Wedding food!

frannyann

beks wrote: »

Try posting here instead:
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/forumdisplay.html?f=142

We are just recuiting new [STRIKE]bridezillas[/STRIKE] members now :rotfl:

beks

frannyann wrote: »

We are just recuiting new [STRIKE]bridezillas[/STRIKE] members now :rotfl:

LOL!!! You beat me to it though so I deleted mine!!! :rotfl:

alenax

frannyann wrote: »

We are just recuiting new [STRIKE]bridezillas[/STRIKE] members now :rotfl:

Haha I've been told by my future husband-to-be that I wasn't supposed to show him all my craziness until after the wedding, looks like I'm jumping the gun a bit, oops!

I will no doubt be annoying everyone with endless wedding talk on the wedding forum now, hehe!

Pitlanepiglet

We did our own catering in 2007 for approx 120 guests. You need to think about lots of things, will your venue allow it? Does your venue have cutlery/crockery that you can use? Who will clear the tables, who will wash up in between courses if there isn't enough cutlery.

I have a catering background I was determined that none of my friends and family were going to spend the whole of my wedding in the kitchen - it's hard work and I wasn't prepared to let it happen.

Cold buffet food is fiddly and time consuming to deal with and requires lots of fridge space, we went for a cream tea (tea/coffee/mulled wine) followed by a hot buffet. We prepared most of the hot food ourselves (hubby did anyway) in the days before and froze it.

We then hired a local lady who my aunt knew and she got together a team to reheat, fill/refill the buffet and to clear tables etc.

You need to add in a lot of additional costs if you are doing the food yourselves, pepper/salt etc., napkins, serving dishes, serving spoons if you can't be sure that you can raise enough.

We roped friends and family in to help us to set up tables at the venue in the morning and we got married at 3pm.

It was hard work and there was a hell of a lot of organising in the weeks ahead. I was very glad of my catering background and I'm fairly unflappable.

We spent around £3.5k in total including clothing, unlimited wine, loads of cava, food and everything else. DIY was the only way that we could do what we wanted for the numbers that we wanted there but I'm not sure that we saved any money by doing the catering ourselves by the time you add all the extras in.

Good luck!

beks

alenax wrote: »

Haha I've been told by my future husband-to-be that I wasn't supposed to show him all my craziness until after the wedding, looks like I'm jumping the gun a bit, oops!

I will no doubt be annoying everyone with endless wedding talk on the wedding forum now, hehe!

LOL! Go for it, there are some great peeps on there who give some really helpful advice - I have been helped no end!!!

JBD

It's not that difficult to self cater as long as you have some help. We catered our own wedding [over 20 years ago]. We had meat platters, salads etc. We did have to cook things like cocktail sausages but nowadays it is possible to buy things like this ready cooked.It really depends on the sort of reception you want. If you want something grand and formal then it is probably best to have professional caterers although I would advise obtaining more quotes. If you want to do it yourself it will probably be simpler and more informal but you can definitely save a lot of money. I'm sure your guests will enjoy it just as much either way.

Curious_George_2

have you spoken to your venue about it?

the venue we want for instance is a hotel too and doesnt allow outside catering, but thier food / buffet packages are VERY competetative compared to other places we looked, infact we knocked over £3000 off the wedding costs just be deciding to go with them instead of our original choice,

maybe you should find out what your venue allows, provides, offers etc before you start whipping out your costco cards!

smartie12

I did my own food... but that's cos we had a MSE wedding!

Why pay someone else when you can do it yourself for a LOT cheaper!

I'm very anti spending lots of money on just one day:p

alenax

smartie12 wrote: »

I did my own food... but that's cos we had a MSE wedding!

Why pay someone else when you can do it yourself for a LOT cheaper!

I'm very anti spending lots of money on just one day:p

Yeah it's like Monica and Chandler's wedding where they couldn't decide whether they wanted a big wedding or a big marriage! I believe in making the day special but not in spending crazy money on it.

Curious_George_2

smartie12 wrote: »

I'm very anti spending lots of money on just one day:p

part of me is too,
however, the money we will be spending on the wedding is not any that we have physically worked for, its what OH is owed that we have had to fight tooth and nail for (and are about to go to court for) from his devious money grabbing ex,
we will be money-saving as much as possible (hence not going with our first choice!) but im also of the view that im doing this once... we have had a long hard slog to get there and i want it to be as special as any i have been too,
not like my sisters for instance which was thrown together in under 2 months, cheap and looked it and hardly attended (and no.. before anyone asks they are NOT happy!)

besides... we are paying off all debts first, then booking the wedding