I am a kosher caterer. Ask me anything!

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Forum -> Household Management -> Kosher Kitchen

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Chana Miriam S

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 1:58 pm

I wasn't always a kosher caterer, in fact, I m not even a chef. I am a project manager at heart and this makes me able to manage catering events. I do weddings, bar mitzvah s etc. I also volunteer at my Shul to be the lead coordinating volunteer for our monthly united shabbat, which is a shabbat lunch, cooked by volunteers, for the community. We cook for 350 to 400 monthly, including with volunteers who don't know how to cook.

I am a good cook, mostly because I play with recipes until they are right, and constantly critique my results. I am familiar with working in a home kitchen as well as a Shul kitchen doing events up to 500 ppl. Ask away! If I don't know the answer, I will find out!

bigsis144

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 2:36 pm

do you taste food as you cook it? do you double-dip?? Wink

(I have such a hard time believing bakers/cooks don't taste food, especially since the germs will be killed during cooking...)

Chana Miriam S

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 2:48 pm

bigsis144 wrote:

do you taste food as you cook it? do you double-dip?? Wink

(I have such a hard time believing bakers/cooks don't taste food, especially since the germs will be killed during cooking...)

I do not double dip and I do taste before serving anything. Frequently use plastic cutlery, or coffee stirrers for tasting.I took a food safety course when I started this and while I am aware that heat kills most things, I feel like I should behave professionally.

In addition, handling food in large quantities is different than in small quantities and it is more likely that you will make people sick from errant bacteria. Whether you taste or not. Knowing how to mitigate these problems is part of what ppl pay me for.

sunny90

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 4:30 pm

I'm so interested in this! How are you able to make and estimate so many portions of food? Do you do everything yourself or do you hire help? Can you make huge quantities of food in a normal sized kitchen with a regular oven?

Raisin

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 4:36 pm

sunny90 wrote:

it will kill your oven. I am not a caterer but have a lot of guests and go through ovens like water. I am on the 3rd oven in about 7 years. (good, brand name ovens but not top of the line)

Chana Miriam S

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 4:38 pm

There has been a learning curve for sure...I always try to overestimate and occasionally when I do, it's possible to freeze stuff til another time. Most of the time you just take the entire menu into consideration and sort of go from there with some exceptions. For example, no matter how much sushi we make, it will be eaten. It defies logic and does not remotely depend on the rest of the menu.

I guess a lot f it is experience. Also it's way easier to estimate when yu are having plate service and there is way less waste.

Up to 100 ppl I can cook in my. Own kitchen. I have three fridge freezers and a standing freezer. If it needs to be under hashgacha, I use the Shul kitchen. Once I did a wedding in a barn in a conservation area and had to cook in the Shul and put together a kitchen after transferring everything to the barn. We used rental equipment that was under the Cor.

Chana Miriam S

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 4:39 pm

Raisin wrote:

sunny90 wrote:

it will kill your oven. I am not a caterer but have a lot of guests and go through ovens like water. I am on the 3rd oven in about 7 years. (good, brand name ovens but not top of the line)

So far the ovens I have are ok. One is seven and one is four. But since I use both, I guess it evens out the usage.

Chana Miriam S

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 4:40 pm

Also, I hire staff. Because the work is intermittent, I have a long list of people that I can call because they are not always available.

Dolly Welsh

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 5:18 pm

Chana Miriam, maybe you would consider including an Apprentice program so others could learn by helping you during your activities.

You could clone yourself.

You might ask to be paid a little for it.

You could get written up in Jewish publications and people would know about you that way.

You could have a website perhaps. Or give online classes. Or publish a book.

You might devote one lecture to the original root task of thinking like a Project Manager in the first place, your organizational methods.

I am sure you were making it all happen when it was time for lunch at Sinai, with the twelve tribes and everything. Kol HaKavod.

Chana Miriam S

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 6:17 pm

Dolly Welsh wrote:

I have a web site although its a bit messed up right now and I need my husband to fix it.
My catering is really a hobby. Mi live in a small community and cater only kosher food so I am very limited in my business prospects. As long as I don't lee money, my husband is happy.

Loved the comment about Sinai, thanks!

amother

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 6:23 pm

chanamiriam wrote:

My question: You got a well paying job as head chef for my husband Wink

PinkandYellow

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 6:42 pm

What kind of hours do you work?

Vanilla

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 10:34 pm

Wow...I'm sooo impressed. I really wish you would write a book. Could you give us a few tips offhand ?

September June

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 10:38 pm

It's obvious from your posts here that you have tremendous knowledge in the kashrus department.
Can you share how you learned these halachos? How do you feel kosher catering differs from Non-kosher catering? What do you do to keep up on the latest kashrus updates?

Dini20

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 10:54 pm

I actually sell desserts and I'm looking for some of the cool trays and stuff that party planners use. Do you know any websites that sell those?

Chana Miriam S

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 11:19 pm

amother wrote:

chanamiriam wrote:

My question: You got a well paying job as head chef for my husband Wink

Another, I only wish. It's a small town and the business is small.....

Chana Miriam S

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 11:24 pm

PinkandYellow wrote:

What kind of hours do you work?

It really depends on the week. There are some weeks that are fourteen hours a day for a week straight and some with almost no work. I do work either at home or across the street at the Shul so I am close to home either way. This week seems like its going to be super quiet, which is good because my water heater exploded last week and my house is in total disarray. Of course someone could drop dad and I could need to do funeral food but I never know when those will hit. One week that happened three times and I had surgery on my carpal tunnel too. That's just the way it rolls.

Chana Miriam S

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 11:25 pm

Vanilla wrote:

Wow...I'm sooo impressed. I really wish you would write a book. Could you give us a few tips offhand ?

Tips is a big field... Happy to answer questions though!

amother

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 11:38 pm

Someone posted about knowing how much food.
People learn in culinary school (or prob online too) an average of how much people ear, take chicken for example. If people eat 4 oz of chicken and your serving 200 ppl you don't have to estimate, just do the math. Caterers do this for all the food they serve.

I know bec I'm married to one

Chana Miriam S

Mon, Apr 22 2013, 11:39 pm

September June wrote:

Right years ago, we kept kosher but it to the level of an orthodox community. We started hanging out with frum people and got sucked into our Shul. Over time we decided to move close to our Shul and keep the community's standard of kashrut.

At first I called my rabbi 15 times a day. Then he asked he to Che k if answers to my questions were on kosher quest because he follows rav Eidlitz.

Over time,I became intensely interested, and started researching things on my own. I am connected to people in thecor a d can ask questions to more than one person. My rabbi Made me a mashgiach for our Shuls volunteer e nets and ow I am in the unique position of teaching a rav the practical aspects of kashrut under hashgacha. I worked under dAily hashgacha for a year.

I read a lot ( rabbi forst's book was super helpful.) I look up various things on different Hechsher websites.

I am not a specialist in Halacha however. I am e xperienced with practical issues in kashrut, and kashrut under hashgacha. Most importantly, I recognize when a question needs to be asked and how to frame it. I am good at catching anomalies that crop up In the Shuls kitchen as well.

Some of my knowledge comes from wanting to not have to be more machmir than I need to be so part of my learning process was what I didn't have to do or what didn't need a heksher as well. If you know what doesn't need one then you can use more things. I live in Canada and our market is much smaller so knowing what you can and can or do is very important.

I would love to do some more intense formal training in kashrut, and actually am hoping to set something up with one of the ravs at the Cor. I tried to get to the ou's course but hurricane Irene killed that.

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