Adding Chicken, Steak or Shrimp to a Catering Pasta Tray

How much is a catering pasta tray with chicken in Brooklyn

A full pan of FreeTown Pasta is $85 at FreeTown African & American Cuisine in Crown Heights. Adding chicken is $15 more, which brings the tray to 100 dollars. Shrimp adds $20, taking it to 105. Steak adds $30, taking it to 115.

Those are the published numbers, and the pasta tray is the only item on this catering menu that carries add-on pricing at all. Every other tray is a single flat full-pan price.

Why the pasta tray is the clearest example of how catering pricing works

Most catering prices arrive fully assembled. You see one number and you've no view of what went into it. The pasta tray shows the seam.

Start with a base pan at $85. That is pasta and nothing else, sold as a side that sits alongside whatever proteins are on the table. Now add a protein and the number moves by an amount that tracks what the protein costs. Chicken is the smallest step at $15. Shrimp is more at $20. Steak is the biggest at $30.

Read those three add-ons in order and you're looking at the same logic that sets the whole menu. Chicken, then seafood, then red meat. The gaps aren't arbitrary and they aren't about effort, they're about what goes in the pan. The same ordering shows up across the full price list, which is why the cheapest trays on the menu are the ones with no meat in them at all.

When does adding a protein to the pasta make sense

Three situations where it does the job better than buying another tray.

The first is when you want a second protein on the table without a second full protein pan. Adding steak to the pasta for $30 puts beef in front of people at a fraction of what a separate pan of steak costs. It isn't the same thing as a dedicated protein tray, and for a lot of gatherings it doesn't need to be.

The second is when the room is mixed and you want a dish that works on its own. A plain pasta pan is a side. A pasta pan with chicken through it is something a guest can put on a plate by itself and be satisfied, which matters when people are arriving at different times or drifting past a table rather than sitting down.

The third is budget shape. Moving a tray from $85 to 115 dollars is a smaller commitment than adding a whole new pan, so it's a useful lever when a spread is close to a ceiling and you want more substance without restructuring the order.

When is the plain 85 dollar pasta pan the better call

When you already have two proteins.

If there's a pan of chicken and a pan of turkey wings on the table, a third protein inside the pasta is competing with them, not adding anything. The pasta earns its place as the starch that isn't rice, sitting next to a rice tray and giving people a second option. At $85 plain it does that job without duplicating what is already there.

It's also the better call when you want the pasta to stretch. A plain pan taken in spoonfuls behaves like a side. A pan with steak in it gets treated like a main and goes differently.

And it's the better call when the rest of your order is already at the top of your budget. The plain pan is one of the less expensive substantial trays on the list, sitting level with jollof rice at $85, so it is a sensible way to widen a spread when a second protein pan is out of reach. Nobody looks at a table and thinks less of it for having a pasta tray on it.

Three things the number on the menu leaves out

None of them belong on a webpage, and here is why.

How far the pan goes. A pasta tray next to two proteins and a rice does a completely different job from the same tray as the only substantial dish, so a serving count would be a guess. That question gets answered properly on the phone once somebody knows the rest of your table.

What is in it. The menu lists the tray and its add-ons and does not publish a full ingredient breakdown, so if you need to know what the pasta or its sauce are made from, ask directly. Don't assume.

How the kitchen handles cross-contact between dishes. That's a real question for a lot of households and it deserves a real answer from a person, not an inference from a price list. If it matters for your table, raise it when you call and get the answer from the people cooking.

How to order a pasta tray in Crown Heights

Decide plain or with a protein, then ring 718-799-7160 and say which. It's a short conversation because the pricing is already published on both halves.

Bring your headcount and the rest of your spread with you, because the pasta decision often changes once somebody hears what else is going on the table. If you're ordering for something like a shower or an afternoon gathering where people graze instead of sitting down, bridal shower catering in Brooklyn covers the shape those orders usually take.

The rest of the menu is flat-priced with no add-ons, and the full Crown Heights catering tray price list has all 18 trays. If the unit itself is new to you, what it means when catering is priced by the pan explains what you are buying. And because the published list carries a date, how to read a dated catering price list is worth a look if your event is months out.

One tray, one base price, three published add-ons. It's the simplest arithmetic on the menu and the easiest place to see how the rest of it is put together.