Raquel Vicente Bezjak, CEO of the company, receives the award
More than 1,000 event industry professionals gathered for a night that paid tribute to the sector.
Yesterday, the 19th edition of the Eventoplus Awards was held at the Madrid Arena Satellite Pavilion, a ceremony that annually recognizes the events and meetings industry in Spain and Portugal.
The Valencian catering company has become the first from the Valencian Community to reach the podium in the history of these awards, which have consolidated their position as a benchmark in the sector. This year also set a record number of entries, with more than 266 submitted, from which 21 projects were selected as finalists.
Gourmet Catering & Eventos won first prize in the Best Catering category, with the event ftalks The Food Changemakers Summit 2024 by KM ZERO Food Innovation Hub. Second and third place went to Life Gourmet and Food & Mambo, respectively.
The winning proposal brought together more than 200 guests in Valencia last June for an Experiential Dinner, a conceptual dining experience offering a 22-course sensory journey through the history of food. The dinner aimed to spark reflection on the cultural and identity-based impact of food and its role in building more sustainable, fair, and resilient societies. To design the menu, several foodtech startups from the KM ZERO community collaborated, creating dishes such as crispy crickets, cocoa wine without grapes, and vegan foie gras.
“At KM ZERO, we envisioned the Experiential Dinner as a reflection on how our identity and culture define the way we eat. This dinner was part of our ftalks initiative, the most international event on the future of food in Spain, so its design had the challenge of making the gastronomic aspect shine while transmitting, in a multisensory way, the journey from ancestral cuisine to the foods that will shape our future. Gourmet Catering & Eventos played a fundamental role in making that vision a reality,” explained Carlos Prada, gastronomist at KM ZERO Food Innovation Hub and responsible for designing and coordinating the dinner.
“One of the most important criteria evaluated by the jury is the alignment with the client’s objectives and the contribution of the catering service to the creative concept and overall success of the event. Every year, they look nationwide for the most innovative and creative proposals. At Gourmet Catering, we always strive to bring the client’s vision to life through gastronomy. We see every proposal as an opportunity to innovate and step out of our comfort zone. That’s why just being nominated already felt like a recognition of effort, talent, and teamwork. On top of that, it was an honor to share the podium with two highly talented colleagues in the sector, Life Gourmet and Food & Mambo,” said Raquel Vicente Bezjak, CEO of Gourmet Catering & Eventos.
This distinction strengthens Valencia’s positioning as a meetings tourism destination, one of the main business lines of Gourmet Catering & Eventos. The company operates exclusively in some of the city’s most iconic venues such as La Cartuja de Ara Christi, the Valencia Conference Centre, the City of Arts and Sciences, the Sala Toros at the Palau de les Arts, as well as many other emblematic spaces including the Palau de la Música.
The Eventoplus Awards place special value on the catering service’s ability to integrate with the event concept, its level of innovation, aesthetic and storytelling behind the gastronomy, the impact on the audience, and above all, the responsibility of the action: sustainable production, purpose, and its capacity to contribute to a better planet and society.
Created in 2006, these awards aim to enhance and professionalize the industry, promote best practices, stimulate creativity, and recognize the talent and commitment of all stakeholders in the events sector.