Start & Run a Catering Business. George Erdosh

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      1. Essential Skills and Knowledge

      As briefly discussed in Chapter 1, certain essential skills are a must for running a catering service. You are starting small and you must be able to run the business without help from time to time: when your helper is sick, when no one is available on such short notice, or when a small-business luncheon is only profitable if you do it yourself. Whatever the reason, you don’t want the extra worry of not being able to execute every part of the event competently.

      Here are the essential skills and knowledge you must have:

      • Competency in cooking and food preparation

      • The highest degree of planning and organizational skill

      • A high degree of efficiency

      • Ability to work well under pressure

      • Skills in problem solving and crisis management

      • An artistic touch in food presentation

      • Ability to deal with clients confidently and successfully

      Let’s discuss each of these essentials individually.

      1.1 Cooking and food preparation

      A high degree of skill in cooking, as well as ease, efficiency, and speed in food preparation are by far the most important prerequisites for a successful small caterer. Many would-be caterers start as good home cooks with a moderate-sized repertoire and better-than-average food preparation skills. Some are knowledgeable about cookery, its chemistry and physics, while others have done a lot of food research and experimentation. Still others are formally trained food professionals, such as chefs who are tired of working for someone else with low pay, long hours, and difficult conditions in tiny, poorly equipped, inefficient, overcrowded, and hellishly hot kitchens.

      Your cooking skill should be far better than that of a good gourmet cook, and you should have a sizable repertoire of well-tried recipes. Also, you need to be well versed in preparing all kinds of dishes, including hors d’oeuvres, entrées, side dishes, salads, desserts, breads, and beverages. You not only have to know how to prepare all these items, but you must also be able to present them in an appetizing, appealing way.

      How are you going to acquire all that cooking skill and knowledge? Practice, more practice, courses, and plenty of reading, research, and Internet surfing. The information is available, but you must find it. The place to practice is your own kitchen with readily available and eager testers — your family and friends — sitting at your table daily.

      If you haven’t had any formal culinary training, get some. It can be done, and you can have a great deal of pleasure and fun doing it. You don’t need the entire curriculum of a cooking school, or even the majority of it. A small fraction will be quite sufficient for your catering business; which fraction will depend on what type of catering you choose. It is hardly necessary to learn dozens of French sauces when you have no intention of using any more than a few basic ones (many are out of date anyway). If a demanding client insists on having boulettes of beef with sauce financière, don’t worry. Just look it up in your extensive reference collection and prepare it. If it is a complicated sauce, you may not get it right on the first try. Do it again — well before the event, of course. With a basic cooking background and some experimenting, you will come up with the perfect dish in no time at all. And you will also have a satisfied, amazed, and impressed client.

      1.1a Classes, seminars, and cookbooks

      Cooking СКАЧАТЬ