Family cooking for wedding day

Just agreeing with those saying to cater BBQ. We have local places that do it for $10 a person. Yes that is $2000 for catering for 200 people but that is just how it goes so just budget for it. Another way to save is do an afternoon wedding with appetizers and cake only. Hyvee can do appetizer catering for $10 a person and I am sure other grocery stores can do that.

Hi Sunny - is there a reason for the very large guest list (e.g. large family)? My FH has a very large family and as a result our wedding will be family only. But, we are still having to set limits to keep the guest list from getting out of control. We are limiting the invitations to his aunts, uncles, and first cousins. Only FH's first cousins with children under 18 (this will be few and far between as most of his cousins have grown children with children of their own) will receive an invitation. We are sitting at 134 invited guests. If we had not set the limits, we would be looking at close to 300 people for 'just family.'

I just mention this to encourage you to please reconsider the guest list. It will give you more flexibility with options, open your budget for additional 'unexpected' expenses and give you some play money if you want to add any 'extras' in for the big day!!

I'm glad you decided not to. Cooking for 200 people is a huge undertaking and it's best left to a professional.

My suggestion is save money- or cut corners elsewhere so that you can afford to feed that many people a decent meal, if you aren't willing to cut down guest list.

My thoughts...it's your wedding! We thought about self catering but realized it would be a lot of trouble.

Another option would be to have your wedding at a non-mealtime so that you don't have to worry about a full meal. If the whole thing is from 2-5 pm or 8-11 pm, people wouldn't expect a full meal. Some caterers will also do brunch for much more inexpensively than dinner, plus you wouldn't need as much alcohol since people don't drink as much during the day as they do during the evening.

Don't like the self catering idea but the pig roast sounds cool. Maybe quotes from some BBQ places could save money?

Glad you decided not to self cater. Im only having 10 guests.. We had a small picnic on memorial day and that in itself was to much work to really enjoy our time with company. Let us know what you pick.

Most BBQ places are actually very reasonable. We are getting our wedding catered for about $12 pp ( BBQ food, with 3 different meat options, and about 6 sides) However you could find a small rest. that you really like and ask them, most likely they would cater it. When we were looking at options we talked to one them. Youd be surprised almost anywhere would cater just ask. And they do it cheaper then most

Not sure where you are getting married--but most facilities don't let you bring in your own food for liability reasons. (Had a friend get sick at a tasting from a preferred hotel vendor! Needless to say, they won't be getting married there.)

For large quantity, low cost menus--find a low-profile restaurant known for barbecue, chicken, OR even catering from some Italian restaurants. Many will not only prepare but help serve as well.

Get a restaurant to do drop-off catering for $10-$20 per person. Then, pay someone to do the refreshing of the foods and beverages. Some vendors do this (I do this type of day-of work) or contact a group that feeds a lot of people regularly and some of their folks might do it for pay or donation (Masons including Job's Daughters, Rainbow Girls, Eastern Star, Demolay - Scouts, Lions, Elks, churches, etc).

@Monique had good advice. If you have a junior college in the area you can look into hiring students from their culinary program for serving etc. You will still need to pay them like $20/hour plus tips. We have a larger guest list and are going with a taco caterer (not a taco truck) that does a lot of wedding in my area (my friend had them at her wedding). It is way more affordable than other catering companies where I am at. Look into non-traditional options like BBQ as others have suggested.