Do people expect food after dinner at wedding?

[Budka]

Ceremony is at 1:45 pm. We are serving very filling canapés and cocktails at 3:30pm and dinner at 5:30pm. There will be the actual cake, a homemade cake table, hydration station and a snack table. The wedding ends at midnight. The meal itself is A LOT, we are doing a sit down buffet (think Las Vegas buffet).

I've seen trends where a pizza/burger van turns up as guests are leaving.

Would you as a guest expect more food after dinner?

I personally wouldn’t. I do feel people get weird at weddings re good where they almost expect to be fed and watered on the hour, every hour. But in everyday life you would probably be happy with eating far less (I do appreciate dancing, drinking causes hunger).

But would you expect to be given more food after dinner and cake?

My sister thinks we should order a load of pizza to send people away with.

i dunno i find the idea a bit ott. We are serving a lot of food. People are not those bottomless pits! But I obviously wouldn’t want people to actually be hungry.

Traditionally there is usually something to eat in the evening. It used to be pie and peas!

I don’t think I’ve ever been to a wedding where they haven’t served late night snacks. Seen everything from hog roast to pasties. We did a lush sit down meal and then cheese and crackers, nibbles and chips during the bands half time break.

Iv never been to one wedding where they didnt serve food in the evening. Id be starving by 9pm and probably want to leave to get food. Its your wedding OP, have whatever you want. But your guests are there for a full day and id be gutted if I knew half my guests were hungry in the evening. Its not much added cost to have a pizza van for an hour or two. We had similar timings to you, including canapés between ceremony and meal, our evening buffet was still absolutely demolished.

Sounds like if you have the snack table out for the evening then That’s plenty of food, no need for another food truck at all

Definitely this. That's the thing I regret most, a big chunk of 'canape time' was spent doing photos, group ones take forever as 1 person needed is at the bar/in the toilet/ having a fag/who knows where and they took so much longer than I expected and would have much preferred more time with my guests. My favourite photos are the non staged ones.

The issue is the buffet
If it's help yourself the first half of the guests go up, gake far too much & the second half have hardly anything.
If it's a served buffet
Eg chicken or beef, veg served, one desert of choice per person (not one portion of each desert on offer)
Then it will be more equal and not much else required

My son wasn't going to do the "second supper". I gifted it to him. He was very glad I did. Basically cheese boards, cold cuts, pickles, bread rolls. Served around 10pm.

His friends still talk about his wedding (even if the marriage only lasted six months). He paid for the sit down dinner. We paid for the drinks after the receiving line and wines with the meal and by 8pm, we realized we'd over bought and basically told the Barman that win was to be given to anyone who wanted it. The second supper was useful to soak up the alcohol, lol.

Military wedding and not sure how much would be consumed. It's a bit of a regional thing here to have a dollar bar. Where the family supplies the alcohol and Barman and he charges a $/drink. Basically it cuts down on excessive drinking.

Canapés are too late and too close to the main meal. Should be straight after the ceremony, why the gap?

Yes people will need to eat again late evening. Always better to over cater for guests than under cater.

I agree Jellycatspyjamas. I'm also in Scotland and for every wedding I have worked at there was always a "Second Tea" consisting of sandwiches, tea/coffee and wedding cake later in the evening after a sit down dinner. Nowadays it's often bacon rolls, pizza etc. Was always considered "tight" not to provide food later in the evening and it would be considered to be very rude not to!

In the run up to our wedding, DH and I were guests at a friend’s wedding. We knew each other only (me and DH I mean) and I knew the bride - not even her husband.

It was a long day tbh, despite both being very sociable and being in a stately home we could explore, and this experience was tremendously helpful when planning our wedding and timings etc. We considered the experience of our guests who would know few if any other people.

Sounds like you’ve got a lot on though so that’ll definitely help with waits.

The buffet is being brought to each table

Canapés are pretty much straight after the ceremony. The timings allow for transportation between church and reception (4 miles apart). We’ve given ourselves a bit of a buffer for Saturday London traffic. Guests will travel via red bus

We have entertainment for the bus.

How many canopies each guest are being catered?

Will people want guided tours, lawn games?

You’ve obviously put a lot of thought and money into your wedding. Just to be on the safe side I would do something extra for 9.45 / 10pm. Pizza van, bacon rolls or whatever just to keep the momentum up and people happy.

There are lots on this thread who are saying they would be hungry again
later and with drink flowing it’s always a good idea to

"There will be very filling canapés, drinks, cocktails, guided tours of the venue, lawn games"

The thing being, (as I think someone else said earlier in the thread) I don't wear the sort of shoes I'd wear to a wedding that often, so the idea of then having to play 'lawn games' or go on a tour round a venue in them, would fill me with dread.

I long for a return to the days when there was a ceremony, then an hour or so where people could take photos, chat, and mingle, then a drink as you arrive at the Reception and then the meal. It seems bizarre to me that couples arrange big gaps in the day, then try and find ways to fill them. Why not just start later, and not have the big gaps ?

People will often have late 2nd food in two circumstances:

If the wedding is early and the reception meal is more a late-lunch than dinner - eg 10am ceremony, 3pm sit-down meal and people start getting peckish again by 9:30

If you have separate evening guests arriving after the sit down meal just for the later parts of the party - it would be rude not to feed them at all.

With a 5:30 meal you can get away with no 2nd serving of food if you don't have any evening-only invitees

Then for people like you they can sit and enjoy a free glass of champagne in the sun with mates and nosh 🤷‍♀️

The tour thing is totally optional

Yes, people will be hungry because they've been drinking, and as others have pointed out it's not a normal day it's a party.

I work in the industry
1.45pm ceremony means people generally will be there early, having travelled and will miss lunch. Then have to wait for canapés.
why the gap between ceremony and drinks at 3.30pm? Are you travelling from a church or such?
I've never seen a filling canapé and people won’t necessarily eat their allocation.
IMHO your guests will be tipsy at best by 5.30pm, I’d be advising ceremony ends 2.15pm and if no travel, go straight into canapés/drinks for 90 mins, then dinner at 3.45pm and your sister is right, more food 9/10pm

please tell me what big gap is in my wedding? We are allowing for London traffic so have put in a buffer. We are transporting guests via a red bus from the church to the venue - roughly 4 miles apart in Central London.

Google will tell you the average drinks reception in the UK is 90 mins to two hours.

During the drinks reception we will have plenty of food (6 bulky canapés each) and free drinks. Plus entertainment, games and a tour. If people want. If not, they can sit back and relax. Plus a steel drums performance. Husband is half Jamaican.

Who wants to rush straight into a sit down meal?

The canapés are fusion food - so think jerk chicken lollipops, mini beef patties, salt fish fritters etc. We are not talking blinis

Your guests who have travelled across London missing lunch will be chomping at the bit for dinner! I work in the industry, but you sound like you know your guests and what’s best.

Example of canapés

How will they be hungry again at 9 when dinner won't finish till 7 and there's cake after and a snack table?
Do you eat nine times a day or something?