bday party for 35 kids - efficient food?

[worriednow1]

I hired venue and an entertainer, what shall I buy ( Tesco food)? for kids and parents please? Thank you

Depending on venue..Cheapest I did was hot dogs and cobs with crisps and cakes for pudding.

I am not one for a pile of salad to be binned.

Other than that I have cooked value nuggets, Garlic bread ...

My standard has been

• sandwiches ham/cheese/jam
• cocktail sausages
• carrot/cucumber/red pepper/celery sticks
• crisps or hoola-hoops (individual packs is good), cheese puffs

• party rings
• strawberries
• jelly

• cake

But I've never done anything like 35 children.

(In my experience some children are very greedy and will happily take handfuls of sausages they then don't eat, leaving none left for the others.)

With that number I would consider going with boxes - so a sandwich or roll (cheese or ham), a small pot of crisps/hula hoops, sausage roll or cocktail sausage or two and a fairy cake in each box (plus token cucumber sticks/cherry tomatoes/grapes), a couple of plates of nibbles for parents, and you're done.

One caution - what stage of primary? They seem to go from eating almost nothing at parties to being a ravening hoard somewhere around 8.

For DS's birthday (8) which we had a large indoor play centre, I wanted something easy so I did hotdogs (vegetarian hot dog sausages)
I kept them warm by taking along a couple of slow cookers and just putting all of the sausages in them.
I also put out some big bowels of crisps, little bags of pre preped fruit (the ones from asda) and cupcakes.
We also took a few emergancy cheese sandwiches incase someone didn't like hotdogs.

It went down really well and all of the children were happy with it.

Fish and chips?

where do i get boxes?

ebay

I did a party for 65 (twins in different classes).

I used the boxes...

half a ham/cheese roll
bag of pom bears
individually wrapped choc roll
sausage roll and small sausages
napkin

I put plates of cut fresh fruit and veg on tables plus jugs of juice and water.

For dessert we did ice cream cones with a choice of vanilla, chocolate and strawberry. These went down very well.

drinks - is it better jars of squash or cartoon juices?

food for boxes...do i buy in tesco?

mini cheeses
mini sausages
chrisps/hoola hoops
prezels
cake
drink cartons

For drinks I like the pop top bottles as they don't spill and you can fill them up with water if they drink it all and they are still thirsty. I put stickers with their names on on the drinks.

I always do boxes too - can prepare in advance and they all get the same amount.

Hot dogs every time. Heat in microwave. Precut the rolls before the party. Bottle of ketchup

Posh or cheap, posh cook real sausages night before. Cheap open some value tins of hotdogs. Still heat in microwave.

Bowls of crisps and grapes. Birthday cake.
Capri Sun usually on offer for large boxes or even in pound shop and prevents spillages.
Paper plates.
As Gordon would say.... done.

Amazon for boxes otherwise

Drinks - whatever is easiest for you... cartons/bottles ok if you have small numbers otherwise big bottles of hi juice in a couple of flavours to keep costs down.

I also did some rolls/cakes for parents.

I live in the USA and every party we've ever been to has had pizza delivered to the venue. I think it's cheaper here but certainly the easiest option. There's normally some crisps, cut fruit and birthday cake too.

I came on to say boxes. I put a roll (mix of ham & cheese safest), bag of crisps and penguin biscuits. Plus a drink - you know the ones that come in a cup with a peel back top and a thin straw? You can buy them in boxes of 24 for about £4 in tesco.

Don't worry tool much about adult food, nobody expects food for them. Bowl of posh crisps and left over roles for friends/family who have travelled far is fine.

No one eats the sandwiches though...or maybe it's just dd! Re: icecream, did the venue have a freezer then? We just do church halls....a kettle at best!

For adults, I've pre-made loads of smoked salmon bagels (cut into quarters). For kids, I do mini cupcakes, rather than big ones. Kids rarely eat the whole cupcake anyone. I can make over 40 in a normal batch.

I also order pizza in. We have a really cheap but posh pizza place near us (yah!).

I've done boxes before also. Sandwich, mini babybel, drink , small packet of biscuits and grapes.

I've 4 dcs, initially I used to really overcater, but the pizza and birthday cake thing seems to be very popular,

For the person that asked, yes our village hall has a fully functioning catering kitchen so ice cream was in the freezer. If you want to ice cream cones probably best to check if your venue has a freezer.

only done one and got another one shortly.

we did all cold stuff
cheese sandwiches and ham sandwiches (in quarters so little - loads left)
cocktail sausages
sausage rolls
carrot sticks, grapes and cucumber sticks
bowls of crisps
party rings
then we brought out the cake but gave them all a fairy cake.

we did have a lot left over and as has been said some children take loads and don't eat any. they would have happily eaten more crisps but our kids don't get crisps very often so I worked on half a packet per child.

doing it this time? I am thinking of putting crisps on each plate to make sure they all get some. reluctant to put sandwiches or sausage rolls on plates as past experience of children means we have found out when a child has come round for tea that they are actually vegetarian (panic) so I would be worried a parent hadn't told us of something like that in advance.

drinks we do jugs of squash - generally an orange and a blackcurrant choice and then water.

we don't do food for parents - just tea/coffee. I did make sure there were a few spare cakes though for any siblings who had been dragged along.

I did for 30 a couple of times boxes s good idea. As you prepared before hand and no leftovers afterwards.

NEVER GETS EATEN
sandwiches
carrot sticks

GETS EATEN
crisps/hula hoops
grapes, cherry toms
biscuits cakes