£15 budget for mini buffet

PasturesNew

For £15 my initial list would probably look like this:

- bake my own bread/rolls and make cheese straws and cheese breads, say £2 for flour/yeast, £1 for cheese
- make my own pizzas, just simple ones, at the same time as I was making the bread. Cheese/onion would do, few mixed herbs on and for the base a squirt of tomato puree mixed with a dribble of olive oil does the trick.
- rice salads, £1 for good rice, £1 for things to put in them (e.g. mixtures of bits of chopped apple, bits of tinned mandarin, bits of tinned pineapple, frozen peas, red onion)
- potato wedges, 2.5kg spuds £1 will make wedges and a potato salad
- pasta salads. £1 for pasta, mix with mayo and possibly flavour some mayo with other stuff, e.g. curry mayo just using curry powder
- sandwiches, £1 for cheapo bread. Fill with egg/mayo (£1 for eggs), cheese, cheese/apple, cheese/onion., cheese/tomato, cheese/pickle
- couple of bags of store's own tortilla chips (Tesco do a bag at 25p) and make up some quick/easy dips using mayo, e.g. mayo/curry powder, mayo/chilli, see what other sauces I had in the cupboard I could get away with. Say £1 for this.
- ritz biscuits with a squirt of cheese spread on them. £2
- flapjacks, just oats/butter/sugar/golden syrup needed. £2 for a load

For a cake, you could cheat by picking up a plain/cheap cake and just whipping up the frosting yourself and spreading that on, if you didn't want to make one from scratch.

I'd not bother with cocktail sausages at £2. I'd be thinking about volume for my money - and cocktail sausages are small and people don't notice they're eating them

pretz_2

hey
What i did for my DD 1st birthday party was just make up loads of sandwiches, a mixture of cakes which you can buy cheap enough if you dont want to make them, large bowl of salad and a large bowl of crisps serve with plenty of tea, coffee and squash to hand.
You really don't need to prepare as much as you think if they are dropping in and out at different times they probably won't be expecting food.
pretz

vij

at 3 Im sure she would love to help you make the cake and show her party guests how well she can decorate it

bluestarrz

These ideas are so impressive! Love the puff pastry hearts idea and the new potatoes for dipping! People might not expect food but because my mum will be there all day and she's given me the money for it..
You guy have got some great ideas for only £15! Have got some flour and sugar etc already so hopefully that'll be enough to use for cakes etc. Will go to aldi's today to check prices there too!

slm6002

Just a quick suggestion if you have an aldi near by they are doing salard items (celery, cucumber, little gem lettuces(2 pack) and tomatoes) all for 29p each. could make a nice salad for a little price.

Also if you were to decorate the value cupcakes you could arrange them into a number 3 shape to make it a little more special.

jackieglasgow

Also, if you are doing the failry/cupcake idea for a birthday cake, what we do it buy those candles which spell out happy birthday (bought some recently in HB for 69p) and put one each in a cake to make it looke a bit fancier. The other option which I used myself recently when totally skint for my DS birthday was to make the Millies Cookies recipe from the Grocery Challenge recipe list and make a giant cookie, which we used those cancdles on, everyone got a slice and that's definitely an eyecatcher for a birthday cake, my sons have demanded that this is the only birthday cake for them for the rest of their lives!

It's very easy to make, and you could easily afford to make 2 with your budget, or one big one and some smaller ones - I get 24 from a batch, weighed on my scales at 22g per cookie, sounds mean but they are very sweet and a perfect size to dunk in your tea!!

ETA - on the giant one we also spelled out my sons name and a big number in smarties!

Boodle

If I was you I think I would probably use the cash to buy things that you can leave out happily as guests come and go throughout the day, so... cheese straws, crisps, cakes and biscuits rather than things that will dry out like sandwiches or cheese. If you want to do pizzas, I would suggest using smartprice pittas from Asda for the base - 19p for a pack of 6 :j I spread them with a blob each of ketchup or brown sauce and tomato puree, sprinkle with herbs, top with cheese and grill.

Funnily enough, this afternoon I have been planning the menu for my new DD's party. The cost comes to £21.75 (reliant on mil bringing potatoes, and fil bringing a couple of bottles of bubbly for toasts.) This is with organic animal products so if you weren't doing that, I would imagine you could do it for closer to £15. This doesn't include the cake, but I will be making a fruit cake from stuff in storecupboard anyway - only needing a couple of eggs, marzipan and fondant icing. I did a cherry jam sponge for DD's 2nd birthday with chocolate butter icing, covered with sugar daisies and silver balls for stars, then topped it with Upsy Daisy and Iggle Piggle playdoh stamps (unused, obviously!) from the top of special Night Garden playdoh tubs! Buying all of that might have been the same as buying one, but IMO homemade means so much more (and usually tastes better!)

This is the planned menu:

Organic Pork Sausages with Ketchup, American Mustard and Organic Mayo in Buns (BBQ)
Roasted Vegetable Salad
Mixed Crunchy Leaf Salad
Tuna and Sweetcorn Pasta Salad
Organic Mature Cheddar Sandwiches
Marmite Sandwiches
New Potatoes
Ready Salted Crisps
Carrot Batons
Bubbly and Iced Fruit Tea

4x 6pk organic pork sausages 8.72
2x 12 value bread buns 0.58
Value ketchup 0.40
American mustard 0.71
Organic mayo 1.15
Organic mature Cheddar 1.50
2x courgettes 0.70
Aubergine 1.18
6pk tomatoes 0.88
Value sweetcorn 0.29
Bag of crunchy leaves 1.50
Tuna in sunflower oil 0.78
Value pasta 0.43
Value brown bread 0.50
Organic butter 1.11
Value multipack ready salted crisps 0.47
10x carrots 0.80
(Marmite I have in, as well as tangerine, peach and echinacea tea bags which I will make up with some normal tea bags from the cupboard too)

Chell

I had no idea cheese straws were to simple, I'm just defrosting some pastry to make these for my DD's 1st Birthday bash tomorrow.

shellnapier

u could buy tesco value etc !!!!as there like 46p each adn just chuck extra veg ect on top, even buy "recuded" veg or mb have some lying around in the house
Buy tesco value xrisps very cheap
any of the tesco value jam rolls, mini rolls out of packet r the same.
if u nd pudding make a fluffy jelly just need jelly n caranation milk

bluestarrz

Thanks again for all the ideas guys! Pleased there are some great inventive mums and dads out there! Been reading all the posts, several times over and thinking maybe:

Do some fairy cakes so still need eggs: £2
Salad items - cucumber, celery, toamtoes and lettuce - aldi 29p each! - £1.16
quiche using ham i have, the eggs and some cheese -£2 (cheese)
Cheese straws/ puff hearts so need puff pastry - 86p
cookies - flour and butter and sugar i have so just choc chips/smarties - 60p
pizza- again got flour yeast etc so will use ham cheese and pineapple -£1
pineapple chunks with cheese chunks on sticks? - may need more cheese for this actually..
value bread- 50p (or go late tomorrow night for premium bread reduced to similar value!) for sandwiches
fillings- ham (i have)
Cheese if i get the extra block
maybe tuna and sweetcorn - £1
potatoes for potato salad/wedges - £1
onion - 15p to add to pizza/quiche etc
crisps- £1 multipack and can use extra in DS's lunch box etc
juice £3.00

got that down to £14.27 if my calculations are right and hopefully quiche and pizza can be used next day as can salads bit worried about preparing all night before/ on morning wish i had done this before so i had an idea of cooking times etc but am going to try and do some tomorrow night and take photos etc!