F&B Trends for 2010

In boom times, everyone wants to know about the hottest cuisine. Planners aim to find exotic foods that attendees haven't tried and to serve them in the flashiest, most memorable way -- even if that means paying a premium.

But 2010 is not shaping up to be a boom year. And, when money is tight, the F&B budget is one of the first to be cut. Therefore, the question on planners' lips is not "What's in vogue?" but "What's inexpensive?"

Most of the food trends on M&C's 2010 hot list are cost-cutting tips in disguise. Even organizations that still can afford caviar and lobster will be opting for modesty this year. Opulence has become tacky.

"All the out-of-the-box stuff is back in the box," says John Vingas, the San Diego-based senior vice president of convention centers for Centerplate, which caters five of the 10 busiest convention centers in North America. "The 'Did you see that?' days were left behind in 2006." Besides budget-slashing, the catering world is making food approachable, healthful and sustainable; setups have become simple and practical. In a word, food is becoming real.

Classic dishes are new again Every year, it seems, foodies designate a newly discovered ethnic cuisine as the latest must-eat. This year, though, the fads are on hold. People are looking to sophisticated interpretations of familiar foods -- though that doesn't necessarily mean meatloaf or mac and cheese. "Honestly, it's about good food, well-executed," says Brad Nelson, Marriott International's Bethesda, Md.-based corporate chef and vice president of culinary.

Stacy Zeigler advocates a return to Julia Child, as repopularized in the movie Julie & Julia. "Beef bourguignon, coq au vin, apple tarte tatin," recites Zeigler, CMP, director of sales for Bold American Events and Catering in Atlanta, as well as first vice president of the National Association of Catering Executives. "They sound fancy, but they're really simple, warm comfort foods. It's an inexpensive cuisine, but it has some flair and specialness to it. Julia Child has made simple cool again."

Chicken is king In 2009, for the first time in memory, Marriott saw chicken outsell filet mignon at final-night banquets. "On the surface, filet seems extravagant," says Brad Nelson. "There's been a pretty strong movement toward the anti-luxe."

In addition to filet becoming less prevalent, Nelson has seen less king crab and lobster, and the reason is only partly due to price. Often, a planner will choose a less gourmet option that doesn't actually cost less, simply due to concerns about perception. "In many cases, the perception of 'less is more' is more important than the actual cost," Nelson says.

Cows are versatile A different cut of beef can do the job. "There are only two tenderloins on a steer," notes chef Gregory Griffie of the Renaissance Boston Waterfront Hotel. "There's always a lot of other product that not a lot of people use, so it can be obtained at a great price."

Griffie has gotten kudos for a hearty pot roast, which is considerably less expensive than filet. And for the price of a traditional filet, he can do something more exciting with a different cut, like braised short ribs with ginger, chilies and hoisin, served on steamed jasmine rice. Using more of the animal is friendlier for the environment, too.

Small surprises still surprise Even on a budget, planners can include just one "wow" item during the meal, suggests Stacy Zeigler. She recommends a hot doughnut station or fish and chips served in a newspaper cone -- creative elements that will build some buzz.

Breakfast can be tweakedPlanners looking to cut costs often target the morning meal. For small meetings, instead of giving each gathering a room and breakfast setup of its own, Loews Hotels has begun opening up its dinner restaurants to house a handful of groups at once in the morning. A single buffet serves everyone, which saves on labor, space and food costs -- and guests get the experience of eating in the beautiful restaurant setting.

ASE Group Inc., an independent planning firm based in Overland Park, Kan., has been able to save clients money by offering brunch. Coffee and pastries are served in the morning, and then at 10:30 or 11:00, a hearty brunch replaces breakfast and lunch. For groups that want breakfast, ASE's vice president, Marissa Schaffner, CMP, advises doing a continental spread plus just one hot item, which saves considerably over a full buffet.

Some meetings are dispensing with breakfast entirely. Mariano Stellner,  Fairmont's San Francisco-based corporate director of food and beverage, notes that the standard meal progression used to be breakfast, break, lunch, break, dinner, but nowadays, planners are requesting an a.m. break table that stays out all morning and has enough food to satisfy those who didn't eat breakfast.

Barbara Ketcham, senior consultant of hotel operations for America's Health Insurance Plans, based in Washington, D.C., has obviated the need for breakfast by moving the meeting's start time later. She makes it clear in conference materials that breakfast will not be served, and she leaves a coffee break out for the constant flow of attendees in the public areas. (For more on how Ketcham has cut costs, see "Saving Money on F&B" at left.)

Vegan Showstopper

Boston-based Ceres is a national network of investors, environmental organizations and other public interest groups that work with companies to help them become environmentally and socially responsible. No surprise, then, that its own conferences are on the cutting edge of sustainability, as proven in 2008.

