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Wedding venue catering restrictions?

Perfect wedding venue (inexpensive yacht club in perfect spot in RI) wants a licensed caterer to prepare the food- but my good friends want to cook and are not licensed. -Is there a way to get around this? - Is there a way to find a caterer to do part of the meal and have my friend's supplement the menu with their own dishes? (ones that dont need the kitchen) - Any other advice on getting around this dilemma? -Do most venues have this requirement? Thanks so much!

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Permalink Reply by Caren Jeanty on August 30, 2010 at 6:19am

Yes the majority of venues have this requirement - I would say 95% do; I don't know that a licensed caterer would allow someone who is not licensed to work with them. Can you friend obtain a license?

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Permalink Reply by Liquid Catering on January 13, 2011 at 8:19am

Hi Tess! As a professional caterer, I would recommend that you hire a licensed caterer for your reception. I'm sure your friends food would be fabulous, but I've had so many bad experiences with friends catering, that I recommend againist it. First of all, your friends will want to enjoy the party too, if they are catering, that's probably not going to happen. Secondly, catering is always MUCH harder than people expect, especially if your guest list is over 50 people. There is a lot of equipment you would have to rent, and you can never depend on anything in the catering kitchen working (ie, ice manchine, stove, etc). I would suggest you have your friends cook for the rehearsal dinner, that way they are still included but can have fun at the big party!