Now the number showing up is approx 225, I need to re-think everything. (And my husband had to clear more acreage for parking cars - but we love this girl!) I have a large kitchen; double ovens, plus another apartment size kitchen. I have chaired large dinners at our church so I'm familiar with volume cooking; but I had the church facility to work in, and that church is 30 minutes away too!

Lisa, if you are willing to buy another freezer or rent/ borrow freezer space, I suggest you use the church kitchen for several days of cook and freeze prep between now and the first of July. Also, make foul weather plans- unlikely perhaps but...

And don't forget porta-potties.

Electric raosters, which hold about 60 people's worth of whatever are a very good serving situation for this size informal party.

Are you very attached to grilling? It uses a lot of time and energy at this size event- at least 2 people full time the whole time.

Since people are driving in from such distances they will be thirsty and possible hungry on arrival. You might consider opening a beverage table around 2:00 PM.

An appetizer table can be fully stocked at Costco, and should be ready to go as soon as the ceremony is over, for the hour while photos are done, etc. Just make sure it is visually clear that a meal follows so people don't wolf down the appetizers. Wonderful rolls/ breads, butters and cheeses are an option, here.

Take a look at the champagne lunch tab, this will give you some ideas.

Consider my Dijon Wedding chicken, which is freezable, as an entree option. Instead of grilling, how about baked or braised brisket, sliced, with sandwich makings available? With this many people, you need one meatless entree- how about a cheesy casserole, or a big mound of really good egg salad?

Baked rice such as pilaf, can be made in a roaster, much simpler than steamed. Or a baked potato bar. Two great veggies- we can get a frozen whole green bean medley with yellow and two green beans and carrots- lovely. Plus a baked corn side dish or squash casserole, or both. Two great green salads, one Ceasarish or Greek tendency and one tossed or slaw.

See the Nepalese potato salad recipe and the other potato salad recipes for some potato sald ideas. If you do use a commercial base, what they skimp on is eggs, diced celery and plenty of chopped fresh parsley. All these will help, as will mustard or chutney. If you make it yourself, pasta salad is easier to make and store.

Really good bread and rolls with honey butter, strawberry butter and cheese logs or balls, which can also be made ahead and frozen.

A big dessert table with 3-4 2-bite size sweets, cookies, bars or chocolate covered strawberries, 1 of each for everybody- yes in addition to the cake.

With this many people you need to set up your beverages, desserts, and appetizers separately, and the serving line should be 2 or 4 sided- 2 sides is several 6 foot tables with the same things on both sides. 4 sided, even longer with the meats in the middle, the same from each end to the middle and each side. People circulate like a big 4 leaf clover.

Do read the thread labeled "DIY brunch for 100" for some set up and appetzier ideas.

Yes, I've factored in the weather! We live along the mighty Columbia River in Washington State so rain and wind is always factored in. Tents are rented just in case. Haven't forgot those important Port-a-potties too. I do appreciate your insight to the guests needs as they arrive, the buffet table arrangement, and the menu. BBQ is out- thank you - and Chicken is in. Thank you again.

I have two full size freezers, along with two household size fridges and three smaller "dorm" size fridges. I'm thinking I may need another fridge for this. We roughed out the Buffet menu last night. My daughter insists on simple and not too many items, and doesn't see the need for any hot vegetable or starch other than main entree. I love the potato bar idea, but that is a bunch of work within 6 hours of wedding and I want all done a day in advance except throw it together or warm up. She wants healthy- lot of cut-up veggies instead. Isn't that on the appetizer table? here is our thought:
Salmon Spirals (Salmon/cheese base rolled up on Lasagna noodle, Pesto sauce over top.)
Your Dijon Wedding Chicken
Potato Salad
Greek Salad
Tossed Green Salad
Rolls/Butter as you suggested
Dessert table as you suggested

(I need to read your site for rule of thumbs on how many of each dish I need to prepare.)

I'm thinking individual bottled drinks (water, Crystal light, lemonade, etc) vs pitchers. Easier and saves us prep time and tubs to keep cranking out the fluids. Champagne will be served for a toast - that is the only alcoholic drink being served.

You can never have too much fridge space for this kind of event. Your menu looks good.

The baked potato bar is not a time eater- see the article- you might LOVE the bake and hold method using ice chests- or what about made ahead twice baked? If you don't have a hot veg or potato or rice, consider adding a pasta salad to the cold dishes.

Right now I'm scrambling to put together a High School Graduation BBQ June 7th for my youngest child. So, my goal is to have it prepared by 2:30 - keep warm until time to eat (When we return from ceremony around 6:00) I have a friend who will babysit the food, but I don't think this friend cooks much (don't wish to tap the experienced ladies from the church) so I must make it just a watch and put out when we all get here.

Do I need to increase any of the meat or cheese quantities? Should I also serve chips?

