By Heidi Bouchard
Head of Style and Design

In the wedding design industry, vintage China has become all the rage. From the bride who wants a “full-fledged vintage look,” complete with vintage glass ware, linen and chairs, to the bridal or baby shower hostess who wants to add just a touch of nostalgia to her party.  More and more customers are asking for us to source vintage pieces for their catered event.

Our collection took shape slowly at first—a few pieces from gatherings at antique shops, some beautiful thrift store finds, one or two pieces discovered on EBay. As we began to build our collection, it was clear we were onto something—each piece of china we added was in high demand with many of our clients. As Head of Style and Design, it became my responsibility to make sure we had enough inventory so that we could tell our salespeople to present vintage china as a viable option to clients.  Although off to a great start, we still needed more and better quality pieces….

Brimfield Here We Come!

Over the course of two days and with the assistance of two “pickers,” I scoured field after field at Brimfield, Massachusetts’ famous outdoor Antique Show and Flea Market last September.  We came home with almost everything we needed, completing the 1^st phase of our project: 125 complete place settings made up of vintage china.

The appeal of these pieces is that every dish, every cup and saucer, has a story.   It’s safe to say that every piece belonged to someone’s Grandmother.  One dealer, whom we purchased a complete service of 8 from, told us he had bought it at an auction in Philadelphia, out of a stately old brick house that had been empty for years.  He broke the original 48 place settings into 6 sets of 8 each.  We imagined the grand parties these plates had witnessed.

Midway through our 2^nd day of foraging, we stopped for lunch to have our traditional Pilgrim Sandwich (Fresh roasted turkey, stuffing and homemade cranberry sauce on a fresh bakery roll). Deciding to divide and conquer I waited in line for lemonade.  I was the last to return to our table.  There were our three Pilgrim Sandwiches served on three late 19^th century green and gold Limoges plates.  The sandwiches were of course delicious, and yes, I think the plate was partly responsible for that. What fun to sit and pause a moment and enjoy the antique china ourselves!

When planning an event for soon-to-be-married couples, questions of unique wedding catering ideas arise.  A general concern is often “Should we have a sit down dinner, buffet, or food stations?” This is usually decided based upon each couple’s personalities, budget, and overall expectations of the event.  Food stations are a new and quickly-growing trend and they offer a fun, non- traditional approach.

Definite Pros

• Love comfort food? How about trying a Mac N’ Cheese bar or grilling up some Mini Slider Burgers with Fries? Would prefer a more healthy approach? Try a Sushi Bar or Seasonal Kabobs with Grilled Vegetables and a Quinoa Salad. The options are ENDLESS!
• It’s difficult to choose a meal that EVERYONE likes (or can eat due to allergies and intolerances), but by choosing food stations with multiple choices, no one will leave hungry.
• Food stations can accommodate both the largest and smallest appetites at you wedding- allowing for some to take just a bit and some to come back for seconds or thirds without a problem.
• Stations allow your guests to get up out of their seats and mingle with each other, even if they’ve never met!
• Stations will “WOW” your guests with the opportunity to watch their meal being prepared and served right before their eyes. This ensures freshness & quality and will fill the room with wonderful aromas.

Possible Cons (and how to fix them!)

• Depending on where you decide to put your stations, it can cause a bottle-neck which may minimize the time your guests have to eat and mingle. Focus on spreading out the stations and consider calling up one table at a time to ensure shorter and even no lines.                    
• You have to ensure that each station has enough food to feed all of your guests and vendors (including those who will come back up for more) which makes portion control a bit tricky and can be a little more costly. Your catering sales representative will help you choose the correct portions and ensure that you won’t end up with too much or too little food.
• Elderly guests may prefer to be seated during the wedding and not have to stand in lines and get their food. This problem can be resolved by asking a member of the wait staff to assist them.
• You need to make sure that your venue of choice allows cooking indoors/in the room where your guests will be seated. This can be the deciding factor for some couples.

In the end, whatever option you choose to go with will be welcomed and appreciated by your guests. Just remember to enjoy your day and focus on what really matters- your significant other, family & friends celebrating a wonderful milestone in your life!

Graduation parties are a great way to celebrate a recent graduate’s achievements with friends and family, but planning the celebration on your own can prove difficult.  Depending on the size of your child’s graduating class, it’s likely that more than one person will be having their graduation party on the same day, causing lots of traffic to and from your home, which can dictate the type of party you’ll want to have to keep guests comfortable and entertained. Follow these tips for graduation planning and you’ll be sure to give your son or daughter another memorable senior year memory:

Aim for a casual get-together—Consider getting together with other parents and organizing a joint graduation party. This will save people the trouble of traveling to more than one party and also save you money!  By splitting the cost three or four ways, you might actually end up reducing expenses, and can often go bigger when it comes to food and/or entertainment choice.

