COOK - Progress

April 2013

Things are moving along nicely, want to hear some "CRAZY" details.......

How much staff do we need for an event this size?  A TON!!!  We have to have so much staff on this event that most caterers would be freaking if they just had an event for this many..... 498 (superveriser, clearer, servers, bartenders, trash removel, runners, kitchen, and utility).  Thats 11 busses full of people just to work.  Image the job it is going to be just to manage 498 people let alone trying to serve close to 9000 people at the same time.

Yes Rach, that is right.  Glad to see that I am not the only one with my jaw to the ground right now.

Getting quotes for products: how much bottled water?  Over 20,000 bottles.  That 833 cases. Stack them side by side 5 high and have a wall that is 240 feet long.

Here is my favorite:  We were trying to decide on the what size plate to put the desserts on.  The plan is to unpack them at the shop, put the chocolate midalian on them and put them on sheet pans to load on the truck.  Well we might as well plate them at that time so that we are only handeling them once and not have to plate them up in the August heat.  So the day of the event we roll them off the refer truck and set them out....easy peasy.  So again, what size plate.... well after doing the math we determinded that if we used a 6" plate we would need 52 speed racks, but if we just take the plate size down one inch and use a 5" spuare plate it would only be 32 speed racks.... we would need 20 less speed racks.  Not only does it cost $100 a rack to rent but 20 less speed rack means 1 less truck.  All because we decided to go 1" smaller on a plate.  "CRAZY!"

Road Trip

April 29th -

Its time to take another trip to the lovely town of Bloomington In.  Look how good we all look in out Thomasware.  

The purpose of todays trip is to meet with IU's Board of Health to review the plan.  I called this meeting (yes, I just said I called a meeting the the board of health) so that I could review our plan with a man named Grahm.  I figured it was a lot eaiser to get him involved in the planning stages then to have the board of health show up of the day of the event and demand things that we were not prepared for and shut us down.  I have always been a "kiss ass".....I like making friends because friends are always on you side.

Rach, Keith, Vince and myself were supposed to meet at the end of last week to work on this event but we got so busy with the every day event schedule we had to postpone that meeting.  I agreed to postpone it with the expectation of spending the 3 hours on the road talking ("meeting") about this event.  I told them that we had an agenda that we have to get throught and on the way back Vince will just drive us around and around 465 untill we are 100% done with our meeting.  

We began our mobile meeting reviewing what we were gong to discuss with Grahm the Board of Health man.  We discussed the "food" plan and the kitchen layout and reviewed IU's 15 page health and safty rules.

A quick stop for breakfast at our tradtional Martinsville Starbuck's and we were on the road again.

Our meeting with Gram the Board of Health man went very well.  He was not expecting a group of us and between the 4 of us and the 3 of them we were squished in this tiny room around a table that was to large for the room.  I crawled over 3 chairs to get to my seat and Vince followed.  Of course after everyone sat down and we were waiting of the rest of the IU particapants Vince had to use the restroom, so Rach and Keith had to get up to let him out (it was kind of like sitting in a booth, but not). Needless to say Vince just sat on the end when he returned.  It was ovious that we were at the Board of Health meeting and not at the Fire and Public Safty meeting. 

We blew them away with our readyness, our plan and our package of paperwork.  They sat across the table with a slight look of surprise in there eyes.  The girls said "WOW, IU has never seen anything like this befor"  to which I reply "Well neither have we".  They talked about taking picutres and using them in training videos. I said "That would be great! I sure hope they turn out to be pictures of what to do and not pictures of what not to do".  The only thing they asked us to do was to add a couple of hand washing stations inside the bar areas, which is the one thing I didn't think of (a little weird but understandable).  We walked out of there with a list of items to remember (test strips, anitbacterial soap, etc) and the respect of Grahm the Board of Health man.

A quick stop by the field house to show Rach and Keith the event space.  Whden we first enterd the space Keith said "It's not as big as I thought it would be".  Vince replied "It's a football field in a building!  How big did you want it to be?".  After we looked, walked and measured we were back on the road and back to our meeting.  The "drive home meeting" focused on equipment and reviewing the list of rentals.  I am happy to report that we did not have to drive around 465 any more then needed and we were back at the office before the close of the day.

