I’m trying to organize a lunch lecture series for about 100 graduate students. The first one is coming this Friday, October 13th. We had to pick such a short date because it was the only time before Christmas when all of the students would have lunch at the same hour.
So, we’re thinking a sandwich buffet as the simplest, cheapest way to get food that most everyone is happy with. We students get food bribed at a lot of lunch lectures, and the pizza routine gets tiresome. Fresh veggies should go over relatively well.
I’m having trouble, though, thinking on a scale for 100 people. Can anyone with large feedings experience weigh in and tell me if I’m even in the right range or if I need to do seriious shopping? Does the menu even sound appealing at all?
120 Deli buns
1 quart mayo and mustard each
25 pounds luncheon meat (probably turkey)
10 pounds Hummus (for the veggetarians)
5 pounds cheese
5 pounds tomatos
2 heads iceberg lettuce
3 pounds cucumber
3 pounds green bell pepper
5 pounds celery sticks
5 pounds carrot sticks
1 pound ranch dressing (for dipping)
2 large bags Tostitos corn tortilla chips.
Ditch about 8 pounds of hummus unless you know you have a veggie heavy crowd
replace with similar weight in mixed deli meats, ham can be pretty cheap. Cheese slices run about 20/pound so you are pretty close there assuming not everyone wants cheese. 2x mayo/mustard, you might get 40-50 per quart.
Couple extra heads of lettuce, tomatoes look ok, I assume you mean a quart of ranch?
double up carrots and celery, they are cheap. Definitely more chips, maybe some salsa. Party on…
Thanks, Drachillix. It is a pretty veggie heavy croud, about 1/3rd are requesting humus in the RSVPs. I’ll double up on the things you suggest.
The other fun part of this equation is, due to massive miscommunication, my budget for this thing has been reduced to a couple hundred dollars. Gotta go bust some heads about that.
You might also be able to make arrangements to purchase it through your schools existing food suppliers getting you actual wholesale prices, get ahold of your cafeteria/foodservices manager pronto.
The folks who are coming in to give the talk do generate some business from it, so they were willing to chip in about $200 for food. We got everything we need (hopefully) for about $260. Even a box of AirHeads for dessert. Sam’s club is awesome.
Sadly, the campus food people require 2 weeks notice minimum for all the events they are involved with. So they are no option. Good idea in theory, though.
When I agreed to chair this project for the group who is “sponsoring” it, I thought they were giving me $500 to work with, and then I would fundraise if I needed more. Come to find out that, not only is the $700 left over from last year’s fundraising MIA, but they never intended in fronting me any cash at all. So, they want me to run a project that improves the groups PR with the students, but don’t want to divert any money from their other random projects to do it.
I guess that doesn’t surprise me, really. I’m just annoyed that I got myself involved before I understood all the way.