Do you complain in restaurants?
19 August 2008, 12:40 AM
#61
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You're looking at over 2000 branded outlets there without even mentioning the unbranded pubs or the leased houses.
19 August 2008, 01:11 AM
#63
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It's very unlikely you'll find anywhere that does home-made food anymore.
The places I've named above will be supplied products by Brakes Brothers. Other companies use 3663 as their distribution agents. But regard;less of who they use, for example, a lettuce grown in Spain will take 5 days to reach a UK pub/restauerant. The staff that then have to serve it, are under that much pressure to use as much as they can, that they will send it out until they see it leaking brown juice.
The places I've named above will be supplied products by Brakes Brothers. Other companies use 3663 as their distribution agents. But regard;less of who they use, for example, a lettuce grown in Spain will take 5 days to reach a UK pub/restauerant. The staff that then have to serve it, are under that much pressure to use as much as they can, that they will send it out until they see it leaking brown juice.
21 August 2008, 12:57 AM
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Only just back about 15 minutes ago from today's VIP servings before tomorrow's public opening.
We asked for the guests tonight to be hyper-critical of everything - food service, drinks service and food quality etc.
Being the type of person that I am, I chose to lead from the front.
What a mistake - I put myself as the starter and deli chef.
**** me, did I get bum-raped! The bastids didnt even give me any KY Jelly 
We sent out over 500 dishes between 18:00 and 20:30 (starters, mains and deserts) and not a single dish came back which is amazing considering that all of the kitchem team are new to the business and equipment, including myself. The only negative comments concerned certain dessert items which we knew we'd have problems with, plus the staff getting used to our e-ticket system, which suddenly re-arranges meals by priority. (So should table one order a main course, we start cooking it, but if someone else joins table 1 and then orders starters, it wants us to stop cooking the previous mains, serve the starters and the resume the mains after that - complicated and I can see it causing issues).
On the whole, it was a great trial run. We had major pressure at stages, we took the requested hyper-critical requested criticsim and used it to improve our standards as we were going. My feelings are that if we, as a brand new kitchen team, with a brand new menu, and being placed under what is projected as 140% of our maximum service rates, and not even gettimg 1 meal sent back, then everyone should be able to produce the goods.
However, it will be interesting to see what the bank holiday weekend brings...
We asked for the guests tonight to be hyper-critical of everything - food service, drinks service and food quality etc.
Being the type of person that I am, I chose to lead from the front.
What a mistake - I put myself as the starter and deli chef.
**** me, did I get bum-raped! The bastids didnt even give me any KY Jelly We sent out over 500 dishes between 18:00 and 20:30 (starters, mains and deserts) and not a single dish came back which is amazing considering that all of the kitchem team are new to the business and equipment, including myself. The only negative comments concerned certain dessert items which we knew we'd have problems with, plus the staff getting used to our e-ticket system, which suddenly re-arranges meals by priority. (So should table one order a main course, we start cooking it, but if someone else joins table 1 and then orders starters, it wants us to stop cooking the previous mains, serve the starters and the resume the mains after that - complicated and I can see it causing issues).
On the whole, it was a great trial run. We had major pressure at stages, we took the requested hyper-critical requested criticsim and used it to improve our standards as we were going. My feelings are that if we, as a brand new kitchen team, with a brand new menu, and being placed under what is projected as 140% of our maximum service rates, and not even gettimg 1 meal sent back, then everyone should be able to produce the goods.
However, it will be interesting to see what the bank holiday weekend brings...
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