Planning
How much food do I actually need?
Most hosts over-order by about a third, because they have been to a party where the food ran out and would rather waste money than repeat it. Portioning is not guesswork though — it is arithmetic with a few honest assumptions. These are the ones our kitchen cooks to.
Counted at a third of an adult portion
Sabzis on the counter
For 40 adults
22–26 kg of food
₹11,960 – ₹15,960on food, before delivery and GST
- Riceuncooked, with a bread also on the counter4.8 kg
- Dal7.2 L
- Main sabzis (2)6.0 kg of each12.0 kg
- Breador about 60 parathas80 phulkas
- Dessertor 3.2 kg of halwa40 pieces
- Two starters is plenty when a substantial main is coming; three is a courtesy. Starters are where hosts over-order most.
- Three dishes done properly beat six done thinly — and the per-guest cost drops at the same time.
Rather we just cooked it?
Tell us the date and this headcount and we will put a menu against it — priced per guest, cooked the morning of, delivered across Pune and PCMC.
9am to 9pm, every day.
Where these numbers come from
One adult at an Indian buffet eats roughly 550 to 650 grams of food in total, across every course. Split across a standard spread, that is:
- · Rice — 120g uncooked per guest, when there is also a bread on the counter
- · Dal — 180ml per guest, one generous ladle and a top-up
- · Main sabzi — 150g per guest per dish, where there are two
- · Bread — 2 phulkas, or 1.5 parathas, per guest
- · Dessert — one piece of gulab jamun, or 80g of halwa
These are the portions we cook to, written up in full in how much food forty people actually eat. The calculator applies them and does the multiplication; it does not know anything the post does not say.
What a calculator cannot tell you
The number that matters is not how many people are invited. It is how many will be standing at the counter when the food comes out — and that depends on the occasion, the hour and whether the food is the event or the interval. A wedding function runs heavy. An office lunch where people eat and return to their desks runs light. A kitty party at four in the afternoon is chaat, not a sit-down meal.
Each of our occasion pages carries the headcount that occasion actually runs to, and what changes about the spread. If the number here looks wrong to you, it probably is — tell us the occasion and the time of day and we will adjust the portions before we cook, not after.
Questions hosts ask
How much food do you need per person for an Indian buffet?
About 550–650 grams per adult across the whole plate — rice, dal, two sabzis, bread, a sweet and the odd papad. It reads small and looks generous once it is served.
How much rice for 50 people?
6 kg uncooked, if there is also a bread on the counter. Without bread it climbs, because rice stops being the side and becomes the meal.
How do children change the headcount?
Count each child as about a third of an adult portion. A nine-year-old eats roughly that much and spends most of the party away from the table.
What does the food itself cost?
Menus run ₹299–₹399 per guest depending on the spread, with delivery and GST on top. The calculator shows the food figure only.
Where do hosts most often over-order?
Starters, almost always. Two is plenty when a substantial main is coming and three is a courtesy — guests fill up on paneer tikka and then look at the biryani politely.
We cater across Pune City and PCMC, for parties of ten to a thousand.