Crushed Ice Catering

Ice House

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Employee Spotlight: William Szenay

Employee Spotlight for Crushed Ice Catering is our incredibly talented Sous Chef William Szenay. William has been with us since December 2017 and has continued to prove just how truly gifted he is as a chef. We take a beat to sit down with Chef William to learn what his daily motivation is, why he chose this career and what inspires him to give his best in the kitchen.

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Sous Chef William Szenay creating a masterpiece.
Q: Lets get to it. What inspired you to become a Chef?
A: My Swedish grandma, she lived with us when I was a child growing up. Her life, actions, and words had a deep impact on me and stay with me even today.
Q: What do you love most about being a Chef?
A:  You are part of a lot of people’s favorite memories. Whether it be a wedding, Birthday or memorable celebration, you were a part of creating something memorable.
Q: What are your favorite dishes to create?
A: Ones that everyone can enjoy, of course!
Q: Where are you from?
A:  St.Paul, Minnesota.
Q: How did you get started in this industry?
A: I worked part-time at a Vietnamese restaurant in high school washing dishes.
Q: If you could choose anywhere in the world to be a Chef where would it be? And why?
A:  Australia.. good surfing and great local product to work with.
Q: Describe your cooking philosophy in 3 words.
A: Keep it simple.
Q: What would you say to other aspiring Chef’s?
A: Take care of both your physical and mental health. Both are crucial to maintain in order to bring your very best to the kitchen each day.
Q: Do you have any culinary hero’s?
A: Ferran Adrià. He ran the best restaurant in the world for several years.
Q: Do you have foods that take you back to your childhood?
A: I definitely have several and most of them are Swedish baked goods. Like , Toscakaka an almond and Carmel cake. Butterkaka, which is like cinnamon buns stuffed with almond paste and baked in vanilla custard.
Q: What’s playing on your kitchen soundtrack?
A: My recently played list top five is as follows. The best of all time. No contest.
  • J.S. Bach
  • Old Crow medicine show
  • Taj Mahal
  • Frozen soundtrack
  • Warren Zevon

 

Regardless of the career you choose, everyone needs a motivation that gets them out of bed in the morning and inspires them to pursue excellence in their career field. If you are an aspiring Chef, take his words of wisdom and let them fuel your culinary dreams. For those pursuing other dreams, remember to maintain physical and mental health, be ready to take inspiration from anywhere, and to turn up the soundtrack of your day.

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Why You Should Shop Local and Organic

If you’re anything like us then you like to shop local for not only your clothes but also your food. However some people struggle with the “Why?”. Why should I shop local and organic? For us, there is just something about eating a meal that you know has been made with fresh and local foods!  Because let’s face it, strolling through Kroger is just not the same as strolling through a farmers market or fresh produce stand.

With Crushed Ice Catering we go above and beyond to insure that our meals are made with as many fresh, local, and organic products because not only do we find it important, but our head Chef also believes in this. As we have written on our website this is what our head Chef, Laurence Agnew, has to say about buying local and eating organic.

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Pictured: Sample platter of the delicious local and organic items we serve here at Crushed Ice Catering!

“As a chef, I’m happy to use organic whenever possible. Organic catering is important to me because in the simplest of terms “It just tastes better!” and there is a reason for this. . not only is locally sourced organic food fresher, local foods produce something known as terroir – which means the food tastes like the area from where it is cultivated. Organic to me also means removing harmful GMOs, irradiation practices and dangerous pesticides and fertilizers. Organic farming in itself is friendlier to wildlife and helps the local economy and farmers to thrive and what they are talented at doing. Lastly organic foods have a lot more important nutrients that are lost in the modern day farming practices.”

However with shopping local and organic, people worry about the cost, accessibility, and if the benefits are really worth it. You can now stop your fretting because we are here to save the day! To keep your meals fresh and clean we have created a list of some of our favorite places we like to use here at Crushed Ice Catering to stay true to our motto of cooking with organic and local products.

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2017 Catering Trends & Food and Event Trends

Every dreary Louisville January, after the excitement of the Holidays, Wedding Seasons and the New Year have worn off – you will find our Crushed Ice Catering & Ice House Coordinators and Culinary Team pondering over the previous year, and wondering with great excitement, what the future year will hold. This blog post is always one of my favorites to write – my fingers move faster than the keyboard will allow. I can barely keep up. And this year’s predictions exceed any we have seen thus far. Curious to see our predictions – check it out!

