There are several great things about being awarded this job:

*the reception will be held at the Kansas State University Alumni Center, my alma mater

*we are being given the opportunity to work with a great family

*we have established a relationship with a wedding coordinator that we have not had the opportunity to cater for in the past

*we will have the opportunity to use our two mobile kitchens

*this will be a “magazine wedding”

*the food will be outstanding

The couple tasted a selection of over 20 items, here a few of the chosen items:

Appetizer hour:

signiture drinks: dirty martinis and frozen margarita machines

Appetizer Stations and passed appetizers to include family favorites:

ice sculptures overflowing with jumbo shrimp cocktail, tangy cocktail sauce, lemon wedges

crisp brioche, roasted Roma tomato, crisp pork belly, and micro green (mock BLT)

Chimmichuri beef roulades filled with crisp jicama, carrot, bell pepper and jalapeno

Gourmet brown sugar, apple cider, and stone ground mustard deviled eggs

Salad course:

baby iceberg wedge salad, crisp bacon, chopped egg, sliced Roma tomato, red onion, sliced cucumber and smoked tillamook cheddar. Peppercorn Parmesan and balsamic vinaigrette

Intermizzo (palate cleanser):

orange fizz shooter

Plated Entree:

filet mignon/mushroom Pinot Demi glacé, Boursin stuffed chicken/shallot cream reduction, creamy cauliflower mash, roasted brussell sprouts bacon and shallots, vegetable bouquets of asparagus, tri colored peppers, hericot verts, and Malibu carrotts. Butter and thyme roasted fngerling and sweet potatoes.

Intermizzo:

soda and lime sorbet fizz

Dessert:

Wedding cake to include carrot, chocolate, and white.

After party:

assorted call hall ice cream sundae bar

mini cozy burgers

A variety of varsity donuts

What a fun couple, a fun menu, a great wedding this will be!

I will make sure to follow up with photos from the event in August!

Two weeks ago four of us took the opportunity to attend the Catersource Convention in Las Vegas. Catersource is an industry convention that focuses on catering education, a vendor tradeshow, and networking with industry peers. Four of us attended the show including Mollie, our director of marketing, and Jessie, one of our lead culinary designers attended the conference. One of the great things about this convention is the diversity of learning opportunities that allow companies like ours to take members of their organization from management, marketing, administration, kitchen, and operations. We all gained so much knowledge of the upcoming trends, new marketing concepts, culinary ideas, and ways to  improve operating procedures. We are excited to be able to share the things we learned with the rest of our team and our customers.

Here are some photos of the things we saw, enjoy!

It is not typically a busy time of year for our company, or for most catering companies in our area, but last week we set a sales record for the month of February.

Our week:

We have had the pleasure this last week to provide food service for the National Association of College Book Stores Convention. This entailed daily breakfast, lunch, beverage and snack service for about 300 people in many different locations, as well as several seated lunches and breakout meetings. Each night of the convention there was a reception ranging from 450 – 1100 people. The reception menus mainly consisted of stations and passed appetizers, to include: Mashtini Bars, Carved Turkey and Prime Rib Stations, Kansas City BBQ Stations, City Market Fruit and Vegetable Displays, SW Blvd Mexican Stations, and Asian Inspired Stations. On Saturday night, there was a 1920′s themed party that included costume actors and speakeasy style decor designed by our company. The food for this event included many 1920′s throw back  recipes, such as passed lobster thermidor, perfection salad, passed peanuts and popcorn, classic relish trays, and corn souffles.

Outside of the Book Store convention services on Saturday, we served an appetizer station, passed appetizers, and a seated dinner for the 115th Anniversary of the University of Kansas Athletic program. For this plated meal, we served southwest marinated chicken breast with a house-made chimichurri, carved tenderloin with chili cilantro bernaise, smoked cheddar and chive mashed potatoes, braised green beans,  and a family style dessert platter, that included: mini red velvet whoopie pies, handheld fruit tartlets, mini cupcakes, and bite sized cheesecakes. Among the 450 person crowd was basketball legend JoJo White, as well as many current and past Kansas athletes.

Last Thursday began our event season for the year at Kemper Arena with the annual tractor pull. We provided concession and suite service to thousands of spectators.  This year we have taken the opportunity to make sure that each of our stands provide not only the concession classics, but something unique to each one. We were proud to offer, for the first time in Kemper Arena, our homemade Italian sausage with grilled peppers and onions available at all of our concession stands. If you have not tried it, you need to make sure you do!

In the heart of Kansas City we were pleased to serve the attendees of the Pembroke Hill school auction. I personally had the pleasure of being at this event. When we were originally approached for this event, we were requested to provide a Spanish tapas style menu, but we, as well as the committee decided to use that theme, but structure the menu to appeal to their large crowd of 550. This event began as a silent auction in one room of Starlight Theater, while our staff passed Spanish albondigas (meatballs) with a spicy tomato sauce, Parmesan stuffed bacon wrapped dates, marinated grilled shrimp with lemon aioli, and goat cheese roasted red pepper and fig coulis bruschetta.

After about an hour the guests began to move into the stage house portion of Starlight where the seated dinner, live auction, and presentation would be held. While the guest were moving, our staff was busy preparing 1100 pan seared scallops with burre blanc, braised beef short ribs with root vegetable reduction, tri colored roasted fingerling potatoes, and roasted brussell sprouts with caramelized shallots. For dessert, we sent a beautiful limoncello and raspberry tiramisu served in a stemless martini glass to each guest. The salad for this event stretched what would be considered a traditional banquet salad, but was extremely well received.  We served a field green mix, grilled asparagus, roasted reed beets, roasted golden beets, roasted sweet potatoes, dried cranberries, toasted walnuts, homemade champagne vinaigrette and peppercorn ranch.  Along with the salad we served two spanish style charcuterie platters on each table to be passed and shared (tapas style). The platter included sliced capicola, prosciutto, serrano ham, genoa salami, manchego cheese, cabrales blue cheese,  assorted olives, dried apricots, dried blueberries, fresh sliced melon and strawberries. This was served along side a basket of fresh pan con tomate, soft breadsticks, crusty rolls, and broken croccatini.

This past week was an extremely challenging week physically,  mentally, and logistically, but was successful in every aspect. We received nothing but great reviews and compliments from all of our customers.

Where I began; I am so proud and thankful to have such a dedicated and talented team of people that work here. We could not have done what we did without the hard work of the 30 chefs in the kitchen, the dedicated culinary execution team, the many layers of management, and the sales and office staff. Every member of our team came together last week to ensure the success of every event. Not only were we up against one of the more challenging weeks of business, but mother nature decided it would make things even harder, however that was no challenge for our team. We rose to the occasion and devised strategies to overcome the weather and continue to ensure the Brancato’s quality and customer service was delivered!

Much like our February, we are looking forward to a year full of breaking records!

I did not anticipate that my second blog would be based on tragedy. JJ’s on the plaza was an iconic Kansas City landmark, known for great food, great service, a great atmosphere, and best known for its wine list. The destruction of a fire is one that our family knows well after our facility caught fire in August of 2011. We were fortunate enough not to have any of our staff in the facility at the time of the fire. Our prayers and sentiments go out to the employees of JJ’s, the patrons that were harmed in the fire, Jimmy Frantze and his family. Jimmy is a friend of the Brancato family and we will continue to pray for a quick recovery for those affected and their business.