Dessert Table: How Many Desserts for 125 people

DO NOT DO THIS!!! First of all, you never ask family to work your wedding. Ever. That is unfair to them and even if they "want to" (or so they say), it's rude. Secondly, anything you provide your guests should be cooked/baked by professionals, especially when you have 125 guests.

Yeah all I can think of is the time I bit into a muffin that someone I went to school with made and got a clump of dog hair. Get the desserts from a bakery.

I love the dessert table idea. We will be doing this too. I work for a bakery and generally we say 1.5 pieces per person. Which for you would come out to 188 pieces.

Pies alone, at 8 slices per pie would be about 24 pies.

But you will need to figure out with the cakes, how many slices each one produces and so forth.

(And I would suggest possibly rethinking having the family members involved....but it's your call)

@lindseyo that visual tho .... iiick

(Told this story before)Had s church pot luck...someone made monkey bread.. looked like a freakin picture, so amazing... I cut a piece, put it on my plate.. got back to my table. Drooling because it looked and smelled de-frickin-licious.... cut into it... poked at it with my fork to take a bite. A hair.. not just any hair... but a hair about as long as the top of your head to your waist long... allllllll wrapped up in my big chunk of monkey bread... I almost threw up.

Can you collect everyone's recipes and have a professional baker do them? It really isn't fair to your family members to make them work for your wedding. Not to mention I doubt all of them are certified to provide food publicly. If you must go this route, check with your venue that it wouldn't be illegal.

A wedding I went to did this with different cookie recipes and I fell in love with the idea until I actually started thinking of all that could go wrong and the logistics of it. A couple days before your wedding when these things would have to be done, you'll be too busy to coordinate picking up the desserts from a bunch of different family members (which honestly family shouldn't have to make anyways), setting them up and making sure that each dessert can be set out for the whole reception without going bad. If you're set on having the family recipes I would see if I could give it to a professional for them to do.

Do not self cater, not even desserts. You cannot guarantee the food safety or the kitchens they were prepared in. In the end you could be liable for any medical expenses your guests have if they get sick.

So you're trying to save from not buying an expensive wedding cake by pawning the cost and time off on your family? It's rude to use people. Have a baker make your family recipes and cover the cost out of your budget.

I wasn't looking for your opinions on whether or not to ask my family to work during my wedding. I am a grown adult and can get close and personal opinions in regards to etiquette. Families helping with a family member's wedding is a personal, case by case situation. To clarify, I am not asking my family to do this. These are individuals that have offered and are excited to help with my wedding. To those of you who provided actual helpful feedback. I thank you!

I've only seen one of these done. It wasn't planned the Baker dropped the cake at a wedding I was working just minutes before the bride showed up! What a disaster! They went to walmart and gotten pies and cheesecakes. I've seen a candy bar which is never a good idea, I've seen smores bar, and a pimp your cupcake table.

But seriously, you need to check with your venue about the legality of doing so, and if they allow it, you need to get good wedding insurance. If someone gets sick because you self catered, it's on you to cover their medical expenses.

Everyone telling you not to do this is just looking out for you. However, you're an adult and will do what you please. I'm just strongly recommending you don't do anything illegal.

I'm sorry but this is extremely dangerous. If your family wants to do this, then they need to rent out a professional kitchen to use for a day. They should also take a class on proper food handling. You don't want your guests to get food poisoning.

"To clarify, I am not asking my family to do this"

But in your original post, you stated "I am going to ask 5-6 family members.." see the confusion there?

The idea of a variety of desserts over cake is great, but seriously, use a professional.

Damn too bad we can give our opinion anyway.

I'd say my feedback was actually very helpful.

I really would get a baker to bake your treats. This is coming from someone who has the worst luck in the world. But anyways, I'll give you an example of the way we are doing our deserts for 106 people: we are having 70 cupcakes and 9 pies of 3 different flavors (standard pie is about 6-8 slices)

Gross. If, as a guest, I knew you had a mashup of people make the desserts for your wedding, guess who would not be eating dessert, for the reasons pp provided? Me. Because you don't know how clean other people's kitchens are, you don't know if they are people who taste test food, you don't know any of that.

Don't use your family, and yes, that is EXACTLY what you want to do. You yourself said you were going to ask 5-6 people to make enough full size desserts to feed 125 guests, so YOU don't have to pay for a wedding cake. In other words, 5-6 people get to share the cost of feeding your 125 guests dessert because you were to cheap to pay for it yourself. Gross. That is literally exactly what using people IS.

Grow up and behave like an adult and pay for the damn dessert.

Welcome to the internet where you don't get to tell people how to respond to you.

This is a bad idea. I love to bake. I'm a fantastic baker. People make requests of me all the time and I take them. However, unlike a professional bakery, when things go badly in my kitchen, there is no backup. I time things right but usually that means I don't time them for fuckuppery. And it's stressful, and just because I offer does not make it less stressful!

Quit cheaping out and hire someone or purchase the desserts from a pro.

I went to a wedding once where we overheard the mother of the groom on the phone in the hallway finding out that her cat had jumped up on the counter prior to the wedding and licked the top of the pan of brownies she brought. Thank god I didn't eat the brownies!

You'll have peace of mind using a professional, and if something goes wrong, it won't cause any rifts between you and friends/family.

Even if they offered, don't have them work on your wedding day.