My second question is in regards to drinks. I have 2-5 gal drink containers one will be filled with non-alcoholic punch, the other with an alcoholic punch, both of which can be refilled if necessary. We will also have coffee, bottled water, wine, beer, and an open bar featuring mixed drinks(no blended). How do I determine the amount of soda/mixers for the bar when I am offering other drinks. currently we have 9-2 liter bottles of coke, 14 diet coke, 7 -7up, 2 diet 7up, 10 club soda, 2 collins, 2 tonic, 3 1/2 gal cranberry juice, and 2 1/2 gal orange juice. Is there some magic way to guess?

The meats are OK. I would add a big bowl of egg salad (put bowl in a bowl of ice to keep chilled), as it will cover your non-meat eaters. I might also put out a big bowl of swirled peanut butter and jam, since you indicate multo kids. I would definitely add chips, and dip; 6 pounds potato chips and about 3 quarts dip or salsa for 100 people.

Pasta salad is easier and faster to make than potato salad, so that is not a bad idea.

What kind of recipe would you use for the cold marinated salmon fillets? And I got a bit confused on the 100 Qty page with just how much salmon fillets I would need.

Other than that, I've got my master outline in the works - thanks to your site. Can't wait to give you the final report. We are cleaning up the old dingy w/sail to fill with ice for water bottles and pop. Any ideas where to go and buy ice in bulk??

For the salmon, I would aim for 3 ounces per person cooked in addition to the chicken portion, which means 1 pound raw fillet or steak for each 4 people. Poach it over water and green herbs, chill in light dressing.

Unless you do a sugarfree, the cheesecake is not a big improvement over the regular. Fruit and cheese is a good option. There are good sugar-free frozen apple pies. Or look at the baked apple recipe for quantity I have posted. See my favorite baking site for some splends/ sugar-free recipes:

baking911.com

Here is the baked rice recipe I use.:
www.ellenskitchen.com/recipebox/bakerice.html

Fruit tray, see the fruit tray page for amounts for 25 and increase to your party size.

There is a beverage planning page that covers punch, coffee and tea per 100.

I would go for 4-6 appetizers per person, as you will have about an hour between the service and the appearance of the bride and groom at the reception.

Reporting in on my Wedding Reception.
Day was hot: 90° with light wind.
Outdoor Wedding at 3:30 - had 40 RVSP'd No Shows and I factored in 15 servings more than responded "just in case" so we had food left over.

Dingy filled with water/soda was huge success.
Chafers for hot; iced salad bar for cold food
What we served:
Your delicious Wedding Chicken.
Your Rice Pilaf. Very Popular, almost ran out.
Greek Salad Recipe from your site. Fantastic color ,flavor and easy to make up to 3 days ahead.
Potato salad: Costco purchased & beefed up each tub w/ 6 hard-boiled eggs, 1/2 cup mayo,1/4 whipped cream, pickles, celery and radishes. 2 hard-boiled eggs for garnish. Yummy.
Shrimp/Pea Salad made with Smoked Gouda Cheese.
Smoked Columbia River Salmon with herb dipping sauce. HUGE hit.
Wedding Cake & Speciality Cakes- Choc Mocha, Choc. Mint, White Choc; German Choc
Homemade cookies as you suggested (All eaten)
Strawberry Lemonade
Decaf Coffee (yes..some did drink it w/dessert)
Appetizers:
Mini Muffins (popular)
Spinach dip w/sourdough bread (Very Popular)
Veggie Tray: (always needed, yet not alot taken)

As you recommended:
Used (2) buffet tables for (4) lines - made serving food quick and comfortable for guests.

Lots of ice: used (30)17# sacks of ice between salad bar coolers, and the dingy.

Bought neighbor girls matching shirts and my "helper coordinator" friend happened to wear a coordinating dress. Very nice touch.

Unplanned challenges:
Woman delivered cake and set it up 11am. The heat had the tiers sliding off. Quickly cleared champagne out of extra fridge took out shelves and put it in. Problem was I did it on the fly and being the Mother of Bride - I got into the photo happenings soon after. Realized no cake on display while eating and went and grabbed it in time for photos. Whew.

One woman from my church came down w/shingles leaving one to come and handle the day by herself. Very experienced, but a few hiccups with communication. I luckily checked the food before telling my daughter to start the food line realized chicken was not throughly cooked. Another half hour, and I found one oven accidentally turned off. Cranked the temp up and spent too much time going back and forth checking on it. Yet, most folks didn't even realize the delay- they were happy visiting in the shade with appetizers and music. Turned out good thing as it set a slower pace for the event since the ceremony was pretty short.

All-in-all a beautiful event with delicous food that most thought was professionally catered. Wedding Chicken is still being pulled from the freezer and cooked. I think it is more delicous than ever!

What I do differently:
• Really look at the size of chicken breasts before putting in my order. I receved such large chicken breasts that one easily made to servings, plus the tender.
• Figure out a better way to gauge how much of each dish to make. Sure don't need full servings for three salads for all attending. i.e. 150 people: 3 salads made for 90 servings? Didn't have this figured out well and had way too much salad left over.
• Make sure communication with kitchen help day of is extremely clear and most importantly - followed. (I did have a sign taped to oven saying PREHEAT to 400° with the instructions on when to put in oven, etc. Help choose to use their judgement over my sign and chicken wasn't done, nor was it ck'd with temp gauge. Divine intervention though - timing of dinner was better being a bit later. I had it planned: ceremony and go through line. Way too fast.

