Expert: Keith Patton - 5/29/2008

Question
Approx how many guests will 16# of ground beef made into sloppy joes feed?

Answer
Jan:

To figure it out it depends on a few things.  What percent fat is the ground beef?  Normal ground beef results in about a 30-40 percent cook down.  So expect to have between   11.2 and  9.6 of cooked beef.
If you add onion and the requisite tomato sauce etc fiture you will add back in probably 50 percent in volume, depending on how runny you make it or how thick.  So lets be conservative and say you are making a thicker sloppy joe and less runny.  So say you end up with adding 4 lbs of tomato and onion combined after simmering and cooking it down a bit.  This leaves you with a bit less than you started with.  15 to 14 lbs of finished sloppy joe.

Now you need to figure out how big you buns are and how much they will hold.  The average ladle or serving spoon probably holds 4 ounces or half a cup, and that will fit on the average size bun.  Larger buns might hold 6 ounces.

You can try working this our by trial and error.  That is what a caterer does to price out the servings.

So say lets split the difference and say 5 ounces.

15 lbs = 240 ounces  = 48  five ounce servings
14 lbs  = 224  = 44.8 five ounce servings

By reducing the size of the buns or by simply reducing the amount you put on the bun you can stretch it even farther.

Keith