# Need menu for 300 people



## rookiesmoker

Hello all, I need your help.

I am new to smoking, but am loving every minute of it.  My first smoke was New Years Eve 2006/2007, so I am by no means a "pro".

A fellow employee has tasted a few of the items that I have smoked and has asked me to cook for her daughters wedding reception.  What she really wants me to do is smoke a bunch of whole chickens.  I am a little nervous to say the least.

Now she does not want this to be a meal for the guests, just a snack type of event.  So my question is how many whole chickens would an event like this take??????  Or would it be better to do a combination of chicken and some kind of pork (tenderloin or pulled).

She is trying to keep the cost down and I am not charging her, so any suggestions would be helpful.

Thanks in advance....


----------



## up in smoke

Man, Thatâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s a lot of chicken! I would think that a chicken wouldnâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t serve more than 6 people-that makes 50 chickens. I would try to talk her into pulled pork & briskets myself! What kind of smoker are you going to use! Do you think you are ready for something that big?


----------



## rookiesmoker

Well, I don't think she wants it to be a meal.  She is planning on having rolls and serving it like a snack sandwich, as she is going to have other things like salad, crackers and cheese, etc.....  She is planning on removing the meat from the bone and having it layed out in a warmer.  I was thinking a combo of chicken and pulled pork myself.

Do I think that I am ready for something like this.  Honestly I am a bit nervous.  Am I scared, not really, just nervous.


----------



## zardnok

For little snack sandwiches, chicken will be difficult, or rather not so much difficult, as overly expensive.  Trying to smoke whole chickens and remove it from the bone will take FOREVER!!  If she wants chickens and plans on serving it on buns, your best bet is probably to do boneless skinless thighs and breasts.  Less work for you, less time for you, more money for her.  If she wants to serve it as a meal, well OK then, whole chickens is perhaps the way to go, but for snack sandwiches, keep it simple.  I would also perhaps suggest sliced brisket and pulled pork for snack sandwiches.  When you start comparing it pound for pound, it comes out pretty close.

How much space do you have on your smoker??  Do you have enough to do 50lb of boneless skinless breasts?  I guess you could use rib racks and stand the breasts up perhaps, but keep in mind the time required to do all this and make sure to cook a day or two in advance so everything is ready to go.  Do NOT try to cook everything and have it all magically come off the smoker right as the wedding finishes.  It will not.  Something will go wrong and you are left with 300 hungry people.  Been there.  Done that.  Not gonna repeat that mistake!!


----------



## up in smoke

Ya might wanna consider some turkeys-or turkey breasts (start watching for sales-right after easter they are dirt cheap!) they take pretty much same time (especially if ya split em!) alot easier to carve too! Plus some butts! Or how about a couple whole pork loins (get em on sale cheap at Sams or Cosco!) Rubbed and smoked-sliced real thin…great sandwich platter meat! Very un-redneck!

p.s. Remember to the common folk, smoked turkey is very gourmet!
We’re just spoiled


----------



## keywesmoke

That's a very tall order for some who hasn't done it long! The chance of you making somebody sick is there, you'd need an industrial smoker and a whole lotta room.....I'd ask her to price out some local BBQ joints to cater it, even just the snack concept.  JMHO


----------



## msmith

Rookiesmoker I agree with Up In Smoke the tenderloins would be the best way to go. You can get whole loins at sams and there pretty big. What kind of smoker are you using. Ive done a few benefits and some grand openings and we always figured 1/2 pound of meat per person if this helps you.


----------



## da pigman

Thats a whole lot of people for someone to smoke for that is just begining....scares me.  My pigroasts I do a 200lb. pig which 25 hungry ball players put away fast.  It will serve 125 with side dishes.  Is she wanting the smoking to take place there or can you cook a couple of days ahead?


----------



## short one

Rookiesmoker IMHO this would be a very large undertaking. Stop and think, how long will it take you to prepare this much food, do you have a place to keep it refridgerated and safe after it's cooked, where or how do you reheat that much food, and do you have the equipment to keep it at serving temp. after you set up and wait for the wedding to end. A lot to think about and do if doing something like this.


----------



## rookiesmoker

Thanks to all that have replied.

To answer a few questions:

I am leaning toward the tenderloin, as it can be sliced thin and put on a roll for a sandwich or just eaten like it is.

I plan on doing the smoke the day before the wedding.  This will ensure that I have ample time to prepare everything.

I have access to a food vacume sealer that I plan on using after the loin has rested for a while. 

