Tulips and Maple

I was invited to Tulips and Maple’s «Spring Catertaining Showcase Event» that took place last night at their Merivale Road office/​kitchen/​event space. You guys, I’m telling you, these people are genius.
They call what they do «Catertaining» and I think it’s apt, if a little dorky, to call it that. Their food is not only incredibly delicious, but also nothing but fun.
We walked in to a very friendly, genuine greeting from Kristine, who owns the business with her chef husband Mark. We were directed to a giant chalkboard where we were to make our own cocktails. Genius. There was a mixologist on hand to fill a small glass with either non-​alcoholic peach iced tea or alcoholic lemonade. Then you could put different flavoured syrups in, (I tried rosemary syrup and mint syrup in my peach iced tea), and then you chose garnishes to drop in as well, (like alcohol-​infused fruit jellies, or fresh fruit. I dropped two little blueberries in mine). All the garnishes and syrups were attached to the chalkboard, so it was all well organized and prettily labelled with different coloured chalk. I kind of have a thing for chalkboards and the temporary art you can make on them. Seriously. I painted my entire kitchen with black chalkboard paint for this very reason.
I can’t get over the creative ideas these people have come up with. When we walked into the main room, there was a long table in the centre of the room covered in wheatgrass. Resting on the grass were these plastic balls. Inside the balls were salads! They called the station «Bubble Salad». I chose the caesar and my sister grabbed the mixed green with seared tuna. I know it was just caesar salad, but it was VERY clear that everything was fresh and the dressing was a special recipe thought up on site (I would expect nothing less, of course). It tasted so fresh and light, and popping open that ball to eat it was super cute and added some whimsy to salad. I mean, whimsical salad? You guys!
We then moved on to something they called «Fooze». There were two different cocktails with little meat pieces on top. I tried the caesar with a crispy piece of bacon laying aross the top of the glass. I should tell you, I’m a bit of a caesar snob. The ratio of spice to beverage needs to be just so. This was SPOT ON. Spot on! AND the glass was rimmed with garlic infused crunchy breadcrumbs. Perfection.
Servers walking around handed us watermelon chili shots with a skewer holding a cube of feta. It was spicy, and sweet, and incredible. I could probably eat a whole bowl of that stuff.
In the kitchen they had a station that smelled smokey-​sweet. A cook was creating smoked salmon on top of spaetzle noodles with some sort of yellow sauce on top. The fun was in the presentation, though. They were on tiny plates with a wine glass covering the food. You could plainly see there was smoke in the glass. They were like swirly crystal balls of deliciousness, (and I don’t even like smoked salmon.) We were directed to lift the glass, smell the smoke inside, and then take a bite. I thought about telling the cook I was probably in love with him, but thought better of it. Sigh… what could have been…
There was another room with two boards with wooden spoons sticking out of them. There were rows of little bite size apps on the spoons. Honestly, I think the presentation was inventive, but it looked a bit messy for my liking, and nothing on those spoons was overly delightful for me. My sister was very into her little chicken roll wrapped in some sort of leaf with tarragon pearls, but I guess it wasn’t for me. Other things in that room were platters of Canadian and Italian meats, olives and pickled onions. Fairly regular, nothing to write home about in there. Except maybe the cheese baguette. I think it was parmesan in the bread, but it was dense and crunchy and I’m sure I could eat a whole loaf of it if I wasn’t trying to squeeze into a wedding dress in 2 months.
Our parting gift was a little purple chinese take-​out box with a straw sticking out of it. Inside there was a lemon, a little bag of mint infused sugar, a little bottle of Smirnoff vodka and instructions on how to make «Tulips and Maple Lemonade» out of it all. SO cute and SO delightful! I can’t wait to get home tonight and try it out.
All in all it was a perfectly wonderful experience, even with the creepy juggler they had hired to entertain us. (Pretty sure he had a crush on my sister or something. She’s apparently not impressed by carnival tricks.) It’s no wonder this company is being touted as Ottawa’s best caterers. I hope to one day have the cash to hire them, or the friends to invite me to an event they’re catering.