Wedding Anniversary Catering: Silver, Ruby and Golden

The couple are the same. The room is not.

Anniversaries look like one occasion and behave like three. What changes is not the couple’s taste: it is who is in the room, how mobile they are, and how long they will stay.

Silver, at 25

The largest and latest of the three. A couple at their silver wedding are usually in their fifties, their children are grown, and the guest list runs to friends as much as family.

This is the anniversary that behaves most like a party. Evening, standing, drinks-led, sixty to a hundred people. Buffet 9 at £11.00 a head or, if there is outside space in summer, a hog roast from £795, which at a silver wedding tends to land better than a formal meal, because nobody wants a second wedding breakfast.

Food out about an hour in.

Ruby, at 40

Smaller, earlier, and more family than friends. Often forty to sixty people, often a Sunday afternoon, and increasingly with grandchildren in the room.

The shift is towards seating and towards daytime. A hot buffet at £23.50 a head (minimum fifty) works well because people expect to sit; below fifty, Buffet 5 at £7.70 with plenty of chairs is the practical answer.

Order the kids menu at £8.00 a head separately if grandchildren are coming. It costs less and they will eat it.

Golden, at 50

Short, seated, and the food must be easy. Two or three hours in the middle of the day, thirty to fifty people, and a good proportion of them older.

Sandwiches cut small, savouries that do not crumble, cake with the tea. Buffet 5 at £7.70 a head. This is the anniversary where ambition in the menu works against you, what matters is that everything can be eaten sitting down, without a knife, while holding a conversation.

Make sure there is more seating than you think you need. It is the single most common thing families under-plan at a golden wedding.

The numbers mistake

Families consistently order for the invitation list rather than the room.

At a silver wedding that overestimates: friends say yes and do not come. At a golden it underestimates: relatives travel from a long way for a fiftieth, they bring people, and they have not eaten since setting off.

Our rule of thumb, and it is only that: at 25 order for about 85% of the list, at 40 for the list, and at 50 for slightly over.

What is worth spending on

Not more food. Better food for the same number.

The gap between Buffet 1 at £5.50 and Buffet 9 at £11.00 is five pounds fifty a head: for sixty people that is £330, and it is the difference between sandwiches and a table with crisps, fruit, cake and juice on it. Almost every family that asks us where to spend gets the same answer: go up a level rather than up a headcount.

A dessert grazing board at £97.00 a crate serving ten is the other one. At an anniversary it doubles as the cake table.

Planning one? Party catering has the full range and prices.