Cooking & Entertaining: Emma's Hollywood Cafe

This year my girl decided to make it a Hollywood themed neighborhood cafe.  Here's a photo-explanation of this crazy tradition:

Her Hollywood Cafe sign is a bit hard to read, but it guides customers to the back yard.

Here is the menu she came up with - complete with cutesy, movie-themed names.

Finally had a reason to use my favorite movie poster! (Thanks Ang!)

A couple days of cooking - maybe 8-10 hours total prep time.

Lots of food!  She'll use the leftovers on her nights to cook in the coming weeks.  Thank heavens for freezers!

With 5 tables, hopefully the wait time wasn't too long!

Cousins make great wait staff.

Every countertop was covered with assembly-line food to fill orders.

Love the chance to visit with old friends.

Emma chose wisely when making her menu - the food was delicious. 

The price for eating at the cafe was a generous donation for the local food bank.

We had a ton of food to drop off and it made the folks at the food bank pretty happy.

All in all, it was a successful cafe.  It teaches my kids to donate time and effort to help others in need.  It teaches planning, cooking and food-service skills.  Most of all, it teaches them what I call, "motivation for higher education" as they decide that working as a server, or cook may not be the way they want to spend the rest of their life.   Are there cheaper ways to donate food to the food bank?  Sure, but few are as fun!