Here are some of the items I use pretty much every time I put together some kind of mass feeding. Some are also items that are workhorses in my day-to-day cooking. Machines and gadgets are great for saving you time and effort, and items that help you serve food properly are essential. This list is by no means exhaustive, but I use everything often and wouldn’t be without any of them.
Inexpensive Chafing Dishes:
Unless you do big events fairly frequently and can’t use ones already available, you probably don’t need to buy these. However, I will say that I have two of them and that I use them all the time. One of my biggest hangups about serving food is that I want hot things to be hot. That’s also a good principle for reasons of food safety, as you don’t want perishable hot food sitting at room temp for more than two hours. I use them probably half a dozen times a year for various events. You have to put some hot water in the bottom deep pan and then put the regular pan in on top of that. Be sure not to put more than about an inch of water in the bottom! There’s not a whole lot of clearance between the two pans, and if you put in too much water you’ll end up with your top pan floating.
Here’s another hint: Don’t set yourself up for scrubbing out chafing dish pans. Either line the pans with foil (which is fiddly and clumsy) or buy cheap disposable foil half pans in bulk, as I do, and use them inside the regular pan. Be sure to use that regular inner pan to hold them; they aren’t sturdy enough on their own. (I get mine from Costco, where the half-size ones cost about 25 cents apiece; Amazon has the same ones for about twice the price. Get someone with a Costco membership to buy these for you if you can’t. The half pans are much more useful than the full-size ones, as you can have two different items within the same chafing dish.) They’re a great, great convenience and have all kinds of uses beyond chafing dishes—mixing, transporting, etc.–and then you throw them away. Whew! No more standing at the sink scrubbing away at baked-on gunk!
About fuel: Anything labeled “sterno” (the brand or the substance) or “ethanol” will be fine. There’s somewhat of a variety out there and a wide range of prices. My dear friend Costco sometimes sells flats of 24, but that’s available only around the Christmas season. Just stay away from cans that claim to burn for six hours; I’ve found that this type of fuel burns much less hot than Sterno. There’s no reason to use something that will just keep your food lukewarm. The hot-burning fuel will last at most 2.5 hours; it would be rare to need more time than that.
Dishers
If you saw one of the bigger ones you’d figure it was an ice cream scoop, and indeed these utensils are often used in that way. However (since I rarely eat ice cream), I don’t use them for that. They are supremely helpful in portioning out ingredients or mixtures that you want to have all the same size. I have two of them, a teaspoon size and a tablespoon size, and, again, I use them all the time. I use the small one for portioning out items such as quiche dough and meatballs. They don’t give you a perfect amount each time, so I also weigh the portions, but they were a good start. (You might not be quite so nit-picky.) I use the big one for muffin or cupcake batter to portion it out among the muffin cups.
Digital Kitchen Scale
All the time, folks. All the time. This is a highly-rated item that I’ve had for years. Quick tip: always cover the top with a sheet of plastic wrap before you start weighing items, especially if it’s something yucky such as raw meatballs. You can set it to weigh in ounces or grams. You can weigh multiple ingredients as you add them to a bowlful already sitting on the scale using a feature called the “tare,” which means to reset to zero: weigh something, reset to zero, and add another ingredient, reset to zero, add another, and so on. It doesn’t really take that much extra time to weigh individual portions when you’re making a lot of something, and your results will be so much more consistent. It’s hard to eyeball weights consistently. (OXO also has an 11-lb. version of this scale, but I see no reason to have something that big.)
Kitchen-Aid Mixer
I don’t know what I’d do without this piece of equipment; I’ve had my current one for at least ten years. Mine is the base model, with the smallest size bowl and no accessories other than the whisk and paddle attachments. (It also came with a dough hook, which I’ve managed to lose. Since I never found that item to be particularly useful it was no great loss.) The cover on the control lever for mixer speed has fallen off. But it still works just fine. What I would do without it I don’t know, as I simply don’t have the arm strength to mix up the stuff I make. It’s heavy and big, and you have to have shelf space for it, and you have to be able to lift it down (or up) onto your counter. (And keep an eye on it; read this entertaining post from Sally’s Baking Addiction in which she tells about her KitchenAid vibrating itself off her counter and onto her brand-new kitchen floor, leaving a gouge.) There’s an almost infinite array of models available for this piece of equipment. When mine finally wears out I’ll get a prettier color than the white I have now and maybe a slightly bigger size.
Food Processor
It can be hard sometimes to determine whether you should use a processor or a stand mixer in a certain situation. Some are clear-cut: if you’re grating a large amount of cheese, or grating/slicing lots of vegetables, then you have to use the processor as the mixer can’t do that. But what if you’re mixing up dough? Both machines would work, but the mixer would be better because the sharp blade of the processor moves so fast that it can actually generate heat, which isn’t good for the dough. Also, you don’t want to use the processor when you’re dealing with something very liquid-y, as processor bowls have a tendency to leak. (I’ve never figured out why.) But a processor is absolutely invaluable when something needs to be pureed. So I used it for my wonderful Green Sauce recipe, and it made short work of pureeing the cilantro, nuts and avocado. I’m on my third food processor in my 25 years of marriage, and I hope this one lasts me a good long while. I’ve had it for several years and it’s showing no signs of age. It’s heavy and expensive, but man does it do the job!
Instant-Read Thermometer
I bought my Thermapen a number of years ago, at least five and maybe more, and at the time it was about the only one around. I paid around $100 for it and felt that it was worth the price because of its high reliability. There are now tons of similar ones on the market, many of them much cheaper. I would be careful, though, and check the ratings and reviews. It’s worth paying a little more to be sure that you’re getting an accurate reading of the food you’re serving, especially if it’s something containing meat. I test the food I serve obsessively, especially if it’s for a large group. I never, ever want to be responsible for anyone’s getting sick. (Link is to the actual manufacturer’s website; the same product on Amazon. is significantly more expensive, and the manufacturer has a warning about third-party sellers.)
Thermapen Mk4 Instant-Read Thermometer
Note: Links to Amazon products are affiliate links; if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a small commission at no additional cost to you.