Wedding Caterer #3- Agate Alley Laboratory

There is this great restaurant in south Eugene that is Douglas and I's go-to for date nights, called Agate Alley Laboratory.  The restaurant is the perfect mix of casual but classy and as the name would suggest, has a subtle science-y theme.  When you walk in you see test tube and other glassware, molecule art on the walls {like we have at home!}, and delicious science-themed cocktails {Douglas' favorite is called the Absinthe Minded Professor}.  For two nerds like us, it is a really fun restaurant to eat at, and the food is absolutely delicious.

I met with Dug, the owner of the restaurant at the Eugene bridal show last January.  Douglas and I had eaten at the Lab restaurant several times, but it was surprising to see that they are starting to break into the wedding catering business.  I began to chat with Toni the catering manager and we decided on a menu to try to see if that was the kind of style we'd like at our wedding.

Douglas and I went yesterday for the official tasting, and it was a good thing we came hungry!  Dug and Toni sat with us discussing the food as we got to try lots of different kinds.  The first dishes that the chef brought out to us were two appetizers: filo-wrapped baked brie with cranberry compote and apples, and a brochette with roasted red peppers, panchetta, pesto, and mozzarella.

Baked brie

Brochette

These were both so incredibly delicious, it was hard to pick which we liked better.  We would be picking one of these to serve with a fruit and cheese platter, as well as a vegetable platter, so we would have to narrow it down.  Ultimately we decided we liked the brochette better because it's more portable {the baked brie was a little difficult to eat; entirely worth the effort, but might be difficult as an appetizer for our guests} and we would be having brie cheese in the fruit and cheese platter.  But OH how delicious these things were.  Looking at these pictures makes me want to eat them all over again.

The second course they brought out to us were two salads: a spring salad with champagne truffle vinaigrette and a caesar salad with egg.

Spring salad

Caesar

At this one, we were really torn about which we would pick.  The spring salad has delicious cranberries and pine nuts with a really refreshing dressing which is perfect for a late summer dinner.  But caesar salad is just so darn tasty {especially with the egg and the cheese crouton like thing on top}.  Toni was such an awesome host, she suggested that we could serve the salads family style and bring a bowl of each to each table and guests can kind of pick which one they want {or have both!}.  I thought that was a really neat idea if we can't decide which one we would want to have. 

Then the chef began to bring us out half portions of three entrees that we chose to taste.  The first was a crusted salmon with a yellow pepper coulis, potatoes and veggies.

The salmon {half portion}

I have honestly never had a piece of fish I enjoyed so much in my life as this one right here.  Oh my god.  The sauce on the side was a little sweet and peppery which balanced the fish and the potatoes really nicely.  Also, I never heard of having whipped potatoes with salmon before, but it worked so perfectly together- you have to trust us on that one.  Beautiful, simple and clean presentation.  I will go back to this restaurant and order this meal.  Hands down one of the tastiest things I've ever eaten.  Douglas hated his so much, he had to clean the plate to avoid having to stare at it ;-)

The second entree they brought to us was a NY steak with mushrooms, garlic mashed potatoes, grilled asparagus, and a little bit of blue cheese crumble.  To be perfectly honest, I was in just a food heaven that I completely forgot to take a picture and just dove right in!  It looked something like this:

I stole this picture from Google. 

The one we had did not have a sauce with it, but honestly it didn't need it.  It was juicy and went perfectly with the sides.  If you're a meat and potatoes kind of person, this is the dish for you.  But it also had that little extra something-something that made it special, with the mushrooms and blue cheese crumbles.  So delicious. 

The third entree they brought to us was one that we knew we didn't want to have at our wedding, but they offered us to try three entrees so we picked it.  It was a lamb dish with roasted red and yellow peppers over mashed potatoes.

Lamb

Looked pretty, but really not my cup of tea.  I really don't like sauces that are very tomato paste-y, which is just a personal preference thing.  But it was fun to try it.

So the food is everything we would hope to have at our wedding.  We discussed how it could be served {buffet appetizers, family-style salads, plated entree} and with delicious drinks like lavender lemonade {yum!}.  The food is the exact style we like and is a little fancy without being overwhelming.  All the flavors balance nicely together and its just a good, hearty meal that will look very pretty. 

At this point, this food would be on the upper end of our budget so we are not sure how affordable it will be once Toni crunches the numbers and gives us a proposal bid.  That's kind of the price you pay for having a restaurant who does catering versus an actual catering company.  Additionally, there is a little faith that we would have to have because the company hasn't been catering {specifically} weddings for very long.  I'm sure they have served other groups of 65 people, but then again you always have to take a leap of faith when you're trusting someone to take care of something so important.  So now it's hard to say whether or not this will be our caterer until we see an estimate for how much it's going to cost, but Douglas and I are huge fans of all the things this restaurant does, and we hope that we can make everything work out!

And as Agate Alley Laboratory likes to say, we would love to show our guests "experiments in culinary excellence".

<3 J