In Amy's Eyes: Wedding Planning: The Tasting

I wrote this at the time of the tasting, but decided not to post it. :)

I was very excited about the tasting. Despite working a million hours a week, I'd arranged weeks ahead of time to have the day off. (As it turned out I ended up working for a few hours to watch our batting cages be poured anyway, but it didn't kink our day! (plus, concrete splatters are a nice accessory, right?)) If I hadn't been required to work, I likely would have dressed up for the event because I like to dress up. I was probably more comfortable in my regular clothes.

Look, a table for two... kinda.

We arrived early and there was no one in the room so we just made ourselves at home! :) I had no idea there were quite so many ways to fold napkins... We finally settled on one that we thought would hold the menu cards nicely.

We hadn't eaten much as we were warned there would be lots of food. We were not disappointed! I felt a bit awkward because with each course the responsible chef would come out and tell us about all the ingredients and how it was prepared. Then he would stand there and watch and wait while we ate it. They were all very nice and very helpful, but I felt weird with them standing over me. Plus I would NEVER say I didn't like anything in front of the person who made it! It wasn't a huge problem because everything was very good, except the bread. I think the bread was pretty bleh.

Bleh Bread. It is pretty.

The first 'real' course were the crab cakes.

Crab Cakes

The crab cakes were good. I wasn't thrilled with the andouille sausage. The presentation was very nice, although the lobster bisque was apparently intended to be served in a more frothy state. The crab cakes were eventually cut, primarily because I didn't think they were worth the asking price and there was too much food anyway.

Next we got to pick: Soup or salad

Potato and Leek Soup

Summer Salad on Watermellon

I missed the soup presentation, which was very nice. The soup bowls arrived with a little pile of potato and leeks and the soup was poured over the top. The soup was good, but not as good as the salad. Plus, in July after sitting outside for an hour, who wants to eat hot soup? I think Gavin's favorite course was the salad. While I loved it, this is likely never going to be true for me, I'm just not quite rabbit enough.

Finally! The Main course!

Next was the main course. It was BEAUTIFUL. We loved the presentation of the side by side lobster and steak with the corresponding sauces. It was served with an excellent risotto, but we decided I couldn't live without mashed potatoes so they were swapped. (We also experimented with a mashed potato appetizer I just realized I failed to photograph, but it flopped). Gavin and I both found the meat slightly overcooked, but still excellent. I even ate all of my veggies.

And Desert

I'm still not sure why we need a desert course when we are going to have wedding cake, but after I saw it, I decided not to push the issue of dropping it. To be honest, the mickey rice crispy made it irresistible (well played Disney although despite constantly changing it on our order form they still served hearts at the wedding). As far as the taste goes, it was way too much chocolate for me. I did snack on all of the dunkable items.

Last, but not least, Cake

We tasted four cakes:

1. Red Velvet cake with cream filling
2. White cake with strawberry and cream filling
3. Orange Cake
4. Red Velvet Cake with cheese cake filling

Number 4 was AMAZING!!! I rarely eat much cake, but it was awesome. I ate my entire slice. they ended up letting us keep the cakes (we gave 1 and 2 to our florist) and I ate almost all the rest of 4! Gavin liked the Orange cake as well and we had both at the wedding (and they served us both!!)

***Reflection***

As it turns out, I am very glad we had the tasting. At the tasting, I was able to enjoy the food. At the wedding, we were determined to eat after hearing so many people say they didn't get to enjoy the meal at all. We intentionally went back to our table for each course. But I couldn't taste the food! I remember what it tasted like, but I remember eating it and just not noticing that it had flavor at all! Sensory overload, I suppose!

We also had a fruit spread at the cocktail hour.