TWO (2) DAYS TO GO!!!!

Did you get your gift shopping done?

THREE (3) DAYS TO GO!!!!

How are you feeling? Feet hurt?

Buy Catering From A Competitor

This is a very fun, educational, and eye-opening activity. The next time you need to provide catering for your staff, order the catering from one of your competitors. If you need food for a larger staff meeting, retreat, picnic, or holiday party, just figure out how to order your competitor’s catering without letting them know it is really you. This means you probably need to have the catering delivered to a different address than your own using a non-recognizable name.

Obviously, drop-off catering is simpler than full-serve catering. In either case, your team will think it very cool and informative to be able to taste and view their competitors catering in a real-world private situation. Bring your scales and cameras and have a fun time in your analysis.

A True Fish Story From A Great Caterer!

NOTE FROM MICHAEL ROMAN:

OK.... let''s start the week off with a FUN and TRUE story from my dear friend Cade Nagy of Catering By Design in Denver. You need to know that Cade is one of the funniest people I know. He has a charming boldness balanced by a genuine kindness for all things and people. Ingrid is his lovely and amazing wife who is his partner in their successful catering business. Those who already know Cade will get instant "joy" from his email and photo below. Everyone else should go out of their way to meet both Cade and Ingrid!

Here is the unedited email and photo I received from Cade:

Speaking of fishing. This is a true story. NO BS!!!!

Last week, I was on vacation with the sexy, Ingrid, (in a two piece mind you). Sitting on the beach in Destin Florida with its crystal clear, emerald green waters and snow white sandy beaches, minding my business checking out some local hotties down a few umbrellas, when, out of nowhere appears a fish swimming in circles 100 yards out to sea. It drew quite a crowd of walkers by wondering just what it was. So what do I do being the fisherman I am, I swim out to the beast to get a closer look. It appeared to have been hooked by a previous fisherman and was injured.

  So using my quick ninja skills, I grab him by the tail, and proceed to try and help him swim away by slowly rocking him forward and backward to get water moving in his gills. I then check his gills to see if they are clear from plastic bags and other debris. They were. After ten minutes of trying, I see that I’ve drawn a crowd of passers by on the beach. So I swim the little fella to shore. Pose for a few a photos. Answer some questions. Show of my buff tan. Then give him to some guy from Alabama who says he’d love to eat him. So I tell him I’m a chef, go to his room to clean it up for him and became his hero.

  It was a 38” 19lb Red Fish caught with my bare hands BABY!! I TAMED THE BEAST!!!!

Cade With His Fish!

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Have you checked out my new website?
Don't forget about my new sales clinics coming to
Atlanta, Chicago, Philadelphia, and San Francisco!
http://cateringguru.com/upcoming-education/

Interesting Photo?

I stopped by one of my favorite fast food locations in Chicago Mr. Beef to get an Italian Beef sandwich. The place is kind of famous since Jay Leno always talks about it on his late night program. It's a down-home kind of place. As you will notice in the photo below, the owners have no desire to give cups of water out for free. They do mean what they say. Of course, Lake Michigan is only about a mile away from their place!

We had to cancel our cruise on the EPIC...

Bernice got the Chicago flu on Thursday.

She is feeling much better today, but the

wisest decision was to postpone the trip.

By the way, I'm very happy to say that

I purchased travel cancellation 

insurance!!

I'm So Sorry... I just had to do this!

What can I say? After all the talk in the news media about the makers of Ding-Dongs and Twinkie going out of business I just had to take this photo. So many memories! For better or worse, I've done first-hand research on the entire product line of Hostess since pre-school days.

Roman's Thought On An Interesting Flight

OK. I’m a good flyer. I’ve flown commercial for over 1.6 million miles. That’s a lot of ups and downs. However, for the first time in my life (after flying for 40 plus years) I found myself on a short 30 minute flight from Seattle to Yakima Washington last week. This was my first “prop” flight ever. I had never flown anything but jets.

Silly as it sounds, I was a little nervous. Can’t tell you why? I had the same feeling when I was getting my first root canal. To make it even more interesting I was seated in row 8 which placed me exactly next to the propeller! This is the view from my window. The noise from the engine was loud and the floor was vibrating like a chair you put a dollar in for a massage!

Yakima is a “small” city or perhaps it should be referred to as a town. I found it to be a wonderful city with friendly and warm people. One quick story. After returning to my hotel after eating dinner at one of the city’s finer restaurants, I freaked out when I realized that my wallet was not to be found! As I started to retrace my “steps” the phone range. It was the restaurant telling me that they had found my wallet.

All they knew when they found my wallet on the floor under the table was my name. They knew I was visiting from Chicago, but they didn’t know what hotel I was using. So, they simply started calling all the hotels and simply asked “Is Mike Roman staying at your hotel?” Not to worry… there are only four major hotels in Yakima!

Two things are apparent. Honesty and hospitality thrive in Yakima. Thank goodness that it is a smaller town! 

