March 2009 Archives

Entrepreneur Richard Caring has bought up some of London's dining jewels and left them largely unchanged, but a recent move has ruffled a few feathers.

It's a new scheme whereby members of the Ivy Club are allowed to use Harry's Bar in Mayfair.

The latter is considered by far the more prestigious establishment, and some members have already been somewhat displeased by the development.

Caring insists that the arrangement is temporary - our take on it is that it's certainly a credit crunch measure tables increasingly easy to come by at Harry's.

Harry's Bar is part of the late Mark Birley's group of West End clubs, which include Annabel's, Mark's Club and the Bath and Racquets Club.

Here's an interview with the man behind sushi sensation Nobu, Mr Nobu Matsuhisa himself. He talks frankly about his way up the ladder before he became as familiar a name in the sushi world as a Hoover is to vacuum cleaner fans.

There's more trouble ahead for the pub trade, with enforcement activity on the up and, of course, further legislation in the offing.

Still, legislation takes a while to push through Parliament - even the flagship Policing and Crime Bill - so the Home Office has a bit of free-time on its hands.

So in a move about as welcome as a warm lager, officials have been running a series of free roadshows for council licensing officers to encourage more enforcement activity against pubs.

Councils themselves are particularly keen on enforcement activity, as due to the tough environment for pubs, variations and applications for new licences have tailed off and there's a revenue shortfall for many.

Still, you'd hope the police would rise above all this populist nonsense and apply some commonsense to the issue of problem drinking, taking a lead were politicians will not. Well, in a word, no.

It's easy for older folks to get written off these days, especially if you're beyond the baby boomer generation. Unless of course you're Bill Marriott. The great-grandfather of three and son of the all-American hotel chain's founder JDubya, is definitely still going strong and keeping up with the times, as proved by his blog, which we stumbled across recently...

This week, two members of the Caterer team, Katherine Alano and Emma White, where invited by Mertlin Events to "face their fears" and take a ride on the new £13.5m rollercoaster Saw at Thorpe Park.

The ride features a 100-degree drop from 100ft in the air and has been dubbed the "most terrifying ride in the world".

According to our thrill-seekers it definately lived up to the hype and brought along a camera to capture the moment. (Unfortunately, they weren't able to film Saw itself as it was too dark - at least that is what they were telling us!)

And if that wasn't enough for our daring two, they also took a ride on Collosus - which boasts the UK's only quadruple corkscrew and ten vertical loops! 

Mad? They must be... Watch the videos here.

We are still unaware as to how much Rocco Forte are asking for.

Browns recently underwent a £24m restoration and is home to Mark Hix's Albemarle restaurant.

It joined The Rocco Forte Collection of luxury hotels on 3rd July 2003, but it will be interesting to see if and when it leaves it, and at what price in the current market...

So you think keeping your customers happy is increasingly hard in this recessional times, do you?

Well how about the prospect of setting back the peace process in Northern Ireland a few years, over something as seemingly innocuous as your choice of flowers? Not grumbling now are you...

One shit,shit, shit! moment happened to Colin Prentice and team at the Northern Ireland Assembly at Stormont in the not too distant past.

Prentice and his team, professional to their core, provide a range of services as Eurest Services at the Parliment Buildings in east Belfast, including putting out the flowers.

However, on one occassion a garland of lilies was put up in the building as part of the day-to-day service. Very nice, you may think, but the lilly is of course a symbol for nationalists of the Easter Rising. Not so nice.

Luckily it was spotted and removed before politicans from either side of the political divide noticed, avoiding any rumptions, accusations of favouritism or broadsides from Ian Paisley.

Although people love their coffee, I doubt you get that sort of fallout if you added milk by mistake to a customer's Americano in Starbucks.

For more see A Minute on the Clock this week in Caterer.

Compass Group wins £500m racecourse deal>>

Catering giants tune into FM for revenue growth>>

Compass creates one-stop shop in Eurest Services>>

Recent coverage in Caterer about the renewed interest amongst contract caterers in providing facilities management services bought things full-circle for one reader.

While conceding there was certainly a demand for facilities management from some clients - and adding that the market had developed significantly since, with many professional managers now in the field - our source couldn't help but think back to a time when FM, in most people's minds, was simply a radio frequency.

"Some 24 years ago Compass challenged existing operations managers and their bosses to go out and 'sell' - cleaning & security contracts - with great kudos afforded to any that managed this feat.

"Lifelong caterers received an hour or so of 'training' to prepare us with resource to provide arms-length consultant expertise. The negative energy this created was something to behold. The result was loss of focus on the existing business and loss of key accounts and managers."

Still, with the recent win of National Grid and an extension to their Shell contract, as well as ComputaCentre, it's fair to say Compass's new FM strategy appears to be paying off this time.

Compass creates one-stop shop with Eurest Services>>

Caterers tune into FM for revenue growth>>

Although Kitchen Rat can't attest for the validity of this one, rumour has it that an issue fought over vociferously on the departure of former Aramark chief executive Bill Toner was, wait for it, a £50,000 wine cellar at his London pad.

Mr Toner, who left Aramark in 2005, had quite legitimately amassed the collection of fine wines at his South Bank home for the purpose of corporate entertaining, as was the vogue in those halycon days of greed in the City.

However, on having his contract terminated Aramark's American owners demanded the wine back and Toner had to ultimately relinquish it. Surely not the best way to avoid sour grapes.

Still, given the pursuit of disgraced RBS boss Sir Fred Goodwin and his £703,000 pension pot, perhaps losing some fermented grape juice isn't all that bad in the larger scheme of things.

Where are they now? Bill Toner>>

Marcus Wareing enters into partnership with Aramark>>

The food cooked by top chefs encourages unhealthy eating, according to an independent report from a group of senior dieticians.

