How to Choose the Best Food Options for Your Party or Event
Did you know that 32 million people in the United States alone have some kind of food allergy? When you’re planning a big party or event that involves food, this is one of many things you will have to consider in order to make your event a success. After all, you wouldn’t want your event to be remembered for its number of food-related allergic reactions.
Fortunately, choosing the best food options for your event isn’t that difficult as long as you know what to consider. To start off your event planning and food options, it’s important to analyze your guest list.
Take a Look at Your Guest List
Even if you have the very best quality food at your party, your guests won’t be happy if there isn’t enough to eat. Often, people skip lunch or dinner when going to an event or party because they expect that they will be able to fill themselves up once they arrive. Your guests might be disappointed if they find that there are only a few meager snacks at your event.
In order to ensure that you have enough food for your party, you will need to count how many people are on your guest list. If you are having your food catered, you will likely be able to work with the catering company to make sure that there is enough food for everyone. If you have people working at your event, such as servers or DJs, it may be a good idea to think of getting extra food for them as well since it would be a polite gesture.
At some point on your party planning journey, you still might be unsure how much food to get despite your guest list. When in doubt, you should always overestimate the amount of food you need, even if it might cost you a little extra. This is because it’s always better to have extra food left on the table than unhappy and unsatisfied guests.
However, a good way to check how much food you should order is by asking how much food your guests plan to eat. If you send out invitations for your event, you might be able to include this kind of information. Of course, your guests might not be obligated to respond, but those who do respond can give you some important information in terms of the quantity of food you might need to order.
Check for Food Allergies and Other Dietary Restrictions
As mentioned before, it would be especially unfortunate for some of your guests to fall victim to allergic reactions due to your event menu. No matter how many guests you plan to invite, it is important to check if anyone has any allergies or dietary restrictions.
For example, if there are peanuts in a cake and someone with an awful peanut allergy happens to eat some without knowing what’s in it, the guest, the party, and you could all be in big trouble.
Even if none of your guests suffer from serious allergies, there are other dietary restrictions that could also cause a lot of trouble. For example, if some of your guests are vegetarian or vegan, they would not be happy with you if they didn’t know they were eating something with seafood or other animal products in it.
Then there are people who might have sensitive stomachs for one reason or another.
For example, many people in America are lactose intolerant. If your party menu is full of creamy cakes, cheeses, butter, yogurt, and other lactose-related foods, many of your guests might not be able to enjoy themselves. Other people might not be able to eat a lot of gluten, so bready foods would be off-limits for them.
These dietary restrictions might make planning your food menu a bit of a challenge, but it’s always better to be safe than sorry. However, keep in mind that, most likely, not all of your guests will have dietary restrictions. If only a few of your guests have allergies or restrictions, you may be able to keep a wide variety of food as long as you alert your guests of the contents of the food.
Create a Theme for Your Party’s Food
While having every type of food at your party may sound attractive, it often is not. Instead, simplicity is often the best option. Keeping your food centered around a certain theme can often be easier to plan too.
For example, there’s no need to worry about different cuts of steak, fish, pork, and so on. It may be best to stick to a certain kind of meat. It can be very easy to center your food around seafood such as crab.
Once you decide on a theme for your food, it can be a breeze to come up with appetizers and desserts. For example, since seafood is light, other light foods tend to compliment it well. So, go crazy with salads, finger foods, and fluffy desserts.
Drinks are also important. By matching the drinks with your event’s food, you can get great reactions out of your guests. Wine is so versatile that it can go well with any kind of food.
Beer may also be a great option. If your event is more casual, you might be able to get away with soft drinks. And, of course, water should always be at the table.
Everything You Need to Know About Choosing Food Options
If you were unsure about how to choose food options, you should now know all about it. From considering allergies to counting the number of people on your guest list, there are many things to consider when planning your menu.
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