COOK - The Truth about Trash

March 2013 - We go to Las Vegas every year to the Catersource conference and this year I took advantage of a few friends.  I started to talk about the Cook Event to some of the best caterers in the country. Caterers who have done events like this one and could shoot holes in the plan that I was forming.

I stood in the hall and told Jeff Ware from Catering By Michael's in Chicago the "plan".  After I was done  he shook his head at me and said "sounds good but I am a little concerned bout the trash.  We have a formula written out for trash, when I get back to the office let me email you that formula"  OK, Great!!  I said but I thought I had this thing laid out really well.  What is wrong with my trash plan? When we did our big event in West Baden We had one dumpster for almost 2000 guest, surely 4 dumpsters for 9000 will work.

Later that week after returning from Vegas I get this email:

Breakfast & Lunch served on disposables = 0.075yds per person

Snacks/Beverage Service on disposables = 0.03yds per person

Dinner served on disposables = 0.08yds per person

Dinner (multiple stations) served on disposables = 0.082yds per person

Dinner served on china = 0.0375yds per person

Based on our experience you would need around 720 yards. That is 24 of the big roll off dumpsters (30yds each). I think asking your vendor to bring a garbage truck will be the best option. In Chicago, Waste Management also has portable compactors they can bring to events and that significantly reduces the yardage needed as they compact it onsite.

LMAO 24 DUMPSTERS!!! I guess I was a little off!!!

Nothing I could do but laugh.  Thank God for friends!!

A few days later I called the local trash removal company and he tried to convince me that I only needed one dumpster...........AH NO???  He wasn't getting it so I said "I tell you what, let me send you a list of all the disposable items we will have on site that evening.  You take this to yours operation meeting on Monday morning and get back to me"  This is what I sent him:

Trash Estimate
30,912	Bottles of beer
1,026	1.75 Lt bottles
6,624	Wine Bottles
15,962	Soda Cans
25,056	Bottles of water
1,026	Bottles of Vodka Drink
20,000	Cocktail Napkins
3,000	coffee cups
25,000	9oz plastic cups
12,060	9" plates
1,000	dessert forks
10,000	6" plates
25,000	12 oz plastic cups
10,200	Dinner Napkins
10,200	forks
10,200	spoons
10,200	knives
12,000	sugar packets
3,000	cream packets
232,466	Pieces of trash

The next Monday afternoon I got a phone call from Ron Howard (yes I said Ron Howard) from Hoosier Trash. "Um I think we are going to have to come up with a better plan, can we met?"

My response "You Think?"

COOK - So Buffet... No, I mean: "Station" it is

Feb 2013 - After weighing all our options for this event it is unnanamous, buffets are the way to go.  But because of a bad experience our client had over 15 years ago we are not allowed to call it a buffet so we call it Food Stations :-)

The biggested fear for ALL of us, clients and myself, is running out of food.  I can't promise we will not run out of something but I can promise we will do our very very best not to.  So we have agreed to put into play all the industry "tricks" that we have in our back pocket.  

The first is to use a slightly smaller plate. This will help cut down on the guest piling to food on to high and waisting uneaten food.  They are more then welcomed to come back for seconds.

Secondly the order we place the food in on the buffet.  We are only giving the guest the one plate to fit 7 items on.  It is common to see people put more quanities of the first items on their plates but as their plate fills up the quanities get smaller because they are running out of room.  It is an industry secret to always put the meat at the end and the least expensive stuff at the begining.  A lot of time, rolls go at the end because it is easy to just place your piece of bread on top but not this time.  Again because the clients greast fear is running out of food (which should also be any caterers greatest fear) we have decided this will be the order of the buffett: Pasta salad (we went with pasta salad because it is easier to handle off-premis in a parking lot in August then a leafy salad would be), rolls and butter (hoping that it will take up a little space on the plate so that guest will not put more food on there plate then needed, green beans, red skin pototoes, carrot souffle (we have decided to do a blue scoop instead of a green scoop - with less room on the plate we think we can get away with a slightly smaller serving. A blue scoop is 1 ounce less then a green scoop which for this event means 9,200 ounces less ounce of carrot souffle - that is 68 less pans we will have to produce), chicken, beef short ribs.