She assures me that there is a commercial-type heating tray there at the church that we can use.  I will either reheat the loin on the grill or slice it and reheat it in the church oven before serving.


----------



## pigcicles

RookieSmoker if you are head strong and hell bent on doing this, can you at least bring us some pics? And tell the tale of how it went. Every now and then someone has a large event that someone want them to cook for... this will be good info for them. Thanks

Keep Smokin


----------



## up in smoke

To be on the safe side, I would allow myself more than 1 day to smoke! Itâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s probably gonna take ya 4-5 hours just to slice it. If I figured right, 1/4 lb. meat per person. 300 peopleâ€¦thatâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s 9 pork loins at 8 lbs. each. 3-4 hours each! yeah, more than 1 day!


----------



## peculiarmike

Great freakin Mother of Pearl! Whadda ya nuts?
And doing it for FREE?
Cajones  
	

	
	
		
		



		
		
	


	





Just make sure you plan ahead and make more than you think will be needed, cause there is a chance you will need it. Better to have some left over than to run out!

Good luck.


----------



## goat

Food for 300 is a pretty tall order for anyone.  I don't know what kind of equipment you have and I am not sure of your experience level.  In my opinion, and I might be wrong, you have bit off more than you can chew.  IMHO, pork loin will be the hardest meat you can cook the day before and then reheat and not be DRY as hell.  I would not do it for anybody, for free or not.  

I just hate someone who cuts down my plan without offering another.  Here is my suggestion.  If you are attempting this by yourself, don't do it.  If this is self serve figure at least 3/4 lb precooked meat per person.  There will be folks that just get a plate of meat if it is any good.  I would get 50 lbs of boneless chicken thighs to cook the day of.  I would cook about 5 pork butts prior to the event and also 5 briskets.  The briskets and butts can be sliced/pulled the day of.  Put the meat in a large foil pan along with all juices and perhaps some fat also.  Pour a beer over this meat and seal the top with foil.  Place these foil pans in the oven or in your smoker to warm.  Cook the chicken thighs the day of and have some of your help slice them as they get done and pan them up.

I know there are those of you who will say that this is way too much meat.  All I know is that I have NEVER run out of food and hope to be able to say that when I die.  Two weekends ago, I cooked all weekend for a group of people, men, women, and children mixed.  On Saturday night, about 40 people ate 2 large briskets, (there was enough for 3 sandwiches left) and 15 lbs of boneless chicken thighs.  Along with that, they also had a potato dish, pinto beans, cole slaw, bread and cobbler for desert.  If it is free and self serve, it is hard to have too much food.

Sometimes NO is the correct answer.  I am not trying to discourage you or discredit you in any form shape or fashion, but I think I have an obligation to draw from my experience and bestow my thoughts on you.  Never forget the safe handling issues.  Good luck.


----------



## peculiarmike

AMEN, Bro.


----------



## keywesmoke

If anyone would know, goat would!


----------



## squeezy

Bravo .... be sure to let us know how everything turns out !!!

best regards,
Squeezy


----------



## msmith

Rookiesmoker if you wait and cut those loins after you reheat them they want be dry at all.


----------



## up in smoke

If you are using the loins for sammiches, I wouldnâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t even reheat, treat em like fancy lunchmeatâ€¦thatâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s just me! (saves them from drying out)


----------



## rookiesmoker

Thanks everyone,

With your suggestions, I have talked them into pork butt and briskett.  I have also recruited a couple more smokers and am going this weekend to buy myself a larger smoker (gave me an excuse to give to the woman of the house).

I will have two wood burners and two electric smokers to work with.  We plan on starting on Thursday night and cooking all night and day on Friday.

Now my question is, do I put the butts in the wood burners and the briskett in the electric?  This seems logical to me as the butts are bigger and will need more space.

Getting the meat Tuesday and will take pics from start to finish.


----------



## shellbellc

Brass!  Last football season I "signed" up for bringing pulled pork for a tailgating party at my VFW.  I planned on a sandwich and a half for everyone considering that some would make one, some would grab two.  Felt I had everything under control and smoked so I could let rest and then pull and finish right before serving.  My timing was perfect, the amount of food should have been plenty.  Word of mouth travelled what I was making and all these hethens showed up like we were giving away superbowl tickets and free beer!  Well most of them never had NC pulled pork before, they ate ALL of it and left some late comers empty plated.  I would never under take 300.  
What I would be worried about here is if this is just like for like an appetizer or is she having an actuall dinner afterward. Sounds like this will be her main source of food for serving.  People will scarf it down.  I think most people expect a meal when attending a wedding.  If pork and briskett sandwiches are the meal, then they will eat more than that one sandwich...


