Learn how to Plan Meals for Lady’s Camp

Final yr I used to be answerable for all of the meals for a big lady’s camp for church. We fed 260-270 folks for practically every week, and I made a deliberate effort to take heaps and much and many notes alongside the way in which in an effort to share every little thing with you!

I received’t be delving an excessive amount of into budgets and cooking on a price range as that issue will differ broadly between teams.

I additionally acknowledge that some folks could be cooking out of coolers and over a campfire for all of the meals whereas others have a connoisseur kitchen and 5 fridges at their disposal. (VERY jealous of that final group 😉)

The knowledge I’m sharing on this put up is targeted on:

• prep suggestions
• portions
• steered menus
• useful assets
• meals allergy workarounds
• and so on

My hope is that this Info can be useful and relevant regardless of for those who’re within the mountains at a church camp or on a seashore for a household reunion.

MY TOP THREE TIPS FOR SUCCESS

Tip #1: Get Your self a Committee That Will Go to the Ends of the Earth With You

A superb committee is every little thing! I had six of essentially the most wonderful ladies on the committee with me, and so they have been so extremely useful.

I couldn’t have accomplished it with out them, and if I ever handle to get myself into this case once more, it will include the clear caveat that I might solely do it if I had the identical committee. (Additionally, if my price range could possibly be elevated by $2,000, that will be fantastico, ok’thanks.)

Executing meals for this measurement of group isn’t only a week-of form of factor. We deliberate for months to make it occur. I believe formally we held two precise in-person conferences to plan. In any other case, we did most of our planning/strategizing through texts.

A number of on my committee labored full-time and/or had main life occasions happening main as much as camp, so their predominant duties have been brainstorming, grocery buying (extraordinarily useful! particularly the few days main as much as camp), and hands-on assist up at camp.

Others had extra time obtainable within the months main as much as camp and have been instrumental in serving to prep and freeze meals.

The week of, everybody that would make it was all arms on deck. Each day of camp, we have been up at 5:30 a.m. and on our ft till 9:30 p.m.

Actually, it couldn’t have run smoother for us up at camp. The truth that my committee was low-drama, high-working, and fun-loving was such an enormous blessing.

End up a committee you’ll be able to plan with, snicker with, work with, and nonetheless love one another after it’s all stated and accomplished!

Tip #2: A Word About Meals Allergy symptoms

Sure, this step comes earlier than any of the menu planning. As early as you’ll be able to, work with those that are attending to determine what meals allergic reactions you have to to work round.

For the meals or meals objects that weren’t gluten- or egg-free, we offered a gluten- and egg-free model – planning the menu after figuring out meals allergic reactions helped us to streamline what meals to make.

For a lot of the baked items, we additionally made a gluten-free model principally simply subbing in gluten-free flour 1:1 for the all-purpose flour.

The one exception was the do-it-yourself brownies. I used this brownie mix aff. hyperlink as a result of it has such nice opinions (and I can attest from snitching: DELICIOUS).

I additionally talked with mother and father and did analysis on how to ensure we didn’t cross-contaminate whereas prepping and cooking at camp.

Most of our egg-free women may have gluten, so I made a number of batches of those egg-free cookies forward of time (common chocolate chip and double chocolate chip) for them.

For the few attendees that have been gluten- and egg-free, I made the boxed brownies above utilizing applesauce for the eggs and in addition had Heavenly Hunks aff. hyperlink obtainable for snacks/treats in addition to an EF/GF blondie bar.

Tip #3: Make Every thing You Can Forward of Time and Freeze It

Making meals forward of time was our committee’s superpower when feeding 260 folks for lady’s camp.

After we met as a committee and set a menu, I put collectively a calendar from March till the primary week of June, and I set a meals precedence for every week.

I texted my committee the week earlier than and stated “subsequent week is pulled pork week” (or cookie week, and so on). Anybody who may assist cook dinner/bake for that week texted again and we divided and conquered.

I, or one among my committee members, would go to the shop on Monday after which farm out the substances to whoever may assist.

I tackled the entire gluten-free and egg-free desserts and meal diversifications and reserved particular days for that the place I wasn’t cooking or baking something that would cross-contaminate.

