Slate's Bizbox
weddings: Notes on nuptials.

Soulless FoodWhy is what's served at weddings so wretched?

By Regina Schrambling
Updated Tuesday, June 12, 2007, at 6:56 AM ET

Click here to read more from Slate's wedding issue.

A wedding buffet. Click image to expand.

I know I had good food at a wedding once, but I cannot tell you what that food was. I remember it only because I was standing next to the groom's disapproving best man, the prototype for Michael Douglas in Wall Street, when the hors d'oeuvres passed by, and, to make conversation, I said everything was surprisingly fabulous. He sucked back whatever succulent tidbit he had chosen, threw the skewer onto the tray, and spat: "It ought to be. It cost a fucking fortune."

Unfortunately, even a Halliburton-level budget is no guarantee the food at a wedding will be anything better than forgettable. What is served after the vows and before the bouquet toss almost always makes the chicken-or-pasta choice at 30,000 feet look like haute cuisine. Brides who will obsess for months on the color of the candles inevitably go all Stouffer's when it comes to what will be laid out on their rented china.

Given that more planning goes into the average small wedding than went into the invasion of Baghdad, the mystery remains: Why is such an essential element of hospitality kissed off so uniformly? Caterers, after all, have their hands out as hungrily as florists and musicians and videographers when the average $28,000 is being divvied up for that special day.

One obvious reason is that quantity rarely begets quality. The most gifted chef on the planet cannot turn out entrees in the hundreds without making like McDonald's and its billions served. Assembly lines are great for cars, a little upsetting for special meals. Corners must be cut—the fettucine may have to be parboiled and reheated, rendering it sodden. The steaks may get grill marks first, actual cooking second (and perfect beef waits for no buffet line). In my short-lived career as a caterer, I did one wedding: The happy couple was smart enough to limit the guest list to 20 and request relatively hardy, serve-yourself entrees such as jambalaya. Too many of the weddings I have suffered as a guest push the caterer to be a Julia of all cuisines (and master of none), ordering them to dish up "foods of the world" for appetizers—dim sum, antipasti, sushi, miniburgers—and then still offer a full sit-down, lukewarm dinner. Everyone would be far happier grazing from hot and cold stations with a few entrees done exquisitely.

A worse problem is that wedding planners encourage the betrothed to try to please everyone but themselves, pandering to the distant aunt who won't touch salmon and the long-lost college roommate who is lactose-intolerant. Too many choices spoil the dinner while pushing up the tab. In this crazy era no one even dares risk serving one spectacular vegetarian entree for all, simply for fear of offending the stricter vegans in the crowd.

Then there is the awful truth that couples are victims of location, location. Often the trendiest venue is saddled with the lamest caterer, the kind that still engages in "continental cuisine" (and as Calvin Trillin famously said, that continent is Antarctica), with musty specialties such as chicken cordon bleu. A bride who wants the Statue of Liberty as a backdrop for vows photos on a boat ride around Manhattan may have to settle for pasta salad as the most cutting-edge option on the buffet. The venue that controls the catering takes home twice as much profit.

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Regina Schrambling is a New York writer who travels to eat and writes about it for gastropoda.com, the Los Angeles Times, and other publications.
Photograph of a wedding buffet © 2007 iStock International Inc.
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