Pubs adapting dishes as oil prices rise further

This comes as olive oil supplier Acesur export manager, Miguel Colmenero, earlier this week told the BBC prices could rise by some 20-25% over the next three to four months due to heatwaves in Spain, understood to produce almost half the world’s olive oil.

Furthermore, the BBC added other olive oil producing countries, such as Italy and Portugal, had been experiencing extreme weather alongside a lack of rainfall, exacerbating the impact on production, which Colmenero told the BBC was “drastic”.

Owner and chef of the Cadeleigh Arms in Tiverton, Devon, Nicholas Hack explained the pub’s olive oil cost had recently gone up some 50% pushing the chef to switch to rapeseed oil for the majority of dishes and dressings.

However, the pub, number 48 on the Top 50 Gastropubs list, still requires olive oil, due to it not being as heavy as rapeseed, in making its charcuterie offering, which could be taken off the menu if prices increase much further.

Managing costs 

Hack added: “[We’ll] have to look at the charcuterie and it’ll be a choice of do we increase the price of the dish, it's already quite an expensive dish, or do we remove it altogether?

“If it comes to the point the olive oil is actually more expensive than the charcuterie meat from Cornwall on the board then, it's a no brainer, we will have to remove it from the menu.

“We're lucky in Devon, we've got a couple of local suppliers that do our rapeseed oil so we've got a reasonable price on that at the moment.

“Everyone's got to manage costs as best they can at the moment and hope next year things are going to start coming down again, but we'll have to wait and see.

Furthermore, the Cadeleigh Arms has not been the only pub to switch to rapeseed oil to combat costs.

Great substitute 

The Parker Arms in Clitheroe, Lancashire, number 2 on the Top 50 Gastropubs list, chef patron Stosie Madi, who uses produce from Manchester-based Wignalls Farm, explained using rapeseed oil had not only been cheaper than olive oil, at some £30 for 10 litres, but it also offered a better balance to some dishes.

She said: “The benefits of using rapeseed oil are it's UK produced, so it's sustainable and it's delicious, very nutty, not as verdant, and grassy as olive oil.

“It works well with our cooking because we don't cook Mediterranean food. We cook regional sort of Lancashire UK classics in a modern way, so it gives a perfect balance to our dishes.

“Rapeseed has got quite a neutral taste and it's not as strong as olive oil, so it could be a great substitute.”