Development chef profile: Liezel Bezuidenhout, Admiral Taverns

What food concepts most inspire you?​

Street food and pop up restaurants have really taken the market by storm, making their way to local markets and venues, even pubs, and bringing lots of inspiration with it.  It has allowed different international flavours and food concepts to come into the market and really widened our horizons in terms of taste and variety.

As a South African my attention has been caught by Bunny Chow restaurants in London, which are inspired by the traditional South African Bunny Chow dish, a hollowed out loaf, filled with a stew or curry.  The menu isn’t very big but what they do, they do well - exactly what street food is all about.

Bills - I like their menu, which features smaller plates that can be shared with friends through to succulent ribs and burgers.  The presentation, food quality, customer service and restaurant design is very good. Also ‘Power food’ ingredients such as quinoa and kale, which can be quite bland at times, are used effectively and you almost forget that you’re eating something healthy.

What trends do you think are having the most influence on pub menus? ​

American influenced dishes - the likes of ribs, wings, BBQ pulled pork, hot dogs and burgers are making it onto most menus.  I have also seen more and more pubs getting involved in some kind of Man vs Food-style eating challenge. 

Burgers are not exactly a new trend, but they still remain a best-selling dish on menus and they have been developed within menus.  We now find full burger sections as well as ‘Build your Burger’ and ‘Tower your Burger’ with as many toppings as you can.  The ‘Build your Own’ is also becoming increasingly popular with pie menus, with a choice of pies, mashes, gravies and accompaniments. The concept gives customers additional choice, menus more flexibility and helps increase spend per head.

Pizzas: there are so many products available that makes pizza so accessible for pub caterers. It’s a great offer for pubs that have limited space and investment in kit is relatively low. It also gives pubs the opportunity to take advantage of a late night food offer and help keep customers in longer. The offer can stand on its own or be part of a larger menu and can enable pubs that haven’t been able to offer food previously, to offer at least a pizza. 

Basket meals are also making a return in some wet-led pubs that want to offer a small food offer. It’s easy to do with value for money price points and low to no wastage.

I think another thing we may see more of is pubs outside London allowing food pop ups to come into their pubs.

With the trend for craft beer and lager I think we will see more food matching centred around them. Finally, with the allergen laws we are already seeing more and more gluten free available on menus and this will continue to grow.

What national food events do you recommend pub caterers should get involved with? ​

These are something we encourage our licensees to get involved in.  It gives them the opportunity to try something different from their usual food offer as well as using the marketing around the events to advertise other activities and drive footfall.

A few that stand out are National Chip Week and Farmhouse Breakfast week – both great for encouraging visits during the ‘slump’ months of January and early February. Chip Week is an opportunity for caterers to get more creative with their chips, perhaps doing homemade, hand-cut chips or having a dedicated chip menu.

British Beef Week, organised by beef farmers the Ladies in Beef, starts on St Georges Day. There is a great website with tips, recipes and ways for pubs to get involved. Britain’s favourite meal gets celebrated during British Roast Dinner Week (28 Sept – 4 Oct 2015). It is an excellent opportunity to show off your roast not just on a Sunday, but during the whole week.

With more people looking at having vegetarian meals due to it being slightly healthier, National Vegetarian Week is ideal for caterers to do something different on menus, such as running a vegetarian only specials board or experimenting with a few different veggie meals. 

What are the biggest crimes against pub food?​

Lack of control on menus – it’s quite a common occurrence even in those food offers that on the surface look very successful. You would think it makes perfect sense in any business to know things like costs, wastage and profit margins but for some reason in many pub kitchens these things aren’t a priority.  Most licensees know most of the profit margins on drinks or will not allow unlimited wastage on draught, but food seems to be lacking these controls. 

Consistency in terms of delivering the food to customers is also very important.  This includes serving food when you say you are and serving what the menu states.  Not doing this, lets customers down and you might not ever see them returning.  Many pubs also make the mistake of having menus that are too large to deliver consistency and quality.  It is better for a pub to serve a smaller menu and do everything very well.

What is the key to keeping chefs/ kitchen staff motivated?  ​

Have a well organised kitchen, with a fun working environment and clear communication. Without clear communication to kitchen and front of house staff, there is no way that a fun working environment or organisation will happen.  ​Set clear goals for your staff to achieve and give them regular feedback on progress. 

Having a menu that staff can manage without getting out of their depth will also help.  There is no point in having a too large or over ambitious menu that kitchen staff cannot cook.  This will only cause feelings of worthlessness and lead to low motivation and staff leaving.  There are many ways to keep staff motivated.  I think in the hospitality industry this can be particularly hard as it can be a tough environment to work in, but if managers invest in this it can save a lot of time and cost in the long term.

What is the best thing you have introduced to your company’s food offer in the past year?​

A concept called ‘Build a Menu’, which follows on from our ‘Food 4 Thought’ concept launched a couple of years ago, which involved a selection of small food offers that licensees could adopt either as individual offers or as a combination. 

With ‘Build a Menu’ (BAM) we aim to make menus as flexible as possible, to allow each of our licensees to still have a slightly bespoke menu but one with all the controls in place. 

The concept allows for different skill levels, meaning a licensee with a limited kitchen and skill in the kitchen can still do a great menu using freezer to fryer/microwave products through to licensees making homemade dishes. 

Coffee for me is also such a great opportunity and is far more than just a hot drink for customers to enjoy.  Licensees can get creative with coffee desserts, cocktails and liqueur coffees. 

What do customers in 2015 want?​

In terms of retail offering, it is important to listen to customer feedback. Find out why customers visit you in the first place and how you can make that visit better.  Really look at your customers, create a customer profile for your business and really think about how you can amend your offering to suit their demands.

If footfall is an issue, find out why - there is always a reason be it pricing, your total offer, competition, standards or customer service and act sooner rather than later.  Competition for customers is fierce and with the likes of coffee shops starting to sell alcohol, licensees will need to really start looking at their overall offer in more and more detail in order to compete.

Recommended food apps and websites: ​

O2 Priority Moments - free to access app for O2 customers and a great way for pubs to get promotions out in their local area.  It is quite geographically focussed and a great way to drum up business during quiet times.   

CaterCost - a system that help manages your menu in terms of costs, portion control and menu prices.  It also gives allergen information and dietary information on dishes which is very helpful in terms of the recent allergen law and more and more customers wanting information on calories per dish. 

Pinterest - It allows you to post images of dishes and events and you can connect your account to Facebook and Twitter.