If the party is being held outdoors, consider renting a tent.   The weather isn’t always going to cooperate, and large party tents are perfect for keeping your guests dry rather than going through the hassle of rescheduling.  Even if you end up with a beautiful day, a tent is the perfect supplier of shade to help you cool off and relax with friends.

When it comes to serving food, a buffet setup is usually the best way to feed a large group of people.  Work with your catering service to make sure you have a wide variety of foods suitable to your guests. Appetizer foods, such as salad and finger sandwiches are easy to eat on the run and not too filling so guests can keep coming back for more, or fill up on their way to another party.  Browse through some of Pepper’s graduation day menu ideas to get an idea of what Pepper’s can provide, or to gather inspiration for  a do-it-yourself party.

Be sure you’re fully stocked up on supplies like utensils, cups and plates.  An open-house party creates the kind of atmosphere where guests may put down a plate or cup they were using and forget to pick it up when they want a refill. Make sure your caterer has plenty of extra cups, plates, napkins etc. for all of your guests and then some.   

Add a little character to the festivities. Displaying school colors or incorporating the school mascot into the event design is a popular graduation party trend. If your graduate is heading off to college, why not tailor the catering menu to their school of choice?  For example if they are going to the University of New England in Maine, perhaps a New England clambake will help set the mood for celebration. Maryland? Crab cakes! With a little imagination, your graduation party can be unique and memorable.

Interested in hearing more of our graduation party ideas?  Contact Pepper’s to discuss with our staff. We would love to help you celebrate this significant stepping stone in your child’s life.

With wedding season upon us, I have finalized the 2013 cake flavor menu adding four new flavors.  If you read my earlier blog, you already know that we voted in favor of the Spumoni and Chocolate Chai Tea cakes.  After trying three additional flavors, we landed on the Pink Lemonade cake and the Salted Caramel Devils Food cake. 

Our staff gave both flavors two thumbs up during our cake flavor and bridal tastings. The Pink Lemonade cake conveys our colorful theme for this season, and is perfect for a summer wedding with its bright and vibrant colors. The cake is lemonade flavored and consists of three pink shades filled with tart lemon curd and lemon mousse. 

After having Chocolate Caramel Fudge cake on last year’s menu, I can say the Salted Caramel cake has replaced it hands down.  This delicious dessert is a rich devil’s food cake filled with layers of salted caramel and dark chocolate ganache.  As one of our staff tasters put it “this is chocolate heaven!” Although I was wary about using salt, I have to admit, it’s a winner. 

The third cake was just as yummy, but more in line with a seasonal menu rather than our wedding menu.  I call it Pumpkin Gingerbread cake.  It’s made up of two layers of golden cake each with a layer of spicy gingerbread and filled with white chocolate ganache and pumpkin mousse.  I am putting it on the Holiday menu and if it’s a hit, will be available to all.  Next on the “to-do” list: a Dessert Buffet makeover...Stay tuned!

If you’re interested in a tasting with Pepper’s—Contact Us, we’d love to share our delicious cakes with you and work to create your dream wedding cake.

Casual Warm Weather Menus

Here in New England we don't have the longest summers, so we have to enjoy it while we can! Nothing says summer food quite like a barbecue - especially if your planning an outdoor wedding or special event. 

I know some of you may be thinking, “barbecue and my white dress?” But trust us. Barbecue wedding catering is making a big splash on the wedding scene. Whether couples are aiming for low-key, small celebrations or a big affair with all of your family and friends, our barbecue wedding menu is specially designed to please every palate and mark a very special occasion in scrumptious style.

When we say barbecue at Peppers,  we’re talking real barbecue—cooked low and slow to produce meats that are tender, succulent and bursting with flavor. And don’t forget the options for grilled seafood—all cooked using local and fresh ingredients. Do you envision the traditional New England clambake for over 200 of your closest friends? We can make it happen! Whether it’s buffet or sit-down, we ensure that each plate is carefully thought out and constructed to please the eye as much as the palate

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Our Pepper’s Event Designers are as much a part of the menu as the food itself, looking for ways to tie your wedding day inspirations into the presentation, with special touches like the addition of bales of hay around the buffet table at your barn wedding, or beautiful plaster starfish dispersed amongst the dishes at your seaside wedding.

The options for barbecue catering stretch as long as our imaginations (which at Pepper’s is pretty long!). If you’re planning an outdoor wedding, we encourage you to take contact us to see how we can help turn your special day into something truly extraordinary.

Reach out to Pepper’s to schedule a consultation with our Senior Event Designers. We would love to sit with you and discuss your special day. 

A catering company is a bit like a mobile 4-star restaurant, so you can imagine the amount of moving parts involved. From our clients to the wait staff, wedding planners and chefs, it takes a lot of planning to sync these parts properly, and orchestrate memorable, inspiring events—the kind of planning that makes up the Pepper’s difference and sets us apart from the rest.