NOTE: Just in case you doubt my air miles flown - remember it is on one's monthly milage report.


NOTE: If you didn’t receive this blog post directly to your computer via your email without needing to login to my blog site, then you should take a moment and register to get my posts automatically without going directly to the website. Simply input your email address in the field directly under my photo in the top right margin of my blog site.  You will receive an email to reconfirm and you are done.

Thanks Larry & Randee Estes

Bernice and I had a great dinner with Larry & Randee Estes of Max's Hospitality Group of Chicago last evening. It was fun, interesting, and an overall great evening! One of the coolest things about the evening was that they treated us to dinner. This is a very good thing.

New York City In A Bottle!

OK, I love NYC. Bernice and I have had amazing vacations in the "Big Apple" over the last thirty years. Again, we love it. But, $8.00 for a $1.50 bottle of water? Each time I come to NYC it just amazes me how they price things - and they (and I) pay it at will because it is NYC!


If you ever need a boost to get your confidence up to raise your prices in your catering, just make a visit here the day before you are going to make your decision on how much to raise your prices.We're having fun but I just wanted you to see the $8.00 bottle of water in our $400.00 per night hotel room. I wish you could have seen my $26 hamburger at lunch today. Bernice enjoyed her $7.50 cup of tea. We do love NYC and will be back soon!

Had Some R & R Over The Weekend!

Bernice and I spent some time in Michigan over the weekend visiting some family and friends.

When visiting our longtime friend Bill Reynolds and Mary Hess at their summer home we were greeted with a wonderful dinner in their beautiful garden. This is something that I usually shy away from, but it was simply delightful. Even the "bug" gods were on our side. When a dinner starts with a Shrimp Cocktail first course, you know you are in the correct place!

That's Bill on the left, Bernice in the middle and yours truly. The photo is being taken by Mary Hess who made an amazing dessert for the dinner! Food glorious food!

Ten Days On The Road!

I'm back in Chicago after giving my educational sessions in San Antonio (for IMCEA), Dallas (for ACF), and Reno (for NACE). Glad to be back home. I also made a quick consulting stop overnight in San Francisco!
The wonderful professionals I met at all three conferences were a delight. I had lengthly and spirited conversations with many attendees. What is always great is to see so many Catersource alumni attending these conferences. It should also be stated that NACE, ACF and IMCEA are all active business partners at the annual Las Vegas conference.
The only problem I had during my trip was the 4500 foot altitude in Reno along with a lot of flight delays because of weather. Flew Southwest all the way except for United from Reno to San Francisco. In my view, the staff on Southwest care a whole lot more than on other airlines!
For some reason I didn't get many photos of the trip - the one below of Jerry and Julie Edwards makes up for that, since any photo of them is equal to five other photos of anything. That's because Julie Edwards is in the photo along with Jerry! Here they are!

IMCEA's Annual Conference - San Antonio

This week I was a speaker at the annual IMCEA educational conference held in San Antonio. The International Military Community Executives Association (IMCEA) members are foodservice professionals that work for the U.S. Government in the five branches of our military – Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force and Coast Guard. In essence these fine people are part of one of the largest groups of caterers anywhere.

I enjoy speaking for the IMCEA simply because they work for our amazing men and women that protect our freedoms and make the ultimate sacrifice to our nation. My presentation was 90 minutes in length and was called “Enhancing Special Events”. If you would like a PDF of my presentation, simply email me at mikeroman@mac.com with a subject line IMCEA.

Kent Cummins, CMCE - Executive Director IMCEA

The Executive Director of IMCEA is Kent Cummins. CMCE who has become a solid friend of mine. Kent has owned restaurants, done catering, and was and still is a professional magician. Several months ago I mentioned to him that my first attempt at making money as an entrepreneur was my business (when I was twelve years old) called “Mike The Magic Kid”. Yes, silly now, but I was able to learn a few basic magic tricks to work as an entertainer for birthday parties, etc. I actually made some spending money! Also, I enjoyed being on stage.

CLICK ON PHOTO FOR LARGER IMAGE

So, when I arrived in San Antonio Kent presented me with a fun package – my own “Mike The Magic Kid” magician’s kit containing a bunch of magic tricks. You can see by the photo that Kent really went out of his way to have some fun with this project using Photoshop to place my head in a tuxedo and top hat! Great job Kent! It should also be mentioned that Kent has operated “Magic Camps” for children learning about the wonderful world of magic. Thanks Kent.

Note: The IMCEA is a business partner of Catersource and helps make our annual conference in Las Vegas a great success!

Dinner With Friends

The other evening Bernice and I had the pleasure of spending an evening with Amy Garrard, Director of Marketing for Tablecraft, and Elmer Martinez, owner of Gryphonmedia. We arrived at Prosecco restaurant in Chicago just before the city had a huge thunderstorm with hail.

Amy Garrard & Elmer Martinez

Amy & Elmer's companies both had booths at the Catersource 2011 Conference & Tradeshow. Tablecraft (tablecraft.com) has a creative line of tabletop equipment for caterers and Elmer's company does vehicle wraps and large graphics (gmedia.com).

