I need some help deciding on a menu!

[Moonshadow]

Okey, so its my birthday on the 18th, and I'm trying to have the family + girlfriend + her parents around on the 22nd for a birthday dinner. I'm intending to cook for about... 13 people as the max? and its the largest amount I've ever cooked for.

Now in the interests of not totally depleting my already limited funds, I'm trying not to go totally overboard, but I want to try and do at least 3 courses, tentitivly a soup, main and dessert course.

At the moment, the only solid idea I have is for dessert, for which I plan to try and make dessert sushi (take a pancake, put some rice pudding and seasonal berries in it, roll it up like sushi, I got the idea when my girlfriend was talking about how much she likes avocado sushi).

I also have to deal with 2 vegetarians, and 2 people on diets, so its a lot to take into consideration.

Its also autumn, and somewhat cold over here, so nothing really summer-y is a good idea, I think.

I could really use some help! :smallsmile:

[lord pringle]

Make a nice salad with pretty much everything in season. than have chicken cheese and dressing stations for people who want that.

[Serpentine]

My spaghetti bolognaise is really tasty, really easy to cook for a lot of people, and really easy to cook in advance if necessary (hell, it even gets better after being frozen). I'll go grab the recipe.

edit: I'll go easy on you and just post it here.


Serp's Dad's Best Ever Spag. Bol.

*=optional

Olive oil
2 rashers bacon, chopped
2 cloves garlic, very finely chopped/grated*
1 onion, finely chopped*
500g kangaroo mince
1 cube or tsp beef stock in 1/2 cup water
1/2 cup red wine
2 cans tomato soup
2 cans tinned chopped tomatoes
1 tub/couple of heaped tbs tomato paste
1 tsp mixed herbs
couple of bayleaves
mushrooms, chopped*


1. Fry oil, bacon, garlic & onion.
2. Add mince, brown.
3. Drain liquid
4. Add stock, wine, soup, tomatoes & paste then herbs & leaves
5. Stir until boiling.
6. Cover, simmer ~1 hour, stirring occasionally.
7. Remove lid, add mushrooms. Simmer >1 hour (the longer the better).
8. Serve with spaghetti & cheese.Freezes and stores well.





This serves at least 6 people easily. If you just double it you should be fine, or 2.5x it. Or triple it and have your lunches and dinners taken care of for a week.

Oh, and you don't need it to be kangaroo mince. I originally posted it for a thread on homeland foodstuff. The recipe originally uses beef mince, but you can use any.

edit: Oh, vegetarians and diets. Okay, do up a tofu-based one as well/instead (or some other meat substitute type thing). I haven't done it before, but I have no reason to think it wouldn't work fine. And remove the bacon, obviously, and possibly use vegetable stock instead of beef. Should be fine other than that.
If you want to keep it healthy, use lean mince, or maybe chicken (or kangaroo! Almost no fat!). Low-salt stock, soup, tomatoes and paste. Probably leave out the bacon, and maybe the wine. High-fibre spaghetti.

[Moonshadow]

Spaghetti could work. Not too sure about tofu though, I don't believe either of the vegetarians eat it.

I was also thinking about some sort of creamy, vegetable pie, something like sweet potato and pumpkin and carrot in a creamy sauce in a pie, but I'm not sure how that would go...

Also, the whole traditional roast and vegies, but once again, that causes problems with the vegetarians and dieters.

And if I do the pie, then I can't do cream of potato and leek soup for the soup course, which is one of my absolute favs, but I have to try and think more of the rest of the people eating over me =/

[Serpentine]

Well, the tofu wouldn't really be tasted in it. Anyway. Doing a quick google search for mean mince substitutes comes up with these:
Quorn Mince (won The Vegetarian Society's Best Meat or Fish Substitute)
Realeat Vegemince
Textured vegetable protein
Wheat protein/seitan

Actually, I've been thinking for a while that this could go well with beans instead of meat. You should try it out for me :smallwink: Just get an equivalent amount of, I dunno, mixed beans maybe. Tinned you could just use straight away. Dry ones, not sure if it'd cook in the process.

That pie sounds good too, though. But trickier to cook for a large group.

