party for sixteen 5/6 year olds - worrying now about quantity of food... advice please!

[loomer]

Am doing my DD's 6th birthday party tomorrow, and having decided to keep the food simple I'm now worried that I've under-catered somewhat...

Party is from 3-5pm, intending to feed them around 4pm, and assuming that most kids will have been fed 'properly' at lunchtime, so only a light tea needed? In my experience they tend to hoover up all the crisps/crap and then need persuading to eat some sandwiches, so I am planning on not much crap and mostly 'normal' food:
3 platters of sandwiches (ham, cheese & marmite), allowing 4 'quarter' sandwiches per child, so in theory they can have a round each
'cocktail' sausages - enough for at least 2 per child
Quorn 'scotch' eggs - enough for 2 per child
bowls of cherry toms and cucumber
bowls of grapes
twiglets and hula hoops

Then the birthday cake will be pudding. Do you think that's a bit of a bah-humbug spread? Should I put out some more fun/crap stuff? And have I allowed enough food overall?

Bumping for the evening crowd

In my experience they'll eat two of the quarter sandwiches, a handful of crisps, a couple of sausages and then cake so what you've planned on sounds fine. They're not that bothered about the food side of things and if their parents want to give them something else then there's plenty of time before bed.

Yeah, I'd say that was probably an alright sort of amount. Just in case, make sure you have a few extra bits if they hoover that lot up.. Perhaps some mini jaffa cakes/jammie dodgers or something to put out after they've eaten the main stuff. And if they don't need the biscuits it will be no great hardship for you

Good luck.....

Your plan sounds great, loomer. As Virgil says, they will eat less, but it's a party and it should be generous. It's not as if the food is either expensive or can't be saved and served later.

We did DD's 6th party for 17 children today, the food was already in bags, (catering was done by the venue) 4 quarters of sandwiches each, one sausage, one tomato, a couple of carrot/cucumber sticks, a lollipop, some Haribos, pack of Pombears each and then cake to take home. This was more than enough, they all left quite a bit. When I've catered myself I've found sausages all tend to get gobbled up no matter how many you put out.

I would not rely on cake for the sweet though, by the time they have eaten the other stuff, sung Happy Birthday etc and you have cut up the cake they will all have got down from the tables in all likelihood, so I usually clear the savoury stuff (if catering myself) and put out some plates of iced rings and chocolate fingers, then take cake home.

sounds about right but I think you will be better plating up prior to party as most kids will grab in handfulls so will end up with 6 sausages etc and eat 1.

last couple of partys dd has been to there where pre preped lunch boxes they seemed to save a lot of money and cleaning up.

I think you need something sweet on the table tbh, what about party rings and a choc biscuit.