“We couldn’t find kosher wedding catering we loved, so we called our favorite bakery”: How a cold call to Razava Bread Co. fed this Twin Cities couple’s big day
When Ian and Maddy went looking for kosher wedding catering in the Twin Cities, they wanted memorable food, a menu every single guest could actually eat, and people who cared about the day as much as they did. Maddy had an idea: call the kosher-certified sourdough bakery on Grand Avenue.
On November 9, 2025, at Urban Daisy in Northeast Minneapolis, their 130-guest wedding became the first wedding Razava Bread Co. ever catered — the start of an events calendar that has since grown to include bar mitzvahs and large group gatherings, all out of the same kosher-certified kitchen that bakes around 4,000 sourdough loaves and bagels a week.
Here’s how it all came together, in their words.
Maddy: When we started planning our wedding, we went down the route that Jewish couples in Minnesota who want a kosher wedding go down. We explored what was out there, but hadn’t really found something that felt like us.
Ian: In general, people don’t think of wedding food as amazing food. You go to a wedding, you know you’re going to get fed. Some bread rolls, some chicken on a plate with mashed potatoes and a vegetable. It’s not bad. But it’s not super memorable
Maddy: Razava had opened a few months earlier, and we’d been a few times. I was running through every kosher place in the Twin Cities I could think of, and I said to Ian, “Why don’t you call Razava?” Ian said, “They don’t do catering.” And I said, “Why don’t we just ask? It can’t hurt to ask.”
Maddy and Ian’s menu for their Razava-catered wedding reception. (Photo by Liam Doyle)
Ian: This is the part I remember. I remember where I was driving. I looked up the number on Google and called the restaurant line, totally cold. Razava’s GM Christopher answered, and I said, “Man, this is kind of a wild ask, but I’m just going to throw it out there” — explained the whole thing, and asked if there was any chance they did catering. He said, “Dude, it’s crazy that you just called me, because we’ve been thinking about doing this. It’s something we’ve been wanting to do for a long time.” From that first conversation, he came across as someone excited — and exciting — who cares. It was invigorating.
Christopher Fisher, Razava Bread Co. GM: I remember that exact call and the excitement we shared. It felt a bit crazy to try to launch an events catering business less than a year into the life of the bakery. But with Ian’s and Maddy’s excitement and a team full of dreamers, we felt we had to.
Maddy: I remember our first meeting with Christopher at Razava. There was a plate of bagels and cookies, water set out for us. So simple, but so nice. I’d assumed we’d go in and pick from a set menu. It was the opposite of that. Christopher asked, “What are your favorite foods?” We left thinking, whoa — our options are kind of endless.
Ian: It was a blank canvas. It felt like being in a think tank. And honestly, that’s why Razava was even on our radar in the first place — the ethos. Take their black-and-white cookie: something so simple, so classic, done by everybody, and they do it in a totally new way. It’s creativity, but with cohesion. Not throwing things at the wall — a creative spirit guided by a cohesive approach.
Maddy: We went home and talked about our favorite foods. It was November, so we leaned into fall, and it was a kosher menu, so dairy and fish. Christopher threw out the idea of grain bowls — he’d done them at his own wedding — and we immediately said, “That sounds awesome.” I love wild rice, so wild rice went in. Salmon was the obvious choice for the fish — it ended up as a smoky-sweet chuma-glazed salmon.
And then there was the Cretan salad. We’d traveled to Greece in November 2023, and our favorite dish there was a Cretan salad made with carob rusk. We mentioned it once, in passing. The next time we met, Christopher had made us a Razava version, with sourdough miche croutons, feta cheese, and freshly grated tomato. It was so delicious, and so thoughtful. We ended up not using it, because it didn’t fit with the rest of the menu. But that stayed with us.
Ian: He was like a mad scientist! He listened so thoroughly to everything we’d said and came back with something that was Razava. There was a care, and a creativity, and a commitment to really doing it right, through the entire process, from the first time we met, to the tasting, to the actual output.
Maddy: The tasting was probably the best part of the whole wedding planning process. Christopher told us to invite some people. So we brought friends and family to the bakery around 5 p.m., and everyone got a cocktail. There were sweet potatoes, a garbanzo bean salad, a quinoa mix with pumpkin seeds and sun-dried tomatoes and roasted peppers. It was crazy good. And there were the maple-glazed carrots.
Ian: The carrots, unanimously, were everybody’s favorite. To me, that is the hallmark of excellence. A carrot can be the most boring thing there is. And somehow you make a carrot out of all this stuff, and people are going, “Man, those carrots were really good.” The eggplant was fire, too. Everything else about wedding planning felt like a grind. The tasting was a breath of fresh air.
Maddy: There was a challenge in the planning, too. We have friends who are vegan, friends who are gluten-free, people with tree-nut allergies, people who keep strict kosher, and people who don’t. Christopher was great about all of it — “we’ll put this on the side,” “we can substitute this for that.”
Ian: Honestly, that was one of my biggest stresses going into the wedding. As a host, I want everybody equally partaking. Not throwing some random vegetables at the vegans to check a box; everybody gets something that’s actively delicious and memorable. To land on one menu that fulfilled all of those restrictions, in a way where none of them felt lacking, was pretty astounding. And then to hear afterward, from those guests in particular, that they had a really good meal? That was really, really cool.
Some of the food catered by Razava for Ian and Maddy’s wedding reception. (Photo by Liam Doyle)
Maddy: The day itself is a blur. But I remember the moment we walked into the reception room. The candles were lit, and on the tables were these giant bowls of hummus and labneh with Jerusalem bagels and pita. Whoa. Our vision came together.
And at the head table, there was one more surprise. Early on we’d talked about how much we loved Fishwife tinned fish. Christopher had arranged for everyone at the head table to get a tin of their chili-smoked mackerel. We took it with us on our mini-moon right after the wedding, and I distinctly remember eating that smoked mackerel the next day, on Jerusalem bagels.
Ian: It was a very personal touch. A little above-and-beyond thing. Very sweet.
Maddy: That night, people kept coming up to us: “Your food was so good.” My brother-in-law kept trying to get drunk, but he was like, “I can’t. I ate too much bread. There is too much food.” One person filled up on so much hummus and pita they never made it to dinner. People are still talking about the food.
About a month after the wedding, we went to Razava, and while we were ordering, someone behind the counter said, “Maddy, what can I get you?” I was like — oh! It felt so special to be known at the bakery.
Christopher: To me, catering someone’s special event should feel exactly like an extension of the restaurant itself. So we knew we wanted this to feel different, from the day you call or inquire, through the menu creation and the day of the event itself. Ian and Maddy’s wedding was a true honor to test our approach and it laid the foundation for a growing and exciting part of our business. I can happily say in my 10 years in this industry that Ian and Maddy’s wedding was my favorite event that I’ve done.
Ian: We were back at Razava this morning. Tonight we’re going to friends’ for Shabbat, so we grabbed them a challah, and Jerusalem bagels, because that’s their favorite thing. For somebody coming into this without any previous knowledge — looking for a caterer, considering Razava — the food is going to be excellent and amazing. But the process is going to be equally as great.
Razava Bread Co. is a kosher-certified sourdough bakery and café at 685 Grand Ave., St. Paul. From bar mitzvahs to board meetings, we’ll bring the bread: catering@razavabread.co.
This piece is sponsored content provided by Razava Bread Co.