Alright! I’ll (try to) keep this short! Remember my post about our food tasting experience with them?
Read: Queensland Catering Food Tasting Experience
I was so worried that they would mess up my wedding by forgetting a lot of details, bringing spoiling food, and stressing me out with extra charges. But hey, NONE OF IT HAPPENED.
Our package
We chose the Emerald package, second cheapest at ₱465/head. We got it because the package includes fruits, vegetables, and hot coffee and tea (ie. lola favorites). Additional things we got: stage upgrade and the bottomless iced tea upgrade.
As I mentioned before, Queensland’s wedding packages are at the bare minimum. Which is perfect if all you really wanted is a caterer. They don’t have a cake, bridal car, emcee, souvenirs, and whatnots but they would refer you to other suppliers if you asked. We were concerned at first, how could a wedding package be this incomplete? But eventually we shrugged it off and went busy looking for other suppliers lol. No actually, I kept ranting about it to my then-fiance-now-husband-lol for about a month before we realized it’s actually for the best haha.
We got a separate supplier for the tiffany chairs because their chair upgrade is 100/chair and masyadong mahal haha. Thankfully we found a supplier that rents tiffanies at 60/chair so pak, we got them (shout out to Eventials Manila). We still kept the regular monobloc chairs that’s included in the package and had them arranged at the garden ceremony area instead. Yey to no waste.
But reaaaally, I would’ve rented additional tiffanies for the ceremony and scrapped the monobloc chairs but oh well, budget constraints!
The Food
Everything was delicious! I wasn’t really able to check which foods were present, but I don’t care. None of our guests complained naman. They were even raving about it. Yehey! There was no shortage too, we were able to take home a couple of containers for leftovers pa. Good job. I mean, we paid for 180 guests and only 141 came so dapat lang naman na may sobra haha.
Here’s our (annotated) menu by the way:
- Plain rice – yeah
- Crostinis with pesto and herbed tomato – aka oversized bread pan and some dips
- Cream of pumpkin soup – SOO GOOOD
- Buttered vegetables – didn’t get the chance to try this
- Spaghetti with two sauces – I love love love thiiiiis especially the red sauce, it’s almost like marinara. Perfect!
- Roast beef with mashed potato – PERFECTION
- Pork spareribs with barbecue sauce – Uhm I forgot about this
- Chicken teriyaki – PERFECT! It almost tasted like Andok’s Manok haha
- Grilled tangigue with mango salsa dip – PAAAAK I looove the dip.
- Fresh fruits – pass
- Oreo cheescake – pass HUHU we were so full already I can’t believe I didn’t leave room for dessert WHAT’S WRONG WITH ME
- Buko pandan salad – AAAARGH MISSED THIS but who cares, I bet it’s perfect too
- Hot tea and coffee – didn’t try but I saw the hot drinks table. Okay naman hahaha
- Bottomless iced tea – not a fan of their iced tea ‘cos it’s like red tea haha
- 4 containers of water – they ran out of water and had to buy an extra container so we paid extra. No biggie.
We didn’t have lechon by the way. Which was a good call because there’s already enough food on the table. Unless you’re receiving lechon for a gift, I suggest don’t order anymore because that’s additional ₱6,000 to ₱7,000 per lechon de leche and if you’re feeding 180 guests you’d probably need 2! Mahal! If your menu already consists of 4 entrees, I think you’re covered na. 😉
The Styling
These are the pegs we agreed on, para madali we didn’t demand anything they haven’t tried. We just selected from their previous works and entrusted everything to them. Our theme is trying-hard rustic earth (kung ano man yon).
And in fairness it looked very nice naman in photos.. because honestly, I never really noticed during the program. If you look at the other pictures scattered in this post, they’re the final output! Sorry I had put them in random places because I don’t have enough photos to show! Everything could’ve gone under this section but it’s unbalanced so yeah haha.
I still had a couple of disappointments with the styling but I already let it go ‘cos ako lang naman to hahaha and I only noticed them when I started browsing photos on Facebook hehe
First – they changed the floor layout. I was looking forward for the main entrance to be used because it’s grander, shorter (so carpet won’t be bitin), and that’s the layout they sent me… so I was (internally) shocked to see they setup the stage at the wrong side. Ending is the side entrance became the main entrance (which suuuucked) and the red fat carpet is bitin. I should’ve told them I’m very specific with the layout arrrghh. I also hated the carpet. I should’ve noted not to use red carpet. It looks hideous.
Second – the chair ribbons are ugly and not all chairs have one. We chose celadon green (whatever that is) for the ribbons because it matches the green bottles at the centerpiece of each table. But when I saw the photos, it looks weird. Hindi pala bagay. It registers differently on cameras, sometimes it looks mint! Not their fault we chose the wrong color though. Shouldn’t have gotten ribbons in the first place haha. OH WAIT I CHANGED MY MIND, the ribbons look okay naman pala based on the raw videos LOL. It’s just me hehe.
Overall it wasn’t so bad! I love the flowers, the centerpieces, the VIP tables, and the stage. It’s really just the layout and the carpet I didn’t like. I want to be facing the main entrance but for whatever reason (maybe because they can’t fit all the tables) it didn’t happen. Pero kebs na.
The Service
All the waiters who attended to us were very kind and polite. I heard that you don’t usually get to eat a lot during your wedding because you’re so busy with photo ops and blah but we never felt hungry. In fact we were bloated. I wanted to stop eating na nga ‘cos my gown felt super tight already but our coordinator made it a point not to starve us so uhm, yey for the food!
When it comes to the AE though, we’re lucky we got the good one from their team to handle our wedding (after so much fussss). I couldn’t imagine if we settled with anyone else.
Overall
I would recommend Queensland for your catering needs. It was a risk getting a supplier from the south (being that we’re from the far north) but thank God they were able to deliver. Food is great, styling is good, and price point is very affordable (our bill totaled ₱107,000 for 180 guests). No regrets backing out from Hizon’s. I was super relieved when I tasted their food because I’ve heard horror stories about their pasta getting spoiled, rice being kulang, leftovers that are not left over hehe… but waley. Nothing bad happened! Yeheyy!
Great job Queensland, I love you na.
That’s it! Hope this helps any of you planning for your big dayyy!
Wanna read more of my incessant blabbing? Here’s a directory of all my wedding related posts!