Niche Catering Company Offers Fine Dining at Home

A local insurance agent is staring a high-end, small-scale catering company.

When he moved five years ago from Fort Worth, Texas, to Fayetteville, Brent Hale had quit the food service industry in order to spend more time with his family.

His company is called Big Sexy Food. It specializes in throwing multi-course, high-end dinner parties serving locally sourced foods and ingredients. 

“We are basically setting up a restaurant every week in someone’s home — full service, full tablescape, as far as they want to go. We want to be able to provide everything from the last spoon to the last centerpiece,” he said.

And the food? “It’s going to be three-Michelin-star quality,” he said.

Hale started culinary school in 1998 at Tarrant County College, but never finished because his catering career took off, starting with a job as personal chef at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.

His catering company, Dining by Design, was in operation for about 10 years, and between 2007 and 2009 he was executive chef of the upscale White Bluff Resort, Lake Whitney, located south of Fort Worth. 

Before Big Sexy Food, Hale catered dinners for friends and people who knew his culinary background, and for years those people asked when he was going to start a business.

After taking on a friend’s annual Christmas party, he and wife Becky, who partners with him in the catering business and the insurance agency, decided it was time to try it out, and officially started the business Jan. 1.

“From an outsider’s standpoint you could look at Arkansas and think, ‘Well, that’s Arkansas. There’s no market for fine dining,’ and it’s just not true. There’s an opportunity here for this, and it fits where we are because there’s not a need for it every day of the week,” Hale said.

The plan is to keep it small. Hale will not serve more than 50 guests and plans to work no more than two events per month. This distinction, along with the quality of the service and food, make what he does unique in the region, he said.

“We don’t want this to be a full-time business for us,” Hale said.

Prices vary because of the wide range of available service and menu options, but Hale says they start at about $40 per guest, with a 10 person minimum. 

“We’re not setting ourselves up to be the cheapest catering option in Northwest Arkansas,” he said, “but based on my experience and research, we really are one of a kind.”