----------



## rookiesmoker

It is Wednesday April 18, and the big event is Saturday.

The "Meat Man" just delivered the goods....


8 Bone In Pork Butts 10lb average pre cook weight for $85.60
6 USDA Choice 12lb brisket pre cook weight for $96.43


Yeah, I think I got her a heck of a deal.  That is $1.07 per pound for the butts and $1.33 per pound for the brisket.  I just ordered a case of 6lb pork loins for $2.12 a lb.  It helps to have a friend working for a major food distributer that gets meat at cost.....

I will continue to update this blog with pics from the start of the smoke until the end.

And just to let everyone know, when I agreed to do this, I was under the impression it was going to be for about 50 people, and when I found out that there could be as many as 300 I was thinking the same thing you guys are saying, "HE'S NUTTS".

Oh well, Get-R-Done..........


----------



## deejaydebi

Good Luck Rookie!


----------



## chefloydb

That is a tall order 
I think if it were me i would agree with zardoc and do boneless skinless breasts and thighs. you could also do somthing like a smoked chicken salad if the smoking doesn't have to be done onsite.
I would also try to push some pork either pork loin or butt.but if you must do the whole chickens a 4# wog should get you between 6 to 8 snack sized servings that pus you at about 38 to 50 chickens.


----------



## rookiesmoker

Sorry folks, left my camera at work last night.  Had to take it to work to download all the vacation pictures to a cd and left it there.

Anyway, here I am back at work at 7:45 after being up pretty much every hour and a half last night.  (YAWNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN)

At around 10:00 p.m., I trimmed and rubbed three of the six brisket's down with my favorite rub, put the wood chips in to soak, and got ready for the start of a 2 1/2 day event.  

I then got everything else ready to start the three masterbuilt electric smokers that I was able to borrow from friends and family.  Had to keep everything separate so that I did not mix and match.  Cleaned all the components of one, then the second and then the third.

I estimated that at around 12 lbs apiece, they would take approximately 15-16 hours to cook, and I get home from work around 3:30, so I decided that 1:00 a.m. would be the official start time.

Took a little cat nap, and around 1:15 the first three briskets were in the smokers, so I toasted myself (cause the wife and kids were in bed) with a good ol' Natie Lite.

Back to bed for another cat nap, this time I would need to be awake about 3:15 to mop and flip the meat.  Well, 3:45 rolls around before I wake up, oh well nobody is perfect.  I mopped the meats, flipped them, and check the wood chip trays in the smokers, then back to bed.

5:00 a.m. back up to mop and make sure everything is going good.  Looks great, so back to bed for another quick nap.  6:20 another mopping, temp check, everything is going great.

Two cups of coffee while watching morning news, s---, shower and shave, get dressed, then back out to mop and check before I go to work.

I am going home at lunch to check and will take pictures then.

Yes, I think I am NUTTS but were doing great.


----------



## msmith

RookieSmoker your not nuts sounds like to me your a true blue smoking fool like the rest of us Lol.


----------



## shellbellc

Can't wait for pics!!  It's almost lunch!


----------



## rookiesmoker

Just wanted to let everyone know that the brisket and pork butt came out great.  I will post a couple of pics here.

The Pork butt is complete and the brisket is about two hours in to a heavy smoke on a wood burner.


----------



## deejaydebi

Rookie -


Are you trying to say that this type of behavior is not normal? 







BITE YOUR TONGUE BOY!


----------



## rookiesmoker

DeeJayDebi, 

I am not sure of what you are trying to say.  If you were referring to the meat coming out great, well yes that is normal, but remember it was 155 lbs of it, starting at 1:00 a.m. on Thursday and ending at 11:45 on Friday night.

Here is how it went down.

Started with 3 of the briskets at first.  Just to get my feet wet on the electric smokers.  Set temp to 220 and timer to 15 hrs.

Every hour and a half or so, I would spray the brisket down with apple juice and check the chips.  Then when temp hit internal temp hit 120-130, I wrapped in foil and sprayed again.  At about 11 hrs, the temp was hitting about 185.  I wanted to get them as close to 200 as possible, and actually hit 205 at 15 hrs.  I then unwrapped them and placed each in their own juice in a aluminum roasting pan, covered the top with foil and let stand for 2 hrs.  before I duplicated this process, I wanted to check the taste to see if I needed to alter anything.  Man that stuff just melted in my mouth, it was great, but the smoke ring was not very good, just a little, and I wanted a good smokey flavor.  The electric smokers were just not going to get it done.

