Simmer Down Catering

We are so glad that we decided on Simmer Down Catering for our wedding! Janon and Jamison were so amazing from beginning to end. Plus, the food was INCREDIBLE! Southern-​style cooking with fresh, local northwest ingredients. Delish! Here was our experience from beginning to end:
TASTING: We scheduled a tasting with Janon at their shared kitchen space in Portland. There were four of us: my parents, my fiancé, and me. They had a table set up in the back with a white table cloth, herbal iced tea, and a full set up. We started with bacon-​wrapped dates and cheese stuffed endive leaves. We were ready to hire them after the appetizer — that’s how good the bacon wrapped dates were. They were stuffed with almonds and rosemary or something — just incredible. But, we weren’t done yet. Janon fed us an entire meal during our tasting, complete with salad, sides, and entrees. We couldn’t believe how much food there was! And everything was incredible. They’re a pretty small family-​owned business, so we were a little worried that they wouldn’t be able to accommodate our massive 200+ person wedding. But, Janon said it wouldn’t be a problem and we said «you’re hired!» Janon was also great about explaining their cancellation policy, why they do it that way, pricing, when they would need guest numbers, etc. She was with us for probably two hours between the tasting and answering our million questions and she didn’t rush us along at all. We felt very well taken care of.
COMMUNICATION: Janon’s policy is that she will respond to your emails in two days or less and she stuck to this policy throughout the process. We had about a year between when we booked Simmer Down and our wedding and we ended up changing our order and asking her questions several times during that period. Janon was always on her game — responding to emails fully and quickly. This is so important when you’re planning a big event!
WEDDING: The food was AMAZING! We had bacon wrapped dates (duh), cheese stuffed endive leaves, and caprese skewers for appetizers (passed); garden salad, mac and cheese, roasted vegetables, and cauliflower farro salad as sides, and flank steak with chimichurry and chicken breast with bruschetta as the main dishes. Everything was buffet style. And they were so quick, professional, and out-​of-​sight about the whole thing. Seriously, as the bride I barely even saw them, except when Janon brought us a take-​home container full of appetizers in case we didn’t get any. So sweet! They came in, set up, and served amazing food — everything was so smooth! And, we got so many compliments from guests on the food! (I’ll attach photos as soon as I get them back from the photographer).
Another thing: We had glass water bottles on the tables at the wedding, which were empty by the time the caterers were packing up (our wedding was in August and guests were thirsty!). Janon and Jamison noticed this and left behind their beverage dispensers full of ice water, herbal iced tea, and iced coffee to make sure our guests stayed hydrated. I definitely drank some of that iced tea and so did many others. This is not something that they had to do, but they were thinking ahead and made sure to take care of our guests. We really appreciated them going above and beyond!
Honestly, we are just so happy that we went with Simmer Down. We didn’t know much about them when we booked them (really just the Unilocal reviews), but we had a good feeling after meeting with Janon and were totally sold on the food. We highly recommend them for your wedding or event!

I had the pleasure of hiring Simmer Down Catering for a work event. Not only were they professional, über friendly and flexible to our needs. The food was outstanding, succulent pulled pork, tender shredded chicken with the perfect seasoning. We were impressed and look forward to catering with them again.

I had the great pleasure of working with the outstanding folks at Simmer Down catering for a corporate event I hosted. They made our event exceptional with their succulent pulled pork and perfectly shredded chicken offerings. Employees are still talking about them. The owners are extremely friendly and accommodating. They know and support local businesses to provide the freshest ingredients. They also share ideas that help even those new at planning events look like pros. 2 big thumbs up.

Simmer Down has great staff, always friendly and upbeat. Their food was delicious! I liked it so much I went home and made their jambalaya thatwas on their website. Everybody raved about that as well. *HIGHLY recommend them for your next family function, work anniversary party, or whatever your need is*

We signed a contract with Simmer Down, once that paperwork was signed — our cares and concerns were dismissed by the owner, with a reoccurring theme of «more money, more money, more money» to take care of your concerns.
Biggest concern: lack of reviews, especially recent reviews. We met with the owner and her sister. They seemed like the nicest people you could ever meet — in listening to her stories of catering, cooking, and her previous work in las vegas as an events manager — how could she go wrong, right?
So why is this the biggest concern? Simmer down wanted a very hefty «tasting fee» to sample their offerings. If the only reviews they are receiving are from another wedding vendor company who they traded reviews with and a charity event over 2 years ago — something must be wrong. If they have you sign a $ 4000+ contract and can’t offer you a small sample of what you’re paying for — something must be wrong. Their excuse for the fee is that they planned on spending $ 75 – 200 on supplies to create our «tasting» — well if they have been doing this for multiple years, and if they have any level of steady business — it’s quite easy to schedule a tasting into the tail end of prep for any other one of their events which would almost wholly eliminate the expense they kept telling us they had to charge us for.
Second concern: They don’t own their own «kitchen”/prep space/​etc — the way it was described to us made it sound like there is a shared commercial kitchen in downtown portland that they use — but since they don’t own it — their schedule is limited, and it adds to their «costs» because they are renting out the kitchen time — which goes back to why the tasting fee is so hefty.
Why is this a concern? We are only getting married once — I don’t want any wedding day nightmares because of the possibility of a shared kitchen mishap — Simmer Down has no control over broken equipment, mis-​scheduling, lack of room to store any prepped food overnight, etc etc since they don’t own their own facility.
Third concern: Our wedding will be in Wilsonville. Their rented kitchen is in downtown portland. When multiple guests suggested that we should not be paying $ 4000++ for food to sit in the back of a truck and either get overcooked during such a long drive, or for food that would have to be undercooked and then hopefully sitting in a warming dish for that long of a drive would get it to the proper temp/​doneness/​etc — we voiced this concern to Simmer Down and that is when the «more money, more money, more money» responses started.
In summary, in case you didn’t feel like reading all of this — our experience was ‘Want to taste what we do? Pay a hefty fee’, ‘Don’t like our cooking & handling plan? Pay a bunch more’, ‘Don’t want to pay more? Well that’s fine, we will be keeping a bunch of your many anyway because you signed the contract’, ‘You gave us over 3 months cancellation notice, we don’t care, we are still keeping your money’.

Amazing food! I give them five stars.

I have to start this by saying I have never hired a caterer before, so I have nothing to compare them to.
We hired Janon and her husband to provide some hot appetizers for our recent wedding reception and I have to say, I am glad I did.
The pulled pork sliders were divine, the coleslaw a delight and the deviled eggs with bacon flew off off the plate. I kid you not, we had to put some of them under guard to ensure the bride got her fair share. We had contracted for service for 30 and what we received could have easily fed 40 or more. Their attention to detail and presentation was superb.
The most striking thing about our experience though was their eagerness to please and their passion. There was fantastic communication throughout the process, keeping us apprised of every detail.
I love to cook and usually do my own when we get together with friends, but, my experience with Simmer Down left me feeling that it would be more then OK to take it easy and let them do all the work.