Outdoor private residence catering

Hi Erica
Check on thumbtack.com.. Maybe you can find what you're looking for there. That is where we found our caterer

Is the kitchen in the house a commercial kitchen? I can’t imagine a regular household kitchen having enough burners, ovens, equipment, or space to make a plated meal for your guests, unless you’re having less than 20 people. I cook for 25 people for thanksgiving and I use FH’s aunt’s kitchen (she lives next door) and my kitchen because my oven isn’t big enough for both the ham and the turkey I cook and the 5 burners I have aren’t enough to make all the starches and veggies I cook.

You can look into caterers that already have travel kitchen equipment (some do) but I’d expect any who do will require you rent it for them or require you to pay for them to rent it.

I was going to recommend thumbtack.com as well! I was initially going to do an in home cooked dinner and got a few quotes from thumbtack to do so!

Most kitchens aren’t equipped to handle the needs of a large event, especially if all the appliances are “standard” sized.

We had a private residence wedding and allowed the caterer to use our kitchen , but they had initial needs that needed to be met. It cut down on how much we needed to rent, but we still had to rent. They used our stovetop and counter space, but needed to rent convection ovens . The ALTERNATIVE was this catering company also had a “mobile kitchen” truck that they could have brought and used instead. Using the truck or renting the additional equipment was about the cost. The caterers came and did a site visit ahead of time to determine the best course of action — basically if our kitchen was usable. So they evaluated the needs, went for the additional ovens and we were good to go.

My best advice is shop around a lot for caterers, when reaching out present the situation and see how they respond. We came across a few different options (one had grills and *everything* cooked was grilled; one brought their own tent for a fee, one required an additional rental etc etc). To be honest, though we tried and met with a couple different options, I was sold by our ultimate choice from the very first interaction— their confidence and excitement towards a backyard wedding made me feel assured that this was something they could handle expertly.

Ugh “initial” in that second sentence is supposed to say “additional” 🤦🏻‍♀️ I don’t know WHAT is going on with my autocorrect today.

Worth noting that our caterer coordinates all the additional equipment rental and delivery and temporary kitchen set ups themselves, which is important. Of course it costs a premium but that’s one of those hidden expenses of a backyard wedding, and as we like to say on the forums— a backyard wedding is rarely a money saver! That said, the add on for us, for the oven option or the mobile kitchen truck option was $500, which in the grand scheme of things felt pretty minor. I also want to clarify that the truck is not to be confused with a “food truck” with window service or anything. More a box truck that was essentially a traveling kitchen room. Strictly for prep and cooking. Caterers have to be prepared to NOT have kitchen access (many people simply don’t want this) so any that are prepared to do this are very skilled at makeshift kitchen. Ours asked specifically if they would have kitchen access, and they were happy to utilize the vast counter space we had available, but the kitchen was simply not equipped to prepare a meal for 125 without additional appliances.

Hi Erica! Have you had any luck finding a caterer for your wedding yet?