Food, Glorious Food!

With pictures to come, let me describe the much anticipated taco bar. It was awesome.

Oh…sorry, you probably want a little more detail, huh?

First, I have to give props to my new step-mother-in-law (weird) and her preparation. The NSMIL graciously agreed to make her famous tacos, but then realized that it was for 60 (!) people. She went shopping with her family motto: “go big or go home.” Any concerns of running out of food were put to rest when she brought home 30 pounds of meat,

a garden of vegetables, a number 10 can (the giant one) of refried beans, restaurant sized boxes of rice, and 3 whole watermelons and cantaloupes. We had just enough food. Actually, we had leftovers. More on that later.

If you’re not familiar with catering, there’s a lot of planning involved. Large batches of food take a lot more time to cook, refrigerators only hold so much, and you have to keep everything hot until serving time. We (and for the most part NSMIL), ended up cooking the meat the night before, prepping the service line…

…and heating things all through the morning, baking rice and corn cake just before the ceremony, and magically bringing everything together by 4:45 where it was all served steaming hot–or ice cold–to our hungry guests.

Meanwhile, we had serious dessert prep going on. As you recall, we featured an ice cream bar and a cupcake tower. The ice cream bar, complete with soft-serve machine, was generously provided by my Dad. We had soft-serve vanilla and Breyer’s chocolate ice cream with a variety of toppings, including chocolate syrup, strawberries, crushed pineapple, chopped nuts, sprinkles, and even maraschino cherries. It was, without a doubt, a hit. It was truly sad when, after the kids’ 4th helping, we finally broke down the machine and put it to rest. While the ice cream bar was being purchased, my Mom was busy in a cupcake frenzy. We gave her carte blanche as far as the cupcakes were concerned, and she amazed us. She baked 3 different cupcake flavors, matched them with scratch-made butter cream frosting, and individually decorated them. She even bought a cupcake tower made out of cardboard that she applied fabric to and decorated with ribbon and artificial flowers. The final outcome was nothing short of a professional cupcake display. Way to go Mom!

(Notice our cake toppers!)

From the cupcakes to the tacos, we had more than enough food for everyone. That turned out to be good though, because our reception went quite late. By about 10:30, the close family still standing congregated in the kitchen for a late-night feeding frenzy. Most of us were quite busy during the early portion of the reception, so the feeding frenzy was well-deserved.

Overall, the food couldn’t have worked out better. Everyone loved the spread, everyone got enough to eat, and NSMIL got to feed her family leftover tacos the next day (or six).

Thanks to everyone who pitched in! We couldn’t have done it without you.