Indulge Contemporary Catering

I was able to try their barrel smoked tacos at an event over the weekend. It was neat to see part of the process! Chef Flor cooks them straight from the iQ Barrel Smoker!
She was already making tacos with meat when I arrived and later on through the night, I tried the seafood version too. Both kinds were very tasty, but I prefer the seafood variant more. The scallops for the seafood taco was a little tough, but still delicious– especially with the habanero salsa! I liked adding the extra grilled veggies and green salsa to make the tacos extra flavorful.

Flor and her team at Indulge catered our wedding this past August at the Japanese Friendship Garden. After doing tastings at a couple of other places and thinking that we were going to have to just accept having mediocre food at our wedding, we knew we wanted Indulge to do our wedding after the first dish we tasted. They helped us create a unique and personal menu and they were very accommodating with extra tastings, meeting us after we got off work, last minute menu changes, etc. The food was just as amazing at the wedding, and we received rave reviews from our guests.
Our only complaint is that there was sometimes a lack of communication, and when we talked about menu changes they weren’t always very clear about the corresponding price difference.
Overall, we definitely recommend checking out Indulge when you’re looking for a wedding (or other event) caterer!
Note that some of the Unilocal info is incorrect — Indulge is located in Chula Vista, not PB.

I have no idea how to express how grateful we are to have found Flor and Tonya to cater our wedding. They seem like a part of our family now and the wife keeps saying that we have to find other events to do, just to taste some more of their food.
We found Indulge because it was on the Japanese Friendship Garden’s very limited approved caterers menu. After reading through the company profiles, Indulge was our first choice based on their usage of local, organic and sustainable ingredients. After contacting 4 vendors to set up tastings and discuss food options, the only one that quickly got back to us was Indulge.
We actually met Tonya on the first day we signed our contract with the Garden and she talked us through a number of options and set ups all while setting up for another wedding. She gave us her card and told us to set up a tasting when we had the chance, which we did.
The tasting was unbelievable! They catered to a variety of dietary restrictions (we had a number of allergies to work around) and presented us with appetizers, salads, entrees and desserts that had us looking at each other in disbelief. Everyone was pretty sure we would make them the vendor after that tasting, but we wanted to do our due diligence. One other caterer strung us along for more than a month. Another basically said we didn’t have enough money to consider using them. What a blessing that was!!!
Once we signed the contract, Tonya stepped in as our make-​shift wedding coordinator until ours was ready to be involved. She helped us menu plan, plan table linens and rentals. Tonya sent us alcohol estimates to ensure we ordered enough booze for our wedding (we overestimated but that was because much of my family are teetotalers). She even helped us set our timeline which we appreciated because she’s been through a few more of these than we have.
She talked us through what we wanted on the menu and she and Flor allowed us to give them some special family recipes to include as appetizers and desserts. There were a few items we weren’t thrilled with at the first tasting, and Tonya brainstormed some new choices with usand set up a tasting to check those. In all, we did 3 – 4 tastings, going over entrees, appetizers and desserts.
Everyone at the wedding raved about the food that was served. The empanadas, egg rolls and mini pizzas were a hit for the cocktail hour. In fact, the mini egg rolls were better than those we had on our honeymoon (at the winner of best Din Sum restaurant in Vancouver– which is known for its Chinese food!). The beef, chicken and risotto entrée options were also well received. As we walked to various tables, the only food I saw remaining on any plates were the carrot tops.
Indulge even provided our desserts! That is amazing for a caterer! The double chocolate macadamia nut cake we had for our cake cutting was among the moistest cakes I have ever had. But we didn’t just want cake, so they also provided us with lemon bars, chocolate mousse with apricot sauce, lady fingers and bread pudding. I have never seen a dessert table look so decimated. I even saw guests pull the wedding topper off the remaining cake so they could eat that. And it wasn’t for a lack of food… they just loved the desserts!
We can’t say enough great things about Indulge. One of my friends was the banquets and events manager for one of the largest wedding venues in North County and he told me, «I’ve been doing this for a long time and I’ve never seen a wedding go off like this– without a hitch.» If I could give them 50 stars, I would. Flor and Tonya will be getting Christmas cards from now on and any event we throw or people who ask for suggestions will only get one name from us– Indulge Catering.
I think it is important to point out that Unilocal is doing you and Indulge a huge disservice. They have 33 reviews that are blocked (if you scroll to the bottom you can force it to show them) and 90% of those are 4 or 5 stars. Check them out. Don’t let the few bad apples lead you to a wrong decision.