2017 Food Trends and  Predictions from our Executive Chef, Laurence Agnew and our Sous Chef, Zach Tackett:

2017 Catering Trends

  • Chicken Salt – long used and started down under in Australia in all the chippers. It’s actually a vegetarian seasoning used on chips (fries) that’s very tasty.
  • Proper old school butchery using animals either raised by the butchers or very close to the source and introducing real authentic bone broths and animal fats in classic and more modern takes.
  • Continued use of cannabis! As states continue to legalize recreational marijuana, so does the edible market continue to sky rocket into the billions from candies, tortillas, baked goods and cocktails.
  • Plant based cooking using Heirloom varieties, legume based pastas and dinners focused on plant leftovers and waste.
  • Drone delivery whether it’s pizza, burritos or burgers. We wouldn’t be surprised if Amazon started offering a delivery service for bigger cities and companies such as Shake Shack (it’s coming! you heard it here first).
  • Fried chicken in a bowl, bun, Nashville style, for breakfast, lunch or dinner – it’s not going anywhere anytime soon.
2017 Bar/Beverage Trends and Predictions from Derek Steinbrecher, Bar Manager

2017 Bar Service Trends

  • Higher focus on beverages and beverage pairings (food/wine), vertical tastings for both beer and wine, bourbon themed events, bigger budgets for better quality booze.
  • For cocktails, continued pushing the envelope of high tech crafty cocktails. I see Italian wines continuing to be highly demanded and educated about also see Croatian and Slovenian wines continuing to be of high interest
  • Bourbon, Bourbon and more Bourbon great for all Kentuckians, and there’s even a bourbon emoji now, we’ve gone mainstream.
2017 Event & Decor Trends from the lovely ladies at Crushed Ice Catering, Lindsay and Madeleine 

2017 event and Decor trends

  • Creating more vertical impact for event spaces with the use of draping, aerialists, hanging lights, greenery ceiling installations and even an increased use of aerialist entertainers.
  • Black is Back – using black in a strong or subtle presence, which will lead to a more formal “feel” for events.
  • The bouquet and garter toss is going to be a thing of the past – and we are completely okay with that :)
  • Both Band & DJ – it’s the best of both worlds! Starting the evening with a live band and switching to DJ for dancing. It is sure to be a crowd pleaser, as the younger guests may enjoy the DJ (it’s hard to find a live performer that can belt out Hotline Bling) and the older crowd may love that jazz trio for the dinner portion.
  • Drone Videography, because who doesn’t want an awesome wedding video or a cool tech-y gadget flying around their event?
  • Lighting change during the event – transitioning from a soft romantic glow during cocktail hour/dinner to a more party atmosphere (think neons, gobos and strobes) for late night dancing.

2017 Event & Decor Trends from the lovely ladies at The Ice House, Erica and Christina

2017 catering event trends

  • Seeing a shift in DIY from crafts/goodies to DIY services – photo booths, videos, DJ service apps and other service related niches that Brides can simply download on their phone and plug in to their event.
  • Less Instagram Hashtags to more event specific snap chat filters and groups
  • More unique configurations of event space and design. Away with the traditional “head table” or half round conference style set-up. We will see more unique table configurations (elevated, stage, etc) as well as alternatives to traditional “boardroom” style – more lounge furniture, and creative workspaces.
  • Event Flips – larger budgets will give way to satisfying client’s high demands for flipping event spaces during an event. From theater style, to cocktail hour, to seated dinner – clients will be more demanding than ever. And we will aim to please!
  • Mixed wedding parties – with marriage equality passing in 2016 we expect to see less common and new titles such as Best Lady or Man of Honor
  • Color Trends: Winter=glamorous (silver, white, gray), Spring=floral (blush, sage, champagne), Summer=bright (yellow, blue), Fall=earthen (amber, sage, orange)
  • Incorporating Pantone’s Color of the Year “Greenery” – We are not seeing this trend go anywhere anytime soon. It will be continuously popular – Eucalyptus, Ferns, Sage, Thyme color themes are here to stay in 2017.
 So there you have it folks – Do you agree with our predictions? There is only one way to find out if we are correct… wait and see what 2017 really has in store for us here at the Ice House and Crushed Ice Catering!
Cheers!
Erica

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Louisville Wedding Spotlight: A French Themed Wedding

French Themed Wedding in Louisville, KY
Champagne Celebrations were in order for this French Inspired Wedding!

