Wedding caterers in Bengaluru

What a plate costs depends on the meal and who cooks it:

Non-veg costs a little more. Bhandary's Kitchen's simplest non-veg buffet is ₹500 a plate against ₹400 for veg. At 200 guests, Nandhini Deluxe's non-veg starts about ₹150 a plate above its veg.

A bigger wedding doesn't get a cheaper plate at Bhandary's Kitchen: its price is the same at any count, from 50 guests. Ask the others whether more guests bring their price down.

Cheaper than any of these is your own cook with groceries you buy and vessels you hire, a neighbourhood caterer someone in the family has used, or the cooks a temple or mutt hall works with. We couldn't find a published price for any of them. Ask the cook for his fee as one number, and for a list of the groceries and vessels for your count, then price those yourself.

The families who wrote to us asked for a breakfast at ₹120 a plate, a leaf lunch at ₹300 to ₹400, and a non-veg reception with two live counters at ₹1,000 to ₹1,200. Below ₹200 for breakfast or ₹350 for lunch, ask what's left out: fewer dishes, or servers and the leaf charged apart.

Ask about food the day you book the hall. The hall's caterer rule decides whether you get to choose a caterer at all.

The tax differs too. One hall that sells its own food adds 18% GST to it. A caterer cooking at your venue adds 5%. On ₹2.4 lakh of food that's about ₹31,000 more in tax at 18%, by our sum, before you compare the plate prices themselves.

We couldn't find enough hall prices to say whether a hall's own caterer usually costs more than bringing your own.

Dish count alone doesn't set the price. At Bhandary's Kitchen, ₹200 more a plate buys five more dishes: 23 at ₹400, 28 at ₹600. A premium leaf can carry about the same number. The extra goes on costlier dishes, food planned with you, and enough servers that the last row isn't kept waiting.

Who works the modest way here: Bhandary's Kitchen, from a printed menu by tier. Its leaf meal is ₹350 a plate and its Mahurtham lunch ₹400, ₹500 or ₹600. None of the caterers named here serves a premium leaf lunch.

Taste before you pay for the top end (question 7), and compare what each price covers (question 4).

The same kind of plate covers different things at two caterers:

A worked bill. At Bhandary's Kitchen's printed rates, GST and transport add ₹18,000 to a reception for 400:

Other extras some caterers charge: water cans, extra sweets, a generator, a lift, and service after 10:30 pm. Karnataka bans plastic plates and cups at functions, so ask whether you get a leaf, steel or another reusable plate, and whether that costs extra.

Don't take a lower price for cash with no bill. Without a bill you have nothing on paper to show what was agreed if the food or the count goes wrong.

The food running out before the last batch eats is what the extra cooking is for. If you book the number you're surest of, the extra food feeds the first few guests over it. Most caterers bill any extra plates afterwards.

Ask who else is in the count. Cooks, drivers, the photographers, the band and the hall staff all eat. Ask whether their meals count toward your number.

Ask who counts on the day, and name one person in the family to agree the count with the caterer at the end. You'll be too busy to do it yourself.

Moving the date. At Authana, a late move loses the 25%, because its staff are booked for your date. Ask what counts as late. Ask every caterer for its terms for moving the date, in writing.

Ask what happens between the deadlines. At Bhandary's Kitchen, for example, ask what you'd get back if you cancel after the 75% is paid.

Your date isn't held until you pay the token.

Taste it at a real event. One family who wrote to us asked to taste the food at an event the caterer was already serving. It shows you the food as guests get it, after hours in the vessels.

Ask for a video of a full service, not only close-ups of dishes. The video below is a leaf lunch at a wedding, served the way it should be.

Ask who will cook and who will run the service. The person you meet may not be the cook. At Authana Caterers, one of the two owners leads each event.

Ask for a tasting. Authana Caterers offers one before a wedding order. Nandhini Deluxe serves a half-portion of the menu at one of its restaurants, and Swaad holds trial meals for events of over 200 guests. Ask whether there's a fee.

Speak to a family they fed. Ask for one or two recent wedding clients and call them. Before a caterer gets mytribe's tribe-approved badge, we call their past clients too, including about what went wrong.

One caterer or two. A second caterer means a second minimum (Authana's is 100 plates a meal), a second transport bill, and two teams to manage. If you split, give one person in the family charge of both on the day.

"Are the cooks Brahmin?" is a normal question for a muhurtham caterer. Ask it on the first call.

For a community menu, such as a Kerala sadya, Iyengar, Chettinad, Marwari or Bengali food, ask any caterer for a menu they've served at a wedding of that community, and whether the head cook is from it.