Opinions on a hog roast for a wedding breakfast

My fiance really likes the idea of a hog roast at our wedding in July next year. We initially thought of having one instead of a traditional sit down wedding breakfast but the venue turned their noses up at this idea. We're now considering it for the evening catering however I'm interested in other peoples views about having it as the wedding breakfast. Has anyone done this? Surely it must be cheaper than a formal meal. Ideally I'd still like it served. I don't like the idea of a self service buffet. What are your thoughts on this? Is it cheap and tacky or a good way to save some pennies?

 Thank you all for your comments. I like the idea more and more after some of the suggestions on here. I'm definately going to look into this more now and make sure we have lots of extra side dishes and a veggie option too. That and lots of free flowing wine and I think it should be lovely! I'm going to have to check with the venue again about this. They said we could do it in the evening but weren't keen about having it in the day. Surely this means the facilities are there and it doesn't break any rules for the house so we should be allowed to bring it forward as the main event.

I love hog roasts, but I think I'd prefer something more substantial for the actual wedding breakfast as you normally get just a roll and a small selection of potato salad/coleslaw type things. I'm not sure it would be enough to see people through to the evening as it can be a long day. i like the idea for evenings though.

If you're not keen on a buffet, you could do a 2 course breakfast and then serve cake as pudding to save on the pudding cost

I've only ever been to weddings where this is the evening buffet, but it's always gone down a storm. The one we went to had the hog, lots of salad and potatoes and bread and it was yummy. It could work as a main meal, depending on what you serve it with. Not sure on the cost though x

We are having a hog roast as the meat part of our wedding breakfast. Guests have the starter, hog roast meat and we are also putting on side dishes to go with it, and then dessert. I'm really looking forward to it as it's something a little bit different to the usual 3 sitting down courses.

Sounds yummy to me!!!

The venue probably turned their noses up as they won't make as much money!

I think if it is served maybe as part of a BBQ with lots of side dishes it will be fine! x

The funeral I've been to today had one at the wake. I wanted one for my evening buffet.. but then realised I'd be pretty hungry cos I'm vegetarian!

BrideBrat:

The funeral I've been to today had one at the wake. I wanted one for my evening buffet.. but then realised I'd be pretty hungry cos I'm vegetarian!

yep, that can be a problem. please have a vegetarian option as well, or at least a few more sides than just salad....... I travelled over 100 miles to a wedidng once and they had a hog roast and no alternative...us veggies had to eat dry baps and salad

PS.... BrideBrat I'm a North Walian too!

Hello

We've covered a few weddings where they've had a hog roast for the main wedding breakfast and it's always gone down well with the guests. I think so long as the catering company bring plenty of side dishes, and of course a vegetarian option then it will be fine.

Ali x

My fiance has said that having a whole spit roast is a tradition back in the area of Russia where his family comes from.

We're not going to do it on the day, but since we'll have lots of family over from abroad who will probably be here a couple of days, we are seriously thinking about having one the day after the wedding. But we'd do it the proper way, i.e. buy a whole animal, sheep or pig and roast it on a spit over a flame pit.

And just serve with salad and potatos.

I don't see why you couldn't do it on your wedding day, and it would be a good centre piece. But you need to have good quality bread and a good selection of proper salads, not just coleslaw. Greek salads with feta cheese and Russian salad with egg and others, and proper chunky bread. Not cheap rolls. If you work along those lines, it would be pretty classy in my opinion.

YES! We're doing this. Our ceremony isn't 'til 3:30pm anyway so we're asking guests to organise their own lunch beforehand and then serving the hog roast at about 5:30/6pm. Our venue usually insist that you have a 3 course wedding breakfast and evening buffet, but to accommodate our requests, they've replaced the wedding breakfast element of the package with the Al Fresco bbq top package option, which means we get to select 14 items off the BBQ menu. The hog roast takes up 6 of those items and that includes bread rolls and salad, so we have 8 further items to choose from and there's a huge range of potatoes, salads and veggie options we're going to lay out. So there should be LOADS to eat! Plus instead of the 'evening buffet', we're having bacon and egg butties around 11pm! it's saved us about £1500 on the cost of the catering and means we get exactly what we want for our food without annoying the venue!

We had porchetta for our wedding, traditionally this is a hog roast but with the bones removed so allowing for easier carving. We had it made from large joints of stuffed rolled pork belly (fat sliced off and BBQd separately for crackling) wrapped in bacon, cooked in a friends smoker BBQ.

This was fantastic - we had separate joints for various guests to take to the tables and carve (we supplied chef's hats for a bit of fun). Served it with loads of cold salads - potato salad, lentil and chorizo salad, bulgar wheat salad, coleslaw and tatziki.

Tasted amazing, was low cost, much better (in my opinion!) than standard average wedding mass catering.

our ceremony is at 4.00 and we are feeding all day and evening guests together - we are having a hog roast with salad, rolls relishes and a huge veggie paella for 100 so that everyone can have one or both options, our dessert is an ice cream trike

all of this will be served up to guests by the caterers, The food for 120-130 people is costing us less than £1500

x

I would say so long as you're planning on serving more than a bit of pork in a roll to guests then I don't see the problem - perhaps add salads, pastas, rice, potatoes etc, this way there is still something for everyone to choose from, as you have to think of the veggies and those who don't like pork!

Alternatively if you wanted a lower cost option but not sure on hog roast have you considered fish and chips? We looked into this until we found a fab priced caterer for our big day!

Venue are only being snobby as it means they won't make so much money out of your day! It's your day, so do what you want, not the venue! xxx

we are having this! it saved us quite a lot of money compared to the traditional wedding breakfast menu that our venue offered, it comes with bread rolls and choice of 5 side dishes which are like potato salad, rice or pasta dish and some more traditional salads, they are also doing a vegetarian quiche option for us, im hoping it will be enough food!! adding a starter is a good idea i might have a think about that! we are having our cake and sweet buffet as the dessert to save more as our venue is quite expensive we were looking for other ways to cut the costs! then we are having an evening buffet later on 

SoontobeMrsSSmith:

I don't see why you couldn't do it on your wedding day, and it would be a good centre piece. But you need to have good quality bread and a good selection of proper salads, not just coleslaw. Greek salads with feta cheese and Russian salad with egg and others, and proper chunky bread. Not cheap rolls. If you work along those lines, it would be pretty classy in my opinion.

that would be lovely! the one I went to had those really cheap 'burger' buns and salad made up of limp lettuce, cucumber and tomato