When our Bride, Emily approached the Ice House, she immediately challenged our culinary and design team at Crushed Ice Catering in Louisville. She wanted a French American Wedding to take place in Louisville, all the while planning from New York City.  Our team rose to the occasion – and delivered Emily and Loic’s dream wedding.

Emily was kind enough to share her experience and amazing photographs from her special day. Check it out:

Crushed Ice Catering: Share with our readers a helpful tip/quote you learned during the planning process or valued advice for future Brides to be:

“Take Pinterest with a grain of salt. While it was such a useful tool for certain things, I also found myself loving ideas that would never go with the style of my wedding, and being disappointed in other ideas that were too expensive to put together. Pick a style and a vibe for your wedding and go with it. Your intuition and decisions will lead to a beautiful event that is exquisitely you.”

Crushed Ice Catering: Give our readers a personal insight on what it was like to work with our team members at the Ice House and Crushed Ice Catering:

“The Ice House had a tall order to help create our wants for our French American wedding from all the way in New York City and they were the incredibly helpful every step of the way. From the first meeting we knew the Ice House was where we wanted to have our event as they assured us they would work with us to make our evening as personal to us as possible. Erica and Lindsay both did an incredible job of helping me create my dream space for the evening and keeping me in a timeline that left me unstressed. They paid as much detail to the small aspects of our wedding as I did, helping me with linens, arranging a Skype session for our tasting, and in general just taking extra care that we didn’t feel out of touch with how things were going even from so far away. Lindsay and the Chef with Crushed Ice Catering were phenomenal and pulled off a full French dinner and appropriate wine pairings that were not only complimented by our French guests, but they also worked with us to ensure we got exactly what we asked for without breaking our budget. Many of our guests commented it was the best meal they’d ever had at a wedding. Thanks to Madeline and Lindsay, day of the wedding I walked into a event space that looked beautiful, was decorated exactly how I imagined, and I truly felt like a guest at my wedding rather than a bride having to call the shots. I am forever grateful to these women for such a fantastic wedding day experience and I highly recommend both the Ice House and Crushed Ice Catering if you want a wedding that you, or anyone else, will never forget.”

Crushed Ice Catering’s Executive Chef created a fabulous menu for the Bride, Groom and all of their International Guests.

French Themed Family Style Dinner menu

As we have said before, it truly takes a village to pull off such an exceptional affair. Emily and Loic’s Wedding would not have been made possible without the collaboration and attention to detail from her wonderful team of wedding professionals.

Reception Venue: The Ice House

Catering: Crushed Ice Catering

Photographer: Bella Grace Studios 

Florist: Nanz & Kraft

Planner: Ashby Wedding & Event Planning

Videographer: LW Films

Dress/Shoes: Theia from the Lovely Bride, Shoes Badgley Mischka

Hair: Xhale Salon and Spa

Make Up: Jess Harrison, Dollface Brows and Beauty

Entertainment: Complete Music and Video

Cake: Sweet Surrender

Transportation: Royal Transportation of Louisville

Ceremony Venue: Midlane Farm

The Lovely Couple at their Wedding Ceremony held at Midlane Farm
Guests enjoy the Cocktail Hour on the Ice House’s Rooftop Garden
Emily and Loic’s First Dance as Mr. and Mrs.
The Happy Couple!
Who are these models?!
Even the gift table had a personalized touch from the Bride and Groom
The Bridal Party Table
Beautiful, Delicate Florals
Guests enjoyed a French-American Menu prepared by Crushed Ice Catering’s Executive Chef, Laurence Agnew
A fabulous time was had by all!
We just love the simplicity of this cake!
The guests enjoy the wonderful fall weather

A big Thank You goes out to Emily and Loic for sharing their personal experience with our readers. We are so truly blessed to have such fantastic clients. It makes our jobs so enjoyable. When you do what you love, it’s not really work, is it? Congratulations to the happy couple – Thank you for sharing your special day with us here at The Ice House and Crushed Ice Catering.

Cheers!

Erica