Category: Catering

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Large Hog Roasts

Good morning blog readers just another quick update to tell you what we have been up to at Chef and Griddle this week. Both Stephen’s are out of the office this week traveling down south in the snow and ice to cater for a large event in Harrow. The traveling conditions are slightly hazardous but that will never stop them getting out at events. The main event they were traveling down for was absolutely huge , we are not allowed to say who the customers were but it was excellent. To start with they booked us to serve our classic spit roasted pig for 1500 guests as well as turkey with all the trimmings for 300 guests. They then added fish goujons with chips for 750 guests, turkey for another 200 guests and then finally Halal lamb for 130 guests.

All in all we are feeding about 3000 guests so we are going to set up a number of serving stations with two to three serving staff on each.  The food is due to be served at 6pm so everything will be set up now and all the meat will be roasting away while our chefs prepare the side dishes and serving areas. Fish goujons and chips is very easy for our chefs to prepare and is a popular request once that people know we can prepare anything. The only extra equipment we need to bring is an electric powered deep fryer, we simply batter the fish and cut potatoes into slices to be fried and served into cones.

The next event they will be doing will also be in the south for a big wedding who are having our menu 5 with pork and whole roast salmon for 100 guests. This menu includes canapes and salads which we will prepare whilst the meat is roasting to be served early in the afternoon.  The party will also be having a chocolate torte dessert freshly prepared on site whilst the other courses are being served, we will then dress this with whipped cream and serve it to tables. I will give you another update next week to let you know how both events went when both Steve’s are back in the office.

 

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21st Birthday Hog Roasts

Christmas is within view with only a few more weeks to go until Father Christmas (or one of our Chef and Griddle Chefs) could be bringing you a warm hog roast carved and served in your dining room. We have booked in two jobs for Christmas day this week, one is for a classic hog roast and in this cold weather I can’t think of anything better than pork in a roll with piping hot sage and onion stuffing and crispy crackling served onto platters. The second job on Christmas Day is the hire of a one of our hog roast machines to a family who are doing their own roast turkey in the hog roast machine as our machines can be used to cook almost any type of meat. We have even had people enquire about whether or not they can cook deer in the machine which they can as long as it will fit. We have also cooked some rather exotic meats with our machines in the past such as Crocodile, Ostrich’s and Bison.

Yesterday we did a hog roast for a young man’s 21st birthday party, the event was a held at a cricket club in Burnley for around 50 people. This was our classic hog roast menu but as it was for a 21st the customer had asked that we ladle Jack Daniels whisky onto the pig whilst it was cooking to see if it would retain the flavour. We have done this in the past with cider and ale and it does give the meat a slight flavour of the alcoholic beverages. When we gave the pig this treatment with the whisky the result was extraordinary, the pork had soaked up all the flavour of the whisky giving it a very distinctive taste. Even the guests that said they didn’t usually like whisky (for whom we had saved a portion of the pig that wasn’t soaked in the brown liquor) wanted to try some and actually preferred it over the normal pork.

As we could tell that the celebrations were going to last until very late at night we carved up the remaining meat onto platters and left it out with bread rolls, crackling and sauces as a snack for later.

 

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December Hog Roasts

The weather is turning very icy now but Chef and Griddle is gearing up for another busy weekend and we will not let a bit of ice get in the way of our hog roasts.

We had an event on today at a farmers market who would like to supplement their organic vegetables with our free range organic pigs. We will also be cooking up some of the market’s organic potatoes in our roasting tray, to show off how superb they are when roasted in the pork juices. A few of the stall owners ended up asking if we could cook some of their vegetables as well and we did, with the results being fantastic. In the end the customers practically had a roast pork dinner with spit roasted pig, crackling, stuffing, apple sauce, potatoes , carrots , onions and fresh floured rolls. The meal went down perfectly, we tasted some of the roast organic vegetables and we must say they were absolutely amazing and will definitely be using them again for events in the area.

The event we have this weekend is for a wedding in Penzance, the couple have opted for our Alfresco Wedding Menu, this is a fantastic option for couples on a budget as it is less reliant on service but makes up for it with the price and the food you receive. This menu consists of whole roast pork and whole roast lamb served with all the trimmings, the couple will also receive three freshly made salads. Having two meats in this way is great foe taste as well as presentation as you can see both meats turning around and roasting whole. As I have mentioned before in these blogs lamb is a great meat for a sit down meal, especially when it is cooked like this.

This month has been one of the best yet for Chef and Griddle and we can definitely see the success continuing on into December and from there into the new year if you would like a hog roast in December I would definitely urge you to book now as we are almost full to bursting for the coming month.

