Good Question: Wedding Finger-Foods on a Budget

Dear The Kitchen,

How can I feed the folks at my wedding reception on a budget? What finger-foods would you reccomend? And for the love of god, can we make it ourselves?

Best,
Amanda in San Francisco

(To All Good Questions)

Amanda,

If you're having ten people to your wedding, sure, make the food yourselves! However, having been through my own wedding, I can tell you that cooking for the 84 people we had was the last thing on my mind. Of course, there are so many different kinds of weddings. Perhaps you're doing something really casual. Could you make it a potluck? Or, could you handle doing some large platters of sliced vegetables, baguette, and cheeses?

Any readers out there with some experience doing the food for their own wedding?

Best of Luck!

(photo: rickandheather.net)

Comments (1)

Amanda, if you're in SF try calling Herbs and Spices catering in Alameda! They did my 2008 wedding for 75 for $2200...and we STILL get comments on how great the food was. It was a simple meal (meditereanean {SP!!} chicken or portobella mushroom, roasted fingerling potatoes, spring veggies and caesar salad) but WOW was it good. They even passed appetizers during the cocktail hour (mozarella and proscutto skewers, mini pizzas and roasted brushcetta), manned the wine table (did you know that in CA any and all open alchololic bottles must be manned by a person over the age of 21 to prevent underage drinking? I didn't until I planned the wedding!), cut the cake AND they cleaned up and packed the dishes, etc and cleaned the kitchen for us! SO worth the money to not have to deal with anything on your special day! I recently went to a cousins wedding and ended up in the kitchen for hours trying to free the mother of the groom for photos, etc! It's SO much more work than it seems for a savings of not that much money once you plan for food, serving trays, help, etc.

PS- sorry if I sound like a commercial, but they won my heart when they delivered my Mom's coffee with her special 2% milk instead of cream directly to her table during the dessert service. The look on her face was priceless when she refused the coffee saying 'no thank you, I can only have 2% milk' and they said, 'no that's what it is', smiled and walked off! All because I asked if they could bring a small bottle for her in an email 6 months earlier!