The Cupcake Thieves

Folks find all sorts of things to ponder before hiring their wedding caterer.

1) Does the caterer have a great reputation?

2) Did they hit it off at their first meeting?

3) Are they offering services in their price range?

4) Is their food good?

Personally, I think, “Is their food good?” should be number one on the list, but then, I’m a chef. Food is my jam.

I’d say number two should be, “Are they an expert at catering weddings?” but really “Are they an expert?” and “Is their food good?” are both number one.

I can’t tell you how many war stories I’ve heard from people who hired their local restaurant, which served fabulous food but didn’t know diddly squat about catering weddings. As the dirty glasses piled up, the food cooled off awaiting for the far-too-few waiters, and the drinks warmed as the ice ran out, those customers realized too late that they needed to hire someone who actually knew how to cater a wedding.

I’ve been catering weddings for 30 years; folks say the food we crank out is fantabulous. I can’t say the same, because it’s rude to toot your own horn, but I will say that, yes, I am an expert.

I’m an Ashkenazi Jew; I dole out a lot of food. Too much is never enough, is my motto. The one thing I dole out more than food is advice. I always tell clients that they don’t just get a wedding caterer when they hire my company; they get a Jewish mother. A rather young and fetching rocker chick type of Jewish mother, but I digress.

Every year for 30 years, the one thing that never ceases to amaze me is the client who hires my company for my expertise and then proceeds to NOT listen to me.

I stopped counting the amount of weddings I’ve catered at a thousand. I can see a train wreck coming from a mile away.

For crying out loud, if I sound the alarm, listen to me!

“Don’t buy a farkakte whipped cream wedding cake from the Italian bakery you love for your August wedding, at a venue with no air conditioning or refrigeration!”

Did they listen? The 175 wedding guests who ate wedding cake pudding are your answer.

One “RTL” (refused to listen) bride some years back wanted a cupcake tower for her wedding instead of a wedding cake.

No problemo.

I’m a huge fan of wedding cake substitutes. Most of the cake is wasted anyway.

I’ve served towers of donuts, brownies, strawberry shortcakes, Rice Krispie treats, French macaroons, even a tower of Twinkies.

My personal fave was creating a large tower of really great chocolate chip cookies, and when it came time to cut the cake, my waiters wheeled out the cookie tower with a glass of milk. The bride and groom dipped their cookie in the milk and fed each other. Adorable.

I was totally down with this bride’s request for a cupcake tower.

When I excitedly suggested we arrange the tower on a table with wheels, then wheel it out for their presentation, she said, “No. I want it out all night.”

“All night?”

“I want my guests to see my beautiful cupcakes all night,” she said adamantly.

The fire alarm bell in my head starting going off. This was an Italian wedding we’re talking about! I know you can’t generalize, but … in all these years, the only guests I’ve served who’ve eaten as much as the Jewish ones were the Italians. She wanted her cupcake tower sitting out for five hours, while 200 wedding guests, including 30 kids, just ignored it?!

“Can we put a velvet rope around it?” I asked.

“No.”

“Can I hire an armed guard?”

“My florist is making a beautiful centerpiece. It will be clear that this is the wedding cake.” She said.

“Uh huh.”

During the cocktail hour, while my waiters were passing mass quantities of hors d’oeuvres, the uncle from Bay Ridge, stole two cupcakes from the bottom of the 4th tier.

While the guests were raising their glasses for a toast from the best man, the cousins from Manalapan wiped out the back of the 3rd tier.

Ira, our waiter in charge of gossip, came running into the kitchen.

“The 86-year-old great aunt of the bride took two from the center, wrapped them in a napkin and shoved them in her purse!”

I instructed my waiters to pull two potted plants from the entry way and use them to block the cupcakes. While the bride was dancing with her father, she realized she couldn’t see her cupcake tower from the dance floor. She freaked.

“I can’t see my tower!”

We removed the potted plants. Shortly afterwards, the bride’s own sister removed two cupcakes from the bottom tier.

“Just in case, they run out before we get some later,” she said ducking away.

When it came time for the bride and groom to feed each other from the cupcake tower, the tower looked like it had just survived a war. We tried to save the situation by filling up the empty spaces with flowers.

A lot of flowers.

The bride and groom fed each other the cupcake on top which had been saved only because it had a bride and groom figurine skewered into it. Although I caught one of the kids dipping his finger into the cappuccino icing.

We wheeled the cupcake tower to the dessert table where it could be doled out with the other sweets (cookies, pastries, baby pies and strawberries with chocolate fondue). A sea of locusts dressed in wedding clothes buzzed away with most of the cupcakes before we even had a chance to place them on the dessert table.

Ira came running into the kitchen.

“I tried to snag two cupcakes to pack up for the bride and groom, and some old lady smacked my hand!”

That old lady was the groom’s 91-year-old grandmother.

The cupcake tower didn’t survive, but we did. The guests ate so much, they even shocked my maître d’. Nothing short of nuclear war shocks my maître d’. Thankfully, we had enough food to not only serve the guests seconds (thirds and ?? fourths!), but also pack a goodie box for the bride and groom.

The only thing we weren’t able to pack up for them were leftover cupcakes.

I went to sleep that night feeling pretty proud of myself.

The next afternoon, I got a phone call from the bride.

I love the after-the-wedding thank you calls. They’re what get me through a lot of really hard weekends. Just a little note here, if you loved your wedding, please, for crying out loud, call your caterer and say thank you!

I was expecting a heartfelt thank you. I even prepared myself for a heartfelt “you are so welcome,” but instead..

“I can’t believe you didn’t pack us any cupcakes!”

I looked at the burn on my left hand, I’d received hustling out the entrée at the speed of sound, and laughed.

“I tried to snag you one, but I was afraid your guests might bite me.”

In retrospect making a joke was probably not the best move.

She didn’t laugh, and I didn’t hear from her again.

For almost a year.

One week before what would be their one year anniversary, I received a letter from the groom.

His bride was heartbroken that they didn’t have a cupcake from their wedding to pull out of the freezer and eat on their one-year-anniversary. She felt my making a joke about it was cruel and heartless.

I was stunned.

All of the hors d’oeuvres, the entrée, the dessert table, the signature drinks, the flowing champagne, the attentive waiters and bartenders, all that had evaporated in her mind and she could only see one thing: a cupcake-shaped void.

Worse yet, after years of priding myself on being the “nice” caterer, what this bride was focused on, 11 and half months later, was how cruel I was.

I don’t even know how to be cruel.

I knew I was right about hiding the cupcake tower and that she was wrong. I knew that even when I tried to fix things with the potted plants, she wouldn’t let me. But I also knew one very important thing that my mother taught me when I was a little girl: “The customer is always right.”

I hired my pastry chef to make a mini 3-tiered wedding cake of the exact flavor and icing that the cupcakes had had: vanilla cake with cappuccino icing. Then sent it to the couple with a bottle of champagne and my heartfelt apology.

The bride was thrilled.

“The food was really fabulous,” she called, gushing.

“So are you,” I said, relieved beyond measure.

Removing the cupcake void had allowed her to remember how great her wedding really was. It was astounding that my making a bad joke at a bad moment had taken that from her.

The moral of this story?

The customer is always right, even when they’re wrong.

And, the next time someone wants their cupcake tower on display all night, get a pit bull.