Caterer pivots to home-delivered meals
Kathleen Watson, chef/proprietor of Cuisine Kathleen in Lexington, is shown in the commercial kitchen where she cooks for catering jobs and, more recently, home-delivered meals. {Contributed photo/Larry Watson}
When the pandemic put most people on stay-at-home orders in March 2020, Kathleen Watson, chef/ proprietor of Cuisine Kathleen, quickly pivoted from catering jobs for special events to home-delivered meals.
Once Watson determined she was considered an essential worker, she sent out an email blast to some of her former catering customers to determine if there was enough interest for the service.
“I had always thought about a delivery service,” she recalled. “Something in my gut just told me to move forward. I was pleasantly surprised at the response,”
Roasted salmon with a lemon-dill sauce is a healthy option for customers. {Contributed photo}
Initially, she started her home-delivery food service with 25 customers. But that grew to an average of 60 homes at the height of the pandemic during the winter and before vaccines were more widely available this past spring. She is currently averaging about 40 dinner customers of the three days she offers the service.
Watson delivers dinners Monday, Wednesday and Friday between 5:00 p.m. and 6:00 p.m. The food, packed in recyclable and microwavable containers, is placed in coolers clients leave on their porches. There are several payment options.
Her client base tends to be older, with many singles and couples as her regulars. She has two delivery routes: the Lexington Country Club area and the Northside and Sapona Country Club areas.
“Many people have told me what a difference the service has made for them during Covid and I’m really humbled by that,” she explained. “But it was a way for my business to survive, too. We really helped each other. I think we’re too involved in the community now to drop our service, especially for our older customers. In fact, I’d love to expand if I could get more families in clusters of neighborhoods out in the county, such as the Central and West areas, to make it worth our while.”
Watson said launching a new business offering during a pandemic was difficult, at times. She was initially taking orders on yellow legal pads, doing all the administrative work and cooking. Soon, she enlisted the help of Austin Bell, the son of friends who happens to be “a computer wizard,” and established an online ordering system. She also got longtime caterer and mentor Tricia Jenkins, from whom she leases her commercial kitchen space, to help cook with her in the kitchen.
“I am fortunate to have a team of loyal, hard-working women and guys,” she added. “It was such an unknown time but we felt like we were doing our part to make life somewhat normal for people — and it was actually fun. We were offering dishes we knew people liked from the catering business. But we were also trying out new recipes we hadn’t been able to do.”
Chicken piccata over angel hair pasta with a garlic knot and broccoli is a popular home-delivered meal. {Contributed photo}
Menu items for the three evening meals changes weekly but includes one composed entrée of a protein and side dishes each night and a la carte items such as dinner salads, sandwiches and desserts.
The chef said some of the more popular entrées that she rotates routinely include fried chicken (cooked in a pressure fryer), chicken piccata over angel hair pasta, roasted salmon, meatloaf and shrimp and grits. With the warmer weather, she recently started offering a trio of salads that can serve as an entrée or be saved for lunch the next day.
Watson said if there were enough interest from younger families, she would also consider offering family-style meals instead of individual entrees only. She noted she still sells her signature pans of lasagna Bolognese, made with homemade spinach noodles, in varying sizes that can feed a whole family. During Thanksgiving and Christmas, as well as other holidays, she also sells family-size holiday favorites.
The catering business is starting to come back, Watson stated, as more people are fully vaccinated and restrictions on gatherings have been eased. Soon, she will be catering two fundraising events for local nonprofits and has several weddings on the calendar in September and October. Many of those weddings rescheduled from last year. She catered a local prom event, that parents organized this past spring, and has been getting back to catering for wedding and baby showers, rehearsal dinners, birthday parties and corporate events.
“In my four years of catering, this has been the busiest I’ve been in June and July,” she said, noting the summer is typically slow. “We’re getting back to five or six events a month for catering.”
Even though the catering side of the business is gradually returning, Watson said she hopes to expand the home-delivered meal service. She said she’s already thinking of recipes for the cooler weather such as hearty stews, including the French-style beef bourguignon, and a customer favorite, short rib ravioli in mushroom sauce.
For more information on the home-delivered meal service and to see weekly menus go to cuisinekathleencatering.com.
