FAO: Clarehj - and anybody else having no evening guests!

Crash....

I didn't have any evening guests either! We had 58 for the day.

We had canapés - four per guest - at around 3 pm.

We started to eat at 4:45 pm. Dinner was trout, then lamb, then chocolate pudding (obviously, all described by flowery adjectives!).

The food part of our dinner finished around 6:45 pm (we then spent half an hour drinking brandy, or, in the case of my cousins, setting fire to potent Greek spirits....).

Our evening buffet came out around 9:30 ish. We had mini fish and chips/mini bacon baguettes/spinach pie served by staff. Then we had a table with sandwiches, crisps, salads, and four wheels of cheese (each about outstretched hand-sized), with crackers/grapes/chutney. We also had a dessert table, with cupcakes/macarons/sweets.

In the evening, we catered for everyone. I'm too OCD to have done the '80%' thing. So everyone had at least one piece of everything. We provided cake boxes if people wanted to take anything away.

It ALL went. I went around the tables after dinner and didn't spy a single plate with food left, and the evening buffet was demolished. But then, we could be a group of greedy gannets!

Thank you Footlong, that is so helpful. I may have to take a note of it as an example of timings and what was served, in order to provide evidence in my next 'disagree with the mother' moment. I know I'll win in the end though, my mum usually classes good food in vast quantities as a priority, so it's unexpected and baffling to me why she is against it!

You have an excellent memory, so I don't think it would be too late to write a report ... ?

I'm going to gate-crash this thread.

I don't think I'll be inviting many more evening people than we have during the day but we'll still be doing the buffet thing.

I love to graze on food, especially when drinking... stops me getting blotto far too early. Also think that by 10 or so people might fancy something small to nibble on even if they've had a full dinner.

I'd rather have too much food than too little and have peckish guests.

We're probably only going to have 10 or so extra people joining us in the evening and will have eaten dinner quite late so I was wondering about this too, I mentioned it in another thread somewhere and someone mentioned the idea of chips and dips and snacky things like that around 9pm so I'm going to see if our venue can accommodate something like that rather than a full on spread.

Although we did have evening guests we largely had snacky things - cold meats, cheese and leek tarts, pasties, chips and dips from the caterers who did that for a relatively reasonable sum. Also had mini cream teas (well the food bit), cake and the cheese tower. Friend who had no evening guests just had cheese towers, which would have done nicely. Picky bits that can stay out all evening are better to encourage nibbling as required with booze, and cheese and wine is just yummy (friend also had port available but budget for corkage didn't allow)

Thank you, that's all very useful.

We are having anti-pasti type things and pate for starter so I need to be careful things aren't repeated, or I'd have done other things along with the cheese too!

Anti-pasti and pate.... two of my favourite things. Yum!

Well I love anti-pasti too, but I know some of the oldies won't 'get it' so mum suggested pate too which they will be a bit more familiar with!

Ooh, how lame that I excited by a FAO thread.

Hey ATB - I'm exactly the same - I eat because it's there, and I can't resist food.

We had 107 day guests and loads and loads of food during the day. We had about 3 x the amount on canapes you usually have (I love them, always find there are never enough, and end up chasing around the waiter/waitresses to get some more!). We then had 3 course dinner, with rather large portions. This was probably around 5.30/6 but couldn't give you the exact timings as it's all a bit of blur of happiness and fluff.

At 9, the cupcakes were eaten, and as above, the cheeses and breads and fish and chip cones. There was masses of cheese left over (which the french families ended up eating over the following week) and there were fish and chips left. The reality is people just picked, but that's because they were well fed during the day. I would just put out picky bits.

Do you have an idea of your timings - are you having 3 course dinner etc, will give you an idea of picky bits etc.

We haven't finalised the details of ours but the package we have paid for includes an evening buffet and we aren't planning on having evening guests. Everyone will be catered for and although they'll have had a four-course meal we sit down to it at 4.30 and the party goes on till midnight so people probably will get peckish again. It also fills a lull when the band take a break, and tobe honest you can work up quite an appetite by ceilidh dancing! Like I said we haven't picked exactly what we'll have but it will be along the lines of sausage rolls, pakoras, mini quiche etc and for those with a sweet tooth, the wedding cake.

Like FTLOMB, I can't get my head around only catering for 80% in the evening. What if 85% want to eat?! So I will be catering for 100%. However, because our bbq menu was too huge for the original wedding breakfast we are simply having the caterer hold back the burgers and sausages from that to cook in the evening instead of a buffet. Since we'll already have paid for the 85 day guests as part of the original package we're only having to pay for the additional 70 guests to have this reduced menu but still catering for everyone to eat later on.

Having seen a large quantity of evening buffets trundled back into the kitchen or thrown in the bin, I persuaded my daughter not to have one. Instead, she had tea/ coffee and wedding cake served at 9.00. The evening didn't get on the way till 8.00 and finished at 11.00.... so no one really missed it.

We didn't have evening guests out in Australia. We did have a late start to the reception though. Looking back at my schedule, we had canapes at 5.30 and dessert was supposed to have been served at 8.30 although we did run a bit late. I'd say we were finished eating by about 9. The cake was cut and served after that.

We didn't bother with any extra food, but I likened it to eating a three course meal in a restaurant at 7ish. I'd never want any extra food after that. If, however, the meal finished earlier, I'd definitely want to pick at something later on, even if it was just cheese and crackers.

At our home reception, we only had family and close friends to the ceremony, who were then served canapes (at 4ish). Everyone else came in the evening and had a hog roast at around 7.30pm. We had a massive cheese tower, plus a big cake and extras (e.g. cake pops). FIL then fired up the BBQ at around 3am!

By the way, we had an antipasti platter for starters (plus a seafood platter) and it went down an absolute treat with our guests!

I think if budget allows, you gotta have some picky bits. Everyone loves picky bits, no matter how much you have eaten before.

Food was a very important factor to us. Our two cultures love to eat!

I say who needs evening guests, its your shindig girl, do what you like

We didn't have any evening guests either. Dinner was at 5, cheese, biscuits, fruit and cake were served at about 9. It definitely didn't all go, but I think it's important to give your guests something in case they are peckish later on.

We in theory arnt having evening guests as everyone from the church and reception gurests will be being fed at the same time, but we are having a mobile pizza company cateing in an "all you can eat" style all night.

So if anyone is hungray at the end i will be shocked stunned but acepting that pizza and salad may not be my gran's cup of tea.

Hi,

I have 80 guests who will be with us all day, no evening extras:

2.45 for Canapes, Champagne and Pimms on the lawn - 4 canapes per head

4.30 - Sit for dinner - Assiette of Salmon, 28 day aged fillet of beef, and melting middle choc cup

7.pm tea and coffee served with petit fours following the speeches and cutting of the cake

9.30 - Hog roast, selection of 5 salads, bread etc, plus our 4 tier wedding cake

There will also be personalised M&M's and Macarons in my wedding colours around the place.

If they are still hungry after that, I suggest they track down a peacock from the grounds and eat that.

xxx