Education

Out of the Box Salad Ideas

Have you taken lettuce and tomato as far as it can go? Maybe not. Reinvent the salad with these ideas and presentations. Hanging from a chandelier or focused in a picture frame, these new concepts will stimulate your appetite for fresh from the garden produce. 

It's Not Easy Being Yellow. New Menu Ideas Using Mustard

Not just for pretzels, hot dogs, and charcuterie anymore, chefs are using the vibrant flavors of small batch, crafted mustards to add flavor and zing to any dish or salad.  Artisan mustards and seeds are quickly becoming a hot trend for chef’s worldwide. Revisit and learn updated recipes and uses for violet mustard, as well as recipes and methods for incorporating this zesty condiment into your menus.

Food Should Be Fun

Don't forget, food should be fun! Enhance the client experience with more than just food. Create a comforting ambience that increases appetite, social interaction, and, ultimately, saves clients money. If you can create monetary value while creating a unique social experience, you already have the advantage. Join Jack as he discusses modern food and event trends, and how to create a truly unique social experience.

Premonition Deconstructed

Entertaining 3,000 fellow caterers is a daunting undertaking. It requires creativity, organization, inspiration, a phenomenal team, and lots of courage. The guests for the CSES2015 Monday Night Party, Premonition, were a tough crowd to impress, but Jeff and Jennifer Snow, and the team at Catering Creations, hit the ball out of the park. In this class, Jeff and David will talk about how they created some of the menu concepts, recipes, and, of course, offer you a taste of one of the most popular menu items.

Developing Your Social Media Brand

Chefs lead a busy life and who has time to “click” into social media when you are in the middle of production, plating the evening dinner, or placing orders for the next day? Learn how to use social media in a quick, efficient, and simple way that will allow you to develop an online persona, showcase your talented teams, and create buzz not only about your kitchen, but about your entire company.

Tiffany Taste On a Target Budget

Creative solutions are required when working with clients who need spectacular food and events but have limited budgets. This class will showcase several different vignettes that are cost-effective and easy to produce, but still put your company's best food forward. Get recipes, station ideas that don’t require an onsite chef, purchasing tips, and costing for each vignette.

Kitchen Practices. How to Rock Your Kitchen into a Well-oiled Machine

Inspiring your team and creating a “can do” kitchen culture is important, regardless of the size of your company. Speakers on this panel are from small, mid-size, and large companies and will share proven tips and systems for developing a highly functioning kitchen team. Learn team motivators, best kitchen practices, organizational tips, and training systems for food safety and sanitization. Then–just for fun–raise the friendly competition in your kitchen with a series of chef’s challenges.

The Aroma of Change. Fresh Ideas for Corporate Drop-off Catering

Update your salad trios and chicken salad sandwiches, learn new packaging concepts and recipe ideas for corporate drop-off catering, and how caterers are addressing customer demands for more healthy lunch options.

• Tour 1: Culinary Tour - Enjoy the hospitality of Salt Lake City caterers with samples of food, beverages, and behind-the-scenes secrets at each location.
• Tour 2: Cultural Walking Tour - Enjoy a guided walking tour through Salt Lake City’s cultural and culinary offerings with samples along the way.
• Tour 3: Taste of Utah - Unearth the flavors of Utah by enjoying some of the local offerings of the region

The Volume Catering. Planning, Staffing, and Quality Control Systems for High-volume Days

Catering by nature is often feast or famine. One week you aren't too busy and the next week you are so oversold that there are concerns that you will not get the food out to each event on time. Karen and Kyle, veteran excutive chefs, will present some insight on how to organize and staff your kitchens during peak days or weeks, and how to be sure the food quality for every event is exceptional.

Heat It Up. Culinary Game Show

Watch the competition develop as two teams of chefs compete by answering random “Jeopardy"-style questions to accumulate points. Categories include: The Ultimate Balancing Act (Sales & Culinary), You're Making Me Nuts (dietary restrictions and allergies), Clean Up Your Act (sanitation and food safety), Where’s the Beef (vegan & vegetarian), Play with Your Food (presentation), and Love You More than Cake (desserts).

Train, Train and Retrain. Learn New Culinary Training Systems

A well trained staff is the secret to an efficient kitchen that produces excellent food every day. It is even more important on those days that have pop-ups and challenges every five minutes. Learn key elements to training systems and how to make time to train even on the busiest day.

Can you have too many chefs in the kitchen? Not at Culinary Crafts, where five talented chefs are a key ingredient to the Culinary Crafts recipe for success. Get insight into how they work together to organize over 750 events each year, how they develop new and creative menus, and how they motivate staff to do their best everyday.

Make Your Chef the Star of the Party. 10 Ideas for Chef Action Station

Party guests love nothing more than to interact with the culinary team at an event. This is not only an opportunity to provide the guests freshly prepared choices, but also culinary entertainment. Learn about smoking stations, liquid nitrogen stations, interactive sauté stations, and other unique food displays.

Lunch+Learn: The Great Plate Up Race

Different strokes for different folks. Some chefs like to plate seated meals in the traditional "down the line" fashion, and some have adopted a stacked 4x4 system. Learn the basic elements of both systems and observe the chefs and their teams in action as they plate up a hot lunch.

Going for the Gold. The Winning Cuisine of Brazil

As the 2016 summer Olympic Games approach, ethnic food trends will include the churrascos, feijoadas, and caipirinhas from Brazil. Cuisine Unlimited will be the producer and food service provider for the first ever U.S. Welcome Pavilion at the Olympic Games. Get a head start on this upcoming ethnic trend with Brazilian recipes and menu concepts presented by these two exceptional chefs.

Liquid Kitchen. A Sip of Drinks On Trend

No longer designated to the back of the room, the bar has moved to center stage. Crafted beer and cocktails are an important element on any event menu. Learn the latest beverage trends and techniques, including crafting drinks with herbs, hot to make and use homemade bitters, modern jello shots, and more.

Brunch+Learn: Food Trend Round Robin

Passed, please! The 2015 Food Trend Round Robin is all about passed food and presentations. Each 30 minute session will present 5 recipes and 5 different presentations. Topics to include: Vegan/Gluten-free, Fish/Shellfish, Wild Game, Pork, and Desserts.

The Pitmaster Trilogy. Smoke it, Grill it, Put it On the Spit

The craft of cooking over the open fire is not just for camping and back yard fun. At Culinary Crafts, they have perfected the use of open fire stations at events. Grilled, smoked, or put on a spit, Ryan and Kaleb will showcase food stations concepts, recipes, and safety tips for scrumptious and interactive outdoor food stations.

Style Me Tasty and Beautiful

See what's happening on the culinary scene from coast to coast. Be inspired and get your creative juices flowing as this panel of talented chefs showcase their best and most popular food and presentation ideas.

Closing Cocktail Party

End these three days of exciting culinary features with a unique pub-style snacks and cocktail reception. Discuss your favorite features and make some last minute connections before heading back home to implement all that you’ve learned at AOCF2015.