That a grazing table will end up looking a bit shit?

[Lollypollydolly]

Looking for catering for a party, will be children and adults and all I keep being offered are grazing tables/platters. Having not experienced one first hand I'm worried that though it will start looking beautiful once the guests start digging in it will look a mess and maybe bit unsanitary?

YABU - they look fab and stay looking fabulous (if a little disheveled by the end of the party)

YANBU - Wasteful fad crawling with germs, find an old style caterer.

I mean, it could obviously be done very nicely...But it never is.

They’re bloody awful….I had a couple of friends round for a celebration a while ago “don’t worry about food-we’ll bring it”…never been so disappointed in my life!

They're so popular at the moment but I think they look quite off putting. Particularly ones where savoury and sweet items are next to each other.

I'd probably ask your potential caterers for a picture so that you can see what they are offering. I can't see most standard caterers offering what's coming up on a Google search for reasons if allergy/cross contamination etc. I think it will likely end up being a daft word for a buffet.

The grazing platters might be a way of getting everything on offer on 1 plate so that it can be put on different tables - to reduce the number of people digging in to each plate as would happen with a buffet?

I wouldn't eat from a grazing table but I'd probably eat from a well prepared buffet.

Less of a covid thing and more of a people are gross in general thing. Plus my stomach heaves slightly at how much unnecessary handling the food has had on a grazing table just to look instagrammable.

The issue with these grazing tables is everything is so close together it hard not to knock it all around ie you're trying to cut some cheese which is piled up with dried fruit and there's nowhere to knock it off to.

Also if everything is one one table you are all squashed around it, rather than spread out over 3 tables where it's easier to move along on a line.

Do platters but not all piled up and squashed together. So you can have some charcuterie with a couple of grapes thrown on for effect, then on separate trays cheese with some fruit to garnish. Then a fruit board or two. With some space in between them all etc.

We've recently had a grazing box which is the same idea but everything is contained in a cardboard box.

It looked great when we first opened it...very insta-worthy.

Useless in practice. All the stuff was mishmashed...I had cream cheese on hard cheese, chutney I wasn't keen on was scattered all over so it was on some things I otherwise would have eaten etc.

I'm not someone who doesn't like their food to touch, but it was more that I couldn't chose what I wanted and ended up stuck with some of everything whether I liked it or not.

Also it looked a right state about half way through. If you've ever seen a scraps bin in a restaurant or pub....it looked like that,

Buffets always worked for me in the past

A grazing table is not a cheese board @Wroxie

I like a shared charcuterie plate or a cheeseboard.

A friend had a grazing table at her birthday - and for 12 people - no kids - it was lovely - like a massive cheeseboard with added loveliness.

For any more than that, kids or whoever - I definitely want bowls of separate things - tongs and big serving spoons....

@Wroxie that is such an accurate picture you've painted there .

There are certain friends we avoid going for tapas with as the bloke dives in and piles his plate up, oblivious to the fact that there's now not enough meatballs/prawns to go round.

@Wroxie

Charcuterie and cheese boards with bits of other savoury things and fruit (AKA a "grazing board) have been around forever but I've found that British people just don't know what to do with them. They are either terrified of being served food that isn't pre-portioned and/or some variation of a sausage roll or vol-au-vent and they just sort of stand back looking bemused, or they just dive in like they were raised by wolves and take the whole point of a piece of cheese leaving the rind for everyone else or they take a whole baguette and half the butter leaving everyone else to eat their meat and cheese naked. More trouble than it's worth really.

A grazing board is NOT the same as a traditional French charcuterie or cheese board. Have a google.

In a traditional board there is space around the foods so no cross-contamination (e.g. you don't end up with Roquefort all over your goat's cheese) and room for people to slice off their portion. And you don't put the charcuterie and cheese all over each other on the same board.

A grazing table is like taking your cheese board and charcuterie board and baguette and fruit bowl, chopping up everything and throwing it all together. It's hideous.

I love the look of them when it's first laid out, but it would look a mess very quickly ... and post covid it's not a great idea.

It's such a relief to read this thread. They are grim.

They look grim. I'm in a food group on FB and people keep posting photos of them or suggesting them to people hosting parties, I just don't get it. Even if you use serving utensils everything is touching and picking up flavours from other things and will get dislodged and messy as soon as something is taken. As for allergens, it must be a nightmare.

Gross- people dig in with their hands, lick their fingers, food gets dropped all around, all ends up like a pigs trough.

Too many people not washing their hands and touching everything. Like many things it looks great on Instagram, but in reality it is not as it seems.

Just seen @Wroxie’s comment.

What kind of people do you associate with that they don’t know what to do with a cheese and/or charcuterie board?

A ‘grazing table/box/tray’ is a completely different thing. Inelegant, unsophisticated; just horrible.

A bit like feeding a row of pigs in a trough.

Hmm...it seems to look like a selection of cheeses, breads, meats, crackers etc so different in content from a traditional buffet. Like a bigger selection of cheese and charcuterie boards.

I'm not sure how it's less hygienic than a buffet with plates? people can touch the food on either? or why it looks more messy than a buffet with half empty plates.

It's a more 'rustic' looking spread with more limited content.

For me it would depend on the occasion.
If people need a meal a more traditional buffet.
If you want nibbles (or grazing I guess) this would work.

No-one with allergies will thank you for going along with this fad. Even aside from allergies, as a vegetarian I don't want to eat food that been touching meat etc.

A cheese board or charcuterie board, fine. But everything else? Just no.

If there was anything that was style over substance, this is it!

@Wroxie the weirdos you know are not representative of "British people"

Buffets are already gross when there are kids there because you always see them coughing all over the food and touching stuff and putting it back. I can only imagine how much more gross a grazing platter would be

I really don't like the idea of them and because all the food types are jumbled up I think it would cause log-jams with the guests as people try to navigate it all to make sure they get the things they like.

I am not really a big fan of buffets either, but would far prefer a buffet than a grazing table