Thursday, November 17, 2011

Black Friday Lunch at Work

One of my many jobs at work is what I call the catering.  Right now I am working on planning the menu for the "Black Friday"meals.  The company gives us a budget and my job is to try to stretch it out as far as possible in order to try to feed the staff for the holiday season.  I shop around trying to get the best buys so into the ads I went.  Now, I need to feed about 35 people, a number of which are guys who tend to eat more so....I need a lot of food!

So far the menu looks like
Spiral Cut Ham (on sale at Harris Teeter 1.99 a lb) I will bake this on Thursday
Cheese (American Cheese 3.99 a lb at Harris Teeter)
Meat Balls in sauce (should be around 12.00 at Costco and I have sauce left over) They go in the crock pot at work
Rolls (usually runs me about 15.00 at Costco so I may shop around more)
Potato Salad (about 5.00 for a 5 lb container)
Soda (Coke is on a buy 2 get 3 free at Harris Teeter so I will get 10)
Water (Harris Teeter brand 24 .5 liters for 3.37 and I will probably buy 4)

I have bought healthier items before but they really don't get eaten so...I may still add a baked ziti but I need something for later in the season so that may bet pushed to a later weekend.  Last year I added chips and salsa and a spinach artichoke dip I pick up at the Costco. Some of this food I prepare myself in order to save some money. 

Any ideas?

3 comments:

  1. If you've got veggies (um, that's people who don't eat meat, not vegetables) and you want "food" for them, stick blender+ a couple cans of chickpeas and some random other stuff mixes into a pretty good sized vat of hummus.

    And everyone loves Hummus, right?

    For the rolls, have you tried the various day old bread stores?

    And maybe store use a tin of gingersnaps, if you've still got them. Those are yummy. For later on, you might also pick up some on-sale cake mix. Karen used to make "dump cake" which is just a couple cans of fruit under cake mix and butter. I can get the 'recipe' if you want.

    And there's always old fashioned kid-dinner of mac and cheese and tomato soup. Fish fingers too if you're feeling silly.

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  2. PInwheels? (cream cheese concoction with celery, olives, cheese, red pepper and ranch dressing mix spread on flour tortillas then sliced) Cheap, easy and they go a long way.
    Dirty rice?
    Macaroni Salad?
    Egg Salad? (YUM!!)

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  3. ditto what J said about day old bread stores, they have great buys on rolls, cookies and lots of other stuff, people shouldn't eat but love anyway.

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