Hello /r/cooking! Long time redditor, first time posting so please bare with me!
TL;DR - I am catering for my own wedding next fall and am looking to have 150-175 people at the location. I want to outline my ideas and I am looking for someone to tell me any faults in my logic for food preparation and serving. Please help me make this work. I have my mind set on DIY.
The venue is outdoors. The theme is backyard BBQ style food with rustic decor. I have access to electricity but no ovens so the food will have to be prepped beforehand. I am taking off work most of the week before the wedding and understand how much of a pain in the butt this will be. I have access to 6 people (4 other than bride and groom) who are willing to cook. This means that I also have access to 6 refrigerators and 6 ovens. I have priced out both Costco and GFS for items and which would be cheaper and by doing this myself I am saving over $1,000. The pans I will be using are full size deep aluminum foil pans. Please note that I do have access to 8 crock pots as well, of all different sizes (four of them are 8 q size). If I need more for any ideas you may have I could always ask around and find more! Each person offering to cook has a gas stove.
The menu: - Sloppy Joe - BBQ Chicken (open to changing this option) - Macaroni n Cheese - Musselman's Heat n Serve Homestyle Country Apples (7 lb cans) - Canned Corn (6.6 lb cans) - Mashed Potatoes - Pasta Salad/Macaroni Salad (either or)
How I plan to prep:
Sloppy Joe: 40 lbs of meat. Someone will cook portions of the meat at a time on the stove and put the browned meat into the full aluminum pans until all is cooked. Then They will put Manwich cans on the beef and store it in the refrigerator. This will be done the day before or morning of.
BBQ Chicken: I am still stuck on how to prep this. We were considering buying frozen chicken breasts from GFS, boiling the breasts, shred them in a crockpot and put BBQ sauce on them. GFS also has pre-frozen pulled BBQ chicken that serves 16 so we could ask if people prefer to have chicken or sloppy joe when we send out our invites and put our money into whichever people would want more of. Please note that if we do this route with the invitations that I will be having multiple people who could cook the pre-frozen pans, and 4 of these pre-frozen pans will fit in a standard oven (they come in 1/2 size deep aluminum pans). If anyone has any cheaper ideas please let me know!
Mac n Cheese: Boil the noodles the day before. The day of someone will heat and mix the noodles with the rest of the recipe and put it in the oven to stay warm. I will include the ingredients for the macaroni and cheese: (Serves 100) 8 lb elbow macaroni 8 lb velveeta cheese 1 1/2 lb margarine 3 c flour 2 gal milk 3 large pack shredded cheese - Boil noodles, combine all other ingredients separately, then mix them together. The recipe calls for baking for one hour at 350. I understand I need to take this recipe and multiple by 1.5x at least. How long should I bake the macaroni for once I alter the recipe?
Mashed Potatoes: With skin on, boil potatoes, mash them in a mixing bowl with hand-held mixer. Will heat up in oven. My mother was planning on making "Funeral Potatoes" with the corn flakes, but I think this may be too difficult for 100 people. What do you think?
For corn and apples: Those will just be heated on the stove or placed in the oven. Unsure of heating times right now so if you have any ideas please let me know. I personally (the bride) have large pots big enough to cook the corn in - 7.75 q stock pot, 32 q stainless steel pot. The others willing to cook have pots around these sizes as well.
Pasta/Macaroni Salad: Already pre-made, so will put into full size plan with another pan underneath filled with ice and cold water to keep it cold. This is what the bride and groom will take care of. The best man and groom will bring these the day of the wedding. These will be in full size aluminum pans as well. We plan on just emptying the containers into the pans for serving.
The plan in question: On the day of the wedding we are to marry at 4 pm and reception at 6 pm. My fiancé will be at the venue at 1 pm to receive the delivery of the hot box and make sure it is plugged in (I originally was going to do chaffing dishes with the candles, but I decided on an electric hot box/heating box instead.) The day of the wedding the food will be heated in everyone's ovens and immediately brought to the venue around 3 pm. Everyone who is offering to cook lives less than a half hour away. The heating box will be plugged in and warm enough by that time the food arrives to keep the food hot until it is to be served. Once the time comes to put the food out, the food will be placed on its designated tables with hot plates underneath to prevent the pans from burning the table cloth. The food will be rotated and only what is needed will come out. For example, I will only have out 1 full size pan of sloppy joe at a time. Once the first pan begins to run out, another pan will be brought out and condensed. There are people who will be in charge of the process of changing the pans.
The questions: - What could I do better or change? - At what temperature do you reheat the sloppy joe and mac n cheese if it was prepped the day before? - For the hot box, should I double up the foil pans and have one filled with water on the bottom to prevent the food from drying out?
Submitted October 26, 2016 at 05:28AM by Xxprettybritty http://ift.tt/2e8v2l6 Chefit
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