How to Price a meal?

[Jennifer976]

Is there anyone out there making dinners for guests and what do you charge? 

I'm back to this subject again because guests (mostly med students that stay for 2 to 4 weeks) have said they would happily pay for one of my homemade dinners than order a pizza to be delivered when they get in from the hospital.  I'm thinking of starting by offering a meal on Mondays & Thursdays in the evening with a set menu that they can chose to partake in or not. I know how to go about collecting it but  I'm just not certain about what to charge?  I'd be serving things like pastas, salmon, pulled pork tacos, jerk chicken, bbq steak?  Not sure how to go about this and have a reasonable price but not do it for nothing?  I was going to do a more hearty meal on the Monday and then a more healthy and or vegetarian meal on the Thursday?

[Susan151]

@Jennifer976 . General rule of thumb is your actual cost of food multiplied by three. Minimum. So you would need to calculate how much that salmon dinner will cost in ingredients, based on a fixed portion size, and then price it from there. BTW, hearty and healthy are not mutually exclusive!

Other funny things to consider is, WHEN do they have to tell you if they are opting in. Nothing would be more frustrating than thinking you were only serving two people and it turned out to be fie after you had done your shopping.

[Jennifer976]

@Susan151Thanks so much Susan!  The good thing is that I only allow 1 person per room in the 2 rooms in my upstairs and I would not be including the fresh cooked meals for the Suite in my basement.  But I am thinking about having a variety of frozen meals and they can buy or not buy.