What is your default tea when your little ones have friends round?

[franch]

I'm talking preschoolers here, and the occasional 8yo cousin - so far the most popular have been spag bol; shepherd's pie; mini pizzas; marinated chicken drumsticks. None of these are universally popular though.

Oh and I always have Pizza Express marguerita pizzas in the freezer just in case.

Veg are so tricky, I usually do raw - carrot sticks, cucumber, cherry tomatoes.

Followed by fruit and I usually manage some kind of home made cake or biscuits.

Just wondered if anyone had any magic foolproof formula that works time after time - I keep thinking I've hit it, then the next kid hates it ...

sausauge & mash (good sausages though - high % meat...) with peas,carrots & gravy

followed by fruit & ice cream

Sausages, roast chicken joints, pasta and (jarred) pesto/cheese. Tried homemade pizza once and they added the toppings - what a long drawn out cleaning up session that was!

Peas, sweetcorn, carrots etc

Banana split (raisins, dried apricots and sauce on top)

blimey Enid do you regularly do 4 courses for guests? [inferiority complex]

yes its all easy

they eat loads of veg and fruit and then I dont feel bad about the frankfurter

oh actually on monday I did cheese and crackers as well

honest

Cowboy pie always goes down well here:

Cut good sausages (1 per child) into chunks and cook in dish in oven, when cooked add tin of baked beans (1 per 2 children), stir, and top with mashed potato. Put back in oven for 15-20 mins. Clean plates every time.

Why does everyone feel the need to put "good" before sausages?

Thanks for the advice re; sticking to what we normally serve. However, I gave them both GS's current favourite for tea last time I had the little 'un came (pasta), made a nice tomato based sauce with lots of veggies in it, and processed it because the other one said he doesn't like lumps... didn't eat a thing. Then his mum called and complained because he was hungry when he went home and she had to feed him. Perhaps its just me, but I did think she had a cheek (and told her so ... nicely of course ).

This time of year I usually do my own version of shepherds pie which is mince as normal with carrots, sweetcorn, peas etc and for the topping I do sweet potato and parsnip mash and finish off with a cheese layer on top.
So far, I've only ever had clean plates but no doubt I've tempted fate now and when i do it next week for DS's play date it'll be a different story.

Fishfingers and chips, and I ask the guest what of a selection of veg (that my child likes) they would like.

jacket potatoes with cheese
corn on the cob
Broccolli
fruit for dessert

Fab response everyone ........

breads/grissini
carrot/celery/cucumber/beetroot/avocado/tomatoes/pepper & houmus

pesto pasta
or roasted vegetable pasta
bowl of grated cheese to sprinkle

fruit plate
yoghurt & honey
piece of homemade cake or a biscuit

fishfingers and thick homemade chips with loads of bread and 'best' butter.
mmmm lovely

Depends on the child really.

Seems to revolve around rice or pasta and veg with quorn nuggets (I have never met a child that realises that a Quorn nugget is not a chicken nugget :hmm ) or fishfingers.

Most kids seem to like spag bol even though my DS doesn't so I give him pasta with cheese on and veg and they have spag bol.

We don't normally have desserts here so they get ice cream as a treat

Last time my DS had a friend over, DD gave everyone french fancies and chocolate slices and chocolate buttons with pink milk when I was upstairs with my baby!

Your DD is a girl after my own heart WCL

Thanks all

i nominate krabbiepatty's pavlova as the best playdate pudding ever .

last week served up left over cauliflower cheese mixed with mushrooms and tomatoes chopped up into microscopic pieces to avoid detection by the 'vegaphobes' stir in some pasta, sprinkle on grated cheese and bake until it looks reasonably edible....

The next day mum of guest said ds really liked his tea and asked her to get the recipe

Am now feeling quite smug but, would like to add that my cheese sauce is legendary

Ooohhh. Jellybrain, I know what you mean about chopping veg into microscopic pieces. Argh. Sometimes I puree all the veg so no trace of texture remains (apart from the velvety puree ). Then it is eaten. Just. ARGH!
Could you post the legendary cheese sauce recipe, pretty please?

hoxton - link pleeeease!!!

Recipes please!:

hoxtonchick: krabbiepatty's pavlova

quintessentialshadow: sweet & sour chicken + chicken schnitzels

shrooms: mild veggie curry

Many thanks .......

Sausage, mash, onion gravy and a couple of vegetables

Chicken stir fry (trick is to add stock back to pan when noodles are in)

Fishfingers, new potatoes and couple of veg if kids is fussy (sooooo annoying)

pudding is plate of different fruits or yogurt

am definitely going to do the DIY sundae idea - but only when have a non fuss-arse round for tea - not wasting it on one of those!

oh, and always pink or chocolate milk and a biscuit when they get in from school
)

tea faves would be macaroni cheese (I usually do with bacon and muchrooms and allow them to pick the bits out if need be!)

or pasta with bolognese (and if they really don't like bolognese they can just have it with cheese) served with salad - I tend to chop carrots, cucumber, peppers etc and keep them separate. might have dips too.

ds recently had pasta and meatballs and pizza express doughballs on a play date and was very impressed!

or I might do sausages/fishfingers (sometimes do option or some of each) with potatoes and peas/sweetcorn/carrots (again might give choice before cooking)

the other thing I've done is baked potatoes and had options of cheese, beans, coleslaw, tuna

thankfully ds is having friends back for lunch mostly at the moment so that's easy. We have soup or french bread or beans on toast or sandwiches.

Homemade pizza. I make the dough and the sauce. I give them all two lumps of dough, a small one for garlic bread, a larger one for pizza, they make doughballs or garlic bread (in some weird shapes) out of the small ball of dough and I wap those all in the oven, then they roll out their pizza (more weird shapes) and they spread spoonfulls of the tomato sauce on top and top with prechopped ham, mushrooms, peppers, onions, salami, and cubes of mozarella - they choose. By the time their pizzas are ready to go in the oven, their garlic breads are ready to come out of the oven and sludge with garlic butter (a quick wipe of the table before they all sit down with their garlic bread). It is very very popular with my children and their friends.