Don't Order Canapés Blind

August 31, 2026

Every City of London and W1 order comes with a complimentary chef’s selection box — so you taste before the party, not at it.

There is a particular kind of quiet dread that settles on whoever booked the catering.

The guests are arriving at six. The client is bringing colleagues, who knows how many. And somewhere between Farringdon and your reception desk is a box of a hundred canapés that you have never seen, never tasted, and chose forty-eight hours ago from a photograph.

Most canapé ordering works exactly like this. You pick from a grid of images, you pay, and you find out whether you got it right at the same moment your guests do — in front of the people you were trying to impress. If the pastry is soft, if the filling is thin, if the whole tray looks smaller in real life than it did on screen, there is no version of that evening where you get to fix it.

That is ordering blind. And we don’t think you should have to.

So we send you a box

Place an order for delivery anywhere in the City of London or W1, and a complimentary chef’s selection box comes with it. No charge, no catch, nothing to claim — it simply arrives.

Inside is a cross-section of what our kitchen is doing right now: something from the Garden, something from the Land, something from the Sea, and something sweet. Not the four things you already ordered. The things you didn’t, chosen by the chef, so that by the time you’re planning the next reception you have actually eaten your way across the menu rather than read about it.

It is the least complicated marketing we do. We think our canapés are better than the photographs, and the fastest way to prove that is to put them in your hands.

Why we can afford to be this confident

Because nothing about our canapés is manufactured to survive a long journey.

Everything is made by hand, in a Central London kitchen, on the morning of your event. Nothing is frozen and defrosted. Nothing sits in stock waiting for an order. That is also why we ask for forty-eight hours’ notice — it isn’t administrative padding, it’s the time it takes to buy properly and make properly.

Then it travels by cargo bike. Our kitchen sits just outside the Square Mile, which puts most City addresses ten to fifteen minutes away — through cycle lanes, past the traffic, with no van circling for a loading bay and no parking charge quietly added to your invoice. Your canapés arrive chilled, arranged, and ready to go straight from box to platter. Nobody on your team has to plate anything.

The packaging is fully biodegradable, with inserts made to hold each canapé in place, so what turns up looks the way it left. And because the delivery produces no emissions at all, the whole thing sits comfortably in an ESG report rather than awkwardly beside one.

And no, there’s no VAT on top

This is the part that surprises people, so it is worth being plain about it.

Cold canapés, delivered ready to eat, with none of our team on site, are zero-rated for VAT under HMRC’s rules. No VAT is added to the food, and none is added to the delivery charge that goes with it. The price you see when you check out is the price that lands on your invoice.

Compare that with a staffed caterer quoting plus VAT and the gap is close to seventeen per cent of your effective spend — before anyone has argued about the food. If your order does include hot food, on-site staff, setup or a service charge, the standard rate applies to the whole supply, and we will tell you that before you pay rather than after.

What ordering actually looks like

Build your selection. Each item on the menu is twenty canapés. Minimum order is £150, before delivery.
Send the request. Choose your date and delivery slot at checkout. We hold your card details but take nothing.
We come back within four hours. Only once we’ve confirmed we can make it properly does any money move.
It arrives by bike. Chilled, ready to serve, with your complimentary chef’s selection box alongside it.

Delivery is £5 to our immediate neighbours, £20 across Central London, £40 for Greater London and £60 to the outskirts, confirmed by postcode at checkout.

On quantities, the honest guidance: four to six canapés a head for something light alongside drinks, eight to ten for a proper drinks reception, ten to fourteen if the canapés are standing in for dinner. Most people under-order for receptions and regret it at 7pm.

Who we are

City Canapé Company is the sister brand of Mayfair Catering, which has been feeding London for twenty-five years. The kitchen discipline is the same. What’s different is the last mile: hyper-local, same-day fresh, zero-emission, and built specifically around the way the Square Mile actually books food — late, precisely, and with no tolerance for a supplier who doesn’t turn up.

Frequently asked questions

Is the sample box really free?
Yes. It comes with your order at no charge for deliveries in the City of London and W1. There is nothing to claim and no separate form to fill in.

What’s in it?
A chef’s selection from the current season — a spread across our Garden, Land, Sea and Something Sweet collections, chosen by the kitchen rather than by you, so you taste beyond what you already know you like.

How much notice do you need?
Forty-eight hours as standard, so everything can be made fresh on the morning of your event. If you need something sooner, call us rather than assume — we would rather have the conversation.

Do you add VAT?
Not to cold canapés delivered without staff. That supply is zero-rated, and the delivery charge follows the same treatment. Orders including hot food, staffing, setup or a service charge are standard-rated in full.

What’s the minimum order?
£150 before delivery. Each menu item is twenty canapés, so that is a genuinely small reception rather than a corporate-scale commitment.

Do you deliver outside the City?
Yes — across Central London, Greater London and the outskirts, priced by zone. The complimentary sample box offer currently applies to City of London and W1 deliveries.