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Outdoor Catering

Last night Chef and Griddle catered for a 40th birthday party in Bradford. The weather was terrible, as I’m sure it was all over England, luckily we always take mini gazebos to outdoor events, so the food and ourselves were kept dry. It is also lucky that the party was indoors at an enormous house, we cooked and carved the food outdoors onto the guests bread rolls which they then took inside to eat. The menu which this customer had chosen was our Classic Hog Roast, which consists of a whole spit roasted pig, crackling, homemade stuffing and apple sauce served into a bread roll. There were 50 attendees, which a lot of people who make enquiries with us think is a low amount of people for a hog roast, which is simply not true. The customer was debating whether or not to put a few bits out for her guests to snack on, once the hog roast was finished, as the party was set to rage on all night. We told her that there would be no need for any extra food as we carved up the leftover pork and left it with sauces, bread rolls and the crackling for her and the guests. Since her event, she has got in touch with us to tell us that she and all of her guests greatly  enjoyed the hog roast. She commented that leaving her with the leftover food, as we did, was fantastic for later on in the evening when people needed a bit more food to help sober them up.

It may be the end of the week for most people but for hog roasters, the weekend is just the beginning and we are straight back at it. This weekend we are very busy again, we have a large event in Twigworth on Saturday. We will then we need to clean the machines so that they are ready for Sunday, when we are hiring out two machines. We are supplying the machines with two freshly prepared pigs and two boned and rolled pork legs for a customer who is catering for a large amount of people in Somerset.

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Christmas Comes Early

We have had quite a busy week at Chef and Griddle this week with two party menus, a corporate event and another party tonight!The corporate event was a for a small haulage company in Wrexham who were celebrating an excellent financial year and treating the staff to a hog roast for lunch at their offices. The weather wasn’t fantastic but we were able to bring the hog roast indoors to the canteen to serve the hog. The menu was our corporate menu one which consists of a spit roasted pig, professionally presented crackling, freshly made stuffing and apple sauce served into a bread roll. The staff loved the hog roast and kept coming back for more pork of which there is always plenty.

One of the party menus was our menu two on which you get a choice of a number of meats such as lamb, beef, chicken, turkey or a BBQ menu. The hosts of the party chose chicken option which we served with piping hot stuffing and freshly made gravy. The menu two also comes with a vegetarian option so the client chose to have roasted aubergines with feta cheese, cherry tomatoes, caramelised onions and chilli, for a very colourful and flavoursome vegetarian alternative.

The second party menu was for an early Christmas dinner for a family as their eldest son is going travelling over the Christmas period. The clients had the winter warmer menu which is understandably becoming increasingly popular over the Christmas period. This menu has the choice of pig or turkey as the meat and seasonal vegetables as a side dish, they chose the turkey for the traditional festive meat and had freshly prepared mulled wine to go with it.  Spirits were high and everyone had a little bit too much mulled wine but that what  early Christmas is all about!

The event tonight is for a 40th birthday party and the weather is terrible, luckily we have our little gazebo to protect us and the hog I will update you on how it went tomorrow.

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Spit Roast Lamb

Yesterday was the Islamic New Year and we were out cooking a Halal lamb roast for 100 guests in Addlestone. The Islamic couple that we were doing the roast for are repeat customers of ours who trust us to do an exceptionally tasty Halal spit roast. The menu that the couple opted for was a whole spit roast lamb with rosemary and thyme along with roast potatoes which we cooked in a tray with the lamb fat.

For the vegetarians we prepared meat free somosas which went down a storm. This was all served onto high quality crockery which we collected after the meal and cleaned off site. In the office the new years eve enquiries are flooding in especially for machine hires and pigs. Our machines can fit through most normal sized doors and have pneumatic tires for ease of transportation, so they are an ideal machine for new years eve parties. We can also supply pigs and lambs to go in the machine and will put it in the machine for you and set it going, so all you have to do is check the temperature of the meat and carve it when it is ready. We also supply all of our machines with a 19 kilo gas bottles which is enough to feed around three pigs or lambs.

We are also getting a lot of enquiries for weddings and corporate events in Summer next year, summer is always a fantastic time for hog roasts. Due to the large number of enquiries we are receiving and the fact that we are so exceptionally busy in Summer we urge you to start booking your hog roasts straight away to avoid disappointment. We can provide everything from canapés and desserts to simple evening meals such as bacon and sausage rolls with a few salads. Christmas is also still a very busy period for us with us booking in quite a few turkey roasts this week for Christmas parties or just family gatherings. We are all looking forward to being able to share the festive cheer with people through our hog and turkey roasts and we bet they are going to make a lot of customers extremely happy.

