Reception Meal/menu - How Did You Decide??

Our wedding was buffet style so guests had options. I knew I wanted fried ravioli for a passed app prior. Our venue specially made it for our wedding. The other two passed apps we choose from a list the venue supplied. We had a custom package since none of our venues standard menus were buffets. The venue coordinator basically asked us what meats and sides we wanted and we told her from there she created a custom package which included prime rib, carved turkey with gravy, mashed potatoes, grilled veggies, and a pasta bar with penne and tortellini with a choice of vodka or alfredo sauce. We also had a plated salad and of the three choices our venue offered for salads we choose Caesar salad. We ended up adding a late night snack later on because we were going to meet our food and beverage minimum. My husband wanted a mashed potato bar for the late night snack and I wanted a nacho bar during dinner. We comprised and had a nacho bar for our late night snack. We also had a candy bar that was open throughout the reception. We let the decorator, who set up the candy bar, decide what candy to include we just asked that she include at least one type of dark chocolate since my husband prefers dark chocolate.

View Quoted Comment WOW, that's a lot of food! That all sounds amazing!! Very cool that your venue was willing to make the fried ravioli specially for your wedding. Did you get to sample it first to make sure they made it how you wanted it? Late night snacks sound like a good idea too - did most of your guests visit the nacho bar and/or candy bar? Was one more popular than the other?

View Quoted Comment We didn't get to try the fried ravoli first, but it turned out amazing. I'm not sure how many people visited each, but I think we should have had the DJ make an announcement about each because I did hear from a couple people that they didn't realize one or the other was there.

View Quoted Comment Having the DJ make an announcement is a good idea, I was at a wedding once that apparently had a late night snack and I didn't know it existed until I heard people talking about it the next day lol. Glad to hear that the ravioli turned out great!

Our venue serves duet plates so we decided that we each pick an entree. We agreed right from the start not to do fish or seafood. We wanted our choices to be different, and the whole decision took maybe less then ten minutes for us. We also have a different option for vegan, gluten free, allergies and kids plates. We unfortunately did not get to do a tasting because of covid, but we are going to see pictures of the plated meals at our planning appointment before we fully commit to our choices.

The whole point of our tasting sessions were to decide which caterer to book and which food to select for the entree options! We pre-selected several to try during the tastings and then were able to narrow it down during the tastings. We offered 3 choices: chicken, salmon, or butternut squash ravioli.

For me, one of my “non-negotiables” was a plated meal. Our wedding will be in New Orleans (which has ah-mazing food!) so we both wanted to really embrace the local cuisine and share it with our guests. We lucked out that the venue we chose happened to have a renowned New Orleans chef that creates menus for weddings there, so we will be creating a custom menu with him for our wedding. Since it’s a destination wedding we won’t get to have a tasting, so we are relying completely on reviews of his food, and blind faith that it will be amazing 🤞🏻🤞🏻

We've since postponed, but we had our tastings before Covid and we decided on the entree options based on the tastings. We're doing a plated dinner

We also did buffet. Our caterer came with the venue, and provided us with a LARGE list of options. We were able to taste quite a lot of it, and then I let DH decide. (He's the cook and has a better palate than I do.)

With a buffet, we were able to provide fish and beef, vegetarian options, and a variety of sides.

My absolute favorite was the rosemary potatoes. SUPER delicious.

We served "swanky tacos". My wife and I both love tacos and taco nights are a thing for us! So we decided, why not serve fancy tacos at our reception?! I came up with a few options based on one of my favorite local taco shops and our caterer helped come up with another option. They were soooo good.

I had my heart set on my cultural cuisine but it was SO EXPENSIVE and i wanted my budget to be a certain amount.

so what happened was we were planning a typical plated meal and it wasn't... something i was happy with. so we ended up increasing our budget and getting the cultural cuisine we wanted and were so happy for! pretty much my entire budget went to food aha. it costs a lot but i wanted my guests to be happy with food because what i had planned originally STANK.

View Quoted Comment Bummer that you couldn't do a tasting, but that's awesome that you each get to pick something different! Sounds like you've got a great variety of meals covered for everyone.

