Feeding the hordes

May 11, 2009 7:03 PM

How much food do I need for 14 or 15 people for dinner? I know what I want to cook, but am not sure how much of each dish I should prepare.

I have two vegetarians, three pescatarians, 1 person who definitely doesn't eat seafood, 1 person who is unlikely to eat any vegetables.

I will put some snacks out with drinks to start, but intend to move on to eating dinner fairly soon as it is not intended to be a late night. There is also dessert.

I will have to assess the furniture situation, but I think people will be sitting to eat, but not necessarily at a table (should this affect how much they will eat).

I remember once seeing some sort of catering rule that suggested as you multiple the number of people and add further dishes, you only need to multiple each dish by a lower number, as they will eat less of each thing. Might have been on eGullet, but can't find it now.

Any ideas for how much I should cook of the following:

Lamb and date tagine - recipe has 1kg of lamb and says it serves 6-8. In my experience, it serves about 4 hungry people if that is the only dish. I was considering just doubling this, given the other dishes.

Spicy prawns - how many medium size prawns per person? I was thinking 3-4 each.

There will also be a vegetable tagine and one or two salads, cous cous, and some bread. I feel ok about estimating these items.

Bonus for any recipes for salads or other side vegetable ideas (or legumes) that would fit with the above vaguely Moroccan themed meal.

posted by AnnaRat to food & drink (6 comments total)

I think that you're on the right track. I would assume that if you double the lamb and do three prawns per person you should have plenty. I always end up overestimating in situations like this -- you have to remember that lots of people will take a significantly smaller than normal serving when there are this many dishes.

Also, if you're not doing a seated dinner (just guessing from 14-15 guests) then people will eat a little less.
posted by mercredi at 7:11 PM on May 11

I think you should be safe with your estimations. Allow 2+oz of couscous per person, and aim for 8-10oz of veg per person/ You can find a rough guide to quantities.here. As a bonus there are a bunch of veg salad recipes that will fit on this page under Saturday diner, they are designed to be easy to do in bulk.. Those are for 60 people so divide by 4.
posted by tallus at 7:44 PM on May 11

I'd add some nibbly extras, like a bowl of hummus and/or baba ganoush and some cut up celery, carrot sticks and peppers, a bowl of olives, a cheeseboard with three or four cheeses and some crackers, plus grapes for decoration/eating. Then there's extra things the vegetarians can eat that the carnivores can also enjoy, and it's the kind of food that, if it doesn't all get eaten, it goes into the fridge for you to finish off during the week.
posted by essexjan at 2:22 AM on May 12

I feel like maybe a couple more prawns? Out of the meat eaters, some may only really eat the prawns.

I like the nibbly extras essexjan mentions.
posted by KAS at 6:35 AM on May 12

Alright, I will report back after the weekend to see if I got it right.
posted by AnnaRat at 5:23 PM on May 12

Just to follow up - I ended up with 14 people expected to attend, and 12 showed up. I cooked 2kg of lamb (tagine), about 60 prawns, a large vegetable and chickpea dish, two large salads and a mountain of couscous (since it said 1/2 cup = 1 serve, I made about 20 serves, as when I make that amount for two of us, it isn't quite enough).

There was a range of nibbles before dinner, such as chips, dip and bread, grapes, some antipasto stuff, a cheese platter, nuts.

For dessert, I made a large cheesecake (25-26cm diameter pan).

I have probably 1kg of lamb left, about 15 prawns, perhaps a third of the vegetable dish left, half of each salad left and still an enormous mountain of couscous. The good thing is I won't be cooking for the rest of the week. When I looked at everyone's plates, people took small serves of several dishes, and therefore I would estimate that they ate 1/4 to 1/3 of what I might normally consider a serve. This included the couscous where I still had expected everyone to eat a 'normal' size serve as a base for the rest of the food.

I have about a third of the cheesecake left (but that's ok, it is my favourite).

I think it is a good lesson of how much less people will take of each dish where there are multiple dishes. If I made the same menu again, I'd probably halve it. Having said that, it did look rather fabulous on the table!
posted by AnnaRat at 9:47 PM on May 17