Shannon Beers / Pastry Sous Chef, Wedding Cake Specialist, Biltmore Catering, Asheville, NC
Biltmore

Christmas Past

A year after Tropical Storm Helene devastated Asheville, N.C., Biltmore Estate is once again hosting a holiday like no other. “They do Christmas big here,” says Shannon Beers, the estate’s wedding cake specialist and pastry sous chef. “There are Christmas trees, Christmas lights everywhere.”

Owned by the Vanderbilt family since 1895, Biltmore House is the largest privately owned home in the U.S. The 8,000-acre estate encompasses a farm and gardens, a winery, and resort accommodations.

The Biltmore House sustained minimal damage when Helene blew through on Friday, Sept. 27, but the main entrance at Biltmore Village and a retail building were washed out. High winds and flooding damaged the grounds. “The main entrance was under 23 feet of water,” Shannon recalled.

Inside the 250-room mansion, power went out to refrigerators and freezers stocked for numerous events. In Shannon’s banquet department alone, there was a fully-prepped dinner for 300-plus people the next day, plus 14 upcoming weddings. “We lost a lot of product obviously,” Shannon says. “We weren’t really prepared for it at all, not one bit. The town itself, still, I feel over a year later, is not fully recovered.”

The estate was closed for more than a month. Instead of cooking for guests, Shannon and the rest of the culinary staff made food for the crews cleaning the grounds. The estate reopened on Nov. 2, just in time to provide a holiday season escape from the surrounding disaster. “I was very shocked to see how many people came,” Shannon says, “but a lot of our higher-ups described it as kind of like an oasis from the disaster.”

Christmas Present 

This year, everything is in full swing, and everybody is extremely busy, Shannon says. More than 300,000 people typically visit for Christmas at Biltmore, nearly a third of the estate’s annual 1.3 million visitors. In Vanderbilt fashion, no expense is spared for Christmas, which is when the house opened for its first occasion 130 years ago.

It’s the time of year when Shannon’s desserts feature flavors like Black Currant Puree, Cherry Puree, and Pomegranate and Blood Orange concentrates. Her seasonal fruit mousse is a simple yet decadent recipe with just four ingredients — purée, gelatin, sugar, and heavy cream. “We can swap out any of The Perfect Purée flavors, so we make it all year-round,” Shannon says. The Pomegranate Mousse served at the holidays is finished with a chocolate mirror glaze and pomegranate seeds.

Another popular recipe, Banana Sticky Toffee (which, unlike toffee candy, has a pudding-like consistency) is finished with brûléed bananas and a bourbon caramel sauce. “The thicker consistency of the banana purée makes a moist, sticky toffee,” Shannon says.

Shannon started using The Perfect Purée as an intern at the Biltmore in 2019. “As an intern, I didn’t pay much attention to brands we were using, but as I moved up the ranks and started ordering my own products, I realized how much I liked it,” she says.

The banquet department she oversees makes desserts for seven venues, including conference rooms, a ballroom, and reception areas for up to 700 people. During the growing season, desserts include estate-grown produce like herbs, berries, and edible flowers. But the set wedding cake menu requires year-round consistency for fillings, compotes, coulis, and sauces. “I do like [The Perfect Purée] more sometimes, depending on the time of year, than fresh or frozen,” Shannon says. “Right now we’re getting in strawberries, and they are completely white, and they have no flavor whatsoever because it’s not the time of year for strawberries.”

­Christmas Future

Shannon’s department is staffed with interns who, like her not so long ago, represent the future of her profession. The structure of banquet menus lets her encourage their creativity. They experiment and figure out what they like and don’t like. “Customers can order pre-set menus or chef’s choice menus. When that chef’s choice comes through, I really encourage my staff and my interns to do whatever they want,” Shannon says. “We’ll put it on the menu, and we’ll work on plating and presentation and flavor when the day comes.”

That creative freedom keeps her energized, too. “After being in banquets, I don’t know if I could ever go back to a la carte. In banquets, we’re making different things on a daily basis.”