View Quoted Comment You picked 3 great choices! The butternut squash ravioli especially sounds delicious! Very cool that you got to try out a few different caterers. We have to use the caterer that my venue provides, so the purpose of our tasting was to decide which options we wanted, as opposed to which caterer to book. Their food is fantastic though, so I'm happy to go with them!

View Quoted Comment That is awesome that you get to do a custom menu!! I like that you're planning to incorporate local food into the menu too. I've never been to New Orleans, but I have heard that their food is incredible!

View Quoted Comment Very cool that you got to do the tasting before COVID caused chaos! We also did our tasting right before COVID hit, and we also postponed to 2022, so we're wondering if we'll get to do a second tasting. 😀 What entree options did you choose? Did you guys immediately agree on the options after tasting them? Or did you have to compromise?

View Quoted Comment That's really cool that they had a lot of options for you to try! Our caterer comes with our venue too, and I also let my fiance have the final say in food, since he does most of the cooking for us (Food Network is frequently on the TV at our home lol). The rosemary potatoes sound amazing!

View Quoted Comment Oh my gosh, I love the idea of fancy tacos!! Did you serve them as a taco bar/buffet? Or as a plated meal?

View Quoted Comment Sorry that the original plan didn't go well, but it sounds like everything worked out in the end! Glad that you were able to get the cultural cuisine you wanted, I definitely think food is one of the few wedding expenses that is totally worth splurging on. I'm sure your guests loved the food!

View Quoted Comment Thanks! I know we are taking a huge gamble having never tasted the food prior to the reception. I’m just crossing my fingers and hoping for the best! I figured worst case scenario, if the food sucks well hey, we are in New Orleans! There are tons & tons of amazing restaurants on every street- so the next meal will be good LOL

This is a fun question! My husband and I knew pretty quickly we wanted to have a buffet. Our venue was a 5-star resort hotel and I know buffets are considered technically less fancy than plated meals, but neither of us had ever had a plated meal at a wedding that we thought was amazing. Plus, our guests—including us—had some strong food preferences and we wanted to provide a variety of choices.

After we booked our venue, multiple vendors we interviewed told us that our venue had amazing food. We were thrilled! Originally, since our wedding was a destination event, we weren't planning on having a tasting, but we ended up flying down for a day to do a bunch of wedding things, including a tasting. I was thrilled because I didn't really eat on the big day.

We weren't in love with any of the set buffet menus, so we told our coordinator what we were looking for and the chef created a custom dinner for us. Everything was spectacular. We chose three passed apps for the cocktail hour based on their set list, and added two stations as well.

This was our menu:

Cocktail Hour:

Simply Potatoes Station
House Waffle Potato Chips With Smoked Paprika Salt
Loaded Potato Skins Topped With Chipotle Chicken, Spinach, White Cheddar Cheese, Cilantro Sour Cream
Country Mashed Yukon Potato, With Your Choice Of Toppings: Truffle Aioli, Warm Bacon Lardoons, Scallions, Sour Cream, Cheddar Cheese, Sriracha Yogurt

Slider Bar Station
Coppertail Night Swim Porter Beer Braised Pork Slider with IPA Jalapeno Slaw Pickled Red Onion
IPA Crab Cake Slider with IPA Hollandaise
Jackman Ranch Florida Wagyu Beef Slider with Guinness Stout Infused Bacon Jam

Passed apps:

Tandoori chicken salad cups (cold)

Beef Wellington bites

Vegetable samosas

Custom Buffet

SALAD

Mixed greens with romaine salad, shaved carrots, cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, red onion and shredded parmesan Cheese served with balsamic vinaigrette peppercorn, ranch

PROTEIN
Herb rubbed striploin carved to order with chimichurri sauce
Pan Seared Chicken rosemary and mushroom demi jus
Grilled Grouper with Lemon thyme cream sauce

SIDES

Savory Bread Pudding with Organic Mushrooms, Caramelized Onions and Parmesan

Sour cream and chive whipped Yukon potato V

3 Cheese Mac N’ Cheese with corn bread crumbles
Roasted seasonal vegetables, carrots, cauliflower, haricot vert, sqaush

Olde Hearth Pretzel Rolls, Whipped butter and Sweet Honey whipped Butter