Post # 1

Member
34 posts
Newbee
We are having a very small town, church wedding. Our reception will consist of appetizers: fruit, veggie trays, meatballs, lil sausages, pinwheels, mini quiches, pasta salad, dips, chicken salad in phyllo cups. We’re expecting 70-80 ppl. How many appetizers do I need per person. The wedding is at 3 in the afternoon. Not sure how hungry ppl will be. If anyone has any ideas please let me know. Thanks!
Post # 3

Hostess
18644 posts
Honey Beekeeper
I’m thinking 4-5 per person but I’m not sure where I can up with the number lol. I think you don’t need a lot of food per person since you are having it during the day when people aren’t as hungry.
Post # 4

Member
2681 posts
Sugar bee
I would probably plan on 1-2 of each item per person, but it also depends on how long you will be serving them for. If its longer than an hour Id go for 10-12 pieces per person total. I know for me, there are certain items I would eat 4 or 5 of and others I would have one or none. Someone posted a link to a blog that broke down how many items per person for food and bar the other day…Im off to find it!
ETA – I meant to do 10-12 pieces per person because I thought you were only doing appetizers for a cocktail reception. If you are doing a dinner with it, you would need less 🙂
Post # 5

Member
166 posts
Blushing bee
Hmm… maybe 5 each depending how filling they are and what time you plan on having your sit down meal/buffet?
Post # 6

Member
34 posts
Newbee
Oops I should have mentioned, there won’t be a dinner. Just appetizers. Like I said it’s a small town and that’s just the way we do it around here lol Thanks for the advice ladies and naangel55 if you find that post pass it on. Thanks!
Post # 7

Member
3762 posts
Honey bee
Since there won’t be dinner I would go with the attitude that more is better. Also that probably means you will be serving the apps for a while. I don’t know how long you are anticipating your reception to be, but assuming 2-3 hours I would say you should plan for a lot of apps.
Our caterer recommneded 1 large tray per 10 people per hour. I think each tray has about 100 pieces on it. So that would equate to about 10 pieces per person per hour.
It looks like you listed about 8 different items you would want served. I would recommend having about 2-3 large trays (100 pieces per tray) of each of those items for your reception (again, assuming you are only serving for 2-3 hours).
That is probably on the very high side, but since you aren’t having dinner I would shoot to have plenty and be stuck with leftovers rather than run out of food and possibly look cheap.