Catering for an Event - BBQ

[beaver]

So,

in my experience when catering for a party there are a few questions you need to ask before working out how much meat to buy
In this case my engagement party will have 106 people.
Below is my variables and reasoning


How much meat? - (for main course)
you want to work out how much meat each person will have at your event. if its a sit down event then i would suggest that about 250-400g is about what you want
(think of a 400g Steak) and your customers will go home happy. however if you take into consideration the consumption of bread (burgers) and orderves then im going to go for 250.
demographic, lunch/dinner, event type ect all have effect on this.

how many people?
This is pretty simple but you do need to cater for (in some cases) children, people turning up with no rsvp and people leaving early.
usually you just run the RSVP number which caters for people extra when taking into account the lower consumption of children.

Yield of usable meat
This is the one that most people completely forget about
Pork shoulder, lamb shoulder, beef brisket all have 2 "losses" that you need to take into consideration
"trimming and evaporation"

-Evaporation is on average 30% of the yield lost
-trimming is variable depending on the cut.
In my case for a full packer brisket i loose about 15% trimming and another 30% of lost evaporation. I can make up some of this evaporation by foiling the cut and keeping the juices to re-add
For my calculations i will go with a 60% yield based on 40% loss
-Pork butts from costco have a 25%-35% loss and full pork shoulders (all fat on and bone in) can have as high as 50% loss


Here are my calculations


[How much meat?] x [how many people?] x 1.[yield loss i.e .4]
so for instance for 100 people at 250 grams and 35 % loss it would look like this

250 x 100 x 1.35 = 33750 grams or 33.75kg of meat for a 25kg yield which is required

I have created a nigty Spreadsheet here to do the calculations for you.
If you have any questions let me know

BBQ EVENT CATERING CALCULATOR


Event Calculator Spreadsheet by Brett Robinson, on Flickr

[MrLucyTheBoxer]

Thanks! This looks awesome!

Walking a different path...

www.suburbanaussiedad.blogspot.com.au

[Meat and eat]

Here are my calculations


[How much meat?] x [how many people?] x 1.[yield loss i.e .4]
so for instance for 100 people at 250 grams and 35 % loss it would look like this

250 x 100 x 1.35 = 33750 grams or 33.75kg of meat for a 25kg yield which is required

A lot of folks are gonna go hungry at your show.

I believe you are way way out with your figures.

If you have your 35% loss you would need to start with 38.46 kilos.
38.46 kilos minus 35% (13.46) leaves you with your stated figure of 250 grams for 100 people.

Cheers

Meat and eat.

[Smokey]

Here are my calculations


[How much meat?] x [how many people?] x 1.[yield loss i.e .4]
so for instance for 100 people at 250 grams and 35 % loss it would look like this

250 x 100 x 1.35 = 33750 grams or 33.75kg of meat for a 25kg yield which is required

A lot of folks are gonna go hungry at your show.

I believe you are way way out with your figures.

If you have your 35% loss you would need to start with 38.46 kilos.
38.46 kilos minus 35% (13.46) leaves you with your stated figure of 250 grams for 100 people.

Cheers

Meat and eat.

Thats true on his figures M&E and ive always worked on 250G PP when doing hot roast catering . And always had left over so could have worked on 200g PP.
Its fickle science however Beavers is a good guide. Im not so sure about a 35% loss , Maybe close but the meat also gains an intense Umami and richness that most people will enjoy but eat a little less of because it is so rich. While Your correction is just, His method worked for him last year when he had his engagement party I believe.

[Meat and eat]

Here are my calculations


[How much meat?] x [how many people?] x 1.[yield loss i.e .4]
so for instance for 100 people at 250 grams and 35 % loss it would look like this

250 x 100 x 1.35 = 33750 grams or 33.75kg of meat for a 25kg yield which is required

A lot of folks are gonna go hungry at your show.

I believe you are way way out with your figures.

If you have your 35% loss you would need to start with 38.46 kilos.
38.46 kilos minus 35% (13.46) leaves you with your stated figure of 250 grams for 100 people.

Cheers

Meat and eat.

Thats true on his figures M&E and ive always worked on 250G PP when doing hot roast catering . And always had left over so could have worked on 200g PP.
Its fickle science however Beavers is a good guide. Im not so sure about a 35% loss , Maybe close but the meat also gains an intense Umami and richness that most people will enjoy but eat a little less of because it is so rich. While Your correction is just, His method worked for him last year when he had his engagement party I believe.

My figures are absolutely correct.
Beavers workings out will only net him 219.4gm per person, or at his 250 gm will only feed 87 people not 100.
Better get there early.

They're still gonna be the best fed people eating a real BBQ treat, no question on that

Cheers

Meat and eat

[urbangriller]

The Calculation is incorrect, you are right Meat and Eat. ( I don't think Mick was saying you were not).

250g x 100 punters = 2500 (25kg)

2500 x 155% = 3875 (39kg ish)

3900 less 35% = 2535
.......................................You need to multiply by 1.55 (not 1.35) 250 x 100 x 1.55 = 3875

The Loss also depends on the cut you are using. Something with a lot of bone, fat and sinew, you can loose up to 65% (Suckling Pig for example).

Chris

[urbangriller]

OK, I finally had a chance to look at the spreadsheet today.

Hard work because the spreadsheet is password protected, so not much good to anyone.

I didn't bother looking any further than the %Loss as that's the bit we were talking about.



Looking at the top line: 32kg of meat less 30% for trimming leaves 22.4kg That 22.4kg less 35% in the cooking, yeilds 14.56kg of usable meat, not 11.2kg.

Took me a while to work out how to make the calculation right, but here it is:



The Columns B and C must be formatted as "Percentage" and the formula for the Yeild in E2 is: =(D2*(1-B2))*(1-C2)


Beaver: If you format your columns C and D as Percentage, then paste this formula into F6 and copy it down, the "Meat Calculator" part of the spreadsheet will work.
=E6*(1-C6))*(1-D6)

Those of you who went to sleep during that can wake up now!

Cheers
Chris