dipped strawberries

2 dz mini scones ( 2" ) w/ currants/ Devon cream/ jam

Madeleines 3dz - hostess loves these so I make a lot

mini lemon bars - 1 recipe cut into 1" pieces

petits four - 2 dz hostess purchased her own

As far as the ladies mid morning lunch - they will eat very little. 3 - 4 very small pieces per person all the tiers combined will be enough.

The memorial - 2-3 small sweets per person will be more than sufficient

[Wendy DeBord]

I wish I could be of help on this topic. For some reason all the teas I've been involved with, the women barely ate anything. They talked a great deal, but ate nothing.

I prefer to sell per item and let the provider be responsible for the amounts. Put it back on the caterer or the host. That way you don't do more then your paid for, zero waste. But I assume the reason you ask is because your "catering" this? All I can tell you is from my experiences. I/my family owned a catering business for about 10 years. Working on speculation of quantities is not nearly as profitable as filling orders. Especially if you don't have any imediate source for selling your extras. If you have several similar events where you can roll over left-overs into the next event......that works too.

[annachan]

This is from an appetizer book I bought recently:

Rough guide of bitesize snacks per person:

As an appetizer w/ drinks before a meal: 5

As an early evening cocktail party (assume guests will go to dinner elsewhere): 10-12

Evening refreshment following a late lunch part, wedding breakfast or reception: 12-14

Light lunch or supper refreshments: 14-16

[CanadianBakin']

As far as the ladies mid morning lunch - they will eat very little. 3 - 4 very small pieces per person all the tiers combined will be enough.

The memorial - 2-3 small sweets per person will be more than sufficient

Thanks for sharing your experience. I was thinking 5/person total for the mid-morning lunch but I will cut it back even further for my quote and let my client make the final decision. That's why I mentioned it was ladies because I figured they weren't likely to eat much.

I prefer to sell per item and let the provider be responsible for the amounts. Put it back on the caterer or the host. That way you don't do more then your paid for, zero waste. But I assume the reason you ask is because your "catering" this? All I can tell you is from my experiences. I/my family owned a catering business for about 10 years. Working on speculation of quantities is not nearly as profitable as filling orders. Especially if you don't have any imediate source for selling your extras. If you have several similar events where you can roll over left-overs into the next event......that works too.

Thanks for the advice, Wendy. I'm just supplying the food, not serving, thank goodness. They will be paying for the full amount and what they don't use they can take home or whatever so I don't have to worry about leftovers. I guess this means I'm just filling an order but I have to help her decide how much she needs.

[Wendy DeBord]

Well I don't want to sound horrible........but if the host doesn't know how much quantity they need..........I'd probably sell them on the higher side of your guess. Just because everyone can eat/use left overs and running short on food is a nightmare for me.

Theres ALWAYS the exception. You never know if your guest will eat heavy or light. The weather even effects how people eat......... We have repeat groups of people year after year so you'd think we'd know if they were big eaters or light eaters. They might be light eaters the majority of the time and then once in a while they throw you into a panic because we can't keep up with the volume their eating.

Again, it's always best to put it back on the host. What if the guests turn out to be all large people who haven't had anything to eat all day............. If you have a group of wealthy women, chances are they'll eat nothing.............Not that sterio types are right but there are patterns.

[Pam R]

Well I don't want to sound horrible........but if the host doesn't know how much quantity they need..........I'd probably sell them on the higher side of your guess. Just because everyone can eat/use left overs and running short on food is a nightmare for me.

I couldn't agree more. While previous posts may have had experience with people not eating much, unless you know the guests you can't assume this will be true. I don't do traditional 'teas' but I have done many daytime functions (showers, bar/bat mitzvahs, funerals, unveilings, etc.) to know that while sometimes they don't eat, often they devour the food. If the host can tell you that her guests aren't eaters and she wants (and fully understands) that she may run out of food so be it. If the host doesn't know what kind of eaters she has, I'd always rather have too much than too little. Rarely does somebody complain after attending a function that there was too much food - if there isn't enough it's all they'll talk about.

[onehsancare]

If you have several similar events where you can roll over left-overs into the next event......that works too.

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Can you do that? I'd guess Wendy's able to do it because she's "in-house." Or am I misunderstanding and you're talking about the whole tray of x that never got on the buffet?

Had a very frustrating experience the other month. We were at a company event at a destination resort. Cheese, etc. on buffet before dinner, barely touched. We were having a breakfast the next day for which I was making coffee cakes. I thought that the extra cheese would help round things out. The staff refused to box up the cheese, citing health department rules, so it looks like $$$ of good cheese just went in the garbage.

[Wendy DeBord]

We've (in every place I've worked including being self employeed) always left or given hosts any food that was on a buffet/on a serving tray. Left overs are typically eaten by the wait and kitchen staff, then tossed into the garbage if not eaten right away. None are reheated and served as an employee meal or re-sold.

But you always prep for them to eat. Every chef knows to prep extra. If they run out of food it hurts their reputation can get them fired in the long run.......even if the host insists on placing a stingy order (which you shouldn't let them do).

If they don't eat alot, some of the food that never got to the final cooking/or prep go back and get used on another party. An example, we might sear off 10 tenderloins and only use 7. The remaining 3 aren't cooked, can't be given to the host as is....and are perfectly good to use on another party. I'll prep 10 cakes, if they eat only 8 I roll those cakes into my daily special if I completed them. If I didn't totally finish them, I might freeze it. But at no time did they ever sit out of refridgeration, nor were they exposed to the public.

For pastries I'm pretty picky. I don't want day old cookies/cakes/anything to be sold. I prep like the hotside and don't aways finish off all my items (I keep a buffer zone amount on hand all the time).........waiting to see if I'm going to get hit heavy. If they are eating big, I'll finish everything I have and tray it up asap. If they aren't eating much, I'll take what I had as my 'buffer' (extra prepped food) and use that for my next event. If I can't use it in my next event, I freeze it or sell it as my special.