Clients return to us time and time again, knowing that we can deliver an effortless (for them), stress-free event that incorporates their vision. So how do we do it? What’s our secret? Collaboration is the key! Everyone must be working together to achieve a shared goal. In Pepper’s case that goal is an amazing catering event.

Collaboration is much more than simply communicating. To us, it means everyone gets involved. It’s a volley of ideas going back and forth, adding and taking things away, until everyone is satisfied with the end result.

Collaboration is all about asking questions and getting answers. When we brainstorm as a team, it creates a sort of synergy, where the result is often greater than the sum of the individual parts. Everyone on the Pepper’s team is extremely talented—whether it is event design or culinary arts, and when the collaboration begins, truly amazing things happen!

Collaboration is crucial to making any business work, but it is especially true of the catering industry. With so many different parts to our business, it would be impossible to get anything done without knowing exactly where everyone else involved stands.

At Pepper’s, we are open, curious, engaged, and questioning about all aspects of an event. Our event designer will often work in tandem with our chefs to ensure there is an element of cohesion between food and design, our sales reps will need to collaborate with our designers regarding the tastes and visions of potential clients, so that we can better suit your needs when you walk through our doors for the first time. It never lets up at Pepper’s, constant flow of communication is needed to make it all work.

The end result of all of this planning and brainstorming is the creation of any event that engages all a client’s senses and provides lasting memories and endless delight.

When people think of beverage infusions, they  often think of an ice-cold Arnold Palmer, or strawberry lemonade, but why stop at crafting beverages for summer enjoyment? There are plenty of wonderful beverage infusions that can also warm you up on a cold winter’s night!

The other day we visited with friends who had an aromatic, simmering pot of mulled cider that was enhanced with nuances of star anise, cinnamon and juniper berries. Wow, it was delicious!

No matter the season, winter or summer, there are a plethora of opportunities to craft a hot or cold beverage using combinations of locally sourced herbs, fruits and spices. Any of these could be the basis of a signature drink at an event, wedding or for simply entertaining at home.

Peppers Fine Catering is often called upon to craft a signature non-alcoholic beverage cocktail for catered events. We love doing this because it gives us an opportunity to create an extremely memorable and unique catering opportunity.

By using a simple French Press coffee maker or tea pot, you can produce a delightful and aromatic beverage, too. You can also garner plenty of ideas with a quick Google search for tisanes or infusions.

Here are some examples straight from my own kitchen:

During the summer when our mint patch is bursting, I like to put a few cups of mint leaves (whole) into a French press with a few lemon slices, add a couple teaspoons of sugar and fill the vessel with boiling water. Let this steep for 3-4 minutes and then push down the strainer, for a soothing mint tea that can be enjoyed warm or chilled.

With the grocery store stocked with seasonal fruits like clementines, a particularly sweet and delicious member of the citrus family, why not try a Lemon Clementine Infusion?

Scrape the zest from 6 each clementines into a bowl using a microplane. Cut the clementines in half and squeeze the juice into the same bowl as the zest. Repeat this process with the 2 lemons as well, making sure to include the zest and juice.

In a saucepan, combine 2 tablespoons of sugar with 6 cups of water. Bring the mixture to a boil and then remove the heat and add in the zest and juice from the clementine and lemon. Let everything steep, covered for 3-4 minutes and enjoy warm or chilled.

Consider playing around with other ingredients like orange and tarragon, apple cider, thyme, ginger, celery or pineapple. Mix and match, have some fun with them. See what other recipes you can come up with!

If you try a new creative drink infusion, be sure to let us know by posting to our Facebook wall!

Hors d’oeuvres are an ever popular staple at any party— they can be eaten on the move, allowing guests to easily mingle. But the same stale dishes always seem to be passed around at every party. Scallops wrapped in bacon, shrimp cocktail, and the ever popular fruit and cheese tray are all a bit overdone at this point.

As we start fresh with a New Year, we thought why not share a fresh, new recipe as well? 

One trend in Hors d’oeuvres is the desire for more vegetarian fare. Our Parmesan tuille with arugula, mascarpone and roasted pear could be considered a play on the classic fruit and cheese pairing. This new hors d’oeuvre we have been experimenting with has been satisfying guests with great reception in the past few months, ever since we introduced it at an event at the Boston Design Center.

When it comes to assembling our Hors d’ oeuvres menu, we like to keep it fresh, local, simple and visually appealing, with at least 4-5 components all adding complementary tastes and different textures.

Parmesan Tuille, arugula, roasted pear & mascarpone cheese

2              ounces                 Parmesan Cheese, fine shred or grated

2              ounces                 Mascarpone Cheese, whipped at slightly below room temperature. We like Vermont Butter and Cheese for locally produced

1              each                    Pear, nearly ripe & from local source. Split, core, medium dice

¼             oz.                      Arugula

Procedure:

The making of the tuilles is best done on a silpat mat. These can be found at better kitchen stores that are geared for cooks and chefs. Stores such as Williams-Sonoma or Sur La Table.

