The Party Planner: Cooking for a Crowd (2024)

FAQs

How do you calculate food for a crowd? ›

Rules to Plan By

Each adult will consume 1 pound of food total; children, about 1/2 pound. The more options you have, the less you need of each; decrease the main course portion sizes by 1 to 2 ounces if served on a buffet. Guests will always eat — and drink — more at night than during the day.

On average, plan for each adult to consume about 1 pound of food total (not including dessert). Count on children to consume about a ½ pound. Remember; the more options you have, the less you need of each.

Generally, an adult will eat about 1lb of food per seating. So if you are serving 4 portions of food, you need about 1/4 lb per person. If you are offering 3 portions of food, you need about 1/3 lb per person of each item.

Appetizers

If you're offering catered appetizers, plan for about six portions per guest. For a party of 100 guests, this adds up to roughly 600 appetizer portions.

100, 1/2 cup servings of potatoes needs 25 pounds of potatoes. However, if the group has other choices for sides, I think you can get by with about 15-20 pounds minimum.

Add the butter and warm milk to the bowl and mash with a potato masher or fork (or pass the potatoes through a ricer or food mill for a smoother mash). Season with salt and pepper. Plan on 1/3 to 1/2 pound potatoes per person for your feast.

10 lbs for 20, 100 lbs for 200. If I am serving additional starch dishes, eg., stuffing at Thanksgiving, I might cut back a bit. If you want no leftovers I suppose you could get away with 4 oz per person. It depends on how your fellow diners like mashed potatoes.

What Does a Typical Catering Tray Feed? Generally, a catering tray can feed 15-20 people. For example, a full tray of chicken breasts should have enough protein for 15-20 people. However, remember that people may choose sides like salads and desserts, which may not factor into this.

How to set up a food table for a party? ›

In the grand scheme of things, an adult will eat roughly a pound of food at a party, while children (except for male teenagers), will eat roughly half a pound of food. The more food options you offer, the less each partygoer will eat of each food.

To feed 50 people with sandwiches, you may need around 100-150 sandwiches, depending on the size of the sandwiches and the other food being served.

It's pretty simple too: We just determine an appropriate size portion of any dish in ounces per person, the we multiply that times the number of guests and divide by 16 (# of oz in a pound) and just like that you get the number of pounds you'll need.

Overall food cost percentage calculation

Total food cost percentage = (total cost of goods sold / total revenue) x 100. Before you can use this formula, you need to gather some information about your restaurant. Start by taking an inventory count with the costs for each item.

The number of full trays of food needed for 100 guests can vary depending on the type of food and serving style, but a rough estimate would be around 10-12 trays.