How Much Meat Per Person for a Cookout

How much meat per person? Pick your cut and headcount below for the exact raw weight to buy, then read on for the rules of thumb.

Plan on half a pound of cooked meat per adult, and a quarter pound per child. The part that catches people out is that this is cooked weight. Smoked meat loses a lot on the pit, so a 12 pound brisket does not feed 24 people. It feeds about 14.

Start with cooked weight, then work backward

Two numbers decide what you buy: how much people eat, and how much the cut loses.

• Half a pound per adult when the meat is the main event.
• A third of a pound if you are serving two or three meats, or if there are heavy sides.
• Three quarters of a pound for a crowd of serious eaters, or if you want leftovers.

Then divide by the cut’s yield to get raw weight.

Yields by cut

This is where the guessing goes wrong. Fat renders, moisture leaves, and bone was never edible in the first place.

• Brisket: about 60 percent. Trimming takes some, rendering takes more. A 12 pound packer yields roughly 7 pounds cooked.
• Pork butt: about 65 percent. An 8 pound butt gives you a bit over 5 pounds of pulled pork.
• Pork ribs: about 45 percent, because of the bone. Plan by the rack instead: half a rack of baby backs per person, a third of a rack of spares.
• Whole chicken: about 55 percent. A 4 pound bird feeds three to four.
• Whole turkey: about 55 percent, so plan a pound to a pound and a half of raw bird per person.
• Boneless steaks and loin: 80 to 90 percent. Very little loss, which is why they are the easy ones to plan.
• Sausage: about 90 percent. Effectively what you buy is what you serve.

Worked example

Twenty adults, brisket as the only meat, and you want a little left over. Twenty times half a pound is 10 pounds cooked, plus a margin, call it 11. Divide by 0.6 and you need an 18 pound packer raw. That is not a rounding error away from the 10 pounds an unwary host would buy.

Two meats beats one big one

Once you pass about 20 people, cooking two smaller cuts is better than one enormous one. A 20 pound brisket cooks unevenly and takes forever; two 10 pound packers finish faster, more predictably, and give you a second chance if one runs long. The same is true of pork butts, which is why competition cooks so often run pairs.

It also protects you. One cut that stalls for four hours is a crisis when it is the only thing on the pit.

Do not forget the shrink on the day

• Resting loses a little more. Not much, but it is real.
• Slicing loses more than pulling. Trimmed ends and crumbs add up on a big brisket.
• People eat more standing up. A grazing cookout goes through noticeably more than a sit-down dinner.

Frequently asked questions

How much meat per person for a BBQ?

Half a pound of cooked meat per adult and a quarter pound per child. Drop to about a third of a pound each if you are serving several meats or heavy sides.

How much brisket do I need for 20 people?

About 18 pounds raw. Twenty adults need roughly 10 to 11 pounds cooked, and brisket yields only around 60 percent after trimming and rendering.

How many ribs per person?

Half a rack of baby backs, or about a third of a rack of spares, since spares are larger. Count racks rather than pounds, because bone weight makes pounds misleading.

Is it better to cook one big brisket or two smaller ones?

Two smaller ones for anything over about 20 people. They cook faster and more evenly, and if one runs long you still have the other.

Set your weight and serving time in the calculator above and it plans the whole cook backward from when you want to eat. See also the smoking times and temperatures chart.

Meat-by-meat serving size chart

Raw weight to buy per person at an average appetite, no leftovers. Bone-in and fatty cuts need more raw weight because you pay for bone and fat you trim or render off. Add 25-50% for hearty eaters or leftovers.

How much meat per person: frequently asked questions

How much meat per person for a BBQ?

Plan on about 1/2 lb of cooked meat per person if the meat is the main event, or 1/3 lb (5 to 6 oz) if you are serving lots of sides. Buy more raw weight than that for bone-in or fatty cuts, since they lose weight to bone, fat, and moisture.

How much meat per person if it is the main dish?

About 1/2 to 3/4 lb of cooked meat per person, more for a crowd of big eaters. The calculator above converts that into the raw weight to buy for your specific cut.

Why do I need to buy more raw meat than people will actually eat?

Because trimming, bone, fat, and moisture all cost weight. A brisket ends up around half its raw weight after trimming and the cook, and a bone-in pork butt or whole turkey is similar. Boneless, lean cuts lose the least.

How much meat for a party of 20?

Roughly 10 lb of cooked meat as a main, but the raw weight to buy depends on the cut – about 18 lb of raw brisket, 18 lb of raw bone-in pork butt, or one large or two smaller turkeys. Pick the cut in the calculator and it does the math.

How much brisket, pulled pork, or turkey per person?

Brisket and pulled pork run about 1/2 lb cooked per person (roughly 1 lb and 2/3 lb raw); whole turkey about 1 to 1.5 lb of raw bird per person. Use the picker above or the individual guides for exact numbers.