Karen Harper-Fuog, catering Reviews

Karen Harper-Fuog, catering

Purcellville, VA

4.2 out of 5 rating, 18 reviews

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4.2 out of 5 rating

4.2

Good

18 reviews

Recommended by 83% of couples

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Quality of service
4.5 out of 5 rating
Average response time
3.7 out of 5 rating
Professionalism
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Value
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Flexibility
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Sarah Sent on 10/20/2017

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Karen catered my rehearsal dinner and my wedding, and she and her team did a tremendous job. I presented Karen with a bit of a challenge- an all-vegetarian/vegan wedding- and she definitely rose to it! Karen was so helpful in suggesting items that are or could be made vegan, and she went out of her way to find foods (vegan ranch dressing!) to meet my needs. She was also extremely helpful in advising us on what amount of wine and beer to buy for the event, and she expertly coordinated the ordering of all the rentals for the ceremony and the reception. Her staff was extremely professional and attentive at both events- I never for a moment felt like I needed to worry about whether my guests were well-fed. Most importantly, the food was AMAZING. Friends and family who probably would never choose a vegetarian meal were raving. I didn't want a wedding cake, so Karen prepared an amazing array of desserts (including vegan cupcakes- no small feat!), which the guests were wild about. My only regret is that I didn't eat more of the food!
Eric Sent on 09/28/2011

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Karen = Amazing Chef. Plain and Simple. One of the most important things for the wedding is the food, and man did she deliver. She was easy to get a hold of, constantly made excellent recommendations to our menu, and was great to get a long with! Throughout the entire evening, everyone (and seriously I mean everyone) came up to us and said all the food (from the appetizers, to the salads, to the entrees, to the sides. and to the cake) were out of this world. Karen and her staff were just simply fantastic and the best around.
Kristi Sent on 11/17/2010

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Karen was amazing! She was able to honer all of my special requests, my budget, as well as my theme. Our guests all said the beef tenderloin was the best they had ever had. Its obvious that Karen has more than enough experience and is truly a master of her craft. We are so happy with how everything turned out and I look forward to sharing the good news to anyone looking for amazing food! It really was a day that will last forever in our lives.

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Anne Sent on 10/27/2010

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We loved working with Karen. My husband and I had some atypical requests for our reception menu and Karen was completely on board. Additionally, we wanted to serve our food family style, which she didn't even have dishes for. So, she went out and bought them at no cost to us! Everyone praised the food after the wedding and licked their plates clean. YUM! Our food did come out late, but that was to be expected given that this type of service had never been done before by her team. We were flexible and everything ended up working out beautifully. We would use her catering services again in a heartbeat!
Amanda Sent on 10/04/2010

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Many guests told us that this was the BEST meal they've ever had a wedding, and I'd have to agree. The food was fabulous. Karen also took special care of the bride and groom. For instance, we told her we like avocado, so what does she do? She threw some avocado on our salad, just for us. I asked that the staff pay special attention to my father's drink--specifically, that it never be empty--and they stepped up to the task. They even gave him one of the extra beef plates. He was thrilled!

Definitely hire Karen Harper-Fuog. You won't regret it.
Lina Sent on 07/21/2010

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Karen is one of the best caterers out there! Although we didn't use her for our catering services, my husband and I asked her to do our wedding cake. It was absolutely beautiful and delicious. Karen can make anything!
User1728564 Sent on 06/20/2014

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Initially we very minor blips because she was very busy and was hard to reach on email. However, she realized this and came out of her way and met me at my home to finalize the menu and cake design. She was seemed very confident that everyone would love her food. She did not disappoint. The food was fantastic. She even made vegan dishes and vegan desserts for my two vegans guests. She is the main caterer at Hillsborough Vineyards in Purcelville so there is no reason to go with anyone else if you are having a wedding there.

