[Sca-cooks] : Adjusting your Feast budget for Comps

[Terry Decker]

While I love to work with tables of 8, I've had the fun of having tables 
that will only seat 6 (or funny round ones that seat 5).  These days, I plan 
for tables of 8, plan service for a messe of 4 and I'm prepared to deal with 
the screwball seating.  I prefer working with advance reservations, but, due 
to kingdom dynamics, I haven't had that luxury for years.  Instead, I plan 
seating based on the limits of the site and my knowledge of event 
attendence.  Fortunately, most sites hold fewer people than want to eat 
feast.  Standard feast sizes are 120 or 160, and I plan break even at 
roughly 70 percent atttendence.  It makes for some leftovers, but I don't 
worry about waste if we have turned a profit and the entire feast is 
recouped to the exchequer.

I also don't throw most of the uneaten food away.  At one time or another, 
the Barony has donated some food to homeless shelters (bread and 
refrigerated whole roasts come to mind), sent unserved food to the tavern to 
be sold, and set out leftovers for the dancers and singers who infested the 
hall until dawn.

Bear


----- Original Message ----- 

The way I have handled this, and it seems to work pretty well, is to plan 
the food for full tables sets based on the advanced reservations. As an 
example, I typically plan on tables of 8. If I have 50 advanced reservations 
for the feast, then I would plan for 56 people (7 tables of 8). I could 
usually sell the extra 6 seats at the door. If I had 53 or more advanced 
reservations, then I would plan for 64 (8 tables of 8) again knowing I could 
usually sell the extra seats. On the flip side I usually have an advertised 
maximum set of seats I would cook for and a personal or hall maximum of 
seats. If my advanced reservations are "sold out" I will open up another 
table of 8, until the personal or hall maximum is met. With a well 
advertised feasts and reminders that include something like "Feast tickets 
are going fast, make your reservation soon" my feasts have typically hit my 
personal or hall maximum.

Euriol