Posted by sam sears, cec on August 08, 19100 at 22:37:19 :
In Reply to: is this 'catering'? posted by Laurie on August 08, 19100 at 18:31:02 :
: After spending the last hour or so reading through the messages on this forum, I have a question that I hope I won't get in trouble for asking. :)
: My husband is an excellent cook, and just about every time he cooks at a BBQ or a church function, he has people ask if he will cook for a party they are having, or a wedding, or some kind of event.
: We have done this several times now, just cooking in our home kitchen or the host's kitchen. The problem is that it's starting to balloon into a lot of work - we get at least 4 or 5 requests a month, and we have had to turn down quite a few because we both work full time and just don't have the time to fulfill all the requests.
: I found this site while looking into what it would take to do this as a legal, full-time business, and realize that it is out of reach, at least for now.
: My question (finally) is this. Is what we are doing now considered 'catering' and if so, is it also illegal since we are not licensed? So far, we have only been cooking for family and friends, but we have started getting calls from people we don't know saying 'so and so referred me to you' and we are wary of taking those jobs for legal reasons.
: I hope this is not an inappropriate question, and I would appreciate any insight I can get.
: TIA,
: Laurie
when you cook in some one elses private kitchen with no food prepared in any way except in their kitchen & you shopped for the food supplies and took them to their kitchen, NO storage at your home or facility, you are selling a "personal chef" service....when you prepare food in any way in your home kitchen or other unlicensed facility you are probably in violation of some ordinance or law, some locales allow catering from private residences, but with major resitrictions & renovations would be necessary......any time you are accepting money for something you are practicing as a professional in that area......I would check with your local health dept, building & zoning board, & fire protection dept...to find out for sure....hope this helps....this is how many caterers got started, but it is a big gamble to venture into any business, especially the food business, and can be quite costing to start up, a modest commercial kitchen meeting all the various codes from several inspecting agencies can run from 25,000 - 50,000, just to get started..........good luck....sam