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Wedding Hog Roasts

At Chef and Griddle we have had a very busy week in the office and also had a flat out weekend catering. We catered for a small party of 50 for a lovely couple’s wedding in Andover, they wanted a quieter wedding with only their closest family and friends present. A common question that we are asked is whether we can cater for these smaller number of guests and the answer is we absolutely can., as we are very close with our suppliers we can basically pick the size of pig to suit your event.

We had a member of staff situated to spot the bride and groom as they were on the way back from the church, when we spotted the happy couple making their way back we started pouring their reception drinks to have them ready for when they arrived. The couple had also chosen canapés to warm their guests up for the hog roast, the chef and griddle serving staff were constantly returning with empty platters of canapés as they were exceptionally popular. The most popular were the honey glazed gourmet sausages which were skewered on sticks and served on a platter with a whole grain mustard dip.

There were a number of vegetarians at the wedding so we freshly prepared them a Spanish quiche consisting of high quality organic vegetables, at chef and griddle we don’t believe that vegetarians should be left out at a hog roast just because roasted meat is the focus of the meal. We can freshly prepared a large number of vegetarian options from stuffed peppers to roasted aubergine.

The main roast also went perfectly, the pork crackling was golden, flavoursome and lifted off easily. The couple had also opted for a small spit roast lamb which is quite a popular option for weddings due to the diversity of having two very different meats on offer. The spit roasted lamb looks very similar to the pork whilst it is cooking so it is also a good option for people that want whole roasted meat but decide not to have pork. Lamb is also a fantastic tasting meat and it has never tasted better than when it is slowly flame roasted and basted with its own juices. The guests all lined up with their real crockery and went from the roast pork to the roast lamb, most of the guests had a bit of both as they had never tried pork or lamb prepared in this manner.

Serving this small amount of guests did not take long even though we were chatting to them as they came along, for larger amount of guests we simply take more staff and hog roast machines so nobody is left waiting for their food.

Enquiring about wedding menus is easy, simply fill in our online enquiry form and we will send you out prices and information about those menus. You can also call the office and have a chat with us about what you require for your wedding and we can get a quote emailed out to you.

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We Love Repeat Custom!

Good Afternoon and welcome to the latest update from here in the Hog Roast Caterer office…

Its Friday the 14th of September and today we have been dealing with a client over the telephone that has booked in two corporate events with us and two great menus I might add!

because of this I am almost one hundred percent sure will guarantee repeat custom once they have seen what we have to offer.

This is great news for us here in the office as both jobs just so happen to be on a Wednesday a fantastic day to get a job and both are in November, November can sometimes be a quiet Month for caterers after Bonfire Night because the weather can sometimes put people off having an event  and it doesn’t get busy again for caterers until we start the Christmas celebration parties in December.

We have also just collect two Hog Roasting machines this morning fromKent. Yesterday the very lucky chef Andrew managed to rent a spot along one of the busiest streets inKentso far this year, the chef had a great day of catering as the Paralympic cycling took place.

Around seven and a half thousand people gathered to watch the action, the chef that hired the two machines had an extremely busy day serving up scrumptious hot pork rolls with homemade stuffing he prepared earlier that morning along with some delicious apple sauce.

Although there was quite a bit of competition with many other choices of food available along the street with food vans parked on both sides of him selling hotdogs and burgers at very low prices his food seemed to go down incredibly well with comments on how fresh and tender the meat was he explain to us how he managed to sell every last piece of meat in his rolls by the time the event was over because of how well our machines cooked the pigs and he even had time to catch a glimpse of the last part of the races.

Machine hires are a great way to feed a large amount of people with one pig alone you can provide enough pork rolls to feed 130 hungry customers which will leave them all satisfied.

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Leading up to Party!

The summer sport is the topic on every persons lips at the moment and with all our heroes in play we are sure to be cheering them on throughout the occasion. Andy Murray into the Semi’s and ready to fight his way to the final itself.  And then we have the upcoming Olympic 2012 where the best of our British elite athletes with be competing with the worlds best, which will unite people from across the world in one massive celebration of sport.

Everybody loves a good time to lead up towards the events of the summer, and there is no exception this weekend where we will hosting an event in  Sandiacare, Nottingham for some lucrative characters. Our excellent professional chefs will be preparing  food that is mouth watering to look at never mind eat with accompanying vegetables and other sides.  After the main course of our delicious meat we will be serving a range of deserts with cream or ice-cream, which will be topped of the band that will be playing while the people will be laughing amongst each other with the glasses of wine flowing.

With the Hog Roast Caterer team to ensure that they will have a good time, nothing can go wrong. Plates will not be empty, bellies will not grumble, and nobody will have a smile that is upside down. So the upcoming weekend like all our weekends will not be one to forget, nor miss.

We really enjoy doing events for people so if you would like an amazing event for yourself,  friends and family to remember for life, then please feel free to browse the website or get in touch with us for a free quote and we will do the rest.