You already know the value of team building events for fostering better communication between work colleagues. Team building events have been around for decades because they are proven to contribute positively to employee motivation and building trust, resulting in increased productivity.
Food is an important part of team building events and food has traditionally been a way of bringing everyone together in a neutral setting. Why not base your team building event around food? CHEFIN has come up with a few creative team building ideas where food is central.
Cooking Class
Cooking classes not only bring everyone together on a level playing field by providing everyone with the same equipment and resources, but it also teaches skills which are useful to the individual. Whether it’s learning to make pasta from scratch or putting together a three-course meal, cooking classes allow for collaboration between team-mates as they share techniques and equipment. Cooking classes can be organised for any type of meal, whether it’s learning to make healthy breakfasts or decadent desserts. This creative team building idea is all about collaborating and having fun.
Culinary Picnic
For a more relaxed team building idea, consider a corporate picnic. Eating al fresco is available year round thanks to our fantastic climate, and great for team bonding events with a physical aspect such as those which involve an obstacle course or treasure hunt. An advantage of a corporate picnic is that the food comes to where the participants in so there’s no need to organise transport and everybody can eat at their own pace. Alternatively, a corporate picnic can be a team-building event in its own right. Workplaces with strict dress codes can allow employees to wear multi to create a more relaxed environment and give everyone a chance to unwind.
Charcoal Barbecue
An alternative to a corporate picnic is a barbecue (BBQ). Barbecues are great for lunchtime or evening functions but rather than present the team with a pre-prepared meal, get them doing the cooking. Learning how to cook food on a barbecue under the supervision of a qualified chef is fun and a great skill to take away. Large groups can be split into teams to prepare the food with some working on salads, some working on sauces and marinades, and some setting the table.
Mystery dinners are a great way to end a day of team building exercises, especially a formal in-house event. After a day of completing feedback activities and small group discussions, imagine your staff sitting down to a meal as a reward. But instead of selecting from a traditional menu, they are presented with code names or numbers for food and drink. The mystery dinner menu could be linked to an exercise completed during the day or they could be the names of 80s hits – the fantastic thing about mystery dinners is that you get a chance to be creative with the menu. Once the mystery meals arrive and diners begin eating, it will prompt conversation and is also a relaxing way to debrief after what can sometimes be an intense day.
Dining in the Dark / Blindfold Dinner
If building trust within your work-team is a core aspect of your team building event, consider a blindfold dinner. Blindfold dinners are a fun, interactive dining experience for team members as they sample gourmet cuisines from around the world. This team-building event fosters communication because the blindfolded diner is encouraged to guess what the dish is and where it originates. Blindfold dinners are also great for promoting awareness of other senses because not being able to see food heightens the sense of smell and taste.
Creative team buildings ideas based around food have the advantage of being adaptable to most locations. If travel is an issue for some of your staff, then consider holding the team-building event in our house with private chefs and waitstaff who come to your preferred location.
Contact our events team today to start planning your next team building event. If one of the above styles isn’t quite what you’re looking for we’ll help create a unique experience to suit your requirements.
Need more help or information on choosing the best dining style for your corporate catering event? Get in touch with us today for advice and an obligation-free quote.
It’s your party and you can do what you want to! Provided the venue permits, that is. That counts for underage guests – if your chosen venue allows for underage patrons then absolutely! Some venues only allow underage guests accompanied by adults, so familiarise yourself with the specific terms beforehand.
We’re good abiding citizens of the law here at CHEFIN, so if you’re hoping to serve a sneaky glass of wine to your underage guests, we cannot do that for you! Underage guests will be allowed to mix and mingle but must stay away from alcoholic beverages at CHEFIN events. Sorry!
You can absolutely choose a Beverage package! What good is organising your own private event if you can’t choose the best alcohol package to cater to your needs? Have a flick through our beverage profiles on our packages page to get a good idea of each of our Sommelier backgrounds, interests, and specialties.
If you’re hungry for more, then you can have a look through our Facebook and Instagram pages to see each of our different events and creations. We also regularly upload videos to Youtube, where you can see more of our Sommeliers’ menus and drink journeys. Your mouth will be watering, guaranteed!
If you’re not quite sure which Beverage Experience is best suited to your needs, or you don’t have time to do the research, then that’s totally fine! Just send through your event requirements when you make your booking, and we’ll choose the best Beverage Package to suit your needs.
