Wedding Reception for 75 guests
Jana
06/03/09 		Hi Ellen,

I am planning for my wedding reception in September. We are planning an informal buffet-style dinner with the following foods and I would be very grateful if you would double check the figures I've come up with for food quantities. Also, any advice or suggestions you have to offer would be great.

Ham - 38 lbs
Rolls - 150
Chicken Salad - 5 gallons
Fruit - 5 lbs
Veggies - 5 lbs
Cheese cubes - 5 lbs
Sweet Tea - 6 gallons
Soda - 150 cans
Ice - 75 lbs

Our ceremony will be held outdoors and I would like to have bottled water available for the guests as well as having it available to them with dinner. I'm not sure, with the other drinks we'll have, how much water to plan on.

Also, we'll have pictures taken between the ceremony and reception, and I thought about having the fruit, cheese, and veggies out for the guests to snack on until we can get inside. Do I need to purchase more to do this, or is it safe to figure that those who munch on them prior to dinner probably won't have them with dinner also?

Jana
06/03/09 		I forgot to mention that the ceremony will begin at 6:00pm and the reception will begin around 6:30pm.
ellen
06/04/09 		Because the service is at 6, people will not eat before they come and they will be hungry.

Yes to the nibble table. You need to add a starchy salad (pasta is easier than potato and hold better), and some greens to go under the chicken salad. I would make 4-5 pounds of dry pasta as the salad base and 2/3 the amount of greens for 100 for this group.

If this is a mixed age group, I would do a dinner service of coffee with the cake, use about 1/2 the amount for 100 from the beverage planning page.

You have plenty of meat, in fact 4 gallons chicken salad is probably sufficient with that much ham.