It has taken me almost 3 years to write this review - that's how long it took me to get over Harvest Catering messing up my wedding reception. OK, I'm not really over it.
I'll start with the good:
- I liked the menu options, the prices were reasonable and Donald was very professional and responsive. He had great ideas and seemed really excited about doing a cocktail-party style reception as opposed to a formal dinner.
- I also really enjoyed the tasting that Donald set up for my husband and I. Everything was delicious, but it's a lot easier to prepare food for 2 than for 100.
- Most of the food that was served was delicious - with the exception of the overcooked beef (not all of it was overcooked, but some was) and the sliced turkey breast. The turkey was a last minute add-on and we never tried it in advance. If we had, we would not have ordered it.
Now, for the bad (I got a head start above):
- Donald didn't show up and never told us that he would be sending someone else from his staff in his place. I understand that he had a bigger wedding that day so he opted to go there. But NOTHING that we discussed with Donald during our several meetings was passed on to the new woman. As a result, she made so many incorrect assumptions.
- Though we arranged for our cupcake vendor to set up the cupcakes, she would not let him. She didn't want anyone to eat them prior to the cake cutting ceremony. However, we were not having a cake cutting ceremony! Thus, the cupcake tree with fresh flowers on it sat empty until I begged her to please fill it.
- We ordered champagne to be served at the bar. However, she decided not to let the bar serve it because she wanted to save it for the champagne toast. However, we weren't having a champagne toast! They forgot to even order champagne glasses so on my wedding day I had to drink my champagne out of a wine glass (booo).
- We opted for "heavy hors d oeuvres" instead of a full meal and were assured by Donald there would be plenty of food. Turns out, the majority of our guests left hungry because they couldn't find most of the food since the staff spread it out it in different rooms, though we wanted it all to be presented together. The staff also stopped serving the passed hors d oeuvres within an hour of guest arrival though they were supposed to continue all night (until they ran out or no one seemed interested any longer). Guests left hungry while the caterer sent us home with an exorbitant amount of leftover food they never served - something is wrong with that picture.
- The goal was to have all the food out at the same time: appetizers, standing plates: passed dishes, desserts. People could eat what they wanted, when they wanted. There was supposed to be an endless supply of food with no designated "meal time". However, the caterer served in "courses" and took things away shortly after putting them out, making it look like we were serving small chintzy "courses" instead of the promise of "tons of food all night". Our food options looked cheap and embarrassing. We didn't opt out of the sit down meal to save $, we did it to have more of a party vibe than a dinner vibe. We spent as much as we would have for a sit down dinner - though it didn't look it.
- The staff knew they had to be ready for guest arrival by 5pm - but they weren't. They were outside preparing food in plain sight of everyone. One of my wedding guests is still convinced I had a "bbq wedding" because the staff set up a grill right out front. This was not the vibe we were going for. We wanted the food prep to be "behind the scenes".
- Since the staff wasn't ready for the guests upon arrival, the drink line was incredibly long as everyone arrived at the same time. I would have liked to see the caterers at least pass trays of wine & champagne to alleviate the line since we ordered plenty. I even asked Donald if we should have 2 bars but he assured us that for 100 guests, 1 bar was enough.
- Since the bar line was so long at first, the only people who managed to get any of the passed hors do oeuvres were people in line at the bar. The people sitting inside the main room never even had a shot because the staff barely entered that room.
- Once the woman in charge realized how royally she screwed up our plans she must have called Donald because he showed up late in the evening, to attempt to apologize. We just got married and we're throwing a party for 100 of our nearest & dearest and you want to talk about what happened now? Now is not the time!
I debated contacting Donald to complain when we returned from our honeymoon but I didn't really want it to put me in a foul mood. Despite the lack of food, our guests had a blast and danced the night away at our wedding. Plus, I married the love of my life and all was right with the world. Why bother rehashing things? Why not just wait close to 3 years and tell everyone how you really feel, via Yelp? read more
