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Moscow Guide
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Quarterly seasonal full color guide on cultural and VIP events, including restaurant guide. Contains information about dining, fashion, social and cultural events. |
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| Moscow Guide 2007-09-15 01:19:44 |
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Catering Cornucopia
07.06.2007 By Michelle Bernstein
Here’s the situation: you’re having a dozen or so friends over for a dinner party at your dacha. The summer days are long, the weather’s perfect, and everyone is looking forward to a sumptuous meal in the fresh air. There are, however, a few small problems. You don’t have any food, refuse to cook, and won’t settle for takeout. To complicate things even further, let’s say that you don’t even own a single piece of crockery or silverware.
What to do? Well, option one would be grab a bunch of kebabs from your local butcher and roast them over a campfire. Not the worst thing in the world, but not the essence of luxury either. The second option, however, is one that’s becoming more of a reality in Moscow every year – turn things over to an elite catering company and let them run the show.
Whether you’re planning an intimate dinner at home or a massive corporate bash, there’s a catering company out there offering just what you need. Although prices will vary from company to company, you can probably expect to pay anywhere from 1,000-3,000 rubles per person (excluding alcohol) for a standard event. The operative word here is standard, for the extras provided by Moscow’s catering companies are many, and they don’t come cheap. Decor (candles, flowers, ice sculptures of yourself, etc.), high-end items like black caviar or truffles, musicians, fire dancers and other entertainers, master classes given by the chef, funny outfits worn by the waiters and much more are all available, but will likely send the cost of your event spiraling into the stratosphere. Keep in mind that in many cases, the prices for “extras” are not fixed, but negotiable with the company’s management.
Riverboats, French Cuisine and Guess Who....
 For around $250 per person, Megapolis Catering can arrange a party on a riverboat, complete with decorations, entertainment, the cuisine of your choice, and of course, a seaworthy vessel for the festivities to take place upon. Megapolis also provides the services of stunt people, as well as laser show technicians, hot air balloon pilots, glass-flipping barmen and menacing security guards to keep your shindig free of shady characters. They do small events as well as large – for 13,000 rubles, you can have a chef and waiter arrive at your home to serve a romantic dinner for two. Dirty dishes will be picked up the next day.
Regarded by many as the capital’s top French chef, Eric Le Provos is the former part owner and head chef of Carre Blanc and the lead man in the kitchen at ultra-posh French eatery The Most (see review on page 14). He also runs a catering service that many say is the best-kept secret in Moscow – Cuisine 31. While the company can accommodate events of any size, the real beauty here is the delivery service it provides for smaller occasions like domestic dinners and business lunches. Customers can place their orders by phone or online (a menu is provided on the company’s website) and pick it up within several hours, or have it delivered. The dishes offered run the gamut from canapés like duck foie gras served with orange marmalade to a tremendous selection of cakes, mousses and soufflés, with plenty of elegant meat and fish dishes in between.
Those pining for Kavkasskaya Plenitsa’s khachapuri or the tiramisu at Galereya can give Novikov Catering a call. The big advantage of this catering service, run by Moscow’s restaurant overlord Arkady Novikov, is there’s a good chance you will be familiar with the food: here you can find most of the items available on the menus of Novikov’s over two dozen restaurants, from the wild game of Tsarskaya Okhota to Peperoni’s Italian elegance to Azerbaijani cuisine from Barashka, and so on. Choose your favorite cuisine, or mix and match (what would khachapuri taste like alongside sushi anyway?) You even have the option of transporting the chef of your favorite restaurant to the location of your event and having him prepare the food on-site. Size is no problem either – the company boasts it can handle groups of up to 3,000 people.
Taste Tests, Barbeques and an Old Standby
 Uley Catering wants to make sure its potential customers look before they leap. Potential clients are invited to come by, talk to the chef and give all the items on the catering menu a free taste test. The head chef here, by the way, is Frenchman Michelle Loga, who was formerly employed at the Michelin-rated Le Jardin and Chiberta restaurants in Paris and is famous for being steeped in the spice lore of the Middle East, having spent a great deal of time in Morocco. Uley offers the entire range of catering services, from small private parties to corporate events where the waiters walk around with your company’s logo sewn onto their shirts. Expect to pay $50 per person, with a 30-40-person minimum.
And what about that perennial crowd pleaser, the summer barbeque? There’s a catering company specializing in just that – Mr. Catering. At a cost of about 1,400 rubles per person (with a 50-person minimum), Mr. Catering can arrange a barbeque complete with silverware and dishes, waiters, and of course, plenty of meat and other goodies for the grill. A typical barbeque menu includes marinated pickles and mushrooms, Caucasian-style dishes like smoked eggplant and lobio, several types of salads, and various forms of beef, pork, and chicken, as well as salmon steaks and Uzbek-style rice. Barbeques aren’t the only service Mr. Catering provides, of course; they can do up a wedding, corporate party or New Year’s bash with the best of them, and even have a delivery service for office lunches and coffee breaks.
Finally, there’s Jack’s, a Moscow standby since 1992. Here you’ll find a Latin American menu featuring empanadas, burritos, quesadillas and the like, another menu with Mediterranean specialties such as crayfish gratin and meatballs marinara, a Russian menu and a Tyrolian menu, where the food has a distinct Teutonic influence. They organize picnics for large groups as well as romantic outdoor dinners for two complete with an Arabian-style tent.
Uley Catering
795-7575, 981-7060. www.caterer.ru
Megapolis Catering
915-4060. www.megacatering.com
Novikov Catering
226-5605. www.novikovgroup.ru
Cuisine 31
540-3851. www.cuisine31.ru
Mr. Catering
710-0705/0715. www.mrcatering.ru
Jack’s Catering
956-9598. www.jackscatering.ru
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| Author: |
Michelle Bernstein |
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