Like all other aspects of Wedding Services, Wedding Catering has also evolved to another level giving way for more variety and inclusions. Planning the menu for various events in a wedding is a tricky yet a very interesting activity. Indian cuisine is a Gourmet’s delight with enormous choices available in every aspect of food – be it Starters, Snacks, Soups, Main Course, Breads, Side accompaniments, Curries, Desserts etc Till a few decades back Buffet service was considered a strict No for many.
Indian hospitality norms clearly stood by the traditional Elai Sapaadu where all meals were served on Banana Leaves as a sit-down service. The menu consisted of very traditional regional dishes with no room for dishes or sweets that were not part of the tradition. Dessert was always standardised as Fruit Salad with Ice Cream. Increase in cross community weddings slowly saw the inclusion of other regional dishes into the main course. Plus travel and exposure to other cuisines gave room to be open minded about adding dishes from other states. The art of cooking was taken to the next step with institutions being opened up to teach multi cuisines for those endowed with culinary skills. Thus availability of specialised chefs to provide regional delicacies was aplenty In Indian weddings, events are generally spread over 2 or 3 days. There is immense scope to add a variety of dishes spread over various meals like breakfast, lunch, high tea and dinner. Reception dinner was usually considered the ideal meal for experimenting since the concept of wedding reception is more a social engagement than anything traditional. So what constituted the dinner menu has gradually undergone tremendous changes One never heard of soups and starters as part of wedding catering till a couple of decades ago. Now they are an integral part of a wedding reception menu. A wedding catering menu with starters like mini samosas, cocktail vadas and Kuzhi Paniyaram is not uncommon. Chaats are another favourite with most clients as far as marriage catering goes. Items like pani puri, bhel puri, ragada patties, aloo tikki, samosas and dahi puri are hot favourites with guests. These dishes offer a welcome change from the dishes served regularly. Adding of starters or chaat items as special counters as part of wedding catering is also necessitated when the number of guests expected is huge and the dining hall has limited capacity. These special counters act as fillers for guests as they await their turn to have the main course The variety is not confined to snacks alone. Hot beverages and cool drinks too have varieties hitherto unheard of. Apart from coffee, tea and fresh juices we now have green tea, sukku coffee, mocktails, milk shakes, thandai, jal jeera and other specially concocted drinks are offered by the wedding caterers. The wedding menu for main course, in a South Indian Wedding, has also seen the inclusion of North Indian cuisine like roti and other breads with appropriate accompaniments made to match. The reception menu has more mixed rice varieties like vegetable rice, Brinji rice, Bisi Bela baath, Kashmiri pulav, Fried rice etc that are ready to eat. Even Rasam Saadam and curd rice are served, in ready to eat style. Desserts are served as live counters. As wedding caterers we have varieties in ice cream including the stone cold ice cream counters where required flavours are made instantly. We have live counters for Jilebi and Makhan misri. As part of wedding catering we curate the reception menu to offer dessert combos like hot carrot halwa + ice cream, malpua with Rabdi + Ice cream, Hot gulab jamun + Ice cream, hot jalebis + ice cream …. the list is endless!
As one of the leading wedding caterers in Chennai (testimony to this are our google reviews) we have detailed discussion with our clients in finalising the wedding menu and offer our inputs where appropriate. We can claim with pride that we have brought back traditional sweets of Kerala like the Elai adai and Pootharekulu from Andhra back into circulation as part of the wedding menu. We believe in innovation but it should be done sensibly and appreciated by all concerned to give special memories of the wedding.