French Food
The first thing you should know if you’re planning to serve French food for your wedding is that you will need a pretty solid budget. Once you got this out of the way (we’ll go over pricing later), it’s time to think about your menu and because French cuisine is pretty sophisticated, you really have lots of options available. In the end, everything will be based on how fancy you want your menu to be! The one thing that is important though is making sure you found a catering company whose chef is actually French – trust me there are too many clueless chefs coming out culinary schools who wrongly think they can cook French food! SERVICE Contrary to other foods, this one will be easy: if you want to serve French food at your wedding, you will need to spend extra bucks on waiters as serving gourmet food buffet-style will ruin the good impression you are trying to make; of course you could argue that you can find French food at buffets – for examples at Las Vegas’ Paris hotel – but it’s no classy experience. MENU IDEAS Your choice of appetizers will pretty much depend on your budget. You can serve something simple like a salad with warm goat cheese or calamari’s. A little pricier, you can offer a charcuterie platter usually composed of saucisson (like salami but way better), smoked ham, paté and cornichons. But if you want something more luxurious, I would recommend Fois Gras or even smoked salmon. When it comes to entrees, you can go with something easy like chicken cordon bleu but I would recommend a steak, which can come with various sauces (pepper, tartar, blue cheese & more). As a side thin “allumette” fries, vegetables, mushrooms or potatoes gratin will be a good match. A nice piece of fish such as salmon will also work. The French always have cheese before dessert so you will need to present a nice platter of cheese with some good artisan bread. Be warned that cheese can be pretty expensive and if you want to do things well, you can’t use cheap, tasteless cheese. I would suggest serving at least Brie or Camembert (stronger taste as more fermented) with Roquefort (blue cheese – Société Roquefort is popular but average, Papillon Roquefort is way better) , goat cheese (plain, no herbs or add-ons) and Emmental or Gruyere. These are your basic cheeses and it will already be a bit pricey but you can spend even more on more sophisticated cheeses such as Epoisse, Munster, Roblochon and more. Just make sure you buy actual French cheese, no Canadian, Spanish or Dutch cheeses please! Finally, you can also get an authentic French wedding cake which is usually a Croquembouche made with choux pastries and caramel. You can, in addition, serve Macarons to complement the cake. Regarding alcohol, it also depends on how far you want to go budget-wise. First, the French usually have an aperitif before eating: Kir...
Read MorePrices per Person
There is no unique answer to what the price per person should be. It all depends on the type of food you’re serving, the number of dishes and if it’s a buffet or not. Here are some ideas (not including drinks and cake): If you’re looking for something cheap, you can pick Chinese or Mexican food and end up paying less than $10 per person. While you can get correct food for that price, despite the fact it’s pretty inexpensive, just make sure you select a catering service which food actually tastes good – trust me there are plenty of bad Mexican and Chinese restaurants so do your homework and find a place that has good reviews. You can get something decent for around $25 per person, more particularly Italian and Indian food. This is the kind of food everybody likes and if you are worried about etiquette, this won’t make you look cheap. Any meal including a nice piece of meat or fish will go for at least $40, with at least an appetizer. Of course, it all depends on the meat cuts, which can bring the check even higher. Any meal heavy on seafood should easily pass the $50 mark. This can actually go way higher if it includes lobster or scallops. Now if you get a several-course meal from a fancy restaurant, don’t be surprised to pay $100+ per person. In that case, you will be treating your guest to some classy dinner, which is sure to create a memorable...
Read MoreBudget
Of course when looking into estimating the cost of wedding catering, several elements will affect your budget, from the type of food you want to the number of courses, the venue, if you have waiters or a buffet and the number of guests. As a result, the numbers listed below are just an estimate to kind of give you an idea of what to expect. You should however do your homework diligently by first figuring out what you want and then shopping around. All the prices below are based on the food itself, not including the wedding cake, alcohol, gratuity or the waiters: The cheapest option is going for Chinese food or BBQ, with prices starting in the $10 – $20 range per person. This will also allow you to save on service as you can serve these foods buffet-style. Average prices are in the $30 to $70 range, which can be just hors d’oeuvres (appetizers), Italian food, Indian food or Mexican food. Once again, a buffet might be enough and will allow you to cut costs. Higher prices start around $80 and go as high as $300 per person. This pricing is not only based on the type of food you select – usually gourmet food such as French cuisine or seafood (lobster anybody?) – , but also on the location – a fancy restaurant or hotel – or the catering company you choose – for example when hiring a celebrity...
Read MoreGourmet Food
For those of you not familiar with that term, gourmet food refers to haute cuisine or culinary arts. You usually find in that category luxury items such as lobster, caviar, salmon, foie gras but also elaborate cuisine such as French food as well as sophisticated dishes with an aesthetic presentation. Of course, this means that you will need a pretty large budget, with prices starting around $80 per person and going as high as $300 a pop. When it comes to service, this is one where you will need waiters as you just can’t serve gourmet food buffet-style (it’s called etiquette). You should also make sure that your guests are familiar with these types of foods, as these dishes have distinctive flavors and texture. There is no typical gourmet menu as those plates are very varied but we can certainly give you a few menu ideas by listing some of the most popular gourmet dishes across the board: When it comes to seafood caviar, smoked salmon, scallops and oysters are a sure bet while French foie gras (liver paté) should satisfy meat-lovers. For entrees, lobster is probably a favorite, but it can also be salmon with a champagne sauce, an expensive steak prepared with a sophisticated sauce (wine sauces, reduced sauces, truffle sauces) or, a duck comfit. Popular cooking styles include nouvelle cuisine (smaller dishes emphasizing presentation) , fusion (mixing various ethnic styles) or any innovative dish created by a gastronomic chef. If you’re going for a gourmet wedding lunch or dinner, you will probably order your cake from a higher-end pastry shop, but you should know that you can also find gourmet desserts, which usually are small dessert pieces presented in a very fancy way. As a side note, a gourmet meal should be accompanied by fine wine (usually French) and champagne so you will also need to pay special attention to your alcohol selection – sorry that one-buck-chuck won’t do the...
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