SC - HELP!!!!!

[Anne-Marie Rousseau]

Hey all from Anne-Marie
Sianan sez:
>Does any of the more experience cooks have any advice on how to
> organise this 'feeding of the masses' and any recipes for nice food, that
> is reletively simple and can be mass produced?
>

we recently did a buffet for about 1000 people. Well, there were 1000
people at the event. I have NO idea how many of them ate! Probably about
500. My suggestions:
1. pretest all your recipes!!!!! only pick those that are OUTSTANDING, as
well as limiting the fuss factor. Our buffet was all "finger foods", much
of which was pre-bought as is. The rest was precooked (we had no stove) and
then assembled on site.

our menu:
roast beef (precooked, and sliced on site with rented electric meat
slicers)
salami (bought already sliced)
horseradish sauce (bought)
mustard (bought)
pain de mayne (small bread rolls, bought)
sliced cheese of several sorts (bought, already sliced)
pickled asparagus (bought)
pickled carrots (made ahead of time)
pickled eggs (made ahead of time)
hardboiled eggs (made ahead of time)
olives (bought)
fresh mandarine oranges (it was 12th night, so they were cheap)
small apples (ie "lunchbox sized")
fresh carrots and celery
a gajillion assorted period "cookie like things", ie shrewsbury cakes,
marchpanes, etc. These I farmed out to RELIABLE EXPERIENCED cooks, who
brought them when they came. We were makin' cookies for months before the
event and throwing them in the freezer as they came ready.

2. spend your time on site making things pretty. Garnishing, arranging in
attractive ways, on appropriate plates, etc. The menu above was really
really simple, but my Team Garnish went to town and it looked
extraordinary. Special attention was payed to contrasts in colors and
shapes, etc.

3. If they want hot food, not a munchy buffet, get a lot of experienced
bodies. Double check your kitchen AhEAD OF TIME. the size of the
kitchen/number of ovens/etc will dictate your menu. Boil and serve is your
friend. Some ideas:
- --preroast chickens and serve with cinnamon orange sauce after warming
briefly
- --preroast lamb and serve with sauce robert
- --some simple stewed dish, like the chicken with leeks in Apicius
- --ravioles. Prebuy cheese and herb raviolies. Boil, and serve sprinkled
with cheese and spice.
- --cretonnee. a soup of fresh peas (I used frozen). make ahead of time and
heat to serve.
- --wardyns in syrop, pears stewed in port wine with spices
- --anything in a pie can be made ahead of time and frozen, then reheated.
Tartes of fleshe (a meat pie), fish day rissoles (a tart of fruit and nuts
and spice), apple krapfen (a german honey nut tart), etc.
- --compound salats are interesting, and require no cooking! Buy the greens
already washed in the bags so you dont have to do it.

well, I hope that helps some. All of the recipes have been posted to this
list previously.

Good luck!
- --Anne-Marie, who has sworn NEVER to become a caterer, no matter how much
people think she should. They work too hard!

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