Trillis Parker Profile

My answers will be in red.

Subject: Food advice

Hi

I wonder if you could help me with some calculations. We're having a Stake Primary Leadership meeting this Thursday, and I'm hoping for between 150 to 200 people for snacks after the meeting. The menu is really simple:

Lemon water - Each Lemon can be cut into 10 slices. I would suggest to have pitchers of water with Lemon slices in it - and maybe just squeeze just a small amount of a fresh lemon in it. That would be your lemon water. Or you could go the other route and fill 150 glasses with just plain water and put a lemon slice on it.
Grapes, strawberries and orange wedges - Grapes - (not everyone will take grapes and you should have both colors and they should be seedless of course) You can figure that you'll get 8 servings per pound of grapes when you cut them up with scissors. I would plan on maybe 40 lbs of grapes of each color. Strawberries - here you are on your own. This depends on how they are sold. I would plan on at least 3 per person. Everyone loves strawberries and will be your best seller. Oranges - here again I would eliminate these even more so now that I reread who this function was for. In any case - oranges will wedge in 8 section per orange but they are going out of season now so it's hard to find good ones to section. I would only do up 5 or 6 oranges if it were me.
Fruit dip (Cool whip and frozen (thawed) OJ concentrate (mixed) - Dip for fruit is often over looked because they don't know what it is without a tag on it naming the content. I would make an amount up - maybe just one or two recipes and put it right in the middle of the strawberries. That way they'll know for sure what it is.
Carrot and celery sticks- If you buy these all ready prepared - my investigation says figure 1/8 pound per person. I would figure that on the baby carrots and make my own fresh celery sticks. I don't trust the celery sticks you buy. I think 9 lbs of baby carrots should do you just fine. That's half of the amount that you are supposed to have, but you'll have the other half in celery sticks. A large bunch of fresh celery yields about 15 stalks of celery - each stalk you cut in half and then in 3rds length wise. You should get at least 90 sticks from a large bunch of celery. I would say 5 bunches would be just right for 150 people. That would allow each person 3 sticks.
Whole Wheat Pita wedges - Here again you are kind of on your own - and you can figure this out easy peasy. It depends on how big the Pita is and how many pieces you are going to cut the pita bread into. If it's a large Pita I would cut it into 8 wedges, if small, cut it into 6 wedges. Figure at least one pita per person and you'll be safe I'm sure. Not everyone will eat Pita with Hummus I don't think. You know the people that are coming better than I do.
hummus or ranch dressing (depending on cost)- Here I would definitely have both hummus and ranch dressing. I have a recipe for hummus that I'm sending you that will be in a separate email. I think you'll need about 6 cups of it which will feed about 96 people. 8 cups will feed 128 people. It will be up to you. Or of course you can buy the hummus also. They figure 1 cup feeds 16 people. - With the ranch dressing - You'll need that for the celery and carrot sticks - I feel. At least I would want it for that. I would figure 12 servings from a 16 oz bottle of ranch dressing. So 5 or 6 - 16 oz bottles of ranch dressing should be enough.

Could you help me calculate quantities, so I can go purchase the food on Wednesday? I'm trying to make things that take as little processing as possible, are not too expensive, and are nutritious. If you have any other menu suggestions, they are more than welcome! Thanks for your help!
I am going to be praying a lot on this one. You realize I haven't done this for a long time. I've been figuring basically on 150 people. You might check my calculations. I've been doing some goofy things lately.
Love and Hugs,

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