Posted by Nancy B on September 23, 19100 at 01:35:16 :
In Reply to: Still looking for menu to serve 150 posted by Brenda on September 18, 19100 at 18:12:45 :
: at a standup party. No one will be able to be seated. Last year the caterer did paella for a $10 per person charge. Any ideas appreciated
wow -- the more I thought about this, the more came back to me about low food cost menus for a crowd. I did a big dinner for my church last spring, for 150, with a $10/pp charge. We did turkey "potpie", served with lemon butter garlic green beans and a salad or mixed greens, chopped apple, and orange vinaigrette. It was a big hit. I roasted 5 whole turkeys (cheap! and great yield), made the filling (thickened gravy, carrots, celery, onion) and then instead of doing pie crust (too much work for the short prep time) baked off biscuit crust separately on half-sheets. Filled the chafers with potpie mixture, placed heated biscuit on top, and served to a happy crowd. Simple but well-received. This concept of course could be dressed up with wine, mushrooms, chives in the biscuit, etc, to make a more elegant dish.
I used large bags of high-quality, whole frozen green beans, and barely cooked them. For this kind of budget, it was less labor and with a good lemon butter sauce, they were fine.
This menu also included the afore-mentioned pick-up sweets platters.
Another one we have done was Italian Beef or Chicken Stew (prepped like normal stew, using meat, wine, potatoes, mushrooms, green beans, and robustly seasoned spaghetti sauce.) This could also be done with chicken and sausage. + Salad, bread, and simple dessert.
I know that none of these suggestions is elegant or fancy or gourmet -- but with a $10 budget, and a stand-up situation, I know these have worked for me. Hope this helps, and good luck! --N.