Catering for a Social Event – how to work out your Wine, Beer and Spirit requirements
If you’ve been charged with organizing the drinks for a Long Weekend party, here are a few helpful tips to get you through it.
Firstly, you need to define the type of party – a cocktail party, drinks for a few hours, a full dinner, late night party, lunch or breakfast – what’s the format? The next thing to work out is the split of male and female and to understand who is coming along!
Armed with all that information, here are a few general tips and bits of information;
- 1 bottle of wine will serve 6 – 8 glasses of wine, depending on the size of the glass.
- How do you work out how many drinks per person you should cater for? Working on these numbers below will give you a good balance as some people won’t drink and some may have a glass or two more:
- If the event is over say 2 – 3 hours and is a cocktail party, drinks for a few hours or a casual get together, then work on 2-3 drinks per person for 2 -3 hours
- For a dinner, work on about 3 – 4 drinks per person
- If the event is more of a party, then 3-5 drinks per person is the best calculation
- Understanding your female/male split will help you work out the beer/wine ratio – although that’s of course a huge generalization in itself – but you’ve got to start somewhere.
- Water/Non Alcoholic drinks – something not to forget; it’s very important to look after the sober drivers. There’s a great range available – from sparkling water, to natural carbonated drinks like Stoke Ginger Beer.
- Low Alcohol options – Cider has grown in popularity over the last few years and the range that’s available now is quite something ; there’s some wonderful local options and new imported Ciders like the Aspall Apple Cyder all the way from Suffolk in the UK.
- Ice – keeping everything cold on those hot summer days coming is a challenge; putting the drinks outside in a large ice bin, filled with ice, is also a great way to ensure that the fridge stays a little clearer for keeping the food cold.
- Kegs of Beer – not just a student flat thing! At Glengarry Victoria Park you can organize to hire a keg pump and order your favourite handcrafted Beer Keg. If you’ve got the numbers, why not!
- Food – don’t forget the food; it’s good host responsibility to feed your guests as well. Dida’s Foodstore Jervois Road offers a takeout catering menu – whether it’s canapés, sandwiches to go, salads, picnic hampers, antipasto platters or a cheese board, the list is endless.
- Glasshire – we are big on great glasses at Glengarry and have stocks of our Riedel and Eisch glasses to hire out; we also have a range of everyday glasses available for hire with purchase of wine from Glengarry.
That’s a general guide to get you started. Don’t hesitate to contact the team at Glengarry to assist you further.
