I have been a restaurant chef for 11 years. I worked for a catering company that was finishing cooking with sternos in enclosed rolling racks. I never actually did it myself and now have a side catering business with some parties that I would need to do this. Anyone who can give me the rundown with this? How well it works? What products this is good/bad for? Any advice and details would be greatly appreciated!
It would scare the Hell out of me to have to control something I had no control of. I always had my food cooked or I cooked what couldn't be precooked on site. What foods are you trying to finish ?..........Welcome to Cheftalk........Chef Bill
Sterno is poison. The fumes it produces in an enclosed container(like a heating trolley or coveted rack) is nasty. The off-flavours it givesvto foods is nasty.
Use it for keeping the chafers warm and use real cooking equipment to cook.
Ot.o.h., I've used cheapo propane bbq's to do everything fron sauteing to roasting to baking. The cheapo butune hot plates work well in emergencies too.
well i agree, the fumes from sternos and the food itself,never
the twain shall meet. its intended as an external heat source.
and i prefer the tiki-torch, wick type, to the napalm type.
I swear by those butane portable burners, i never do
a gig without at least 2 in a crate at arms reach.
And theyre so clean burning you can use them indoors.
I know many a good cooks that cater and wonder why. The thing they miss is logistics and attention to detail. This is want made me good at catering. I paid attention to details, I wanted to know if it could go wrong how can I prevent it. I did my homework on every catering. I never had a bad catering or a client that didn't call me back for more catering. I remember many years ago a catering Manager I worked with in Hawaii ask if he could call me on the big catering to make sure he covered all the bases. I never like to learn by my mistakes. As caterers we have one shot to do it right...........
I know many a good cooks that cater and wonder why. The thing they miss is logistics and attention to detail. This is want made me good at catering. I paid attention to details, I wanted to know if it could go wrong how can I prevent it. I did my homework on every catering. I never had a bad catering or a client that didn't call me back for more catering. I remember many years ago a catering Manager I worked with in Hawaii ask if he could call me on the big catering to make sure he covered all the bases. I never like to learn by my mistakes. As caterers we have one shot to do it right...........
I was working for the largest caterer in Hawaii. We had a few catering going on and I had to work the Sunset cruise dinner because they had some problems with a few employees. I had to do that to put out some fires so we didn't lose the account. I was pissed because I was missing the Governors Ball at the Governors mansion that we we also catering. This was a nice catering and it bugged me that I had to do the Sunset cruise because someone else screwed up. I was just leaving to do my catering and the phone rang, the Chef asked me to check the oven. I went and checked and saw 8 whole Lobsters on sheet pans. I came back on the phone and told him, he just sighed and said oh shit. The 8 Lobsters were for the Governor's head table. I hung up the phone and thanked God that I wasn't on that catering. I walked out and did my catering feeling good…….
Bowing out of here right now- I was just adding to a thread on sterno. I am not a professional caterer, I was simply contributing some food to my son's party, the food was heated to temp, before being brought out in the freezing weather & was consumed within 2 hours.
If you will read and digest all you can in the "pro" forums you will notice we are pretty direct with our advice.
In no way is this meant to hurt anyone's feeling or make them feel unwelcome on the forums.
On the contrary...we (the collective we who comprise membership here on CT) only want everyone who is serious about feeding the masses to turn out great food in a safe manner.
So if you are really serious about catering do as suggested and work for the top notch company in your area for a year or so.
The best education you will ever be paid to acquire.
OBTW welcome to Chef Talk....hope to see you around.
mimi
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