We principally prepped and cooked every little thing forward of time that will freeze effectively.

This meant that we needed to transport A LOT of frozen meals as much as camp (it was about two hours away). The fantastic thing about that is that we didn’t want coolers for all of it.

As a result of most of it was frozen in freezer luggage, we piled them in layers in massive totes and so they stayed frozen on the way in which as much as camp the place we put them within the fridge and so they thawed slowly there.

The opposite upside to prepping and freezing a lot of the meals was that it meant we weren’t dealing with or prepping or cooking any uncooked meat whereas we have been there.

(One of many predominant causes we prepped a lot forward was as a result of our camp kitchen didn’t have a working oven till the week earlier than…and we knew it was a risk the oven wouldn’t be working in any respect. In the long run, it *variety* of labored, however we have been glad to have cooked nearly every little thing beforehand!)

We did have to search out a whole lot of freezer house within the months main as much as camp.

We despatched out a message to a number of church congregations and located a pair individuals who had a whole lot of house of their massive chest freezers, and it was loads to freeze every little thing that we prepped.

PREP AHEAD TIPS

• All the meat was cooked forward of time in large electric roasting pans (and some slow cookers) aff. hyperlinks.
• These liners for electric roasting pans and these liners for slow cookers have been revolutionary – not just for the prep cooking but in addition up at camp for reheating. It saved HOURS on scrubbing out crusty roasting pans and crockpots aff. hyperlinks above.
• These 2-gallon freezer ziploc bags aff. hyperlink have been so useful with the huge amount of meals we have been freezing. They helped reduce the variety of luggage we had to make use of and bear in mind to move.
• Cookies have been all baked, cooled and frozen in gallon freezer ziplock luggage and these containers aff. hyperlink
• Even the Swig sugar cookies have been baked, frosted, sprinkled and frozen. They freeze and thaw nice even frozen (and have been the hit dessert at camp!).

THE MENU + PRINTABLES

Beneath was our menu for camp.

My objective was to have one FRESH merchandise for dinner (in the long run, this was one of many highlights for the ladies, particularly the caesar salad, cucumbers and watermelon) and one FROM-SCRATCH merchandise for a house cooked really feel.

I saved the menu above as a excessive decision .pdf in photoshop and printed it as an engineering print at Staples (very cheap to get a big black and white print). We hung this up within the camp kitchen, in addition to the day-by-day schedules, which I’ll share under.

Beneath are particulars about every meal that we served up on the camp.
**For a printable/.pdf model of those particulars with bigger font, click on right here**

(Preserve scrolling as a result of there’s A LOT of additional information under these menu charts.)

Snacks (served 1X a day within the afternoon)

We have been tasked with offering a snack within the afternoon. In hindsight, I’m undecided the snack was needed. The women had a whole lot of meals/snacks/junk at their very own campsites, and we additionally had a whole lot of leftover cookies and objects from meals that we might put out and the ladies would snack on in the event that they have been hungry.

These have been the snacks we had available to supply, however in the long run, we used most of them for the grab-and-go breakfast on Friday morning.

• String cheese
• Granola bars
• Applesauce packets
• Cuties (oranges)
• Heavenly Hunks
• Leftovers

HOW TO FIGURE OUT QUANTITIES

I gave a whole lot of suggestions within the above tables about portions, however here’s a fast overview of how I calculated the portions (and what I discovered from having leftovers in a whole lot of areas!).

• Meat (for meat-centric meals): 1/3 pound meat (raw) per individual for meat-centric meals (like sloppy joes, pulled pork sandwiches, and so on)
• Meat for less-meat meals: 1/4 pound meat (raw) per individual for much less meat-centric meals (like spaghetti, Hawaiian Haystack gravy, and so on)
• French Toast: two slices French toast per individual; for the egg/milk combination use 1 egg + 1/4 cup milk for each 2 slices bread.
• Watermelon: 50 servings for common to massive measurement watermelon
• Rice: 1/4 to 1/3 cup DRY rice per individual
• Pasta: 2 ounces pasta per individual (for this simple pasta bake, we ended up needing even lower than that – in all probability depending on our explicit group who had eaten quite a bit through the day so not ravenous at dinner, and we additionally had a whole lot of aspect dishes).
• Ice Cream: 18-20 servings per gallon of ice cream
• Root Beer (for root beer floats): 10-12 servings per liter of root beer

Let me know within the feedback when you have every other particular amount questions – or test up above within the tables for every meal. I included a whole lot of suggestions there!

