Banquet Prep
Well Equipped For Special Events
By Laura Doty -- Foodservice Equipment & Supplies, 2/1/2003
 Equipment in the basement production kitchen at the Sofitel Hotel in NYC includes a charbroiler and tilting kettles, as well as rolling racks for transporting foods in bulk. PHOTOS BY LAURA DOTY |
Weddings, parties of all kinds, fund-raising events, business gatherings - there are numerous occasions for kitchens in many types of professional foodservice programs to be called upon to prepare and serve meals for banquet affairs, which can serve as important revenue builders for operators. The kitchen equipment used to accommodate this type of labor-intensive menu production typically needs to be powerful, multifunctional and reliable, according to chefs responsible for banquet menu preparation. In addition, these chefs tend to have clear preferences for certain equipment pieces that help them create successful banquet menus.
The Sofitel Hotel chain has garnered praise for its French-style cuisine, available both in its on-site restaurants and from banquet services. While freestanding branches of the chain, such as those in Minneapolis and Miami, have been built to include large, specially designed banquet kitchens with plenty of square footage for equipment and storage needs, the Sofitel Hotel located in New York City occupies a mid-block location in midtown Manhattan, where tight space configurations presented a notable design challenge, particularly for the incorporation of the 2,500-sq.-ft. ballroom/banquet facilities. Banquet food here is prepared in an 800-sq.-ft. production kitchen (which also functions as the prep kitchen for the hotel's on-site restaurant), located in the basement of the hotel building, and is transported in bulk in rolling racks, via elevator, to the hotel's second-floor banquet area. Among the key pieces of equipment dedicated to banquet menu preparation in this production kitchen are three tilting steam kettles used primarily for soups and sauces, a tilting braising pan, convection oven, charbroiler, deep-fat fryer, six-burner range top, combi oven/steamer and a vertical cutter/mixer. A small blast chiller, also installed in the production kitchen, facilitates safe, quick chilling of foods prepared in bulk. Adjacent to the production kitchen is a large pastry and bread bakery (comprising about 900-sq.-ft.) that operates 24 hours a day to supply baked goods for all the hotel's foodservice operations, including banquets. The full-scale bakery's equipment includes electric-powered roll-in rack ovens, convection ovens with proofers, a spiral mixer and smaller mixers and a baker's table with racks. The basement area also includes an 800-sq.-ft. storage area for bulk dry and refrigerated goods.
 The main cookline in the kitchen at the Minikahda Club, Minneapolis, (above) includes a high-powered radial flat-top range that is used to support preparation of reductions for banquet menus. The club's banquet prep kitchen (below) is equipped with stacked convection ovens, a braising oven, fryer and tilting steam kettle. |
A 700-sq.-ft. banquet kitchen on the second floor, adjacent to the large ballroom, is used primarily for finishing and assembly of banquet meals. The cookline in this kitchen contains such equipment pieces as a combi oven, four-burner range top, four-burner flat top with a char grill located above, a double-sided deep-fat fryer and a salamander. Also installed in this tightly packed kitchen area are six hot food holding boxes and a steam table that is set up for plating menu items during banquet service.
"We couldn't do without our combi oven, the most valuable piece in our banquet kitchen, because of its great versatility in preparing various banquet offerings with high-quality results. We also appreciate our hot boxes for their ability to hold prepared foods before serving and our steam table, which we use when plating banquet meals," said Executive Chef Marshall Orton.
"The challenge we face here at the Sofitel in banquet prep is the space limitations in our finishing/serving kitchen," he continued. "The design is such that we have to set up special tables for plating and serving and the flow toward service is awkward. This is one reason that I'm glad that we actually do more buffet-type banquet service here at the hotel, where we frequently include a display cooking station equipped with a portable induction cooktop, for pastas cooked-to-order, for example. We would really like to add a rack-style regeneration oven for plated meals to our banquet prep equipment and, although we have the budget to purchase this equipment, we don't have the ability at the moment to replumb the line to include it," Orton added. "Hopefully, we'll solve this installation design problem in the future."