Nigella Lawson, Rick Stein, Jean-Christophe Novelli and John Burton-Race are all noted for using large amounts of cream and butter in their cookbooks, thus promoting saturated fat intake way beyond the recommended daily allowance.

The findings come from The Fat Panel, a collection of dieticians including Sian Porter, a member of the British Dietetic Association. She said: "these recipes are fine for a special occasion, but if you cook regularly from them there is a high chance you will be taking in a lot of fat".

"Nigella, Jean-Christophe Novelli and Rick Stein use the highest levels of saturated fat. If you look at Nigella's egg and bacon pie, it uses butter which is fine for indulgence but not as a habit."

Phil Vickery was also mentioned in the report for using too much saturated fat, but Jamie Oliver and Delia Smith were given a healthy rating by the panel.

 Industry must improve gluten-free offering >>

Rick Stein takes over lease on local Cornish pub >>

Will Denizen, the new name for Hilton's boutique hotel brand, supposedly rivalling W et al, prove to be a major success and culmination of months of planning by former W-man Ross Klein, or will it be a prime example of what critics of the global brands getting their hands on boutique hotels fear - concepts by boardroom consensus? Check out the Denizen website - wait for it citizens of the world - till 100 in fact, before your corporate video begins. What do you think?

The former Dakota Hotel in Nottingham has been rebranded as the first of a new boutique hotel chain - MourHotel.

MourHotel is a new take on boutique in that it's USP - so it claims - is that it's a sensory hotel.

The owners, headed by chairman Russell Allen, plan to have 12 sites up and running within the next six months and have an initial development fund of £120m.

Ken McCulloch's Dakota brand went into liquidation last spring. 

Good to see that Caterer's top tips, as written by Tom Vaughan, for combating the recession caught the imagination of a reading public keen to have some light-heartedness injected into the gloom of an ever-downward headed economy, see below. We may not intend them for actual use, but they hopefully brought a smile to some.

Former MasterChef winner James Nathan has joined the Michelin-starred Bath Priory as junior sous chef, Kitchen Rat can reveal.

The 2008 winner of the BBC show, which gives amateur cooks the chance to make the jump to becoming professional chefs, will be working under the guidance of the property's new executive head chef Michael Caines.

Caines has taken over the reins at the Bath Priory following the departure of Chris Horridge, who left in January to join von Essen's Cliveden hotel.

Head chef is James Sheridan, who joins from Caines' two-Michelin-starred restaurant at Gidleigh Park, where he was sous chef. It's his first role as head chef.

The Bath Priory will reopen Monday week (16 March) after a six-week refurbishment programme, which included a complete revamp of the kitchen.

Look out for a Minute on the Clock interview with general manager Sue Williams in next week's issue of Caterer and Hotelkeeper out on 12 March. 

He's just completed his first installment of Big Chef programmes, but senor Blumenthal was back on our screens last night for more with his new series looking at chowing down throughout the ages.

Blumenthal is targeting those epochs when large meals went hand in hand with culinary invention. And to kick off he turned to the Victorians.

"It was extraordinary", said The Guardian's TV critic Sam Leith of 'Heston's Victorian Feast'. "Heston lacks telly charisma...lines were delivered with the uncertain enthusiasm of a born lab-tech - but what he does with grub is gripping."

The three-star chef served wacky food to Radio 5 presenter Richard Bacon, former Scud star Rageh Omaar, Dawn Porter, Kathy Lette, Jemma Redgrave and Toby Young.

And what dishes: cow's head soup reduced to a stock cube wrapped in gold foil shaped as a watch, which was then dissolved in water. There was also an Alice in Wonderland-inspired layered liquid infusion with toffee, hot-buttered toast, custard, cherry tart and turkey flavours. And he finished with a six-foot edible garden, complete with olive soil and potato rocks.

According to Serena Davies, TV critic for The Telegraph, "it's great. If food can seem this amazing even when you can't taste it, heaven knows how divine the experience of actually eating it must be".

However, Times television critic Andrew Billen thought the whole thing "utterly pointless". Heston now "flaps around wondering where on television his future lies", he added.

Heston Blumenthal puts on a brave face >>

Heston Blumenthal hopes to reopen Fat Duck this week >>

Heston Blumenthal gets green light to reopen Fat Duck >>

In a move that must rate up there with the appointment of Tony Blair as Middle East Envoy, the Hotel Marketing Association has unveiled its annual lecture will be delivered by none other than Michael Prager.

If you can't quite place Mr Prager, it could be because his company, The Real Hotel Group, collapsed into adminstration in January after a protracted demise played out in public over a number of years.

In fact, Kitchen Rat is not sure if "Credit crunch, black hole or Super Nova?" is the title of the lecture, or a comment on Real's balance sheet at the time the administrators were handed the keys.

The irony of the situation had not been lost on The Times either, which elicited the following response from the former chief executive who is reported to be trying to buy back 11 Purple Hotels from the adminstrators for its diary section:

"I made a commitment to the HMA ages ago. Life goes on." Quite. And best of luck to you to Mr Blair.

Focus Hotels plans for ten rescued Real hotels>>

Choice Hotels International ends franchises with Real Hotel Group>>

150 jobs lost as Real Hotel Group closes four hotels>>

Boss of Real Hotel Group takes swipe at rivals>>

Blair appointed Middle East Envoy>>

Heard a new term the other day as i was watching the Rise of the Superchef - three days late - thanks to V+ -

Talking about the king of TV chefs Antony Worrall-Thompson and his vast range of branded products - from pots and pans to sauces and even toilet cleaner - this marketing dude labelled Wozza the king of "brand-slap" - what a great term. Clearly Menage a Trois was not enough for the cheeky chef, and he's just upgraded to a menagerie...

Heard any other great terms lately?