For a lunch at the Renaissance Boston Waterfront Hotel, Marilyn Castriotta, conference and events manager, planned a strictly vegan meal: no meat, no dairy, no eggs. On the menu was an appetizer of Bibb lettuce and spring vegetables with lemon-basil vinaigrette, followed by an entree of soft garlic polenta, braised Tuscan kale, white beans and tomato fondue. For dessert: toasted coconut sticky rice with fresh mango.

The meal, a great success, was a major factor in Ceres' decision to book the hotel again for 2010.

 

Easier prep is better Because much of the cost of a meal comes from the labor required to make it, frugal planners choose foods that don't require extra sauces, individual preparation or careful plating. For example, the Loews Coronado Bay Resort in San Diego recently served paella for 500: A huge mound of the rice dish was carted into the dining room on a stunning 8-foot pan. Attendees lined up, and a chef customized each scoop depending on which items -- chicken, shrimp, mussels, sausage or fish -- the attendee favored. Also, because the dish left out pricey seafoods like lobster and scallops, it was relatively inexpensive to make.

Desserts, too, are moving toward treats that can be made en masse and plated quickly, like rice pudding. "If it takes six hours to make, there'll be a high cost involved," chef Griffie explains.

Meals can allow for mingling Planners and attendees alike want to get more bang for their buck. "We're hearing, 'Don't offer me a big buffet where it takes forever to get through the line. Instead, offer me something that allows attendees to network,' " says Mariano Stellner. Fairmont is responding to that request with grab-and-go tapas-style lunches, made with inexpensive but tasty food.

Nelson has noticed that planners are replacing all but the final-night dinner with receptions. "It's not necessarily less expensive," he says. "I think it's an experience issue. People want things to be much more casual." In fact, that drive toward the casual sometimes means a food presence in the registration area, to get people mingling right from the start.

Along the same lines, John Vingas sees lunches and dinners held in the exhibit hall -- perhaps the ultimate way of pleasing exhibitors.

Some events cut dinner entirely. ASE Group handles meetings that might offer just drinks for an hour or 90 minutes before sending folks off to dine on their own. "It gives vendors a chance to take attendees out," notes Marissa Schaffner.

Décor is going organic Table settings are getting less expensive, too. "Specialty linens and pin tucks have gone away," Zeigler says. "Poly-cotton now is just fine." Zeigler has been doing low-cost candlescapes instead of florals. And a colored napkin might give the table enough panache to skip the charger.

From Nelson's perspective, anything flashy has quickly gone out of vogue. For example, underlit Lucite tables are disappearing in favor of an organic look: linenless farmhouse tables and, as he puts it, "more wood and bamboo and living and breathing things." These items aren't necessarily less expensive but give off an air of simplicity and goodness -- just what we need when times are tough.

Now serving: food with a story One of the major effects of the green movement is that people now like to know where their food came from. "There are more locally sourced items that have a story and involve little culinary manipulation," says Nelson. If the cheese plate of the past was a huge mirror loaded with diced varieties, this year's plate is a smaller cutting board with local artisanal cheeses and signage that tells a little about each.

Loews Hotels takes this one step further, with an Adopt-a-Farmer program. Meeting breaks use foods from specific local farms -- for example, a Florida citrus break at the Loews Royal Pacific Resort at Universal Orlando, or a smoothie break with local yogurt at the Loews Regency Hotel in New York City -- and include a map of where the farms are, in case attendees want to stay an extra day to visit them. Through this program, Loews supports 136 farms to date.

In Tucson, Ariz., the 104-room Lodge on the Desert recently reopened its restaurant with a "farm-to-table" concept. "We start with the freshest products and ingredients, most locally grown and locally sourced," says chef Ryan Clark. "And we believe our guests have a right to know the source of the food they are enjoying as well as the methods used to prepare it. Our role is to facilitate the food's journey from farm to fork."

Vegetarian is viable Vegans, who once had to settle for the meat plate minus the meat, finally are getting their due. Hotels are designing creative vegetarian entrées that appeal even to carnivores. At the Renaissance Boston Waterfront, for example, Griffie's braised fall vegetables in red wine replicates the richness of the classic beef bourguignon. He says about one-third of meeting planners have selected a vegetarian dish when offering a choice of two entrées, and about half have included one among a choice of three.

In the two years since the hotel opened, Griffie has even served completely vegetarian and vegan meals a few times (see "Vegan Showstopper" at left). Ditching the meat entirely lessens a meal's carbon footprint and also can cost significantly less.

"You're not eating rice and beans the entire time," Griffie notes. "You can add some very exciting items to your menu with unusual seasonings that might not be in the American palate."

Waste can be winnowed A banquet can produce a staggering amount of waste. To ease the problem at receptions, F&B departments are serving smaller quantities that are replenished more frequently. That also saves money and keeps the food fresher.

Then there's the question of disposable plates, flatware and cups, when it's not possible to opt for reusable goods. Centerplate has substituted compostable tableware for disposables, but such items are worthless if they're thrown into the landfill; the company also is working on finding nearby composting facilities for all of its convention centers and, where such facilities don't exist, doing the composting on-site.