You certainly can! If you are needing to add requirements or remove guests from the guest list, then we ask that let us know at least 3 days before your event so we can accommodate your needs. This would include things like changing menu requirements, adding additional equipment hire, etc. If you need to add guests to the list, then these changes can be made within 36h of the event.
You can notify us of your additional requests or guest list changes via email or phone. Feel free to shoot us an email over at hello@chefin.com.au. You can also give us a call at 0477 666 351, and we’ll take care of everything over the phone.
If any major changes need to be made before your event, please be aware that on rare occasions we may not be able to cater to them. We’ll always do our best to help you pull off an incredible event, but sometimes it just isn’t possible. That said, we can pretty much always cater to amendments – just get them in 3 days beforehand 😉
We’re more than just a private chef hire company here at CHEFIN! We know there’s a whole heap of stuff needed to pull off a great event, and our services extend beyond just the hire of talented chefs. If you’re in need of equipment hire, a venue, a videographer, or anything else to make your event one to remember, we can help you out.
Throughout the online booking process you will be asked several questions related to your event needs and requirements. If you will be in need of extra services, this is your chance to ask for it (though you can also request additional services later). Some additional event services we offer include:
Alcohol packages,
Photographer hire,
AV equipment hire,
Videographer hire,
Soft drinks.
For more information, just ask one of our friendly team members and we’ll advise you on how we can help. If you have extra requests, contact us and we’ll do our best to meet them.
Of course, you can! We don’t like to restrict the creativity of our hosts here at CHEFIN, and we know that decorating the venue is sometimes the most entertaining part of an event. Don’t let us get in the way…
That said, you will have to include the time for decorating the venue as part of your booking time. For example, if you want to book the venue for a 4-hour party, you’ll have to include the decoration time as part of that, so you may want to hire the venue out for 5 hours instead. This will give you plenty of time to put the decorations up, and remove them once the event is over.
Of course, the time spent putting up/removing decorations will depend on how fancy you’re gonna get, so please allocate enough time to ensure you’re able to get everything up/down on time.
Yes, you can hire a private chef for any day of the week. CHEFIN platform has the largest selection of Private Chefs in Australia with availability for any day during the week. Private Chefs are available for service Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday & Sunday.
There are Chefs on the platform available for breakfast, lunch & dinner services at any time during the week. Chefs are available also for last minute chef bookings, with at least 12h notice!
Yes, you can hire a private chef through the CHEFIN Platform for a Public Holiday event. However, do expect a standard surcharge based on the Australian Fair Works rules & regulations. Hospitality staff are entitled to upwards of 1.5-2.5 surcharge rates from 7 pm on the day before a Public Holiday.
For example, as the 1st of January is a full-day public holiday, if you want to hire a Chef for New Year’s Eve, the 31st of December is considered a half-day public holiday with surcharge rates applied after 7 pm on the 31st of December every year.
We ask that you try to make all private chef bookings at least 24 hours prior to your event. This just helps give our chefs enough time to accept your booking and prepare the meal of your dreams.
That said, we know that sometimes you need a last-minute chef, and if you do need to book a chef for an event within 24 hours then please contact us directly on 0477 666 351. You’ll still get the meal of your dreams, but there’ll be a lot more hurry involved.
It’s easy to book a chef for your event with CHEFIN. Our online booking community is fast and easy and takes care of all your event requirements. Head to our Private Chefs page to get to know our team, our Experiences page to learn about our food journeys, and our Corporate Catering page if you’re planning a large event.
We wish we could, but at the moment we can’t! The online community we use here at CHEFIN simply doesn’t have the functionality to allow for split bills. You’ll have to pick one trustworthy person to make the booking and pay for it on behalf of the others.
Luckily, the payment system at CHEFIN is super easy, breezy, and transparent. We accept all methods of online payment, whether that’s bank transfer or credit card. There are no hidden fees or processing charges, so you can trust that whoever is making the payment will be given the full price upfront. That means you can organise to pay them back immediately.
Still, have some questions? Get in touch with a friendly staff member at 0477 666 351, or via e-mail at hello@chefin.com.au
This applies only to our corporate clients, so no need to worry if we’ll be sending a chef to your home! Corporate clients, we do ask that you organise access to your loading dock so that our chefs are able to easily load and unload goods and equipment into your building. This is the fastest, easiest, and least stressful way to manage transportation of food and ingredients up to the kitchen.
If for some reason you’re unable to organise access to the loading dock, or if you have any questions at all about the above, please feel free to contact a member of the CHEFIN support team. You can give us a call at 0477 666 351, or via e-mail at hello@chefin.com.au l at hello@chefin.com.au.
