How much chicken to purchase?

[pineapplediva]

I'm cooking for a baby shower and I'm making Chicken Parm, Baked Ziti, Meatballs and Sausages for 20 people. How much chicken should I buy for the cutlets? How much pasta, ground beef and sausages?

Thank you.

[hotoynoodle]

that's a lot of heavy food for what i'm thinking is an afternoon event of mostly women? will there be other, lighter fare? salad? roasted veggies? fruit?

6 oz. of meat (total) per person is plenty, and 4 or so oz. of pasta will be enough. i'd suggest making a lighter chicken dish though? maybe legs roasted with lemon-rosemary ? the meatballs and sausages can be messy and drippy to eat on their own, unless everybody will be seated at a table. you can make small meatballs, though, and cut up the sausage and add them to the ziti to simplify your life.

[mcf]

But the ziti is presumably her only vegetarian option, I wouldn't add the meat to it. Sausage and meatballs cut up are commonly served as passed cocktail hour fare, so no difficulty there. I'd want a salad tho'.

[pineapplediva]

There will not only be women at the shower; men also. The mother to be has requested this food as her choice.

[hotoynoodle]

ah! well, then , it is her day, so you're a good friend to do all this.

i stand by rec 's for amounts, but would still add some lighter items, like salad and fruits.

for the chick parm, you can cut the meat into smaller portions so that a serving isn't necessarily an entire cutlet or breast.

[pineapplediva]

Yes, it's her and her husband's day. The baked ziti will be the main dish. There will be a garden salad and a few other items but very light compared to what I'm making. Everyone devours my food. lol

[woodburner]

First, baby shower is not usually a corral of heavy eaters. And the food sounds wonderful, but heavy for that gang. So consider that at the most, people will take only a taste of everything. You should cut items down so they can have, for example, 1/3 or 1/2 of a chicken breast HALF, a piece or two of sausage (maybe cut on the ange for 3-4 pieces per link), and either a small meatball, or a half of a larger one, with a single serving spoon of ziti. Do the math from there...

[mcf]

Are you serving chips, hors d' ouvres before the meal? I think you should figure on 3/4-1 lb lb of food per person, generally, then figure out how many lbs of each food to apportion. Unless you know your crowd to be big or light eaters... and pre meal bites. I always lean toward making more than enough.

[chefj]

If you make 20 full portions of everything you will have enough food for 60 people.
Count on 1/2 portions for each person, less if they are light eaters.
With out recipes ,as stated already, and the complete menu giving you quantities is impossible.

[mamachef]

For the cutlets, figure 6 oz. per, though you could go down to four because of the other entrees. So, roughly 7 1/2 lbs chicken. The Ziti and sausage, I'd go five of the (top-quality) ground and another 5-7 of the sausages - will you be slicing them? and figure 4-6 ozs. pasta per person. Enjoy your party.

[Kitchen Imp]

Since we don't know your recipes, probably the best way to do it would be to look at the number of servings for each recipe and multiply the amount listed for each meat product to come up with 20 servings.