F/U: Number of courses served at your wedding? Was it too much, not enough, or just right?

peaches85

I'm assuming most people on here had cocktail hours at their receptions.  So, if you had a plated dinner following the cocktail hour, how many courses were served and how heavy were they?  (This is just another concern of mine with the dancing because the more courses there are, the more sitting and eating people will feel obligated to do).

Based on the menu our venue gave us we're thinking:
1. Appetizer (soup)
2. Salad
3. Intermezzo (lemon sorbet - Is this necessary? Do people really like it as a palate cleanser?)
4. Entree
5. Dessert (wedding cake and viennese hour

Edit: Based on your experience at your own wedding, is the above too much food (especially after an extensive cocktail hour)?

akmackay

App- fruit salad (they ate this as they came in from the cocktail hour and orders were taken)
Salad (ate during father/daughter and mother/son dances)
Dinner
Dessert (ate as they wanted to take a break from dancing)

Many people commented that the cocktail hour food would've been plenty- but I think that's true with most NJ weddings (well, Northern NJ weddings, wasn't true with the South NJ wedding I went to).

kasabby

We have an app, salad, dinner, and dessert and of course, a huge cocktail hour. 

K&J64

Ours will be the same but with the appetizer as a fresh mozz and roasted pepper napolean. I think the intermezzo is nice, part of a "proper" 5 course meal. The first three courses come pretty quick, and you can tell your wedding coordinator how much time you want to devote to eating and dancing. Plus find out if they have a server per table so that people aren't waiting for food, that will cut down on time alot too.

mbcdefg

I honestly forget if we had a salad and an appetizer, or just a salad (which is what I *think* we had, since I don't remember an appetizer.)

Most people seemed like they ate the lemon sorbet. I think people who aren't from this area were impressed by it. I don't know if it really cleanses the palate, but it was tasty and refreshing. It was a little frozen when we got it, so MH and I used the time to go talk to people. By the time we sat back down it had melted

Then the entree, then the cake and Viennese hour.

The biggest comment I heard about the food was from people saying that the cocktail hour would've been plenty of food for the whole night. Again, people not from this area were quite impressed with that, and also impressed that they could pick their meal right at their table. People were still dancing all night - the food didn't feel like it took up a lot of time.

Can you even change the amount of food you get? For most halls we visited, it was pretty set it stone that you had to have a certain number of courses. We asked the halls if we could take some stuff off the menu to lower the price, and they pretty much all said no (because they didn't want to be viewed as "skimpy" on food).

uppereastgirl

We had five courses (salad, shrimp and mushroom risotto, intermezzo, filet mignon and lobster tail main course, cake and other dessert).

I think it was worth it because everything was legitimately good (and it isn't like we had an option of number of courses), but it of course was overkill after a big cocktail hour and before a viennese display.  But that's kind of how NJ is -- people like to compete with each other on the amount of food they can put in front of people during a wedding (even when in many cases the quantity is there but the quality isn't).  That's how you show that your wedding is "fancy" even though none of that food is great (which is often the case).

I went to a wedding two weeks ago which wasn't over the top on the quantity of food -- cocktail hour had a good number of choices but wasn't showy and over the top, and the meal was only three courses (salad, meal, cake).  No viennese.  But everything -- particularly the main course -- was executed really well.  I actually ate my dinner and enjoyed it and was glad I had room left in my stomach for it.  

So what I'm saying I guess is that I personally don't think people need all of that food, and I'd rather have less food and have it be really good than to have 5 mediocre courses.  But the problem is that venues do what they do -- cutting courses at a place that doesn't have great food isn't going to make the remaining courses better.

peaches85

The only thing we could really cut out that I know of is the intermezzo (sorbet) since it's an add-on that's a replacement for something else (in our case).  Normally our venue provides an additional plated dessert in addition to the wedding cake, but we were able to get the viennese hour thrown in for free, so we decided to nix the plated dessert and replace it with the intermezzo. 

I'm just wondering now if the intermezzo might cause the dinner to be dragged out even longer since it's an additional course.

K&J64

Another thing I've seen at weddings lately is a duet appetizer and salad presented together. I don't know how well it would work for soup and salad, but I was just at a wedding at the Atrium in W. Orange and the presented the fresh mozz/tom appetizer side by side on a plate with the salad which was contained in a large thin cucumber slice held together by a toothpick, the presentation was quite beautiful. If your venue could do something similar with the salad and then provide a small cup of soup on the same plate then you're serving two courses at once and that would cut down on time. Food for thought (no pun intended)

mariaNryan

we have cocktail hour, salad, intermezzo, plated dinner, and vienesse hour

Laurms15

For our wedding we didn't have a HUGE cocktail hour it was very understated so people would be hungry for dinner.

Cocktail hour:
7 passed and 2 stations one with the usual veggies and cheese and crackers and the other was a medetarrianian station.

Dinner:
Salad - Tomato and Mozzarella salad
Pasta - (I have a really Italian family so this was important) like 8 or 9 home made spinach gnocchi.
Dinner - Choice of chicken or beef
Dessert - cake and each table got a small plate of cheese cake lollipops, meringue cookies, chocolate covered strawberries, and other small bite size things 2 or 3 of each variety.

demarcosjd

1. Appetizer (Seafood Martini)
2. Salad
3. Intermezzo (fruit sorbet)
4. Entree
5. Dessert (wedding cake and platter of assorted cookies & chocolate strawberries on each table)

We also had an extensive cocktail hour. I think it was more than enough food. Our Intermezzo came out relatively quickly, there was not a lot of time in between and dinner moved along.

kellybee83

We are having a pretty extensive cocktail hour with 15 passed hors d'ouevres and 7 stations.  Our venue gives us the option of a salad and appetizer course, or a combination of the two.  I'm 95% were we are going to opt for the combination.  They have some great selections for the combinations,  I think we are going to chose this one
Buffalo Mozzarella “en Carozza”Prosciutto de Parma and Fresh MozzarellaSmoked Tomato Vinaigrette and Tiny Vegetable Shoot Salad
Even though some of the other choices are "fancier"  this is very us...I LOVE cheese!
I know of people who have requested to combine two courses even if their venue doesn't list it as an option.  I'm all about maximizing the dancing time!   

We have a choice of 3 entrees tableside or a duet.

Then cake, and the viennese which is also a good spread with action stations. 

I agree with uppereastgirl that it's the quality, not the quantity of food or courses that matters.  

Plus remember venues usually give guests about 15 min per course, and that's not including serving and clearing time.