Heavy Hors d'oeuvres Reception

Hi Mary ~ welcome to WW

Add the pasta, it will help fill their stomachs. Your reception is during dinner and people will come hungry.

An all appetizer meal is actually more work than a buffet. (the staff has many, many, many small food items to create) Is there any reason why you are not considering a sit down meal? It might cost you the same.

Well if we did a typical sit down buffet style then we get one salad, one entree, one starch and one vegetable. It would be a $5pp for each additional item, so we figured heavy hors d'oeuvres would be more of a selection. We are still going to have assigned seating. Thanks for your post!

I think what you have is a lovely menu and you could definitely make it work. I would advise making the braised beef over grits & praline chicken tenders portions a little more substantial (maybe preplated?) and perhaps add a salad and a starch.

Starches are usually cheaper and pretty filling. You could do a pasta dish instead of a pasta bar, which would save you some money, or some sort of potato dish (mini twice baked potatoes, potatoes au gratin with tasso, or Duchess potatoes which make a beautiful presentation).

I love your menu & with a few tweaks, it will be tasty and satisfying!

^ I 100% second that!! I went to my venue with a budget in mind & made up my entire menu. They oked it all & put it in writing. Never hurts to ask!

I think adding the pasta station would be good, or doing what @Alicia H. said. I had a friend who tried to do an hors d'oeuvres reception but did NOT have enough food and it wasn't pretty. The bridal party didn't get to eat, and one of the other bridesmaid's dad went out and bought us a party tray from Subway because we didn't have any food. It was really tacky and embarrassing for her.

You sound like you have a lot though, so depending on your guest list, hopefully you would have enough food. I'd add the pasta though, better to have food left over than to not have enough.

I'd add the pasta. Your wedding is right at dinner time and you want to make sure your guests will have enough food.

Thanks y'all! Yea I going to definetly add the pasta station and see how much it will cost me to add salad. My fiancé comes from a world where you don't go to a wedding expecting much food and I come from a family where you show up to a wedding hungry knowing you will be fed. My worst fear is guests will leave early because they are hungry. Y'all have been uber helpful!

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I see a bit of a conflict here. You are having heavy hors d'oeuvres for our dinner, but having the formality of assigned seating.

Are the Hors d'oeurves being served at each persons seat? Or are the to get up and get the food?

Umm well there will be two pass hors d'oeuvres during cocktail hour and then for dinner they will go get their hors d'oeuvres and pasta. Is this wrong?!!! I just wanted to make sure all my guests had a seat.

I agree with PP, assigned seating for hors d' oeuvers? They are normally passed by servers, lots of servers. What about a baked potato bar, pasta bar, salad bar? It seems to me for each person to have 8 small portions you could get a chicken breast for the same price.

I agree with my my family comes empty and expects to FILL up at any function. We actually got burgers out when going from my nephews wedding to the reception there was 2 hours between. Then they had a cheese and meat tray and a tray of fruit. yes that was a tray of each to cover 50 people. Needless to say we left early and went to eat.

Yea I see what y'all are saying and I guess I have more thinking to do. I just figured this would give more of a variety than just a typical chicken dish.

As a picky meat eater, I would prefer the typical chicken dish. I'm not a vegetarian, but I'm very particular about meat and would probably only eat the chicken tenders, fried tomatoes, and fruit. That's not a very substantial meal. I'm weird though and your guests most likely aren't, lol! I definitely recommend serving pasta or having a traditional buffet.

And I definitely expect to fed at a wedding! The only exception is when the wedding is held at a non-meal time. I went to a great hors d'oeuvres reception, but they scheduled it after dinner time. They didn't have assigned tables. In order to make sure everyone has seats without assigning tables, you need to provide extra seating which can cost more (centerpieces, glassware, etc). Hope that helps!

It sounds like you're going for a dim sum/ tapas idea with the appetizer portions but seated dinner. I agree with the others that since your reception is during dinner time, you need more food! If a guest eats two or three pieces from each dish you listed, that guest might end up full for a few hours, but if someone doesn't eat meat or pork, you're in serious trouble! If you'd like to stick with this idea, I think you should have more dishes and more variety. I think it's a good idea. If not, other commenters have made great suggestions. BF and I had to leave one wedding we attended because the food was not edible and we were ravenous-- all I remember of that wedding is being starving the whole time.

I think your menu is great! We are doing something similar. We will have 4 or 5 different passed horso'deuvres for cocktail hour then for dinner we will have 2 stations and 3 different small passed plates. We have not made final decisions but the stations we are going to have a mashed potato station with beef tips and possibly a salad with protien station or a pasta station. The passed plates we are considering are pulled pork with sweet potato rissoto, chicken pot pie and grilled cheese and tomato soup.

We are not having assigned seating we will have low tables and chairs and some high top tables with out chairs. I want people to move around and mingle

Hey y'all!

I would LOVE an update on those of you who did hors d'oeuvres instead of the traditional buffet/ served meal.

Our wedding is 2 years away but I am a planner and am trying to keep cost realistic as my Fiancé and I will be paying for the wedding ourselves.

Thank y'all in advance!!

Mary I love this idea I am planning my daughters wedding and we are doing a 2 hour heavy appetizers along with a mini buffet so that we have more variety it was to complicated picking just the right menu choices.