AUBCC Blog: Creative Catering That Turns Events Into Experiences
Gone are the days when event catering meant a predictable spread of chafing dishes and a sad tray of cookies. Today's most memorable events treat food and drink as part of the show, something guests will want talk about, photograph, and remember long after the last course is cleared. That shift is exactly what our in-house catering partner, Sodexo Live!, brings to every event that comes through our doors.
The in-house culinary team designs around the personality of each event: the theme, the audience, the time of day, even the setup of the room.
That might mean building a themed food station instead of a plated dinner, choreographing a live-action chef demo in the middle of a reception, or reworking a classic dish into something guests haven't seen before. The goal is to make the food part of the story your event is telling, not just the fuel that keeps people going.
Every great event runs on caffeine, and our on-site coffee shop, Complex Brew, treats that seriously. It's not a fallback drip-coffee station, it's a proper coffee bar, with baristas crafting espresso drinks, seasonal specialty beverages, and grab-and-go options tailored to the pace of your event. Whether attendees need a quick pick-me-up between sessions or want a slower coffee-break moment to network, the coffee shop flexes to match the rhythm of the day.
Recently, that innovative spirit was on full display at the CEESE (Council of Engineering and Scientific Society Executives) Annual Meeting reception, where catering became genuinely interactive. The lettuce wall turned a simple salad course into a live, edible display where guests built their own salads directly from a vertical wall of fresh greens and toppings, making the experience visual, social, and a little bit playful. A chemistry station leaned into food as spectacle, using science-inspired techniques (think smoking cocktails, liquid nitrogen effects, or molecular presentations) to turn food into a mini performance, giving guests something to gather around and talk about.
Creativity in the kitchen goes hand in hand with responsibility, and that's baked into how Sodexo Live! sources and serves. The team follows a set of sustainability commitments that include fully biodegradable food-service items, a pledge to source a portion of ingredients from local vendors and farmers, composting of food waste, and donation of surplus food to local food banks.