Celine & Company boasts a culturally rich history and a diverse kitchen staff. We have the training and the desire to build the culture-specific menu you envison. Back in the ‘90s, our Asheville catering company was just getting going. Founder Celine Lurey brought her traditional Egyptian culture into the food she prepared. When, then, head chef Kim Lloyd arrived they aligned in their love and talent for preparing traditional Meditteranean dishes. Now the owner operator, Kim continues to passionately build menus. She seeks out kitchen staff that portray an aptitude for preparing unique, wordly, and traditional culture food items.
For instance, our executive chef Austin Tisdale has extensive experience in preparing cuisine from a wide variety of Asian cultures. His wife and fellow chef for Celine & Company hails from Mexico. She combines her traditional customs with her professional experience to create incredible regional dishes. Her talent is not alone in our kitchen. Celine & Company currently boasts kitchen staff who have a worldly knowledge of cultural food and experience in devising menus, such as Indian, Mediterranean, Korean, and Latin American, for various events in Asheville.
Wine Night hosted by Celine & Company and Metro Wines
Our most recent cultural event held at Celine & Company’s “On Broadway” event space in Asheville was a decadent and delicious wine dinner. Our menu, inspired by Mediterranean cuisine, delicately paired with the Spanish wines that were served that evening by Metro Wines of Asheville. We started the night with piquello pepper and smoked goat cheese bites softly placed on edible flower petals. We followed with a traditional Spanish gazpacho and charred ciabatta with escalivada. The entree was a delicious lamb meatballs topped with Spanish paprika tomato sauce, white asparagus with saffron aioli, and a zesty lemon gremolata.
Celine & Company takes delight in preparing culture-specific menus. We always work with the event coordinator, client, or other point-of-contact to be sure our kitchen is on target. Our wine dinner concluded with churros for dessert. Lightly fried until crispy on the outside and soft on the inside, the fritters were then rolled in cinnamon and sugar and plated with chocolate ganache on the side—every churros served was devoured!
Catering Cultural Weddings in Asheville
Weddings are often cultural events. Celine & Company takes great care to properly prepare dishes that are important to the client. Furthermore, we seize the opportunity to learn and grow our knowledge when a new dish is presented to our kitchen. The wine-paired menu described above was inspired by an opportunity we had to cater a Spanish wedding the previous summer. We love this type of experience. We want our clients to know how willing, excited, and trained our staff is to make menus that are inspired by their culture and traditions.
When clients request a specific dish we are unfamiliar with, our response is always, “Teach us!” It was an aunt of the groom who taught us how to prepare authentic Persian Jeweled Rice. From Filipino lumpias to Nigerian jollof rice, our Asheville catering kitchen takes pride in sharing our skills for preparing global cuisine items. It is through our extensive experience as one of the most well-known and best catering companies in Asheville, and our openness to learn new dishes, that Celine & Company can offer clients a menu for their guests that make them think of home. Whether home is the American South, Mexico, Ethiopia, Italy, India, or Thailand, we look forward to accommodating your cultural event and food traditions.
Just Economics of Western North Carolina’s “Living Wage Certification Program” is the largest program of its kind in the nation. With nearly 400 local certified employers they are setting the bar and inspiring other communities to follow suit. Being Living Wage Certified means that an employer pays all of their employees at least a wage that is sufficient to live in any given area. Many variables determine the living wage of a particular region and in most cases what is considered a living wage is higher than the federally established minimum wage. For Asheville, the living wage is set at $12.50/hr and $11/hr if the employer provides health insurance. The advocacy behind living wage programs stems from a common belief that the federal minimum wage has not kept up with the increase in cost of living. Many would agree that is especially true in developing cities like Asheville.
