ideas please ........

[bigTillyMint]

.....for party food for a 40th that doesn't require work while the party is on, as I intend to relax, have a few drinks and enjoy myself!

Big pot of chilli, one meat, one veg, french bread, perhaps some rice?

We had bread, meat, pasta salad, potato salad, cheese board with a variety of crackers, sausage rolls, breadsticks, tortilla chips, humus, nice pickles and mustards, chicken pieces, savoury rice, coleslaw, savoury eggs and mroe for the reception of DS's baptism alst weekend.

Along with wine, beer, bitter and pimms. The pimms went down a treat.

Round up all your friends slow cookers. Do a chilli in one, curry in another and rice in another. Jacket spuds in the oven, job done!

Pavlov, how much chilli did you make? We hope to have about 40 guests....

Also, did you keep it hot all night, or just heat it up at a certain time? Presume it was easy enough to eat on a paper(?) plate with a fork?

Maureen, I don't know anyone with a slow cooker

I always make this for lots of people. It tastes the best when cooked the night before which is why it is good for large groups of people, you can leave it to rest overnight, and then reheat when you need to.

Its hard to say how much for 40 - I never cooked it for that many! But a lot I would think, would be a good idea to find out how many veggies there might be and cook proportionately to that....but it is fine on paper plates, or you could use paper bowls, and fine with a fork, can use bread to help mop it up.

You can do rice, or you can skip the rice, and have lots of cheese, tortilla chips and soured cream for people to put on top as they wish.