# How much food for 20 people???



## lspilot82

Hey guys we are having a end of softball season bash and I wanna do all the cooking. We are going to have around 20 people or so, and I wanna make Ribs, pulled pork and chicken. I was wondering how much of each should I buy and prepare. As well as how much baked beans and coleslaw. Thanks.


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## jirodriguez

Standard portion would be 1/4 to 1/3 lb. per person, at 1/3 lb. per preson you end up with 6.6 lbs. of cooked meat. For the pulled pork remember that you loose 40% of the pre-cooked weight, so you need a 10 lb. pork butt/shoulder. For the chicken and ribs you don't loose that much, my guess it two family packs of chicken would be fine and either 2 racks of spare ribs or 3 racks of baby back ribs. That will allow each person to get a generous serving of each meat, and still leave a little wiggle room.


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## lspilot82

JIRodriguez said:


> Standard portion would be 1/4 to 1/3 lb. per person, at 1/3 lb. per preson you end up with 6.6 lbs. of cooked meat. For the pulled pork remember that you loose 40% of the pre-cooked weight, so you need a 10 lb. pork butt/shoulder. For the chicken and ribs you don't loose that much, my guess it two family packs of chicken would be fine and either 2 racks of spare ribs or 3 racks of baby back ribs. That will allow each person to get a generous serving of each meat, and still leave a little wiggle room.




Ok thats awesome. I thought it would be alot more meat then that.


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## jirodriguez

You can always do more if you want lot of left overs 
	

	
	
		
		



		
			






  Also people will be filling up on the sides as well.


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## mballi3011

Now Johnny has given you a good solid amount and I have to agree with him I would figure 1/3 lb per and you should be fine on the butts. I would do a little more ribs then he said for alot of folks go straight for the ribs and leave the PP alone. I would do maybe 4 racks of ribs. then you have all your sides and all of that too. The one thing you can do is take away but it is really hard to add when your smoking.


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## burksmoke

We usually go a little stronger on this basic formula, but then I'm usually just doing ribs.  Last cook I did for 150 people we cooked 150# of ribs. We had 2 or 3 racks left (bonus for the cooks). If you have good sides and you do the serving You can get by with less.  the 1/3 lb for pork butts and briskett is probably ok (i'm always paranoid about running out of food.)

Burk


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## eman

I have found w/ ribs if you precut either in single or double bones and serve them yourself they go alot farther and the waste is cut way down.

 Seen to many folks take a 1/3 or 1/2 rack and eat 2-3 bones and the rest gets wasted. Everyone fills up there plate and gets full on all the other stuff and

alot of great smoked meat gets tossed.

 I know it's not as pretty as serving in rack form but i hate wasting food.


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## miamirick

i dont know about your pals but if it was my crew one pound a piece wouldnt last more than an hour stock it up you can never have too much  but  its no fun running short


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