Fundraising Directory

• We had two slow cookers to serve the meat from set up on a table with containers of cheese, sour cream and guacamole. We had 2 gas burners on another table heating mixture (pre-cooked the previous day) to then go into the slow cookers. We used serving implements that held the exact measurement of meat, cheese, sour cream and guacamole required. We had most of the corn chips pre-served into containers and the containers stacked on top of each other under the serving table, ready to grab. This saved a lot of time when we were busy, which was most of the time! Containers of extra sour cream, cheese and guacamole were kept on ice in eskies, ready to swap for empties. Set up: one person at gas burners, one at the till, one topper-upper and two servers. We put an extra person on the burners at the really busy times. People would line up and a server would take and then make their order while customer paid at the till. This was very efficient. We wondered why there weren’t many people at our stall and it was because at other stalls, people gave their orders then had to stand around waiting for it to be made. So there was no crowd at our stall, just a short line – which probably made us look more appealing to people wanting something in a hurry. When the topper-upper wasn’t topping up, they became a third server.
• We had them at our 150 year celebrations and it was very popular.
• We used hotdog trays to serve. I made all the mince ahead of time and froze it, took it out of freezer the morning before. It all kept warm a slowcooker (we had 4 other hot dishes), and when the rush was on the microwave was running constantly to keep refilling all the slowcookers.
• Here is the serving formula we used so that whoever came in to help served exactly the same:
• We did them as part of our food court for our Spring Fair – we used those cardboard hot dog trays for the chips and then has slow cookers going with the preprepared mince, then just added cheese and sour cream on top – they were really popular.
• Rather than them help themselves, we served customers their toppings – they all came the same way unless they specifically asked for no sour cream/ cheese.
• We didn’t do guacamole as it was a fair food court (we served about 3000 people so tried to keep it simple) however if it was a smaller crowd I would serve it as an optional extra but charge extra for it – but you have to watch the serving for portion control or it could become expensive.

Originally published 25 September, 2019

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