[Moonshadow]

The trick with the pies would be just to make more than one pie :smallsmile:

Its doable, because I'll have 3 or 4 hours to cook, and I'll have my girlfriend helping me out for most of that time (And being able to cook with her is a super good present anyways <3)

[Serpentine]

As an aside, 3-4 hours is the perfect amount of time to get that spag bol perfect :smallwink:

[dehro]

a quiche or an omelette with vegetables in it... nutrient, filling, looks good..and can be served both hot and cold, so you won't have many problems with timing
you could cook it the day before, and always pull it out of the bag at the last minute if other things go wrong

[purple gelatinous cube o' Doom]

I would suggest trying to make something vegetarian that everyone will like. That way you cut down on cost, prep time, and what not. I highly suggest going for something like eggplant parm. It's veggie for the non-meat eaters., and hearty enough for those who do eat meat to like. As for the desert, from what you said, a crepe would probably work out better than a sushi pancake idea. As for funds, you probably aren't going to be able to do 3 courses and make it all that extravagant if you're trying to do it on a budget, it's just not possible for that many people. Example, I made Risotto, pork loin, and a salad for essentially three people earlier this week and it cost $50. I would also suggest trying to find recipes on the web that are meant to serve that many. Foodnetwork.com would be a great place to start looking. Also keep in mind, that if you find a recipe meant for 4 or 5, don't just go doubling or tripling everything in the recipe and think that it will work out for a larger group, most times, that is not the case.

[Serpentine]

Ah spoot, you've reminded me. I was going to link to this financial analysis (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=4199993&postcount=1) of that recipe I did, but forgot. Summary: $3.56AU per serve.

Not that I'm pushing this one cuz I think it's delicious and I wanna see if replacing meat for beans works or anything... <.< >.>

[tonberrian]

Okey, so its my birthday on the 18th

Hey, it's someone with the same birthday as me!

Okay, so I just popped in here to say that. I really don't know anything about cooking <_<.

[Moonshadow]

Erk. No eggplant. I absolutely despise that thing, it tastes horrible. I'd rather cook 2 entirely seperate main courses than cook with eggplant :smallyuk:

[bvdk99]

For soup, you could do a creamy squash soup?

Main course-wise, you could do a roast of some sort, with a vegetable quiche, or root vegetables simmered in vegetable stock, butter and a bit of maple syrup. Verrry good. :smallsmile:

[_Zoot_]

I am now hungry and your to blame Serp :smallmad: :smallbiggrin:

Any way, I would recommend something that can be prepared in advance as that allows for you to deal with all the other things that will undoubtedly come up at the last second.

[thubby]

could go with vegitarian lasagna. it's easy to make en masse.

[Hazkali]

Generally foods that can be cooked as a single mass are good for large numbers. Curries, stews, bolognaises, risottos, paellas and so on can be scaled up in quantities, and easily stretch a little thinner if you're unsure on numbers. Most of these can be made with vegetables or meat-substitutes for the vegetarians too (you should double check, whilst I like Quorn etc, some vegetarians don't).

[Moonshadow]

Oooh, Risotto. I loooooove risotto. Problem is, my dad doesn't =/ so if I do risotto, I'm definatly going to have to do something else to go with it so that those who don't like it can have something they like too.

[Serpentine]

I think you should try to make it easy on yourself, and that's certainly not doing it. I really do recommend a pasta (and not just mine :smalltongue:) - simple, easy, can be quick depending on the recipe, cheap, very easy to cook for large numbers of people.
Here's the recipe from Daft Punk's Revolution 909 video clip (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2R4h3Qsk1rg). Doesn't have amounts, but it should be easy enough to figure out the appropriate amounts.

Boil tomatoes for a few seconds.
Peel away the skins.
Chop the tomatoes.
Set aside.
Heat olive oil on low flame.
Add died red peppers (whole).
Add a diced onion.
Add salt.
Cook onions until tender.
Add tomatoes.
Add torn basil.
Lower heat and stir occasionally for at least an hour.To put it in a more useful recipe form...

The Revolution 909 Pasta Sauce Recipe
Tomatoes (2-3 per person?)
Onion, diced (1/2 per person?)
Dried red chillis (1 per person? I'd probably just use fresh ones)
Olive oil
Salt
Fresh basil, torn (half a handful per person?)