Severs - we are to put a person behind each of the hot items to serve the guest.  Controlling the portion everyone puts on there plates.  We know that the plan is for everyone to take one chicken breast, but the 9200 guest being served that evening don't know that.  It bothers me a little that such a mile stone event for such a great company will have buffets, NO I mean food stations, that resemble a cafeteria lunch room style service, but there is no way around it.  I wish there was a theme to the event. Then at least we could dress then up with a purpose but there isn't......  so the best I can do is black aprons with the COOK 50th Logo on the front and black floppy chef hats.

Station Design - Working with Dodds to come up with a Station design was fun.  The goals were to get people through as fast as possible, get as much out on the station as possible, double sided but served.  We now call our stations the bullets and there are 12 of them around the room.  12 Double sided equals 24 lines.  So that is 383 guest through a line.  Over 3 hours. Thats 127 an hour, 31 every 15 minutes, 2 a minute.  Thats not to bad........right?

COOK - Clients and Cocktail Sampling

 Jan 2013 - Time to present a plan....  The goal: to present the facts so that the clients will see the magnitude and complexity of this event from our eyes (those would be the eyes that are looking straight ahead and focused and not the ones blurred and dizzy with details and fear).  In doing so we hope that decisions (service style, menu, cocktail, etc) can be made with logistics at the forefront of our minds. As much as it scares all of us we think a buffet is the best option but how do we explain that to a client who swore 15 years ago that they would never do a buffet again.  So we begin:

Facts/Challenges: 9200 guest in 3 hours, 7:30 -10:30; Program starts at 6:30, doors open at 5:30; most guest will not have eaten before leave their homes; Guest will be hungry; Can't seat everyone; This group is full of good eaters - meat and potatoes crowd; clients are scared to death to run out of food - how do we control quantities and make it hardy; very limited event space - fire code is 6000; Back of house is very limited - tent in parking lot, no water access, and all of our access is out of one corner and only from one side; this crowd is al so full of big drinkers........

Right now we are looking at 4 semi's of bar supplies and 3 semi's of food with at least 350 people on staff......

Now that I have everyone's attention...... Let's pause and sample a couple speciality drinks :-)  

4 vodka drinks, 4 rum drinks.... a sleeve of plastic cups..... Do we want to go with color?  Red is the company's color but the red ones are not as good. Sampling... no, no, yuk, no, maybe, this ones good, its not red, but its good, its strong, let's add Sprite....oh thats good, but its yellow.. no it gold...gold is the color for 50th anniversaries....GOLD!!  Perfect!!  Name - Cook Gold!! The winner is Smirnoff's Savannah Tea...

So with 8 half full glasses of sample cocktail still in front of each of us we continue conversations.  Serious decision still need to be made,  (remember, the client thinks that buffet is a cuss word, when I first got the phone call they mentioned stations and finger food, we all knew that a served meal is not an option) I proceed with my presentation....

Facts/Challenges: 

Buffet: Negatives = portion control and lines; Posivites: less kitchen staff, less prep space need, we can hot box and hold this type of food best; Thoughts: We can have people dishing out food to control portions.

Stations "finger foods": Negatives = guest will need to stand in more then one line, in a venue this size with this many people finding stations will be like an Easter egg hunt. More staff will be needed FOH & BOH.  More kitchen space will be needed to produce a larger variety of food. More food will be needed because peoples eyes are bigger then there stomaches and with little foods they will pile it on.  Portion control is really harder with finger foods, if a guest is hungery (which they will be) they will eat 12oz of food no matter if it is served as a buffet or stations. Positives = It's not a "buffet".

Ok, so those are the facts.  I glance over to the client and all 8 glasses of specitality drink samples are empty........ And the conversation goes something like this: Client "Ok, good points, cant we just have all the food at one station, with people serving it, hardy food / not finger foods, lots of food station but each of them have the exact same thing on them, the entire meal at one station so they don't have to stand in more then one line", Me "sooooo a buffet?", Client "well yes, but don't call it that", Me "Ookie Dookie"

Lesson of the day:  When whating a client to see things your way bring along sample cocktails!!