Too many choices! How do you come up with Yom Tov Menus?

amother

Red

Tue, May 12 2015, 3:46 pm

Do you sit down with all your cookbooks and recipe cards? How do you decide on which recipes to try? This may seem silly but the reason I ask is that I find this task extremely overwhelming! It can take me hours to put together a menu because I get overwhelmed by too many choices! Does anyone have suggestions for putting together menus in a short amount of time? How do YOU do it?

Mrs Bissli

Tue, May 12 2015, 5:55 pm

me too. I confess I've probably served same meals (at least for dinners) every Rosh Hashana for the last 4-5 years. It doesn't mean I'm not adventurous and willing to try new recipes, but I just know what works, how much quantity to make, and guests like it.

In general, I go around planning menu by figuring out how many people I need to feed for each of the meals, then decide what to serve as main courses. Then how many courses (like do I do soups for dinners, do I do fish for the first course). Most of the side dishes, I make enough so they can be served over several meals. I fine-tune by figuring out if anyone has allergies for food preferences, and trying to avoid too much overlap in flavour/ingredients (eg no tomato soup if I'm doing meatballs in tomato sauce, no mushroom soup if I'm serving mushroom rice), or cooking methods (eg no fish goujons if I'm doing schnitzel). And think about what's in season and budget (if I find something on sale).

zaq

Tue, May 12 2015, 6:05 pm

A fusion of what I did previous years and what's available and on sale this year. Lox may have been on sale and the highlight four years in a row, but if this year the price of lox quintupled, guess what? We ain't having lox. By now I more or less have certain menus for certain YomTovim, but they still need tweaking even if the foods are readily available. It livens things up to introduce a new dish every now and then. People get tired of the same old, same old even if they have it only once a year. Strange, but true. So the ideal is a meal comprised mostly of old favorites plus one or two newbies.

rainbow dash

Tue, May 12 2015, 6:37 pm

I sit down with a notebook and write down the days that have meals. etc, shabbos night, sun day sun night.

Then I write by each day fish, soup,meat, kugel, veg side,salad,compot. Or whatever.

then take another paper and write which type of fish, salmon or gefillta, chicken or veg soup etc. using a cookbook I decide what to make. I usually make what works. If I try something new ill make sure that its extra in case it doesnt work.

By each day I will write what exactly we are gonna eat.

Then ill write up a shopping list with everything I need and the amounts.

On a separate paper ill write a list of everything im gonna cook with the cookbook and page number so later I can see what needs cooking and which day ill do it and get the satisfaction of crossing it off.

Good luck.

I can post pics if you like.