I recently used Indulge for our wedding over the summer.
At first, my sister, mom and I really enjoyed meeting Tonya and our tasting was AMAZING! She was very attentive and did a great job of selling us what they had to offer– we were on board right away! Months later when it was time to get down to business and get the details in order– Tonya (and Flor) were MIA. No answer for over a month– well I had to send out my response cards with the food descriptions on them for our seated dinner and since nobody at indulge would respond (after multiple emails, calls and posts on their facebook page), I had to make up my own menu. Then when Tonya finally did get back to me, she tried to convince me to change the options to what would be «better» in her opinion (too late for that!).
Then during the reception, the presentation of the food was beautiful, but it was cold and not nearly as good as it was during the tasting. I probably should not have expected that, but I did… so that was disappointing. The steak and the shrimp dishes were «meh», but the asian mixed vegetable dish was great (and still hot)!.
the desserts were great too! the way they laid out the dessert table was very pretty too. They did great with that. the cookies from their bakery were really good. I never personally dealt with Flor, but Tonya’s personality was very friendly in person, the main issue that could use a change would be the communication. There were too many different email address being used and it was confusing getting many different messages from different accounts and then responding, but then later they’d say that they never received the email I sent (probably because they didn’t check the right email address).

Indulge catered an event at my home on very short notice. The menu consisted of ceviche, carnitas and chicken mole. As well as rice, beans, fruit and cheese tray, condiments, dessert and hot and cold beverages. It was tastefully and artistically displayed and all went smoothly with minimal input from me. It was all left in their good hands due to my other commitments. They did a great job. Gaby was present during the entire event and clean up was quick and efficient. The food was delicious. I received many compliments and recommend them.

A week ago I got married in San Diego at the Japanese Friendship Garden and had my wedding catered by Indulge. I planned the wedding from Washington, DC so I didn’t really have an opportunity to have a ton of in-​person conversations with Indulge. But I did email them about 10 thousand times :) All throughout the process, Tonya answered all my questions diligently and assured me that everything would work out. And it did! On the day of the wedding, everything went smashingly! They were on location before I even got there. The guests and us loved their food, the set-​up was exactly as I described, and the staff were all SUPER nice. Whenever either I or my fiancé had a question, they went way out of their way to make sure we were happy. From my point of view, the wedding went as good as it possibly could have.
Another important point to mention is that they let me customize my wedding, I chose to buy cupcakes instead of cake and decided to buy my own liquor and they were totally accommodating with all of it! The bottom line, it’s super important that on your big day you are as stress-​free as possible, so you can enjoy the wedding. And that’s exactly what Indulge did for me, I did not worry about a single thing when it came from their side. Thanks for coming through on my big day Indulge!

I learned of Indulge Catering because we wanted to have our wedding at Bernardo Winery (a great place) and they were an approved caterer. I wanted to talk to each of the four caterers before we put a deposit down.
The lack of communication was disappointing, I wanted to expect more out of a vendor where we would pay $ 50 per person. After finally responding to my pricing request, they had my wrong information and I was not receiving the email of a proposal. I continually kept calling and texting with my correct information and still nothing.
After getting disappointing communication styles from the other caterers, we chose not to go with Bernardo Winery (still have only good things to say about this winery, by the way). I emailed all the caterers to tell them Bernardo Winery was losing our business because of THEM. No response from Indulge Catering.
It was only after the venue contacted Indulge about this issue, Flor sent me an email and said they were busy, sent me a proposal with no apology and my name was still spelled incorrectly. If this is how they are in the beginning, I’d be afraid to give them my money and see how they would act the week of our wedding.

My review on Indulge Catering is mixed. I always like to end on a positive note so I’ll start with what my concerns were.
I called to get a quote from Indulge Catering for my wedding. It took quite a while to get a quote back and I followed up a couple of times. When I did received the quote, I called to let them know that it was a bit high for our price range and thanked them for taking the time to put it together for us but we wouldn’t be able to use them. I was assured that they would be able to come down to where we needed them to be and was asked to schedule a tasting. So I scheduled the tasting and my fiancé and I went and met Flor. Flor was very nice and let me tell you, the food was beyond amazing!
After the tasting I was assured again that the new quote would be within our budget and that she’d get it to me soon. I had to follow up again before I received the quote which was higher than where it needed to be. It was a bit frustrating because the conversations I had with Indulge Catering were clear that my fiancé and I didn’t want to come taste amazing food that we wouldn’t be able to afford in the end. If I could break out the star rating, I’d give a 5 star rating for the quality of food and for how nice everyone was at Indulge Catering. I would give a 2 star rating for the level of communication.
As I mentioned, I like to end on a positive note so here I go… I think Flor is extremely nice and as I’ve said, the food was amazing. I would recommend using Indulge but you need to make sure that you follow up with them.

This company’s service was horrible. Hate to negative but they did not treat our bride and her guests with respect. Their staff callled her a crazy bride after they refused to call her back for three days straight right before her wedding. On top of that they were not at all supportive or consistent about the process. They were late to appointments, didn’t follow through with what they promised, and in general did not provide high quality customer service. Save yourself from a major headache.