What worked well: Our process for making volume Wedding Chicken in our home kitchen.
FIRST STEP: Four stations (All areas prepared with proper tools and washed down w/bleach water before starting): Butcher (cut the chicken breasts in half, cut off tenderloin.) Coating (dredge the pieces in seasoned flour.) Browner (cook the pieces in skillets) Cool down and Packer: (Placed browned pieces on large cooling racks w/brown paper bags underneath. From there to cookie sheet -put into freezer for quick cool down. Transfer to Zip lock bags and put in another freezer. Rotate bags every two hours so all get cooled down quickly. SECOND STEP/DAY: Made one batch of sauce: Using a shallow chafing size alum pain inside a deeper alum pan w/lots of ice water to cool sauce quickly. We then figured out that 3 zip lock bags was a batch of chicken, so we measured sauce and divided by 3 and added cooled down portion (1 1/3 cup) to each bag. Then made batches x 6, and cooled. While one batch was cooling, cooked another batch when that one done, Filled bags with cooled batch (getting in and out of freezer as needed) and started process all over again.

Used a lot of ice for quick cool downs - i.e. hard-boiled eggs in ice water for 1/2 hour while boiling up another batch. (Have an extra one in each batch to make sure done. Only put single layer of eggs in largest pot you have helps keep the consistency of all being hard-boiled. So they went back into fridge very cold after being cooked. When you make a lot, home fridges just can't handle getting things cold fast.. have to help it out before the cooked food goes back in.

Best advice I can share on doing something like this when you are a main player in the event. Keep the menu(s) tasty, yet very simple and make as much ahead and use this site! Choose what to make and what can be faked into a great dish. We saved so much time purchasing the Potato Salad and just beefing it up.(And I believe the ready-made salad & extra stuff to beef up actually was cheaper than buying all raw ingredients!) We had 15 show up three days in advance and I had to let go of my typical routine of cooking all from scratch. Not for this! I ordered LOTS of Apple Fritters/Maple Bars from a local bakery, bought a #10 can of peaches and mandarin oranges, Jimmy Dean Breakfast Turkey Sausages and scrambled eggs each day for breakfast. Easy way to fed 15 within 20 minutes start to finish with little clean up. Thought of ways to save time/energy for the other two meals of the day also using recipes from your site. And day of event: Pre-order and have someone pick up lunch if afternoon/evening event. Don't even try to open the fridge for anything! We did a popular-chain Sub shop and our church friend brought 2 dozen deviled eggs. All a huge hit on when all were walking fast to do last minute set-ups; they could grab and go and come back by!

And use bleach water to keep all surfaces as clean as possible. Yes, I ruined more than one shirt, but no one has ever got sick from anything I'm made!

I would be interested to know how many you actually served and what your quantities were. if you get around to it.

Classic Greek Village Salad OR Horiatiki Salata

Serves about 130 as part of a salad selection, about 100 as main side salad, about 75 as a main dish

Normally, the amount in the first part is for 1 person, it is a plateful. Since you have other salads, and it is basically a side salad, I have multiplied out for you, giving amounts in parentheses for your shopping list.

3 ounces cucumber (15 pounds)
3 ounces ripe tomatoes (15 pounds)
2 ounces feta cheese, crumbled or cubed (10 pounds)
1 ounce bell pepper (5 pounds)
1 ounce red onion rings (5 pounds)
1 ounce olives (about 10) PITTED for party purposes (5 pounds)

Simple Dressing (Lisa used the one below)
1 ounce olive oil (use at least half real olive oil, please) (5 pints or 10 cups)
1 tablespoon lemon juice (5 cups)
oregano, garlic, etc to taste (your recipe looks fine, just do upgrade to olive oil)
OPTIONAL sprinkling of capers
few artichoke hearts
spoonful of garbanzo beans
sweet banana pepper rings or pepperoncini or roasted peppers
If I were adding celery, I would add about the same weight as onions.

Most often made without lettuce, but if lettuce is used, you use romaine. If using lettuce, add and toss just before serving.

Lisa's Grek Salad dressing dressing

Dressing:
15 Cups Salad Oil (please use at least 1/2 olive oil)
7½ Cups lemon juice or Vinegar
10 Cups finely chopped onion
10 Tsp. Salt
10 Tsp. Minced Garlic
20 Tsp Crushed Peppercorns
10 Tsp. Rosemary leaves
10 Tsp. Basil Leaves, dried, OR 1/2 cup fresh chopped
10 Tsp. Oregano Leave

p.s.. Around here people laugh at mini-keish and kind of half-heartedly attempt them.

Yes, you can substitute cold cuts for sure, you want 8-10 pounds thin deli sliced for 20.