self-catering

we of the tiny budget foolishly choose to self-cater.....

with 29 days to go and a lecture from my mother fresh in my ear i have decided to finally sit down and organise the deadly shopping list!!

I can't remember how much i have previously shared with you on this point but when it came to catering it was pretty much a no-brainer... i had a quick look into some catering companies in the area found almost all too expensive or not really professional looking and decided we head down the ole self catering track....

we quickly decided against a sit-down meal as it would require more chairs/tablecloths/knives/forks etc (though at one point i really wanted to have a wedding brunch - our favourite meal of the day) and went with cocktail style service.... but we would have needed more waitstaff, people preparing etc

so entered the idea of afternoon tea buffet.... we had all these grand plans for pastries and things when we decided lets just take it back as simple as we can get it because when it comes down to it we want our big day to be as stress free as possible!!

so one solution: Ploughman's Lunch

traditionally this consists of a hunk of bread, hunk of meat, hunk of cheese and some sort of pie and relish

ours will probably translate into something more like this....

source: Zucchini Ribbon Salad on Proud Italian Cook and A Summer Cheese Plate on Sprouted Kitchen

as the RSVPs slowly trickle back in we are getting more of an idea of the number of people to expect and right now unless we become really good friends with a lot of people really fast that number should not exceed 75 people.

now comes the tricky part, unless you throw huge catered parties all the time chances are you aren't going to know that much about quantities and as i am not one of those people i am no different. so whats the first thing we all do when we are trying to solve a problem - Google it. so thats what i did (though how many people will a wheel of cheese feed? does come with some interesting sites) and the most helpful sites i found are here, here and here.

but yes still feeling a little unsure about what quantities i might need, i mean 1kg of butter really??

so i guess we did what we thought sounded right:

1 person will probably have 3-4 slices of bread, 2 thin slices each meat (3 types), like a cup of salad each, lots of cheese (no idea how to figure this one out) and probably like 3 boxes of mixed fruit for everyone (apples, pears etc)

yep and here is where you think i will pull the rabbit out of the hat and say 'voila! here is the perfect solution!'

nope, no rabbit still not any closer

on a more positive note though, i have sanded back 8 out of 10 chairs (before doing some kind of damage to my back and neck, i am comically similar now to the hunchback of notre dame).