ESSENTIAL EQUIPMENT

Right here is the gear we couldn’t have lived with out at lady’s camp.

• Electrical roasters: we had eight of these at camp (needed to scatter them round to totally different shops if we have been utilizing all of them), however they have been invaluable at heating and cooking meals each prepping for camp and up at camp.
• Electrical roaster liners: my complete committee agreed that these liners single-handedly saved us at camp. We used the electrical roasters for practically each meal. The truth that we didn’t need to a number of of them clear after every meal was a much-needed life (and again) saver.
• Useful chopper: one among my committee members introduced this chopper to camp (I didn’t have one earlier than, however I used to be transformed after camp and promptly purchased one). Despite the fact that we simply had one, it was revolutionary for chopping strawberries and tomatoes, to call just some issues. I believe the outline states it doesn’t work for tomatoes, nevertheless it labored effectively for us utilizing agency cherry tomatoes (and a agency hand!).
• Knife sharpener: we did a whole lot of different chopping too – cucumbers, lettuce, and so on. Our knives did extra time obligation and a knife sharpener was essential to maintain them doing their finest.
• Disposable aluminum pans: we used these full size pans for EVERYTHING. Heating, serving, prepping. We washed and re-used lots of them over the course of the week, however we have been all glad we had an enormous stack to begin with.
• Block ice: we used block ice to maintain water chilly through the day, and it lasted a lot longer than cubed ice (and was simpler to stack and retailer within the freezer).

DAY-BY-DAY CHARTS + SPREADSHEETS

My love for spreadsheets runs very deep. Some would say it’s a bit…er…extreme. However spreadsheets and charts saved me through the planning and executing of cooking (and buying!) for 270 folks all week.

My precise spreadsheets received’t be tremendous useful to anybody else as a result of they’ve such particular info for me and my committee, however I stored the next spreadsheets operating:

• prep calendar for what to make when within the weeks main as much as camp
• grasp meal planning spreadsheet with every meal merchandise listed and all of the substances wanted for every merchandise and sub-item
• grasp buying listing separated by when to buy it (most of the pantry staples we shopped for a number of weeks forward of time vs the contemporary substances we would have liked to get the day earlier than or day of) and which committee member would sort out it
• price range spreadsheet that stored monitor of what we have been spending, once we have been spending it and what we have been spending it on (in the long run, we got here in only a bit underneath price range – yay!)
• day-by-day women camp plan spreadsheet – this was essentially the most intense of all of the spreadsheets because it detailed hour-by-hour up at camp what we would have liked to do to prep for every meal, learn how to serve meals and what to serve them in, and many different particulars.

  I turned this into massive engineering prints (pictured under) that we held on the again of the camp kitchen door to maintain us all on monitor!

  And sure, I acquired a whole lot of good-natured grief from leaders/women who stopped into the kitchen and noticed my minute-by-minute outlines. 😂 I’m certain some thought it was excessive, nevertheless it stored us on monitor, and my committee all agreed it was useful to see precisely what wanted to be accomplished.

Here’s a .pdf model of my day-by-day plan for reference in case it’d assist to see the main points I included (with private figuring out particulars eliminated). Sadly a customizable format isn’t simple/obtainable to share because the recordsdata are monumental and this system isn’t user-friendly.

Ooof! AND THAT’S A WRAP! That could be the longest put up I’ve ever written right here on this weblog!

I believed I used to be exhausted after lady’s camp – however, man, I’m much more exhausted now reviewing and typing up all this info. 😂

Little question, it’s a ton of labor to plan for and make meals for a big church camp (or no matter massive group you’re planning for), however with good serving to arms, plenty of planning, and a scrumptious menu, it’s doable!

Use the remark part under to ask any questions and ESPECIALLY to remark with any expertise you might need (favourite meals to make, suggestions, classes discovered). We study essentially the most once we share collectively!