Food to Dine For
Doesn't that food look amazing......makes your mouth water. There are hundreds of food television shows making everyone from NYC to BFE a major foodie. Restaurants and caterers must step up their game; they can't just throw a grilled chicken breast with potato and veggies on a plate and call it a day. A lot more thought goes into choosing the best menu for your event attendees, such as distribution style, budget, and even more important dietary restrictions.
Distribution Style
Plated Meal - Individual meal is served on a plate and served to your table
Family Style - Food is served on a platter and served to table for self serve (budget friendly)
Buffet/Food Station - Guests go to buffet or food station and served food or self served (can have more fun food options & budget friendly)
Budget
As you see from the above list distribution style can affect the pricing of the food, the more staff required to deliver the food the more it will cost. When looking to get price breaks there are multiple options to consider to lower costs.
Choose food that is a lower price point such as chicken, pork or vegetarian OR provide a choice of steak or chicken lowering the overall costs
Try multiple food stations creating a free flowing event to provide more options and giving guests a fun 'Foodie' experience
Start event later or end sooner and serve appetizers rather than a full meal
Dietary Restrictions
Gluten Free (GF) - this request is growing and one appetizer should be gluten free
Vegetarian (VG) - whenever ordering food, please, please, please order 5% vegetarian meals
Kosher - these meals are usually outsourced and will need to be ordered at least 3 business days prior to event
* Guests greatly appreciate signs stating the dietary restrictions next to the food or on menu card.
Bringing It Home
There are so many recipe websites that can help you provide the healthiest to the heartiest food. Below is a list of some great sites.
AllRecipe - this is the most visited recipe website, they also provide meal planning with down-loadable grocery lists
Betty Crocker - this company has been around forever, they have transitioned from the monthly recipe cards, to cook books, to a fantastically organized website and app for your mobile use
Yummly - their unique search filters allow you to find the perfect recipes by holiday, cuisine, taste, diet, nutrition, allergy, cook time, technique, and more – so the recipes you find first are the right ones (website is visually appealing with tiled photos of meals)
Pinterest - this is where I find most inspiration on recipes and you can click through to the recipe sit
Thank you for reading this week’s blog. Please comment below with your favorite recipes for events or tips to lower food costs at events. Look forward to reading your comments. Have a great holiday weekend.
Best,
Kim
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