Volume Smores

[Chef Mike]

Doing S'mores next week for 800 people. Hand passing along with cheesecake lollipops in a crowded room; after plenty of other items, both stationed and hand passed.

As Howie Mandel used to say,"What would you do?"

No kitchen on site; parking lot, generator, gas grills, Good convection oven.

It's a fun (for the guests) menu. If I could figure out how, I'd paste some it up here just for kicks.

I've seen incredible ideas throughout this site; conjure up a couple for me, huh?

Mike www.lasvegascatering.com

[diane]

I read your post and fainted. 800 is too many, tell them to go home.

Would soup for sipping be any use to you? Small cups. About 100 -maybe 150mls. Dinky corn fritters, I am opting out here, anything would do, but for 800?

[Suzanne]

So you want suggestions for the S'mores?

For prep, assembly line: fill sheet pans with graham cracker rectangles (break up the squares when placing in the pan). Top with mini chocolate chips, then with mini marshmallows. (Just scatter each over the crackers; when they melt no one will notice anything.)

On-site, shortly before it's time to serve, bung them into the convection ovens (cranked up high) to melt. Remove from the oven, let cool briefly, have staff (wearing gloves or using spatulas) plate on trays.

[momoreg]

You could make graham cracker shells, and make smore tarts. Easier to eat, but harder to prep.

[panini]

If I had this opportunity, I think I would formulate a cooked marshmellow type of topping. I would try to cook, spread onto a sheetpan, maybe torch and slice the size of the cracker. Then I would play and come up with a whipped/soft ganache.
Set crackers,put on the marshmellow, pipe a dollop of ganache and put the lid on.
I'm only thinking this way because if something happens and you can't get to a heat source, ( oh wait, these type of things don't happen on off premiss catering )the customer will have something that at least will resemble a smore and taste great. Heck, you could even throw these in a van and turn on the heat. Did I just say that?? I guess that's ole catering mentality peeking out.
Kudos to all ,that do this type of catering, it's a different breed of Chef, I think.

[CrazyTATT]

Like Panini said...
I have done this, I love American classic comfort Food, I did it all in hotel pans. Line the bottom with grahm crackers, go on w/ the marshmallow, bke till just melted. put in refer till set, then pour on ganache, refer, set.
Cut to desired shape with a hot, wet knife, and warm through before service. Pass as desired.

I actually have table side Smores on my dessert menu, people love it, and it is super easy on the kitchen and waitstaff. Not to mention the food cost is nill.

[shroomgirl]

Apollo has graham mini shells.....not great but ok.... pipe ganauche sounds easier....then your mallow goo....

[Pete]

I have done smores, when I worked for the catering company in Chicago, for large groups. We would build the sandwiches in hotel pans and just briefly warm onsite. I also like the idea of trying to go a little upscale with these. Maybe blind baking a graham cracker crust in hotel pans, topping with a layer of ganache, and then a layer of house-made marshmallow topping that you torch for that toasted flavor. Allow it to set up and cut into squares or triangles. What about doing them as an action station? Having a cook toast them out front and giving people a couple of different cookies and choc. to choose from to put together their own? The only glitch would be coming up with a cool way to toast them. Toasting them over cassette stoves might seem a little dorky.

[even stephen]

I would probably buy bulk marshmellows and melt them down.
spray hotel pans with shortening, then dust with powdered sugar.
Immediately spread with soft mellows, then layer of chocolate
chips and graham crumbs, then other layer of mellows. make
about 12 hotel pans. this can be done days ahead of time.
At or before the event, cut into 1 1/2 inch squares, the dept
being a little more(the depth of the hotel pan). toss squares
in powder sugar and put on bamboo skewers. Tempura or batter
and fry. If you had to, you could bread the cubes using regular
breading technique, but substitute graham crumbs for bread crumbs.
if you did this, you could omit grams from cubes. Make sure and
work a little melted butter and panko into your graham breading
and they should bake off nice and crisp. Seems labor intensive,
but, its really all in the planning and time organization. If you had
to, freeze them ahead of time on sheet pans. works especially
well with the breaded ones. can do days ahead of time and
it helps with getting them to the even. Anyway. FWIW

[shroomgirl]

torches you'd use for brulee.....fun, interactive and smells good too.....

[tigerwoman]

Having a cook toast them out front and giving people a couple of different cookies and choc. to choose from to put together their own? The only glitch would be coming up with a cool way to toast them. Toasting them over cassette stoves might seem a little dorky.[/quote]


actually if you get the cassette stoves in a bright red color and use chefs dressed in either a boy scout or girl scout uniform you can pull this off as fun, and cute/

Some one else mentioned using the brulee torch. Another caterer I know does this and has a tree like cone that they stick the "torched" marshmellows in for guests to take and make their own s'mores.

Personally I loved the idea (in one of the posts here) of making them in layers in the sheetpans and then "breading" and skewering. Again perhaps a styrofoam cone covered with leaves to skewer the finished product into. Make a forest of s'[mores that would be cool. Another neat dessert is dessert sushi using rice crispie treats jelly roll style with a marshmellow in the center.

If you want to cheat - use marshmellow fluff and nutella spread on mini grahams. Should be able to pre prep these a day or so in advance.

[even stephen]

another idea!
small ice cream cones. have attendent fill cone with mini marshmellows.
top with hot ganache or chocolate sauce. top with graham cracker
crumbs. make sure you get the cones with cone shaped paper
sleeve. easy to eat and easy to carry. could serve with spoon as
an option.

[Chef Mike]

Thank you, everyone, for your considered advice, opinions and speculation.

This is a swell forum.

Mike

[shroomgirl]

Mike, it'd be great to read what you did and how it worked out.

[Chef Mike]

We melted down chocolate, poured out flat, scored and cut it the size and shape of the individual pieces before it got stone cold. Laid it on the grahams, made a "mallow goo", as one of my esteemed colleagues says, piped it on top with an unusual flat tube, torched, and put into hot cabinets just before passing.
After assembling and torching (ahead, since we were under pressure and reactive scheduling on site), my pastry chef put them away in an unused portable refer on wheels, just to get them out of the way. That night, my on-call sous chef wheeled the heavy appliance up a ramp onto a truck, tipping and jerking. When we opened the Carter-Hoffman the next day (on site), most of the sheet pans had fallen or tipped; we still had enough, but it was just a lovely surprise. (Life is like a box of chocolates?)
It worked well though, and was well received.
Like Diane said, "800 is too many. Tell them to go home."