My wedding cake is sitting in my freezer for my husband and I to eat on our year anniversary. I don't know if it's going to make it that long. The cake was SO GOOD! She said she doesn't do fondant cakes because the fondant isn't edible and she preferred cakes you can eat. Although I originally wanted a fancy, pretty, stiff fondant cake, I couldn't disagree that eating fondant cake is fairly off putting. The cake a was vanilla creme frosting, vanilla cake, and caramel/dulce de leche in between the cake layers. It was all her idea to make the cake that way and I left in her hands. Amazing. It looked great too! It was three layers, tons of frosting whipped around it, and it was decorated with flowers from my florist. It was adorable. I never got a chance to try the vegan dessert but I heard it was very very good and I'm annoyed I never tried it.
Diane Sent on 10/09/2011

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Karen catered our wedding at Hillsborough Winery in October 2011. The food was a big part of our wedding and we wanted it to be fantastic. Karen totally delivered!

She jumped at the chance to make Indian food and had great suggestions on how to round out menu that reflected our tastes and personalities but still was had some "safe" options for people that don't eat indian food.

Thank goodness we went table to table during the salad course because it would have been a tragedy to miss the food. The butter chicken was amazing and the palaak panner (fried cheese in spinach) was better than our favorite restaurant. Even the rice had the right texture and spices. And she even had naan in the bread baskets! The appetizers were a huge hit as well. The samosas and the tandoori shrimp were huge hits that people were still talking about the next day.

The day of the wedding she and her staff were so friendly and professional with the guests. They whisked the appetizers around the room with a smile, poured wine, even helped elderly guests down the steps.

Karen is an amazing chef but is not so big on paperwork. Phone calls were a much better way to contact her than email. She was always available for meetings though, even on short notice. I would suggest bringing a calculator to the consultations to help you estimate the price per person.

Karen also made our wedding cake. She made the most beautiful unique french wedding cake that was a pyramid of profiteroles that she decorated with sugar flowers. It was unusual and stunning and absolutely delicious.

Karen made our wedding incredibly special and I would highly recommend her to anyone.
Megan Sent on 06/08/2010

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Karen was great to work with. Her food was wonderful and the cake was beautiful. Both Karen and her staff did everything the day of the wedding. She was the wedding day coordinator and the caterer.
Renee Sent on 07/12/2008

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Karen is great. She is SO creative and obviously loves food just as much as I do. Our phone interview with her was actually what sealed the deal for choosing our venue - since the vineyard would only work with her, we had to make sure she was awesome, since for me, the food was the key element for our wedding. She has wonderful ideas. That being said, she told us right up front that doing paperwork and crunching numbers are not her thing - she would always rather be in the kitchen - so, as she warned might happen, we waited some time for our formal proposal. This was especially true because her assistant, who is more on top of details, was out on maternity. However, her assistant was fabulous in those stressful final weeks before the wedding and attending to us the day-of. They went out of their way for us - for example, bringing us a plate of our appetizers from the cocktail hour while we were finishing up our pictures. Their servers are well-qualified, and they have a relationship with a rental company through which they can get any specialty items you may need. Our "rustic Italian" menu for a plated dinner included a cocktail hour with cheese bar, mini cups of white bean soup, proscuitto and melon, and 3 kinds of bruschetta; and at dinner, lamb loin, halibut, wild mushroom lasagna, and apple crisp with house-made bourbon ice cream (the final item being a nod to my hubby, who loves his bourbon).
Monica Sent on 06/15/2011

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Karen Harper-Fuog is the exclusive caterer for our wedding venue, Hillsborough Vineyards, and while at first we were somewhat hesitant about having only one option, we could not have been more pleased with the food she delivered. We asked her to prepare some Indian dishes which she had never made before and she rose to the challenge, going through several tastings until she got it just right. Our meal was served family style and her staff did an excellent job with the service during cocktail hour, dinner, and dessert. Her prices were very reasonable especially given the quality of service and food. Several of our guests commented on how outstanding the food was. Her food is equal to food that would be served at some of the best restaurants in the country.