Here are some photos of what we ate:

It was a great evening filled with story telling and a lot of laughter!

One Of My Favorite Chicago Restaurants - Coco Pazzo

Last night Bernice and I invited our Granddaughter Dori Davis out for dinner to celebrate her birthday week. She wanted Italian, so it was a simple choice - Coco Pazzo on Hubbard Street in downtown Chicago. Great food and service and easy parking - oh, yes - the bread is to die for. www.cocopazzochicago.com

Here are some shots of how the food looks -

And of course, this is what I really come for - the bread!

Dori and Bernice!

All and all a great evening. The server forgot to charge us for our desserts ($26), but when I mentioned that to him he waived the charges - my kind of restaurant. Of course he got an extra large tip!

Meryl & Andy Snow's "Private Life" Exposed!

 OK - did I get you? This is a look into the private life of two outstanding caterers - yes? These are uncensored photos - maybe? It is fun to see them.

The refrigerator below is located in the Snow's second home on the Jersey Shore in Sea Isle. They visit, except for longer vacations, between two to three days each month. The home, with four bedrooms, has housed groups of twenty-eight guests and is also used for company business retreats during the year. (more below)

According to Meryl "Andy (Meryl's husband) cooks dinner every weeknight and I do the dishes." Andy shops each day for their evening meal which they eat between 7 PM and 9 PM. A little gossip... "Andy makes a mess when he cooks at home because he knows I will be cleaning up" stated Meryl. The Snows enjoy eating at either their Philadelphia area home or Jersey Shore summer home but do go out to dinner, time permitting, on weekends.

What I found interesting in the photos is that some of the shelves have LABELS on them - once a caterer always a caterer! Notice the homemade blueberry jam!

NOTE: I thank Meryl for sending me the photos of her refrigerator and invite other readers to do the same. I will have a surprise for anyone who does. Send them to mikeroman@catersource or call me to discuss at 800-932-3632.

A Great Afternoon With Very Cool Caterers!

Yesterday afternoon I had the pleasure of spending a few hours with my friends from Finesse Catering in Chicago. I love to spend time with them because they know what type of company they wish to be and strive everyday to do some exceptional catering for happy clients in Chicago.

Finesse Cuisine's Tagline is:
YOUR VISION. OUR ARTISTRY, ONE EXPERIENCE.

The Finesse front of the house Team: Left to Right Jon Wool and Carole Wool (owners), Melanie Spratford (marketing coordinator), and Caroline Melia (operations assistant). Check out their website www.finessecuisine.com. These are the kind of caterers that you can always call (I mean you are readers) to talk catering. Their phone number is (312) 280-9999.

(Here is some copy from their website that I really like)

DIFFERENCE

What is the Finesse catered experience

For you, it means…
Custom creations blend form with function, substance with style – signature cocktails, synchronized wait staff, inspired décor…  
Expressions of gratitude from your guests – an outstretched hand, an appreciative smile, a heartfelt embrace – for a one of a kind experience…                                                                                                                                       A growing realization that your vision has been transformed into the extraordinary.

For your guests, it means… 
Farm fresh ingredients that zing with flavor… 
Enticing aromas with high notes of passion and base notes of brilliance…  
A crescendo of conversation, a smile of satisfaction, then a deep appreciation for a truly memorable catered experience.

50 Years of Marriage... a very good thing!

Last night, Bernice and I traveled 70 miles south of Chicago to Kankakee, IL to attend a banquet honoring 50 years of marriage for our friends Bob & Jackie Donald. The banquet was held at the Kankakee Country Club. The dinner was prepared and served professionally. It was a very fun and enjoyable evening.

Bob Donald, believe it or not, was my 6th grade school teacher! We have been friends ever since. When I graduated teacher's college, Bob helped me get an outstanding position with the Chicago Board Of Education. Over the years we've fished, sang and had many laughs together. Our friends Bob & Jackie Donald - congratulations on 50 years of marriage, two wonderful children and three grandchildren!

Here are some shots of the food served by the Kankakee Country Club:

Sun & Sailboats

Last evening at dinner Bernice and I were treated to our first mini-regatta of sail boats from the view out of our Chicago lakefront condo windows - the top photo (taken from our window) shows a sure sign of summer approaching. The bottom photo is of Diversey Harbor showing a fully loaded set of power boats ready to go!

Memorial Day has passed, so...

you can now wear white till Labor Day.

Sissy Sushi

I snapped this photo the last week when we went to our favorite sushi restaurant in Chicago ITTO SUSHI on north Halsted street. We've been going there at least three times a month for over twenty years. This is our sushi course before we take on the cooked menu items that would follow.

I just can't seem to get into the raw fish arena, but as you can see Bernice has also ordered one piece of Hamachi Yellow Tail. I, lovingly call what I order "sissy sushi" simply because what I order is fully cooked or vegetable in nature. Maybe someday I'll take the raw fish plunge?