uspca conference: the food

Recently I was invited to attention the US Personal Chef Association’s National Conference (USPCA) that was held in Long Beach, CA last month. I’m no where close to being a personal chef so I was a little curious why I was invited to attend. There were many classes offered focused on the business aspects of being a personal chef, but there were also classes that helped improved culinary skills and those are the classes I ended up attending.

I drove up early on a Saturday morning to be in Long Beach. Have you wondered what kind of food they serve at these kinds of conferences? Well here’s a little peek! The USPCA Conference was held at the Marriott in downtown Long Beach, a nice hotel right on the waterfront and not very far from the Queen Mary. I arrived shortly before breakfast, which was served a la buffet style.

Coffee tea options for your hot beverage needs. They had every type of milk/creamer combination available and all sugar options were covered.

Sodas for your cold beverage needs.

This was the buffet line with orange juice available at the end.

Place for toasting and warm pecan rolls. 

The “carb” station: danishes, bagels and more.

Fresh fruit, too!

I got a little bit of everything from the buffet line.

The gluten free waffle was sort of edible. It was kind of falling apart and had a strange texture to it that I didn’t quite care for.

Turkey bacon and chicken sausage are certainly the healthier versions of their counterparts. The turkey bacon was just… not worth the effort but the chicken sausage was decent, though a bit on the dry side. 

I somewhat enjoyed the Canadian bacon, egg and hollandaise  sauce on the English muffin. It wasn’t the greatest thing ever but I liked it well enough to finish it. The home fries tasted like they could have been cooked a touch longer but were decent enough.

There was a wide selection of pastries. The pecan nut roll was the best of the bunch. It was still slightly warm from sitting under the heat lamp and the nuts were nice and crunchy with a good amount of “goo”. The other pastries were fair, not terrible but not great either. 

The fresh fruit was nice and crisp. I noticed a lot of the chefs around me seemed to mostly be sticking to eating the fruit. I don’t know if that’s because they thought it was the best thing there, or they were watching what they ate. 

I attended an Olive Oil Tasting session after breakfast (post to come) followed by a short break (where I skipped a session) and then lunch was served.

For lunch they did a three course meal, starting with this lovely cold roasted vegetable salad. There was roasted eggplant, squash, zucchini, asparagus and bell peppers drizzled with olive oil and a sprinkle of fresh basil. I almost didn’t eat the eggplant and then decided to take a bite, surprised by how much I liked it. It was firm and had a nice char from the grill. The olive oil and basil helped make all of the vegetables burst with extra flavor. I really loved this salad and want to remake it at home! Very simple and very delicious. 

Our main course was I believe (but I’m guessing) a cut of London Broil maybe. We weren’t given menus so I’m just guessing the cut of beef. The beef was tender and juicy and cooked to a medium state. Also it came with some garlic mashed potatoes, roasted cauliflower and broccolini. The mashed potatoes were simply delightful and flavored very well with the beef. I like that some au jus was all over the plate, imparting extra flavor into the meal.  

For dessert there was a nice light cake served with a strawberry sauce. I believe the toppig was more than just whipped cream and the crunch of the pistachios was a nice touch for extra texture and flavor.

I was curious what they would serve to personal chefs as a meal and while breakfast was just okay, the plated three course lunch was much closer to what I was expecting to be served. 

I’ll post about the two classes I took in another post!

Disclaimer: I received complimentary admission to attend the USPCA Conference in Long Beach, CA. I was not further compensated for my post and all opinions stated here are my own.