1. Place 1/2 teaspoon of the grated parmesan onto the silpat sheet, forming rounded shapes. Spread so that it is an even layer and barely covering the area. This is a time when “less is more” for the grated parmesan. You can probably get 24 to 30 cheese discs to a sheet. Bake in a pre-heated 275 degree oven until the tuilles are getting golden brown. Remove from the oven and cool. Do not refrigerate or make a day ahead. This is to be done the day you plan on serving them, as they will lose the desired texture.

2. Whip the mascarpone with a beater attachment for one minute at a medium speed. This will lighten up the texture and allow you to easily pipe it onto the tuilles.

3. An hour or so before guests arrive, pipe out a rosette of the whipped mascarpone onto tuilles that have been topped with 2 leaves of arugula. Be aware to pipe some of the mascarpone onto the tuille to have it “stick.”

4. Top the whipped rosette with the fresh chopped pear pieces. I will share with you that we have also done a fresh fig variation, we have roasted under ripe pears, poached apple and I’ll bet by this time next year have come up with another  half dozen variations, so please have fun and experiment with this tasty little appetizer.

The cutting of the cake has been a wedding institution for years, but many couples are choosing to ditch the traditional cake for something with a bit more panache. Today, many are going for a variety of desserts to satisfy any sweet tooth, wow guests and make a statement. The dessert station is rising in popularity among couples, in many cases replacing the towering feat of skill and frosting that is the traditional wedding cake. It has become the must-have attraction for the modern wedding.

With a variety of colors, textures, and shapes at your disposal, the station is a way to continue the theme of your big day—it’s an extension of the celebration and another chance to show off identity and personalize. Going well beyond the traditional 3-tiered wedding cake, the dessert station gives guests variety, from candies and pastries to dessert bars and cupcakes, the options are endless and your guests will appreciate the ability to choose beyond the typical sweet treat.  

If a dessert table is in the cards for your next celebration, we suggest going the extra mile to make it extra special for your guests. Why not think way outside of the box? How about freshly made doughnuts and a chocolate fountain? How about an Ice cream sundae bar? Get creative! Work with your caterer to come up with something fun and memorable.

At Pepper’s we are constantly adapting color scheme and textures to the menu laid out for your guests. The beauty of working with dessert materials such as flour, fondant, glucose and white chocolate is the verstilitie in color affording to our expert bakers. With a little bit of food coloring, we can tie in the décor of any wedding to really make the dessert station stand out.

And for all you traditionalists out there, don’t worry, we offer delicious cakes, too! In fact, a dessert station can include a small cake in addition to other treats, so the bride and groom can still take those memorable photos of feeding one another the first bite of cake as a married couple! 

For years my close friends and associates have tolerated my rants about eating locally grown foods, understanding that it goes way beyond being trendy or simply supporting a local business. My occasional waxing prophetically about eating what is grown, caught and produced locally is about taste and taste alone.

Recently Pepper’s has committed to offering only Murray’s Chicken to our clients. Murray’s Farms are located in New York and Pennsylvania. Each farm is committed to not using growth hormones or any type of antibiotics. This great care makes Murray’s Chickens particularly moist, and they taste delicious.

So where am I going with this? What do Murray’s locally raised chickens and rice have in common?

Last evening my wife and I had a hankering for Asian food. We debated ordering sushi or getting takeout. But it was Monday, and fresh fish is generally not so fresh on Mondays. Okay, what next?

Cook at home of course!

A quick shopping trip brought some fresh petit Asian eggplant, lemongrass, bok choi, Chinese long beans, ginger, cilantro and a really good looking piece of D'artanian Smoked Duck.

We figured we would make some simple rice to go along with the dish that’s taking shape. Combing through the cupboards revealed that we were out of rice, with one exception. We had been saving a bag of rice that was given to us from a local woman from the rice terrace area of Longsheng, a region of China near Gullin.

There’s a long story behind how we came upon this modest ½ lb. bag of rice, but in the interest of brevity let me just share that the indigenous residents of this area have been growing rice pretty much the same way for thousands of years. The rice terraces are an unbelievable site to be seen.

We parceled out ¼ of our stash to have with our dinner. Wow! Neither of us could believe how wonderful rice could be.  This rice has not been genetically modified and absolutely reflects the local terroir of Longsheng.  It was creamy, alive with flavor and just a delight to eat. We kept the preparation quite simple. It was cooked gently in filtered water, and at the finish, we merely added a few dashes of sea salt and a handful of diced preserved lemon Susan had made.

This rice made for yet another convincing argument for eating locally grown foods; and it is especially gratifying to have met the grower.