Category: hog roast

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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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Busy Weekend

Our catering teams have had a very busy weekend at Chef and Griddle, we had two events booked in one for Saturday evening and another for early Sunday. The event on Saturday was for a Halloween party for a group of students at a university, they had our classic hog roast which consists of a whole spit roast pig, professionally presented crackling, freshly made stuffing, apple sauce and fresh floured rolls. The party was fantastic, there were a number of weird and wonderful costumes on show such as someone dressed as Psy from Gangnam Style fame. As is usually the case at university a lot more people turned up than originally intended and they were all interested in the hog roast. However we always bring more food than is required and there was enough to go around very comfortably.

After the party we cleaned all of the machines ready for the next day of catering they are all stainless steel so the cleaning did not take too long and we got an early night to prepare for our early morning.  The event on Sunday was a breakfast meal consisting of warm bacon barms for a group of paint ballers before they started the days activities. The barms went down a treat and they all seemed to look a lot livelier for that time of morning once they tried the food.

On the way back from the paint balling event our events manager received a call from a lovely woman who was a bit on the panicked side to say the least as she had been let down by another company for a hog roast that evening. We agreed to do their catering that evening as we had no other events we had to go to, luckily our butcher was able to provide us with a pig at short notice as that is not always the case. The event went fantastically, the woman and her husband were very thankful that we provided their hog roast at such short notice and they even wrote us a card to say thank you which came in the post today.

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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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Corporate Hog Roasts!!

 

The weather is starting to chill however at chef and griddle we are
busier than ever! October is looking to be a busy month with Halloween
and plenty of corporate parties. Speaking of corporate parties we
catered for a large party of 650 hungry staff in Hertfordshire at
the weekend. They opted for our gourmet menu 3 which includes a
fantastic flame roasted pig, professionally presented crackling as well
as three salads. The crackling lifted from the pig perfectly (as it
always does with our chefs preparing it) and went down a storm. There
is nothing better than hog roast with stuffing and apple sauce served
onto a bread roll and then with a bit of crispy crackling to finish it
off.

 
This event was held so the organisation could plan their strategies leading up to
the Christmas period as well as a training day, everybody enjoyed
milling around while they ate discussing strategy and training
techniques. This gourmet buffet style of catering is perfect for
corporate events such as this due to the more open and friendly style
of service instead of a more formal sit down meal where discussions
among large numbers of people is made more difficult.

We brought along a small gazebo to cover the cooking and serving area
in case of rain as we always do when catering outside, as you can never
quite tell what the British weather is going to do.

Our Chef and Griddle Chefs were kitted out in our crisp chef whites,
smiling and ready to serve the hungry customers, the crackling was cut
up and professionally presented on a platter. The pig was jointed,
sliced and then served with the front side of the pig left on for
decoration as long as possible, the head was left on as the client
requested, adding to the theatrical aspect of a hog roast. The salads
were all freshly prepared on site and served to the customers with a
chef serving each type of salad. All of the food was served onto high quality disposable crockery to fit the laid back style of catering meaning that when the event was done it was very quick and easy to clean up.

We had a large number of enquiries regarding Halloween events at the weekend whilst we were out catering . A hog roast is perfect for Halloween from a visual perspective and would look excellent among the pumpkins and other Halloween decorations.

At Chef and Griddle we pride ourselves on the fact that all of hog roasters are fully trained chefs meaning that if there is anything at all you would like us to make to accompany your hog roast we can prepare it freshly on site from canapes  to desserts.

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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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Olympic Treat

The first week of the Olympics has kicked off to a great start, from London to Suffolk and even to Gloucestershire we have catered non stop this week for many of your Olympic celebratory parties and although the weather has been unable to make up its mind over the last few days everyone has been more that happy to go ahead with their parties and celebrate in style with some delightful spit roasted meat.

Here at Hog Roast Caterer we use only the finest produce on the market at our events and being able to offer our Customers fresh, free range meat is something we take extreme pride in as this enhances the hog roasting experience because you know that the food can not really get any tastier than what you are serving your guests.

If you are thinking about catering your event with a Hog Roast we can assure you that you will be more than satisfied with the end result and the feedback from your guests will also leave you with a big smile on your face.

Although we need to arrive at your event 6 hours before your serving time do not be put off by this as this is only because we make all of our salads, starters and side dished from scratch so we prepare and create our lovely side dishes whilst the pig is cooking away to a mouth watering perfection.

Once we have satisfied everyone’s stomachs we always clear away any mess we make whether it is a formal sit down meal or an informal snack you will have no food or mess to clear away after we have gone as we take all of that with us too so your catering with us will be trouble free.