We did have some difficulty initially with her responsiveness to emails and phone calls. Communicating is clearly something which takes a back seat to cooking for her, which can be frustrating at times. However, as the date drew nearer, she was very responsive and helpful and handled everything professionally.
La Tosha Sent on 05/10/2010

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The food is amazing! We knew when we did our tasting with Karen that she was the caterer for us. It was just yummy. That said she can be a tad difficult. If you have a right hand man or coordinator just hand Karen off to them to handle. I must say the food is worth the trouble.
User868534 Sent on 07/18/2012

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Our guests said that the food at our wedding was the best they ever had, which I also agreed with. Karen was very professional, friendly, knowledeable and candid when it came to what we should choose as our food and how it would turn out. Only complaint is the surprise service fee we got a week before the wedding, which wasn't good timing with all the other payments we were making. We knew there would be a service fee, but we didn't know how much it would cost so it would have been nice to know the price of things a little bit sooner.
Barbara Sent on 10/17/2010

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The food was superb - excellent! Lots of compliments on it. The staff was really great. The only hard part was the money communication - that became a bit rough. She didn't give us an invoice and then complained about not being paid, which she was. It was a bump in the road we really didn't need at the last minute! Thank goodness our wedding planner smoothed it out.
Alison Sent on 07/17/2011

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Food and cake were absolutely delicious. However, she was very difficult to get in touch with, which made planning a challenge. She did, though, offer to make special meals for people. And, the price was right. Overall... it was worth it because the food turned out fantastic. We would have had fewer headaches if she weren't "too busy" to return phone calls and emails.
Ethan Sent on 07/10/2008

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The hors d'euvres and dinner prepared by Karen Harper-Fuog and her team were absolutely wonderful. We and all of our guests truly enjoyed the meal. However, throughout the planning process of our wedding, we found Karen and her assistant to be unresponsive and difficult to work with. To cap off the lack of professionalism, at the end of the reception, while my bride and I were still greeting guests, Karen had the guts to approach us and require us to review her bill and write a check--on the spot!! I know vendors may have occasions where clients stiff them so they have to be careful to get paid every time, but we were good for the money and it was very rude and unprofessional to expect us to write a check while we greeted our guests.

If you can deal with the lack of professionalism and unresponsiveness throughout the planning process (and cutting a check in the middle of your event), I think you will be very pleased with the quality of the food that Karen will deliver.
Pamela Sent on 08/17/2010

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I recently got married at Hillsborough Vineyards and this caterer was the only option. No wonder I got treated with such disrespect and lack of professionalism. Not only did she think that her food was SO GREAT that we didn't deserve a tasting b/c there were only going to be 30 guests, but the food was terrible. The chicken was so overcooked that my guests had it thrown out and the brisket was so full of fat that my husband, the groom, couldn't even chew it up. All in all, it was a NIGHTMARE of an experience for me. She even called me a dim-whit on the phone the day afterwards. How professional is that? I was mortified to say the very least.
Alexis Sent on 09/16/2015

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Terrible!
1) We were told by Hillsborough, that she was great chef and cooks all kinds of food. She told us she could make "anything" just give her a recipe and she'll do it. We chose a Puerto Rican chicken stew with rice and a tilapia dish. She shut down the tilapia dish saying that it is a "dirty fish". We were offended because we grew up eating tilapia. She choose to make a trout dish. I wanted a simple vanilla cake and she refused saying she would make a passion fruit cake. WTF.
2) She forgot to add a $3000 service charge for her staff. We refused to pay the additional because we had already signed a contract for a less amount and she's just not going throw an extra $3000 grand on everything and act like its ok when its her unorganized mistake.
3) She refused to give a tasting. WTF. She finally agreed let us taste 3 of the 9 dishes she would be making after my Maid of Honor had a stern talking with her.
4)Tasting: we met a random Starbucks and she handed me the dishes covered up in containers. She said the chicken was salty, "but let me know if that's how it should taste." She used DELI HAM on the dish, so it looked like cut up pieces of ham paper on the chicken. It looked like old carry out. The rice was overcooked and she lied saying it was a Turkish type risotto. The fish looked raw, with the head, teeth, eyes, fins and tail still on and tasted mushy and bland.

We ended up firing her and getting a new caterer. She's also incredibly overpriced and egotistical. She uses an @aol.com email address, so that should show u the level of unprofessionalism and care this woman has for her business. It was appalling working with her.

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