Becoming Martha Stewart

...minus the jail time and with waaaaay better outfits.  lol.  But yeah, I'd like to follow in the footsteps of the Great Martha Stewart.

Anyways, moving on, it was sooooo hard to get up today.  My body was protesting real bad.  Yuri and I are just completely drained and physically exhausted from yesterday's event.  We took the day off today.  Well, sort of.  We still have the usual queries to take care of, meetings to book, and proposals to send out.

Here's what a typical day for us is like when we do have an event.

Yuri woke me up at 4:15am.  I managed to wake up by 4:30am and then we had breakfast.

We got all our things and clothes read, meaning our laptops, paperwork, our meet-the-client outfits, and my my kitchen uniform.  We left by 5:15am.

By 5:45am we arrived at our supplier's shop picking up the flowers I needed for that day's centerpieces.

We got to our office by 6:00am and Yuri started working on his contracts and what not.  I gathered all my materials (foam, vases, shears, wire, etc.) for my flower arrangements and started working on them. 

I finish my table centerpieces at around 7:45am.  Yuri's done making our buffet diagram and equipment checklist for the waiters.

At 8:00am our assistant arrived to double check on the equipment list.

At 8:15am our waiters arrived and they started loading equipment into the van.  Yuri supervised them and briefed them on the flow and specifications for that day's function.

At 8:30am I changed into my kitchen outfit and took my place in the kitchen.  By that time everyone in the kitchen was in full-swing and done with all the prep work.  I took on the salad and the pasta dish.  It was a relatively small event so we only had 2 cooks that day, 1 kitchen assistant/dishwasher, my mom , and myself that day.  My mom's really the Executive Chef in the kitchen.  She's in charge of all things related to the kitchen including managing it.  I'm usually the Sous Chef since I oversee operations and do a little bit of everything.  We switch roles during food tasting events since my forte is in cooking a la minute and plating.  :)

By 8:45am the waiters have left already to go to the venue.  They usually leave much earlier than this but then yesterday's setup was really simple.

We finish cooking by 10:30am.  It always feels like a race when you get to the final hour of cooking.  Our adrenaline kicks in and hardly anyone talks in the kitchen except to shout out instructions.  I don't think people realize how much of a workout cooking for catering is.  You handle and prep huge amounts of ingredients and cook using bigger stock pots, woks, and pans.  Lifting all these heavy things is part of the job.  I should be all buff by now, but I eat like crazy after all the kitchen work is done so everything cancels out. Harhar.  We were supposed to finish at 10:00am but we ran a little late because of minor speed bumps.

Yuri got dressed and was ready to take the food to the venue by 10:45am.  He got to the venue by 11:00am.  Thank God the place was relatively near.  He checks the setup and checks in with the client.

He usually stays just until the event starts to make sure that there are no problems and that everything goes smoothly.

Anyways, after having checked the venue he came back to the office and kept in touch with our head waiter from there.

While Yuri was gone I met with our carpenter to discuss this new buffet table centerpiece I wanted him to make.  He is amazingly talented!  I'm really bad with measurements and with the functionality of my ideas.  All I care about is the aesthetic and impact of the design so it's wonderful that he understands me every time and that he's able to execute my vision and make it work in terms of practicality and stability. 

Yesterday was supposed to an easy event but things went awry and I wish I could discuss the details but the gist of it all was that the event was moved to dinner.  It was a major headache to say the least but as always we had to suck it up and make it work. 

We had to go back to the venue in the evening to re-check everything and talk with the client again.  After that we ran a few errands since I needed to buy some things to complete my buffet centerpiece concept for tomorrow.  After that, we coordinated with our waiters and assistant from home until the close of the event.
Surprisingly things ended really well.  The client was happy with our food and service.  Yay!  That's all I can really ask for.

So there you go.  Oh did I mention that I work with my husband?  Now I have.  Haha.  It's amazing that we don't drive each other insane.  It took a lot of fine-tuning and a whole lot of blown-up arguments to get to where we are now.


Our day started at 4am and ended at 12am.  Tomorrow we do it all over again.  Whew.

The crazy thing is that we enjoy every second of it.  Don't let our eye bags, ashen faces, and glazed eyes tell you any differently.