Behind the Service, a series by Chef Gerard Bonner of ChefBnbEats
At 5:00 p.m., cocktail hour was beginning.
I was heading to a gas station to buy propane.
We had started the croquettes around 4:20, maybe 4:30, running big batches through the turkey fryer. Then around 4:50 someone told me we were out of gas. I went to check. The wind had kicked the flame out, but the tank was running on fumes either way. And we had not even started the sopes.
The station was four minutes away. I left right around 5:00, grabbed a fresh tank, and made it back by 5:12, maybe 5:15. About thirteen minutes there and back. On the way back I realized there was another station a minute from the venue. Of course there was.
But we were back in business. The team kept moving, and we had a wedding to serve.
To understand why those thirteen minutes mattered, you have to understand the month that came before them.
A Month of Moving Parts
October was busy, really busy, the kind of month where one event bleeds straight into the next. Before this wedding we had handled roughly thirteen other events. Different clients, different menus, different kitchens. And through all of it, this wedding sat in the back of my mind.
Around 200 planned, 183 final plates including vendor meals. A family-style menu built around Mexican dishes. We had been planning for about a month, working through the recipes, the ordering, the staffing, the equipment, figuring out how much beef and how much chicken we would need, what could go ahead without losing quality and what had to wait for service.
One more thing about this venue. It had no kitchen. No oven, no range, no burners, nothing. Every hot plate that night came from our fryers, our boxes, and our planning. We had to make magic, and we did.
The night before, I cooked a Halloween dinner for fifteen. Repeat clients, annual party. I said yes because the trust is built and my crew can run without me. I treat a dinner for fifteen like a wedding for two hundred. That has always been the standard.
It cost me prep time I needed Saturday. By morning, every hour mattered.
The Food Had to Be Right
Barbacoa, achiote-citrus chicken, rice, beans, vegetables, sopes we formed by hand on Friday and cooked on Saturday, croquettes, elotes, salsas, guacamole, churros, tres leches.
Every dish has components, and every component has to be right. When we cook food rooted in somebody else’s traditions, we do the homework. We research, we taste, we ask the people on our team who carry those flavors in their own lives, and we keep refining until the team is satisfied. That is the closest I can come to promising we got it right.
Tasting is a ritual for us, and it is not just me and the chefs. I want the servers, the bussers, the dishwashers tasting too. If they are going to talk to guests about the food, they should know what it tastes like, and if something is off, I want to hear it before a guest does.
The salsa tatemada told us we were ready. Chris tasted it and said it needed salt. I already had it measured out, along with the lime and the cilantro. We added it all, passed the bowl around again, and it was perfect. That is what the system is for. Nobody guessing. Everybody tasting.
The tortilla chips came fresh from a local taqueria instead of a bag. A small decision. Later that night I would hear about those chips more than once.
Ten Minutes to Dinner
The propane run was not the only test.
About ten minutes before service, guests were seated, speeches finished, the wedding on schedule. But we were not quite where I wanted us to be.
Food still needed to get onto serving platters, and our staging was not as efficient as it should have been. I wanted more sheet pans, more hot holding space, a smoother handoff to the dining room. With that many people eating family-style, minutes matter. I am particular about temperature. Lukewarm is not the standard.
Some serving pieces were not quite what we expected, so we adapted the presentation. I shifted Chef Chris onto the brides’ plates, which was not his original assignment.
One bride had a vegetarian entrée, while the other had a different meal. But I had not clearly documented that distinction in Chris’s notes. So when he began preparing enchiladas for both brides, I realized there was a communication gap.
That was not on Chris. It was on me. When you are running an event this size, assignments change in seconds, and the information people need has to move with them.
We made the adjustments, got the platters moving, and dinner went out. Not every part of that process happened exactly as I pictured it, but the team delivered.
And then the feedback started coming in.
The Moments That Made It Worth It
One of the brides came back to see me. We had met at the tasting. She gave me a big hug, thanked me, told me everything was coming out perfect and they were loving the food. You could see she meant it. Her wife was just as appreciative.
After a month of obsessing over details no guest would ever see, someone walks up genuinely happy, and you feel the reason behind all of it.
Later another guest found me, asked if I was the chef, shook my hand, and talked for a minute or two about the food. He kept saying he had been asking for more all through dinner. I remembered that table. They had been. As a chef, not the worst problem to have.
He complimented the chips, the tortillas, the meat. More compliments came through the night, from guests and the wedding team. The next day, the mother of one of the brides left us a five-star review.
That is the confirmation that the experience reached the people we built it for.
One More Order of Churros
Dessert had been out thirty or forty minutes. Oil cooled, uncooked churros put away, winding down.
Then someone from the bridal party came into the kitchen asking for more churros. The cooked ones were gone. She was not ready to accept that. She had been looking forward to sharing them with her little sister.
Technically dessert service was over. But this is their wedding, she is bridal party, and it was something we could still make happen.
So I said we are making churros.
Chris took over frying the remaining batch while I got the oil going. He understood why. I hand-delivered them when they were ready.
Not a grand gesture. A few churros for people who wanted to enjoy them together. But the smallest decisions often make the biggest difference in someone’s night.
We still left about an hour and a half earlier than expected.
The Drive Home
On the way home I replayed everything, like always. The equipment I should have brought. Delegating more. Smoother service. Another prep cook or two next time.
I also realized the wedding had not been nearly as stressful as I imagined. Weeks of running scenarios, and when the moments came, we handled them. Maybe the planning paid off. Maybe I made parts of it harder than they needed to be. Probably both.
Then the grocery store. My daughter had a rough Halloween with her friends and wanted to bake cookies. Close to eleven, so no dough from scratch. Four packs of bake-and-serve cookies.
She was already falling asleep when I got home. I put on ocean sounds, gave her a blanket and a pillow, said goodnight. The cookies waited for morning.
I showered, ate, put my feet in the massager for two rounds, laid down on the couch, and fell asleep without realizing it.
The Morning After
I had planned on the gym, errands, organizing. My body voted otherwise. Not sleepy, just tired, feet still aching. So I made a decision I do not make easily. Nothing that day except one short equipment drop-off, a stop for gas, and home.
The cookies got baked. The gym waited.
For the first time in a long stretch, I let myself have a quiet day. I am still learning that part. I can plan for everything at an event. I am learning to plan for the person doing the planning too.
Because when the guests have gone home and the last plate is served, there is still a family, a life, and another day waiting.
And sometimes, after a wedding of this size, the most important thing left on the schedule is simply being home.
Planning a wedding or private celebration in Chicago? At ChefBnbEats, we believe the details your guests never see are just as important as the moments they’ll remember. Explore our wedding catering and private dining experiences.