Help please with food / drink ideas for christening barbecue

[lilyloo]

Any ideas greatfully recieved
What to cook ?
How much food to buy ?
Drinks to serve ?
Roughly 35 adults , 15 dc's

Right ordered 40 burgers/sausages and chicken pieces from butchers.
Think my numbers have gone up to about 45 adults now.

Anyone ?

Big bowls of salad/rice salad/pasta salad

vegetarian alternative

Baked potatoes/cold potato salad

nice cheeses and nice bread

Drinks - wine, beer and soft drinks

Skewers of stuff are good for bbq's. Skewers of prawns/ skewers of chicken/ skewers of halloumi and veg. they take a lot of prep but are easy to serve.

Filled butternuts are great. Half, empty seeds, fill with rice herbs and cheese, pop back together, cover with foil and then pop on coals.

Potatoes - with some hollowed out and filled with garlic cream cheese and cover in foil on coals.

Sweetcorn again oiled with chillis and cooked.

I am great with sides, but not so good with mains.

Oh Drinks

Punch/pimms fab, can be made before you go with all the fruit etc

or

cream de casis and sparkley wine

breadsticks always work. i love grazing on breadsticks.

haven't even thought of the veggies good idea on the skewers for them though.

What do i put in cold potato salad other than the potato ?

Whats the ratio of drinks per person ?
Was just going to stick to wine / beer.

Themadhouse i thought of punch but didn't want anything too messy/fiddly before as i have 3 dc's to get ready.
If youy got quick easy one let me know

Thought of jackets too but like the idea of filling them! Do you think they could be left in the oven whilst we at the service though ?

Breadsticks fab like easy!

YEs, just bung the potatoes in the oven and leave em

Just serve whole/halved with a hunk of butter next to them and a knife, people can help themselves so you're not faffing about

Pot salad, mayo, chives and potatos

Or potatoes chilli and oil

It is best to slightly crush the pots and dress whilst slightly warm, then cool and leave in the fridge.

Punch - TBH I use a cheep bottle of sangrea from alsi and cheepest sparly wine just add loads of fruit, cool the bottles, chop all the fruit, leave fruit and sangeria in the bowl and add wine on return. I have great memories of punch at family parties. Tended to be whatever spirits parents had in with vermouth and then sparkling wine

Leave jackets in the oven and agree with Mamma G on the butter, same with french sticks.

As an ex veggie - I hated veg kebabs with a vengence - never cooked enough. Much better to have large flat mushrooms you could cook instead of a burger and some really nice sliced cheese on

Thanks ladies
Was going to pick up my salad from aldi so will try the punch idea.

Having done similar thing before it is blummin hard work catering for that many people so try and keep it simple and get everyone to help. IMHO, dishes that can be done in advance and a few big dishes of one thing rather than lots of different things. A big couscous, coleslaw, bowl of new potatoes and a green salad should do it. Meat is easy but ask male friends to take a turn on the bbq, otherwise someone (usually the DH) gets very hot! Skewers for 45 people will take a long time to prepare.

Ask other people to bring something. People will be happy to bring the puddings for example, then you dont have to worry about that. I would say dont do nice cheese because it works out really expensive for a lot of people. Also easier to stick to beer and wine - get from Majestic on sale or return. A bottle per person (we usually do two with our friends tho!)

Hope you have a great time.

I think the reality is hitting now and i am wondering what i have done esp as the weather forecast isn't that great!

We have just "done" DS2 and had similar numbers. I cheated though and got a caterer to do the main food - cous cous and roasted veg salad, bean salad, large veggie quiche, chicken with pesto, cherry toms and green beans (like coronation chicken but different iyswim) and half a side of salmon. All looked very easy and could all be prepared in advance.
We then had a chocolate christening cake (white icing though!) which we served as pudding with summer fruits and cream.
For the kids, it depends on their ages, but ours were nearly 8 to 6 months. I got individual party boxes and did picnic food for them - sandwiches, carton of juice, box of raisons, couple of cocktail sausages, bag of mini stars. They all loved it!
Drinks-wise we did Pimms and Champagne. My lovely mum did all the prep for the Pimms before we left for the church.
Good luck and I will keep my fingers crossed for the weather!

A caterer sounds like a good idea now
I can and will get through this

Lilyloo, you can do it! Dont be afraid to ask everyone to pitch in, it makes a big difference.