1. Boil tomatoes for a few seconds. Remove from water, and immerse in cold water. Peel away the skins. Chop and set aside.
2. Heat olive oil on a low flame. Add chillis, onion and salt. Cook until onions are tender.
3. Add tomatoes and basil.
4. Lower heat and simmer for at least an hour, stirring occasionally.
5. Serve with spaghetti and parmesan cheese.

I've made it before. It's tasty, and vegetarian-friendly. Hell, it's even vegan appropriate.

[dehro]

pasta is easy indeed...you can make it a summer/cold dish as well... simply by making a pasta salad. you cook the pasta, let it cool down and then mix it with corn, chopped carrots, tomatoes, olives, peperoni...any sort of vegetable really. add tuna and/or cheese for the non vegetarians it would be easy to have 2 bowls...
here's a good one I found online, but ultimately you can add and take off anything that strikes your fancy (http://recipes.epicurean.com/recipe/598/pasta-salad.html)
it looks great, it's fairly easy to make, doesn't really take much time.. and is very flexible as far as quantities go

[Serpentine]

I just updated the Playground Cookbook a bit. I suggest you go have a look at it if you're still deciding. I've marked the vegetarian-friendly ones with a V, but I know I'm missed some. Also there's a link to a post on converting recipes to vegetarian.

[purple gelatinous cube o' Doom]

First off, it's too bad you don't like eggplant, it's a great hearty option for vegetarians that us carnivores can like too. I'd go with the pasta or veggie lasagna idea. It's cheap, easy to make two sauces (one meat, one no meat) and make in mass quantities. Since you're on a budget, I'd stay away from the risotto idea. I just did it this past week, and for the one meal (plus a pork loin), cost me around $50 just for the one meal that fed 3-4.

[zeratul]

I recommend making Cioppino. It's a really hearty fish stew that is really delicious and filling, so you could just have that, a salad and bread, and a desert and all would be pleased most likely.

Here's a really good recipe for it (http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/bobby-flay/fulton-fish-market-cioppino-with-sourdough-croutons-recipe/index.html)

[Mystic Muse]

what you should do is make a low fat vegetable dish for the main course. I'm sure there are quite a few online. Don't be concerned about pleasing everybody. Thirteen different people might have Thirteen different tastes. You can't please everybody no matter how much you want to.

[thorgrim29]

If you make pasta, especially without meat in it, make sure to sprinkle lightly roasted pine nuts on it, gives a great taste, and you can offer dieting people not to have some. Actually you could prepare some meat to put on top of it too and set it aside, may I suggest prosciutto chips? You just put thin prosciutto slices in the oven until they're all crispy and stuff (you could probably do it bacon style on a pan if you need your oven for another dish), then you break them up with your hands and sprinkle on top of you pasta dish, also Parmesan cheese goes very well with the mix (as does a nice italian or spanish red wine).

Finally, for the sauce, you don't get much added value IMO from using fresh tomatoes, especially if it's not italian tomato season, and even more so if you're cooking for 13. Just use diced and crushed tomato cans 1 for 1. What you do is you brown onions and fresh garlic cloves (about one of each per 5 person) in olive oil in the bottom of your pan, add italian herbs to taste (I usually use an italian herb mix and add rosemary and a laurel leaf or two) plus some chili for spice, salt and pepper to taste. If you have an extra 20 minutes or so add a few cans of water (1 for each 4 or 5 max I guess) and let it simmer for a while, really helps the taste.

[Coidzor]

Erk. No eggplant. I absolutely despise that thing, it tastes horrible. I'd rather cook 2 entirely seperate main courses than cook with eggplant :smallyuk:

What about zucchini? I've had some success in substituting zucchini for the eggplant in a parmigiana.

What level of vegetarians are you dealing with here, anyway? Just no terrestrial animal meat? No dairy but ok with eggs? No eggs but ok with dairy?

And what are the diets? Low-carb? Low-calorie? Low-fat? Pseudo-diabetic?

[Bhu]

some vegetarian recipes. just split these that are applicable with some being veggie and some with meat

http://webecoist.com/2008/10/28/14-quick-vegetarian-recipes-for-the-hopeless-cook/

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/10/cheap-easy-vegetarian-meals-recipes.php

some budget recipe sites

http://allrecipes.com/howto/cooking-on-a-budget/detail.aspx
http://www.betterbudgeting.com/frugalrecipelist.htm
http://www.myrecipes.com/recipes/budget-recipes/