Hope you got the Dr. Seuss reference.

Anyway, we had a lovely, lovely Wedding at our church Saturday. The colors were navy blue and yellow, the flowers were sunflowers and baby’s breath, and all in all it was truly charming. They even had little packets of sunflower seeds at each place setting, and while normally I think such things are a total waste, somehow this little gesture seemed quite fitting even though I have no plans to actually, like, plant them. (I’ll probably give them to my mother-in-law.) People had labored to put up draped netting to transform the church gym into a fairyland. Lots and lots of work, and then they had to take it all down before church the next day, but it was so beautiful!

There was a sit-down dinner with all kinds of food and then a panoply, and I do mean a panoply, of desserts, to which I contributed the aforementioned treats. I made (roughly speaking—the batter didn’t come out exactly even):

100 miniature lemon bars with pine nuts in the crust
100 miniature lime bars with coconut in the crust
100 plain chocolate brownies with chocolate chips
100 butterscotch brownies with butterscotch chips

In addition to the above (for about 225 guests) there was:

A beautifully-decorated wedding cake made by a semi-professional baker in the church
A big batch of “Mississippi Mud Pie” bars, made with caramel, pecans and chocolate—totally rich!
A big platter of fruit
and
A Costco custom-decorated sheet cake
A huge container of Costco cookies
A big platter of Costco miniature individual cheesecakes

Guess the right answer and you’ll win the prize of a packet of sunflower seeds—which items were totally unnecessary? Hint: There’s a word that begins with a “C” in each one.

There was a fear that there wouldn’t be enough food, something that I totally understand. It certainly wasn’t a tragedy that those last three items were on the menu. But it was unnecessary. My husband had a little cheesecake and said it wasn’t bad, but most of that stuff went right back into the kitchen. I know that the cookies didn’t have many takers. It’s such a waste!

I’m working on a short e-cookbook with recipes for small desserts that will include the things I made. My point here is not to give recipes but to give advice to anyone planning a big event at which food will be served:

Do the math.

It’s so easy (and remember—I’m saying that I’ve done this myself) to just think, ‘Oh, we need lots of food.’ And a certain amount of leftovers is kind of nice, as long as the they’re items that lend themselves to being stored/frozen/reheated. All of my leftovers (and there were quite a few) went into the freezer and will be doled out over the next couple of events I’m hosting. I’ve put them in heavy-duty freezer bags so that they won’t get freezer burned, and they should be fine for the two gatherings of the Chorale that are coming up. So I’m in fine shape. The cookies and miniature cheesecakes mentioned above can be frozen and used later also, I guess. I don’t have to worry about them in any case. But all those individually-plated slices of cake? I have no idea what was done with them.

How to proceed? It’s not always simple and straightforward. Last summer I made all of the food excluding the punch and cake for a wedding that ended up having 300 people, but I didn’t know the final count when I was doing the shopping and the planning. I wasn’t really sure how much of each item to make, and some things ended up being thrown out, including a few chicken-salad sandwiches. They couldn’t be frozen, alas, and they couldn’t be kept for very long. But as I look back on that event (which on the whole was very successful), I wish I’d followed this simple checklist:

1. Get a total number of guests plus a small safety factor. I could have pressed the bride’s mother a little harder on this issue and gotten a clearer picture.
2. Figure out how much your recipes will actually make. So, for example, when I was figuring out my chicken salad amounts I just went with the 42-ounce packages of Costco deli chicken breast meat (see—I do like Costco for some things) as a measure but didn’t take the time to add up how many extra ounces would be included once all the mix-ins were accounted for. Especially for an item that won’t keep well you want to err on the side of conservatism. Last year for our Chorale picnic I ended up having an entire pan of my fabulous baked beans left over. I’m still not sure what happened. I did freeze them, and I’m pretty sure they got used up for a church event, but it was a little embarrassing to see that full pan! One guy said, “You sure have a lot of food left over,” which didn’t make me feel all that great. Again, as with the chicken salad, I had failed to figure out how much the additions (bacon, ketchup, brown sugar, sautéed onions) would add and instead just went with the size of the actual cans of beans before they were gussied up.
3. Think in terms of individual portions and count them up. I actually should have made more of my homemade mini quiches. With that many guests, and with the quiches’ cuteness factor, I needed to make enough so that everyone could have at least one and preferably two. Instead, I made only about 144. That just wasn’t enough. I’m kind of thinking we ran out of meatballs, too, even though I did make 600 of those. Still, that’s only 2 meatballs per person, and boy, were they ever good! People scarfed those and the quiches down like there was no tomorrow.
4. Determine which items are most labor-intensive and make them ahead of time if at all humanly possible. For this most recent wedding I mixed up the crust for the lemon and lime bars and pressed them into the baking cups, so that I could pop them into the oven first thing in the morning. On the whole I did pretty well on doing things ahead, but there are always refinements to be made!

Well, there are plenty of events coming up for me where I can use the above guidelines:

A small gathering this Saturday as a memorial for our beloved associate conductor, Greg Marsh, who died suddenly several weeks ago. His funeral and a special concert at the high school where he taught have been held, but this is just for us. It’s in the afternoon and so doesn’t require a meal, but people want something to eat at such an occasion. There are going to be lots of tears at this event!

Our Chorale picnic, which will garner maybe 85-90 guests.

A rehearsal lunch for the wedding of a son’s friend. At this point it’s all pretty much up in the air, but I’m so wanting to help her out!

And then the regular Chorale events: retreat rehearsal breakfasts for 75-90 and Friday-night post-concert receptions for several hundred. Great, great, great!

What events are coming up for you that can put your math skills to work?

The 400 Treats of a Fine August Wedding