So for the next rounds what I did was to get the wood burner cranked up to 225 and I smoked the meat in there pouring the smoke to it for about 4 - 5 hours, then I would transfer the meat to the electric to finish cooking.

This method turned out great.  The flavor and the texture were outstanding.  If anyone is going to do this in the future, I would recommend this method.  You can over smoke in a wood burner for a while, and I mean smoke just billowing out the stack, then transfer to an electric to finish the cooking.

To give you an idea of how much meat we had, there were around 275 people at the reception, and I smoked 80 lbs of pork butt and 75 lbs of brisket.  There was about 1 butt left and half a brisket left.  

Again, this was not intended to be a meal for everyone, it was just to be a finger food snack.  So you can draw your own conclusions about how much it would have taken if it was a meal.

Thanks for all your ideas, they really helped a bunch.


----------



## goat

Congratulations Rookie.  Sounds like things went real well for you.  Do you have any food porn to show us??


----------



## keywesmoke

Interesting. Can't you put a whole lotta wood in an electric,or is the heat source just never hot enough?


----------



## rookiesmoker

Keywesmoke,

The electrics I had borrowed were all the Masterbuilt electric that BassPro Sells.  I believe they were the 3 rack models, and the wood tray is not very big.  The problem I believe is that the wood never fully turns to ash, so the space is limited.

It did give the meat a smoke flavor, just not what I like.  Not to say my idea is the right idea, but my preference is a good smoke flavor.


----------



## keywesmoke

OK. I was advised here to put a cast skillet right on the element and put chunks on it as well as the tray. I'll see, I get mine on the 30th!


----------



## mysticalman

I have to agree with you about the Masterbuilt smokers. They do an ok job for smoking but they do not give you a true smoke ring like other smokers. I think it may have to do to the fact they have no holes to let smoke out, they are more of a closed system. I have a few other friends that have electric smokers of different brands and they all complain of the same thing. So recently I just switched over to a GOSM and the results have been much better.


----------



## keywesmoke

Huh. My new Masterbuilt on the way has a vent on the top, maybe a mod in response to this problem.


----------



## deejaydebi

Rookie -

Your said "Yes, I think I am NUTTS but were doing great."

I said "Are you trying to say that this type of behavior is not normal?"

When I typed it it looked like it was comming right after you comment but we must have all beentyping at the same time.

Glad it all when well for you kiddo! It's amazing sometimes what we can do when we have too!


----------



## rookiesmoker

Ok DeejayDebi,

I understand now.

Yes it is amazing what we can get accomplished once our backs are against the wall.

I wish I had more pics for you guys.  Unfortunately, both my kids were having ball tournaments that day and I was unable to attend the reception.  My boss and two other individuals from work were able to attend, and all said things turned out great.  I even found out that the people serving the food pulled the pork and sliced the brisket before they reheated it (I told them to reheat then pull and slice) but they said it did not dry out.

Just to let everyone know, after smoking the meat (Pork Butt and Brisket)  I transfered from the aluminum foil into an aluminum roasting pan, the ones you can get at Wally World for a couple of bucks, and covered the top with aluminum foil, and let set on the cabinet for a couple of hours (trying to duplicate the wrapped in foil and towels in an ice chest method).  Since there was sooooooooo much meat, I did not have enough ice chests to do this.

I then transfered into the refrigerator until the day of the reception.  This seemed to work great, so if you are ever worried about refrigerating and reheating, it does work fine.


----------



## gypsyseagod

not sure where you're going w/ this but the last large chicken smoke i did was for over 2,500(you read it right), not sure what size your pit is or anything else but i do know if you go to a meat market or meat purveyour it's easier to get a good count & decent price- now as far as servings & price go- let's say hypothetically you go to walmart. you can get 10# of chicken quarters(roughly 10 quarters per bag) for $4-6.. thats a quarter chicken a person(which is usually plenty) & the sweeter the sauce the fuller you feel,especially if you have molasses &/or brown sugar in the sauce. if thats any help at all.


----------



## gypsyseagod

ops sorry guess i posted too late as i didn't read all the posts - but maybe my post will give some scope to another person doing this - i do know how to plate price for caterings and serving size(w/ extra) for caterings so if you have a gig or a team or questions- don't hesitate to mail me.. always willing to help


----------



## ikinya6

I tip my hat, sir. Very nicely done. Thanks for the details. I've had a few requests myself, but nothing that big... yet. So it's good to see how a fellow newbie pulled it off.


----------

