[Sca-cooks] Feast quantities

[Bronwynmgn at aol.com]

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In a message dated 7/20/2002 8:24:00 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
rcmann4 at earthlink.net writes:


> A topic that has been on my mind lately: what guidelines do you
> use for estimating quantities for feasts: bread, meats, starches,
> veggies, beverages, etc.?  For the purpose of this discussion,
> assume that the number of feasters is known in advance, and is
> unlikley to change.
>
>
>

Food for Fifity is a fabulous book for this sort of thing, since it gives not
only recommended amounts to serve for 50 diners, but also how much you need
to purchase to get that amount after it's cooked.  As long as you keep in
mind that in is based on modern food service work, and they are dealing with
anywhere from 4-7 dishes total per meal rather than the 10 or more many of
our feasts run to.

I have a couple of hard and fast rules, the most useful of which I have to
attribute to Ragnar Ketillson.  He is the one who taught me to make one ounce
of vegetable per person, although any book you look at is going to say 3-4
depending on the veggie.  (That's one ounce per vegetabe dish, not total for
the meal).  Since many Scadians don't consider veggies a food, they don't eat
any, and the ones who do like veggies eat their share.  This means that I
usually get a spoonful, if anything, back when I follow this rule.  When I
look at it and say "That's not enough!" and make more, I get lots back.  The
only thing I haven't been able to work out with this is salad - I always,
always, make way too much!  I just can't figure out how to determine, with
all the different salad ingredients, how to come up with one ounce of salad
per person.

The other hard and fast rule is that as long as I am doing at least 2 meat
dishes, I do about 1/4 pound per person, and in soups/stews figure 1/2 cup to
1 cup of liquid per person.

I'm still working on sauces and salad dressings, but had excellent results
this year working on the basis of a tablespoon of salad dressing per person.

I've also decided that I like using the crusty rolls that BJ's Warehouse
sells for something like $4 for 20 rolls, rather than trying to estimate
loaves of bread.

Brangwayna