This review is for our wedding rentals only, and not the catering aspect of Indulge. My husband and I worked with Tonya throughout the planning of our wedding. At times, things got challenging with planning rentals with one company and the catering with a different company, but with some collaboration on both ends, Tonya was able to pull it together for us! She is one busy lady so it’s understandable that emails might sometimes be delayed. But when we had the opportunity to sit down together, Tonya’s warmth and sincerity was overwhelming! We loved the lights that were used for our outdoor wedding, and all the final touches with the rest of our rentals were appreciated as well!

My fiancé and I did a tasting with Flor for our up and coming wedding and found her food to be absolutely amazing. I do a lot of cooking myself and know what good quality food should taste like and I can say that Flor’s food is the real deal… high quality ingredients cooked to perfection. I would highly recommend Indulge Contemporary Catering, they produce an excellent product.

Flor and her staff are just fabulous, SUPER dedicated, creative, and just on-​the-​ball in every respect. We hired them to execute the bulk of our 10^th anniversary event held at the Japanese Friendship Garden in Balboa Park, a GORGEOUS venue, that Flor actually has a TON of experience doing events at, and it SHOWS, from the details she considers to her easy rapport and working relationship with the staff at the JFG. If your are doing your event here, you REALLY want to work with Indulge, trust me!
«Food Service»: We requested very specific Japanese style dishes in keeping with the theme of the location, which they offered various samples of in our tasting, and they delivered true to that original expectation (maybe even BETTER, according to our guests’ rave reviews of the fabulous food at our event — and PLENTY of it too!), down to the SCRUMPTUOUS (VERY reasonably-​priced!) cake that they also made for us, and also IDENTICAL to (again, maybe even better than) the design we wanted. We had a buffet setup, which looked so attractive and ran marvelously. The serving tables, servingware, dinner tables, and dinnerware were all gorgeous, and Indulge paid attention to details again way beyond our imaginations!
Staff: I have to give special mention to this, because I think this is Indulge’s key to success. The first time we met Flor herself at the tasting, we also met their Chef, who was such a sweetheart and clearly a great listener and «gets» what you want right away, not to mention he’s super skilled at putting the food masterpieces together, both deliciously and attractively! On the day of our event, there was so much staff, I was quite impressed! In fact, at first I was like, «wow this is a huge crew» and thought maybe they were just there for the setup, and perhaps that’s true, I’m not 100% sure, because all I know after that is that once the reception got going in full-​swing, they were transparent to me and yet everything was running smooth as butter! The only one who I was BARELY aware of was the captain (and this is a GOOD THING, as you want to be preoccupied by just your GUESTS and YOU and the MOMENT at an event like this, not your caterer and whether or not they are doing what they are supposed to). He was so professional and just checked with my husband and I a few times (perfect, not intrusive) to make sure we were happy, in need of anything, and feeling like everything was going well. I think he even had our plates served for us, or someone did because we never had a chance to go get in line and hence never did… And yet still had a bunch of food to eat set before us. Flor herself was also there, very much behind-​the-​scenes, making sure mostly that the whole thing was going according to plan, and that we were on schedule at all times (as bride and groom you quickly lose track of everything, and you should be able to, too, if someone is being paid to juggle details for you!). The bar service was really good too (we had an open bar that we stocked), I know I got comments from my guests that they really liked our bartender.
«Rentals»: Their equipment is top-​notch, Flor is very particular about having the absolute best and innovative stuff out there, and is even custom-​designing special unique chair-​table ensembles that look amazing like nothing you’ve ever seen before! But don’t want to give away her secrets to the competition, so you’ll have to ask her to see this stuff yourself when your visit their awesome showrooms near Pac Beach. Bottom line: our reception area (outdoor) looked SENSATIONAL, I felt like someone from the highest ranks of society it was so amazing-​looking! The lighting structures holding the overhead organza «streamers» and the Japanese paper lanterns — it was all looked just so fantastic!
You can trust Flor and her team to LISTEN TO YOU, and to offer up a ton of great creative and innovative ideas, and put it all together for a very unique event that encompasses all your needs, desires, and YOUR personality/​style. You can also count on them to put their hearts into your event to make sure you are nothing but SUPER HAPPY and BEYOND SATISFIED! Plus you will definitely have fun working with them! Enjoy!

Indulge Contemporary Catering was incredible. They helped me create a beautiful wedding which included gorgeous lanterns lighting and linens, extraordinary service and delicious food. I also had my cake made by indulge. It was the best wedding cake I have ever had and it was so gorgeous. I thought this company was exceptional and I would highly recommend them. They made my wedding a dream come true.