 The Sofitel's Executive Chef Marshall Orton commented that the combi oven in the banquet finishing kitchen is his most vital piece of equipment for successful banquet preparation. |
The Minikahda Club in Minneapolis resembles a country club (it includes a beautiful golf course) within the city limits, and is a very popular place for members to dine and hold wedding receptions, special parties and other banquet events, in part because all menus are cooked from scratch. Originally built in 1898, the kitchen area at the club was expanded and modernized in the 1960s, and equipment upgrades in the main kitchen and the 700-sq.-ft.
L-shaped banquet kitchen behind the main production area have occurred periodically as necessary. Key equipment pieces found in this banquet prep area now include stacked cook-and-hold ovens, double-stacked convection ovens, a brazier, 50-gal. tilting kettle and steamer, a deep-fat fryer, and 20-, 40- and 60-qt. mixers. Although space is tight in this older facility, flexibility in the kitchen areas accommodates the flow of banquet service quite well, according to Chef Ferris Shiffer, thanks to special attention given to the organization of walk-in cold and dry storage areas.
"For banquet menu preparation, we're always concerned about having enough oven space to fire food items so that they can be appropriately served at the same time," said Shiffer. "For that reason, our stacked, cook-and-hold ovens are very useful for banquet preparation, especially for foods such as ham or suckling pig that we can cook slowly overnight in anticipation of service at a banquet the next day." The most useful equipment in the Minikahda's banquet prep area tends to be multifunctional, according to Shiffer, such as his tilting kettle, which is primarily used for stocks, soups and sauces, though it may also be used to cook potatoes for large-scale gatherings. Shiffer also stressed the importance of a powerful range top putting out high Btu for successful banquet prep. "I prefer a radial flat-top range for any reductions or risottos we may be preparing for banquet service, partially for ease of maintenance and also because we can closely control the heat from the center outward when finishing larger batches of food," he commented.
 In the banquet finishing kitchen at the Sofitel Hotel, NYC, the cookline includes a four-burner range top, four-burner flat top with a char grill above, a salamander and a cook-and-hold oven. |
"Actually, my favorite piece of equipment for banquet prep duties is a potato ricer, which other chefs I know say is now hard to come by," continued Shiffer. "Besides using the ricer for potatoes, I've discovered that we can also use it for straining and pureeing everything from soups to dessert mousses for banquet service. The ricer can 'homogenize' ingredients very well, providing the texture and consistency we need for large-scale batches of menu items."
At the Fountain Blue, a stand-alone banquet hall in Des Plaines, Ill., functions are held in three large rooms that can be divided by pull- across screens to create six areas. Guests choose from 11 possible menus for banquets at the Fountain Blue, all of which are prepared in and served from the facility's 1,000-sq.-ft. kitchen. The front of the kitchen contains large worktables for prep work, as well as two steam tables used to support plating during banquets.
The kitchen also contains two large steam kettles, five convection ovens, four broilers, two deep-fat fryers, a six-burner range and a griddle, as well as two upright reach-in refrigerators. One large hot food holder and two smaller hot food holding units in the kitchen keep plated meals and soups at the proper temperatures before service. The storage area, which is larger than the kitchen contains a walk-in freezer and walk-in refrigerator and several reach-ins, as well as dry bulk storage containing flatware and china used for banquet service. "We also offer customers the option of rental of special items or a specific china and flatware service, which we arrange through local party rental companies," explained Fountain Blue co-owner Tom Diamond.
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"We purchased the Fountain Blue from previous owners, and it is the second such facility that we have bought and operate for local banquets and receptions, so we are comfortable with the kitchen equipment we have for our menu preparation," Diamond stated. "However, we would design the kitchen differently if we had the ability and the funds to start from scratch," he continued. "We would really like to add a braising pan to our kitchen line, but presently we just don't have the space. Our convection ovens are the most useful equipment pieces for preparation of banquet menus of all types in our kitchen because of their versatility.
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