Jamie's chef
Lucy Britner chats with Aaron Craze six months after he won the tenancy of an Essex pub from Jamie Oliver's Fifteen Foundation xxxx
Even Phileas Fogg would struggle to find Aaron's pub. Beazley End is a lovely hamlet in rural Essex and after the building's colour was described by one food critic as "livid salmon", I thought the Cock would be easy to spot. But its tricky location certainly hasn't deterred the thousands of customers who have made the trip to sample Aaron's food, following his appearance on Channel 4's Jamie's Chef in January. Aaron fought off stiff competition to win the chance to run the pub owned by the Fifteen Foundation charity, founded by Jamie Oliver.
Business is going well for Aaron, with an average 600 to 700 covers a week served and a spend per head of £30. When he took over the Cock with his partner, Nicci, and their two daughters Molly and Leah, he was given a £120,000 loan to get started.
The money has been spent on refurbishing the restaurant, kitchen and painting the pub its famous colour. There is still some money in the pot for the garden, but that will have to wait until the sun shines and Aaron has some time. The inside of the pub is nothing fancy - the couple have kept a very traditional feel with roaring open fires and exposed beams. There are pictures of the family dotted around and perhaps the most stunning feature is the exposed kitchen, visible through the back of the bar.
The menu is called The Graduate at the
Cock Inn - a nod to Aaron's TV appearance
and the Fifteen Foundation. The food is
British/Italian with dishes such as home-made Graduate burger with tomato salsa and hand-cut chunky chips (£8), sitting alongside Sicilian lamb stew with herb and pine nut couscous, mascarpone and Fontodi oil (£9.50).
Aaron makes his own fresh pasta and there are five or six pasta dishes on the menu everyday, including pappardelle carbonara with guanciale (traditional Italian bacon) and grated parmigiano (£8.50).
Aaron certainly doesn't seem much like the fresh-faced graduate with lots to learn who starred in Jamie's Chef - there are no fires, except the one in the hearth - and no signs of arguments with Nicci. He seems organised, authoritative and confident. All that remains of Jamie Oliver at the pub is a photograph of him with Aaron and the show's other finalists. This is now very much Aaron's pub and Aaron's menu.
What's the hardest lesson you've learnt in the pub trade?
Delegate as much as possible. I'm a very hands-on person and I always like to do things myself, but you have to delegate because there is so much behind-the-scenes stuff that no one knows about that you have to do as well. It isn't too difficult running a family and a business - I run it all like one big family, so everyone chips in and looks out for each other. But it's important to make time for my family - we have Sunday nights and Mondays together.
How do you recruit and incentivise staff?
People come to us. We rarely have to advertise - it's mainly local people and students. My chefs are all either at college, have just finished college or never been to college. For the ones who haven't been to college, we are part of a scheme called Train to Gain. Chefs get to use my ingredients and try new things out and we put them on the specials board. They learn on the job and achieve an NVQ level two at the end of it. That's what being a chef is all about - being creative.
Would you recommend running a pub to other young chefs?
It's not for the faint-hearted. If you're really passionate about it and are prepared to give up a lot of your social life and pretty much marry the business and see the goal at the end of it - then yeah, go for it. I'd definitely recommend that young chefs go and work in a pub over a restaurant, it's much better. You don't work in restaurants - you're just a piece of meat. You're basically an extra pair of hands - especially in the fine dining ones. And many of them don't use good produce anyway. You're better off going to a good old country pub where the staff have got lots of passion and care about the food and drink. You'll learn much more and be much more involved in a smaller team and a smaller kitchen. There's not as much money to spend on produce, so you have to be more creative.
Would you like to see more schemes like Jamie's Fifteen Foundation?
Definitely. I think it's a shame that it took someone like Jamie Oliver to do it off his own back when the Government should be doing it anyway. They worry about crime and stuff like that, with young people, but they should be in there right at the beginning with support - not just for cooking, but for anything because wherever they go now, when they're young, is where they're going to end up. With Fifteen they'll help you with whatever you want to do.
How involved is the Fifteen Foundation in the running of the pub?
If I need to know something or need some answers, I can call them.
What was the best piece of advice you got from Jamie and the team?
Value for money - don't over price. Remember where you are and what people want. Don't be too adventurous at the beginning - you have to win people over. Put little specials on of your own stuff and let them try that.
How did you devise the menu when you first started?
We just put a load of different dishes on and monitored what was selling and what wasn't. We also kept some of the favourites from the old menu and just added little twists here and there - like fish and chips and lamb shanks - but using fresh, quality produce.
Some locals have disapproved in the press that the Cock has become a gastropub - does this bother you?
You can't please everyone. We never set out to offend anyone and we've kept all the ales on that were popular. We even kept the best-selling dishes the same - with our own tweaks. Most people like what we've done, but there are always a few that don't.
As part of Jamie's Chef, you worked with Michael Belben at the Eagle in Farringdon, London. What was that like?
Really interesting. Obviously, he did it first. Things like the mis-matched chairs, relaxed lunch service and the GPs were what I came away with. In fact, when it came to furnishing this place, I just went out and bought odd chairs for about a fiver each. Mike told me to just use old cutlery and not spend too much when we set out. Once the pub has a good reputation for food and you're making money - then is the time to think about buying new furniture.
What are your plans for the pub?
We want to get a year under our belt and experience all the seasons and see who comes in and when. Keep consistent service. We want to do the garden up for summer. We're entering stage two, just building on the place and we've got great suppliers.
Have you finished refurbishing yet?
It's almost done but there are always extra things you want to tweak - like Nicci wants to wallpaper the toilets. The kitchen's done though, and we spent about £20,000 on it.
You've been here for six months now, are you on target for the year financially?
Yes, we're doing all right. We can pay the rent.
What's the secret of delivering good customer service?
Good acting skills. If it's 12 o'clock or six o'clock you perform and you're on stage. You give it 100% and forget about everything else that's going on in your personal life.
What were those few months like before the show went out?
November and December were quite busy. We were probably doing around 300 to 350 covers a week. [It was] half of what we do now, but back then it was a lot. Then January was awful and we struggled with ordering produce because we only use fresh ingredients. So if it didn't get used in a couple of days, it was thrown out. We learnt a good lesson that month. Then at the end of January the show came out and we made up for January in February.
15 little questions
1. Average hours worked per week? About 80. It go
