Topic: Main Dishes for a large group

[daddyL]

Hi everyone,

I'm not experienced in cooking for numbers and in a couple of weeks need to cater for around 12 guests.
Their tastes all vary so will/may be serving CTM, Jalfrezi, Madras, Vindaloo, Dhansak my problem lies with reheating them once they are all cooked.
Do i do single portions?
Buffet style help your self?
Microwave or oven to reheat?

Any advice would be much appreciated

Leon

[abdulmohed2002]

Hi everyone,

I'm not experienced in cooking for numbers and in a couple of weeks need to cater for around 12 guests.
Their tastes all vary so will/may be serving CTM, Jalfrezi, Madras, Vindaloo, Dhansak my problem lies with reheating them once they are all cooked.
Do i do single portions?
Buffet style help your self?
Microwave or oven to reheat?

Any advice would be much appreciated

Leon

Hi Leon,

My advice is, for 12 guests, you need at least 3 portions of each dish and do a buffet system. Make sure you have at least 45 medium pieces of chicken or lamb. You will find that by having the buffet system, everything will finish so you will not have to reheat. Hope this helps  .

Abdul

[curryhell]

Hi everyone,

I'm not experienced in cooking for numbers and in a couple of weeks need to cater for around 12 guests.
Their tastes all vary so will/may be serving CTM, Jalfrezi, Madras, Vindaloo, Dhansak my problem lies with reheating them once they are all cooked.
Do i do single portions?
Buffet style help your self?
Microwave or oven to reheat?

Any advice would be much appreciated

Leon

It's always a challenge when cooking for large numbers  .  Even a dinner party for six needs a bit of planning.  I've cooked for anything between 6 to 18 people and the best way i found was to do it buffet style as Abdul said.  Obviously, you'll do all the prep and cooking in advance as you don't have the advantage of a restaurant stove and an army of chefs to help .  It will be  a busy day though and the last thing you will want to do is sit and eat indian at the end of it as you'll probably be sick of the sight of it after all your hard work.  All you will want is a few beers and to hear positive feedback from your guests about how good it tastes and someone saying " you didn't really cook all this did you? You just ordered it in especially"  ;D. As Abdul says i would do three portions of each dish.  I always cook them individually, portion by portion and then combine them and crate them up.  When done it's simply a matter of warming them all GENTLY in the oven slowly (120c for an hour or until nicely hot but not bubbling).  The last thing you want to do is cook them further.  They just need to be warmed through until hot.  While this is happening it gives you time to get the rice on and do any last minute stuff and socialise with the dinners.
As for the microwave, i try not to use it to reheat curry.  By its very nature it does not reheat liquid and solids evenly and therefore results in cooking (or overcooking) sauce whilst just warming meat.
Hope my ramblings have helped  ;D
Good luck with the dinner party.  I'm sure others will chip in with their experiences and advice as well.

[Peripatetic Phil]

As for the microwave, i try not to use it to reheat curry.  By its very nature it does not reheat liquid and solids evenly and therefore results in cooking (or overcooking) sauce whilst just warming meat.

Would you not consider using a microwave oven at the lowest non-zero power setting for this ?  I find that setting a microwave oven to 10% power, I can then use it to re-heat virtually anything since the rest periods between the short bursts of full power allow the heat built up in the liquid to automatically transfer to the chicken/meat/w-h-y without any risk of the latter over-cooking, and it is (IMHO) far more economical than using a domestic oven set to 120C for the same purpose.

** Phil.

[curryhell]

Would you not consider using a microwave oven at the lowest non-zero power setting for this ?  I find that setting a microwave oven to 10% power, I can then use it to re-heat virtually anything since the rest periods between the short bursts of full power allow the heat built up in the liquid to automatically transfer to the chicken/meat/w-h-y without any risk of the latter over-cooking, and it is (IMHO) far more economical than using a domestic oven set to 120C for the same purpose.

** Phil.

Yes i would Phil.  I normally heat my curry in the micro for 6 - 7 mins at 40%. It would probably be better at 10% but the waiting time would be intolerable .  I normally do my baked beans at 10% for 12 mins and they are perfect ;D. Nothing worse than boiling baked beans, it just ruins the taste .  On a more serious note i think it will be more practicle when reheating dishes for a dinner party to throw the whole lot into the oven and heat gently though rather than faffing for  a long time with the "ding" ;D.

[daddyL]

Thanks for the advice, def going to go down the buffet / oven route might scrap the vindaloo and give Abdul's Dynamite chicken or lamb a bash (quick test run Sat me thinks  ;D

    thanks for your support 

The vegan can have dynamite veg 

[curryhell]

Look forward to a full report of the event and pics if poss.  Including the reaction of the vegan

[chriswg]

Hi Leon

If your technique is good you can cook the curries in batches of up to 4 with no degradation in quality. I was quite surprised to hear this too but it works.

Good luck with the meal. If you are doing base on the day make sure you start at about 9am. The rice can be microwaved when needed, that is fairly standard for a takeaway (from what I have seen). I wouldnt try and do too much. Rice, curry and poppadums is plenty. If you start trying to juggle bhajis, naans, sheek kebabs e.t.c. you will have a nightmare

Chris

[daddyL]

Hi Chris,

I think the maximum Ive gone to in the past is about 3 large portions of curry at once, any more for me would be pushing it. The base I will do the day before and as much prep as possible , As you quite rightly point out trying to do too much would be a nightmare   I would rather do a few things well than lots of stuff badly 
Poppadums,curry,rice,chapatti, narga ice cream and a small amount of alcohol 


Leon