Bride-to-be Blogger Leslie: Getting Ready for Our Tasting


This week has been a very crazy time in my Wedding World, because my fiance and I have been spending lots of time attempting to prepare a potential menu for our upcoming tastings!

Our wedding venue, Greystone Hall in West Chester, has three specific caterers to choose from for our reception. We have done our homework on each of the vendors and set up appointments with them to discuss our wedding in detail, and spend some time focusing on the food selection. The good news is that we get complimentary tastings with each of the caterers to help make our decision on what food choices are right for us. The bad news is that I have a hard time making a decision. I know I’ll have a hard time committing to a dinner selection for myself that is over 10 months away, so how am I going to plan a meal for 200 of my closest friends and family members?

A tasting is an amazing way to meet with your caterers, test out the food, get to know the company and how they handle wedding receptions. I am grateful that we have this option. I am just struggling with picking the food! Charles and I were given six pages from each caterer filled from top to bottom with food choices. There are classic, standard items, like shrimp cocktail, new seasonal items, like Vietnamese summer rolls, and even fun items, like Buffalo chicken crisps. Way too many choices, if you ask me!

Picking out your menu is just as hard to committing to the dress, or even the groom!

Deciding on the food for the wedding reception is a big commitment, because I believe it sets the tone for the evening. Personally, I am struggling with finding the right balance of the food selection. I don’t want there to be too much beef, chicken or seafood. I want there to be a healthy mix, but there are so many choices and we only get to pick a certain amount of food for the evening. It’s hard, when looking at the menu — I know that some of our favorite dishes might not be the most popular with my guests. We want to enjoy our wedding reception, but we want our guests to have an amazing experience as well, and I know from attending past weddings that food plays a big part in making or breaking your special night.

By informing our caterers about the overall feeling and experience we want at our wedding reception, they should be able to assist us in making food selections that will enhance the atmosphere of the evening. It can be a bit overwhelming staring at all the menus, praying you are making the right choices, but in the end I hope to sit back and enjoy our upcoming tastings with an open mind and leaving with a full belly!

Are you struggling with designing your menu? Or if you’re all settled, how did you decide what to serve? Did you forego anything you wanted because you thought something else would better please your guests?

For more information on my wedding planning and healthy living for brides, please check out my other blog, And Her Little Dog Too.

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