Food for a 4th birthday party?  

Not the full food idea here, but these are a couple of things that we always have available at playgroups for the kids. We always have Goldfish crackers and we always have cheerios. For drinks we will either have juice boxes or we will provide the juice with a bring your own sippy.
If you are wanting to go for more of a meal type of food. Hotdogs. Since some of the kids are so little you can cut them into fourths to avoid the choking hazard.
Hope your daughter has a great birthday.

You can buy a box of friend chicken at a local market so the kids can eat whenever they are hungry. You can also serve nachos. What about a vegetable tray? These are things that you don't have to monitor all the time. With all the running around you have to do that day it's hard to be in the kitchen cooking as well. You can also make up a fruit tray to snack on. We always serve rice or a salad that day because again you don't have to be monitoring the food.

Make a big pot of spaghetti, a good salad & garlic bread. Most everyone likes spaghetti . I never saw a child that didn't.

Don't go over the top with what you are trying to do.
The PARTY is for a Four Year Old.

Simple Food they understand and simple games. You will see them all get involved if you do.

Fairy Cakes (cup cakes) sliced and filling of Jelly (jello and Whipped cream (thick cream).

Party pies (single bite things)
Sausage rolls, (small).
Mini Pizza's

They dont eat much, they like to play things.

Musical chairs, play the music stop the music, one less chair each time, they walk fast around the circle of chairs, when the music stops they sit on a chair/or a mat on the floor, each time some one drops out of the game.
Have a small prize for the first one out, but dint tell them this , let it just happen , the child will not feel like a looser being the first out of the game.

You can make Pigs in blankets, little hot dogs (weenies) wrapped in puff pastry and oven cooked,

Sliced fresh fruit, Water melon, cherries, straw berries, grapes, apple pears, (remember to dip in lemon juice to stop going brown)

Jelly cups with a Chocolate frog set in it. (frog in a pond green jelly.

Birth day cake can be a double layer sponge, cream filled and iced with some candles (4) and a small toy set into the cake.

GAMES, Pin the tail on the Donkey, or pin the red nose on a big photo of a person some one all the Children know.

Pass the parcel, wrap a small gift in the centre wrap and place another gift, wrap and place another gift.

The game is each child unwraps the PARCEL each child gets a small gift, the final child gets something bigger but not over the top.

Apple dunk, open large bowl filled with water, float apples with a tooth pick in them and each child has so long to bob for an apple by their mouth and lift it out of the water , The fastest wins.

On a lawn area, you can have find the Gift, a bit like the Easter Egg hunt.
Place things around the Garden and the Children can hunt for them, Have some spares for the children who miss out or to top up the child who does not have many.

HICCUP/

We went to a home party and all the kids had fun. It was basically just one room that was decorated simply, they did a craft (shop orientaltrading.com for cheap crafts that relate to your theme) and then went outside with their winter coats on and popped a pinata.
They had pizza, cake and watched the birthday boy open presents and then they just sort of played for a half an hour and we left. It was short and sweet and didn't suck the energy out of the parents. I thought it was nice. Good luck!

when I went to birthday parties at that age, we were usually
served ice cream and birthday cake, and maybe hot dogs pickle relish on hot dog buns, something simple that kids really like. and that
is not too messy. some parties we were served cupcakes with pretty frostings and sprinkles.

you could do her a small BBQ and have some sweets thrown in for dessert, jellies and cakes, some fruit juice and biscuits,e attending, you couls also download some kids songs and music and play it on a cd player for them, maybe play musical statues, kids will not eat everything on the table and most of it will be wasted, maybe make some small fairy cakes with the letter of the kids names on the top, also you can buy them BBQ packs really cheap from a freezer store, plus them bulk bags of mixed sweets, so you won't be spending alot, just get enough for the amount of kids who are attending, if you cannot get a cheap enough bouncy castle, why not get a small paddling pool and some of them plastic garden toys that you can get from the supermarket, kids don't care at that age, they get bored very easily, but a small paddling pool and some of them toys would be fun for them....good luck with your party...oh by the way, if you have an ASDA near you, they sell them donkeys that you hit with a stick and the sweets fall out, they are pretty cheap too...it will be fun for the kids to have a good thrash on one of them.

i would serve hotdogs because they are cheap and can be cut up. For snacks, kid-friendly food, like goldfish and things like that.

I am not a parent but when i have a birthday my mom gives me this sandwiches that are very small. You need like 1 bread 1 salami and some botter for like 20 of them. they are about big as a computer mouse