How to Cater for 100 Guests

Let’s talk about catering now. This is a host of another color. What we have here is some
delicious looking roasted chicken bones and over there is the pot that these roasted
chicken bones are going to be boiled in. So, we have a nice tasting stock to make a sauce
for our sautéed chicken francese today. And there we have another pot of some tomato
basil sauce and onions being sautéed with a little garlic and olive oil which we’ll use to
add to the tomato basil.

Now, we have mirepoix here; onions, celery, pepper, little bay leaf, olive oil. We’re
sautéing it first. We’re going to make a nice pot of like—with chicken stock. Then we’ll
put it in the oven and let it tick very slow, it will never burn.

As you’ll see, there’s a 10-pound bag of rice to that and we’re going to take some of
these -- see those bones with that chicken stock? I strained some in here. We’re going to
have the chicken stock, which we’ll add to the rice. A pot of water that’s heated is about
three quarters of an inch over the rice, cooking real slowly in the oven which should be
just enough where it comes out nice and fluffy.

Of course we have to season this. Very important, we’ll add some salt. I use kosher salt
then we’ll put some pepper in there also. We’ll add some nice black pepper there. There
we go. It’s very important to season this. How often you’ve eaten in a place where the
rice is bland? To me, it’s distressing, a professional guy making tasteless rice. So, what
you do is after you mix this, you taste it. That has nice season in there, from the chicken,
stock, salt and pepper and the onions and the garlic; that’s going to be delicious later.

In the saffron rice, I’m adding a little yellow color to this. If you have the appearance of
saffron rice, these would be the rice that the employers would be eating. Okay now, we’re
just about ready to put the rice in the oven. We’d cover it off and we’ll check it in about
20 minutes.

Here we have a quick way of doing some breading. Avoiding one step, instead of going
flour, eggs and breadcrumb, we make a batter. See the consistency of that? And it’s
seasoned. All the seasoning is in the batter here. We’re making little chicken tidbits.
Quite a few like 800 pieces. That’s enough batter to coat the chicken and then we go into
the breadcrumbs with it. We put salt, pepper, onion powder and garlic powder in here and
you taste the batter. If it tastes a little salty, that’s perfect.

See how simple and fast this is? You just cook the chicken with the batter. Put it in the
breadcrumbs, take it around a little and you put it on another pan and you’re ready to fry.
Look how you avoid another step; very easy, very simple. Now, you just put of chicken
in the breadcrumb, mix it up. Put it on the pan and let it sit for about 20 minutes. The
pieces of chicken dry up a little, easier to handle, you don’t lose any breadcrumb and then
we’ll deep fry it.

If you don’t have a regular normal deep fryer like other restaurants and catering facilities
have, we make our own here today. We use a square pot and fill it up with five gallons of
oil and we’re going to do some frying in there.

We have some fresh green beans boiling in salted water to give you that lovely flavor
later on. We don’t serve bland food in this establishment. And then as soon as it’s al
dente, we go over here and place them in this running cold water. It keeps the color to
cool it off, very simple.

Now, let’s check the rice. I put a little more salt and pepper on it as I taste it. Look how
fluffy that rice is and do you notice? None of it is stuck in the side of the pan. I’ve seen
many cook make this type of rice. When you scrape the bottom, it’s all burnt. Look at
that. It’s beautiful, fluffy and nice. We’ll just wrap it up in aluminum foil and leave it in a
warm place until I get to feed the employees later. That’s how you make rice. Now, this
goes to all you professional spoofs.

Since we’re making a bordelaise sauce tonight from this stock, I’m going to add the red
wine directly into the stock. The alcohol will cook out. This way I don’t have to make a
separate reduction.

Now, we have to make chicken francese for the guest. As you can see, these are chicken
breasts with the bone, French cut and we flour them, dust them lightly in flour.
Yesterday, I toasted in flour. They were first seasoned with salt and pepper. Dust it in
flour and then place into the egg wash with parsley and then later, we will sauté these
pieces in olive oil.

We have the deep fryer going and what we’re cooking now are canned potatoes. I know
you say “Canned. Where’s the fried?” Well, at times we do use these but look at the
finished potato. They got beautiful and later on, we’re going to season that with little salt
and pepper and finely minced rosemary. Delicious! Sometimes you can’t even tell it’s a
canned potato even though I love fried.

We’re going to roast up some chicken legs. These chicken legs go with the rice and this is
for our employee, the waiters and all the kitchen staff. If you want them to work, you got
to feed them. We’ll put a little salt and pepper and then we’re putting a little bit garlic
powder and after this, they’re going to be mixed up. Place it on a sheet pan, load in the oil
on it because there’s plenty of fat from the chicken. And then we’re just going to roast
that at a high flame to get some nice color. You can also grill it first, sauté it first. These
will go straight in the oven at about 450° oven. As soon as it’s golden brown, I’d reduce
it down for about 250 to finish cooking.

Here’s the chicken on the sheet pan and now, we’ll be placing it into the oven then later
on, the staff will be very curious with this lovely meal.

The chicken, notice, they’re not together, they’re spaced out allowing the heat to go
around the pan to get it more evenly cooked. The same thing in your home oven, don’t
put things too close together, especially if it’s a convection oven.

Look at how beautiful this is, the chicken francese. We brown the piece on one side. You
turn it over and cook it a little bit. And look at that. This is what you’ll need in every
home, a nice thing like this. Too bad you don’t have it. I don’t have one either but this is
the way to cook. Beautiful and then you finish it in the oven later. You don’t cook it all
the way here. What a fantastic item.

And there we are, the finished chicken and the rice for the employees of the company.
Look how happy they are. Look at them smiling. Are you smiling? Are you smiling? Is
everybody smiling? They’re so happy to eat this food. Look at that beautiful rice,
beautiful chicken.

Now, we’re putting in some penne pasta, penne pasta with tomato basil sauce. We cook
this al dente and we put it into this pot. Now, make sure you have enough sauce. The
worst thing is, especially if you know when you order something, the catering when you
get it, there’s no sauce left; it’s all dried up. That’s because they don’t understand. You
have to have enough sauce in the pasta to keep it nice and moist. And that goes for you
chef spoof. Now, make sure the pasta water is seasoned with a little salt. Thank you very
much.