Expert: Teri Davis Newman - 12/29/2009

Question
We are planning to buy all the food for our wedding and need to know how many pounds of potatoes for mashed potatoes and how many pounds of spinach for salad and how many pounds of tri-tip to buy. can you help?
Cass

Answer
It is impossible for you to have a party of this size and do all the cooking yourself at your home because unless you have commercial facilities or are going to call a catering company to come and help you--and they will not let you buy the food.  Let me give you a few things to consider because I know you haven't realized the magnitude of what you are thinking of doing and it is not possible for you to have a party of this size outside of a commercial venue.  I know you aren't using a commercial venue because they DO NOT ALLOW food to come in from an unlicensed kitchen and the reason for that is to prevent food poisoning. The average home refrigerator does not have enough space to store the food you will need for this party which means you are risking food poisoning. Where do you think you are going to find parking for all the cars?  Do you think you can cook food and have it ready for all these people?  You can't fit macaroni salad for 150 in your fridge let alone all the OTHER FOOD!! You are talking about nearly 100 POUNDS of salads ALONE, THEN YOU CAN FIGURE ANOTHER 175 POUNDS OF MEAT.  Where are you going to store this?  A RESTAURANT would have a hard time feeding half people you expect that came in all at once and you are not going to be able to do this by yourself. Do yourself a giant favor and  get a professional caterer. Do you realize that you are looking at about $1750.00-$2000.00 just for the food ingredients to feed this many people?