Change in Food Serving Styles During Marriages

Indian weddings, especially the South Indian weddings, are not complete without serving sumptuous food, to the invited guests. On completing the  nichayathartham or betrothal function, the first thing that comes to the mind of both the bride and groom’s families, is fixing of a decent wedding hall and employing the services of a good wedding planner, for wedding and catering arrangements.

The food served during a marriage, plays a vital role in making the marriage memorable. It is always advisable to avail the services of an experienced wedding planner like Athithi, to serve the purpose. Such high end wedding planners, normally, will never come with pre-conceived ideas, instead, they will make an open-ended approach with their suggestions, to improve the expressed ideas of the client.

During the yesteryears, only sit-down and eat on plantain leaf or plate menu option was available. The ever changing lifestyles, have necessitated the introduction of a range of eating patterns and menu options. The most sought after eating styles include, Live Food Counters, Buffet arrangement and sit down and eat on plantain leaf or plate facility.

Live Food Counters

The Live Food Counters are the latest addition to the food serving style. The arrangement, will have a number of Live Food Counters, each catering to a particular variety of food items. The limited food items, are prepared fresh before the eyes of the guest and served hot. Some of the food items, served in the Live Food Counters include, chat items, Dosa & Vada items, specialist food items from Bengal, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Punjabi, Mughalai, Marwadi, Kashmiri and others. Such food counters function during the tiffin, lunch and dinner timings.

Buffet arrangement

Buffet style of dining has more or less become a norm, for the  evening reception in marriages. This self service or assisted service eating facility, either have all the food items set up in rows over a table or in smaller sized cubical arrangements, each serving a particular type of food item.

Normally, buffet style serving is arranged in roomy places, to facilitate easy movement of guests. The facility, enables the guests to eat food items of their choice, while enjoying a chat or discussion with their family or friends.  The buffet style arrangement will have starters, other food items and desserts, to complete the food course.

The variety of dishes served at buffets, allows the guests to taste a range of dishes and indulge in feasting the items of their choice. The arrangement, adequately meets the requirements of those guests who enjoy eating, as well as those who are on a diet and eat less. The arrangement, enables serving more variety of food items.

AthithicateringTable arrangement

This traditional style of food serving is still valued as the best. The food is served in a pre-determined order, over a plantain leaf or plate, kept before the seated guests. The arrangement, allows the guests to taste all the food varieties served and request second serving on items of their liking. When compared to buffet arrangement, the sit down and eat facility allows serving only a limited variety of food.

Conclusion

The change in societal outlook, lifestyle, national and international level contacts, have necessitated the changes in food serving methods, during a wedding. Presently, the bigger wealthy weddings, observe comparatively increased level of rituals and enjoy more guest participation. Such weddings participated by national and international guests follow their own customized type of food serving styles and arrangements to suit the tastes and interests of the invited guests.