When catering to the Hamptons ‘elite’ blows up in your face. Lessons about what you bring to the table.
I don’t cater. I don’t privately cook. I haven’t since graduate school, more than 20 years ago. I am a Culinary Nutritionist—practitioner, author, educator and consultant. Yet people assume that I cater and privately cook. I can, but it’s not where I focus my time—only on rare occasions.
Several summers ago, my Hamptons neighbor asked if I could cater for a “friend.” I agreed—the timing was right, the pay was solid, and helping my neighbor felt like the right thing to do. The gig turned out to be a last-minute farm-to-table dinner for 25—and the “friend” was the daughter-in-law of a well-known entertainment mogul. I enlisted my teenage son, and together we menu-planned, shopped and made our way to their tucked-away estate off East Hampton’s main street.
Knowing your way around the kitchen
Having graduated from culinary school in the 1990s, I know restaurant and catering kitchens inside and out. While earning my master’s, I spent countless hours in public and private school cafeterias, as well as some of the most extraordinary homes across New York City and beyond. I’ve worn the apron, done the work and know what it takes to make the impossible possible. Yes, I’ve endured condescension before, but never had I been treated as if my skill, effort and humanity were irrelevant—as if I were nothing more than “the help.” Until then.
Bang! The night the stove exploded
As the guests settled in, my son and I worked the Garland stove when suddenly—BANG! The shotgun explosion shook us and the room. Silence followed. The stove had blown. My son burst into tears. I held him close, caring only about his safety, not the dinner. As we later learned, a clogged gas line from years of neglect could have nearly killed us.
But the show had to go on. At least for them. Only one person asked if we were all right. Not the woman who had hired me. She needed the performance, the illusion of effortless abundance. I urged my son to sit down while I salvaged the meal on the grill.
What side of the table are you on
Later, she quibbled over the cost of the ingredients and my agreed-upon rate. Her dismissiveness, lack of decency and sense of entitlement were astounding. The irony? Her father-in-law’s fortune may well have benefited from my grandfather, a prominent entertainment accountant. I grew up on her side of the serving tray—the “right side.”
But it’s the “wrong side” that has been my greatest teacher—of humanity, humility, gratitude and kindness.
What’s in a title if you have no decency?
That night left a mark on me and my impressionable son—not because of the explosion, but because of what it revealed. In the Hamptons, wealth and status—frequently inherited—come with a license to entitlement. Titles, pedigrees and fortunes are all fragile illusions if they strip us of decency.
What matters most is never where you sit at the table, but how you treat the people beside you.
To learn more about Stefanie and her work, visit wtfork.com.
