Private chefs and catering on St. Thomas

What a St. Thomas private chef charges per person

Six companies here print a figure, and the spread is real money across a table of eight. WITHIN, in Lovenlund, charges a flat $175 a person for a three-course dinner, $215 with lobster on the tenderloin, and prints no percentage beside it. DiveIn in Red Hook starts a four-course dinner at $150 plus a 20 percent service charge. Island Edge Culinary prices by the table: $295 a person for six to eleven, $275 for twelve to nineteen, $265 past twenty, plus an 18 percent administrative fee that it says is not a gratuity. Y.U.M VI Catering's private chef service starts at $60 a person with a $275 minimum and 20 percent gratuity, the lowest printed floor on the island. All as of October 2026, from each company's own site.

The companies that quote on request, Love City Lunch Box, Ultimate Chef Services, Chef Marshall Bishop, Fleagle by Dezign and Shelly's Cakes & Catering, are not necessarily dearer; they price the menu you ask for. The tradeoff with every quote is that the comparison takes a week of email. Ask each for the per-person price, the fee under it and the deposit in one line, and compare those.

The personal chefs who cook the whole week

A personal chef in St. Thomas can mean the whole stay, not one dinner. Love City Lunch Box plans the menus before the trip and describes a week-long feast, never repeating a dish, with Chef Faye Auerbach quoting after a consultation. Ultimate Chef Services sells it as a package: arrival-night and farewell dinners, a three-night dinner package, or four days with seven services, breakfasts and drop-offs between the dinners, for groups of six or more, with an 18 percent chef service fee inside the rate and two to three months' notice asked for the longest one. Island Edge Culinary has cooked for villa parties on St. Thomas since 2019 and takes up to 25 in the house.

By our read, the week-long booking is where a chef earns the fee: the groceries come with them, the kitchen is clean each morning, and nobody drives to a restaurant after a day on the water. The grocery-delivery alternative, for the nights you cook, is on the provisioning page.

Catering a party or a reception on St. Thomas

For a crowd the villa kitchen cannot feed, the island has caterers who bring the staff. St. Thomas Restaurant Group, whose events office is at Red Hook Plaza, caters private events from ten or fifteen guests up to 120 at a home or villa, buffet, plated, à la carte or brunch, priced on request. Island Edge Culinary's events side runs to 200, with bartending. Y.U.M VI Catering does drop-offs, buffets with servers and boxed meals for day sails. Shelly's Cakes & Catering adds wedding cakes to eight tiers and a cooking-lab dinner party with Julius Jackson at the stove. Fleagle by Dezign names a day on the water for twenty among its work.

St. John Catering and Mathayom Private Chefs, the Coral Bay company, serves St. Thomas on its own terms: $165 a person family style or $219 plated, a $1,125 minimum here and a $225 transport fee on every on-site event, gratuity billed at 20 percent, as of October 2026. For a wedding with a venue and a license, the planners are on St. Thomas weddings; for the nights out, St. Thomas eat and drink.

Gratuity, deposits and the crossing to St. John

Read the line under the price. DiveIn's 20 percent service charge turns its $150 dinner for eight into $1,440 before the wine; Y.U.M and Passion Fruit Chefs add 20 percent gratuity, and Island Edge an 18 percent administrative fee, on the same arithmetic. Deposits run to half: DiveIn and WITHIN take 50 percent to hold the date, and DiveIn keeps it if the head count drops inside 14 days, while WITHIN refunds in full more than seven days out. Island Edge wants 72 hours' notice at the least and charges a rush fee inside a week.

Five of these chefs also cook on St. John: DiveIn, Island Edge, Love City Lunch Box, Ultimate Chef Services and Chef Marshall Bishop. DiveIn and Ultimate Chef Services say the crossing carries a travel fee and do not print it, so a guest comparing a St. Thomas chef against one who lives on St. John should ask for that fee first. The St. John side, with the chefs who live there and their printed prices, is on St. John private chefs.

For owners: a welcome dinner on the first night

None of the chefs here prints a program for villa managers, so a standing arrangement is a conversation. The packages built for it are Ultimate Chef Services' Island Arrival Night dinner, WITHIN's $225 welcome platter for six to eight, DiveIn's drop-off dinner from a $500 minimum, and Y.U.M's drop-offs. By our read, a manager who offers a welcome dinner should fix the price with the chef for the season and name it in the listing as a priced extra, not a gift, because the fees above are the chef's and arrive after the guests do. The rest of what a house can offer is on St. Thomas services.