Hospitality Magazine September 2015

Print Post Approved PP100007268

No.718 September 2015

hospitalitymagazine.com.au

foodservice

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accommodation

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beverage

Rolling with the pincers

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management

PLUS:

Tips for rural recruitment

The rising popularity of lobster rolls

Mastering Instagram

Tell your story & tempt the crowds

Savings that sparkle

How to extend the life of your glassware

14 editor’s note

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Editor: Danielle Bowling danielle.bowling@cirrusmedia.com.au

HO0 9 1 5 _ 0 0 1

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accommodation

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beverage

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management

with the pincers

PLUS:

Tips for rural recruitment

The rising popularity of lobster rolls

Mastering Instagram

Tell your story & tempt the crowds

Savings that sparkle

How to extend the life of your glassware

Maine & Connecticut lobster rolls from Waterman’s Lobster Co.

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cover

20

contents FEATURES

REGULARS

10 Taps beyond tradition

4 News

The rising popularity of food and beer pairing.

6 New openings Four new restaurant openings.

Make this picture-based platform work for your business.

How to avoid breakages and get the most from your glassware.

20 Rollings with the pincers

HEAD OF CIRCULATION Chris Blacklock cblacklock@intermedia.com.au To subscribe please call 1800 651 422.

hospitalitymagazine.com.au facebook.com/ HospitalityMagazine twitter.com/Hospitalityed instagram.com/hospitalitymag

24 The value of a network Building relationships that last.

25 Ken Burgin

Lobster rolls - simplicity at its best.

Menu buzzwords that leave a bad taste.

28 Workplace An update from the Productivity Commission’s enquiry.

8 Wine 10 reds for any wine list.

18 Savings that sparkle

SUBSCRIPTION RATES Australia 1 year (10 issues) = $99.00 (inc GST) 2 years (20 issues) = $158.40 (inc GST) – Save 20% 3 years (30 issues) = $207.90 (inc GST) – Save 30% New Zealand 1 year (10 issues) = $109.00 Asia/Pacific 1 year (10 issues) = $119.00 Rest of World 1 year (10 issues) = $129.00

26 Eat your words

The latest industry trends.

14 Mastering Instagram

MANAGING EDITOR Danielle Bowling T: 02 8586 6226 dbowling@intermedia.com.au

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Rolling

PRODUCTION MANAGER Jacqui Cooper jacqui@intermedia.com.au

ADVERTISING NATIONAL Rhonnie Merry T: 02 8586 6163 F: 02 9660 4419 rhonnie@intermedia.com.au

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foodservice

PUBLISHER Paul Wootton pwootton@intermedia.com.au

JOURNALIST Aoife Boothroyd T: 02 8586 6194 aboothroyd@intermedia.com.au

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No.718 September 2015

Print Post Approved PP100007268

ot to be a wowser, but I’m really not sure how I feel about the number of awards programs in Australia’s foodservice industry. It’s something I think we’ve spoken about before, but each year it seems to become more and more cumbersome.

August and September always feel like a blur of attending and reporting on this awards program or that one, the formats of which are almost carbon copies of each other. If five different programs name five different venues Restaurant of the Year, or five different people Chef of the Year, then what do these accolades even mean? One could argue that being ‘the best’ has never meant so little in this industry.

Come now, I can hear you saying.

Don’t be such a wet blanket, Danielle.

Any initiative that praises those that work tirelessly and passionately to deliver us with memorable dining experiences is a good thing, right? Right. We all know the impact that a good review or receiving an award can have on patronage, so if struggling to remember whether Dan Hunter was named Chef of the Year by The Age, Gourmet Traveller or The Australian means more bums on seats in restaurants, more businesses in the black, and more recognition for the hugely talented, committed professionals in today’s cafes, pubs and restaurants, then I guess I’m OK with that.

29 Shelf space New products that could be worth a look.

30 Diary

Tips for rural recruitment.

Industry events to take note of.

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hospitality | September 2015

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newsonline

Out & about Industry events the Hospitality team attended this month...

9 August Dinner of the Decade event @ Mojo

10 August Appetite for Excellence @ Salt Meats Cheese

17 August Masterclass filming with Sydney Markets

20 August Team dinner @ Sepia

24 August Time Out Sydney awards @ The Morrison

27 August Soho in Balmain launch

Follow us:

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hospitality | September 2015

Hospitality Magazine

Annual Dining Index sheds light on industry trends Dimmi’s annual Dining Index has been released, shedding light on the current trends influencing the strength of Australia’s hospitality sector.

The fourth annual Australian Dining Index found that the restaurant industry has dropped by 2.4 percent when compared to 2013/14.

The ACT was hit the hardest, dropping 9.2 percent, followed by Queensland which fell 6.8 percent and Victoria, 4.4 percent. The market improved slightly – by just 0.2 percent – in NSW, but the clear leader of the pack is South Australia where the market jumped by 7.6 percent over the past 12 months.

Spend per head Despite the industry decreasing overall, the national average spend increased, albeit by only 37 cents. The premium end of the market showed the most significant growth, up by 17 percent to more than $85 a head. West Australian diners spend the least per head ($48.43), followed by Victoria ($53.85), Queensland ($53.88), NSW ($57.43) and South Australia ($58.88). Diners in the ACT spend the most, with an average of $60.77 per head.

-2.4%

National -2.4%

Bookings The Index also revealed that diners are more impulsive about eating out, with lead times decreasing by 11 percent year on year, and 32 percent of all bookings now made within 24 hours of the dining time. In addition, 2015’s Index is the first to show that mobiles have overtaken desktops as the preferred booking method for restaurants, with 53 percent of online bookings for restaurants now being made from a mobile device.

“The release of the Dimmi Dining Index is always such an exciting event for us and our fourth edition is an absolute cracker. The most prolific industry trend we’ve seen is the shift from desktop to mobile bookings. We saw it happen with airlines and hotels, and now we’re seeing it with restaurants too,” said Stevan Premutico, founder and CEO of Dimmi.

DAY TO DAY

SPEND.

Other key trends: • Double sittings: Having two sittings is now a common practice for restaurants. Bookings have decreased between 7-8pm by nine percent when compared to 2013/14, while the time slots either side have both increased • Corporates are back: There has been a 41 percent increase in online bookings, from the top 10 corporates, over the past 12 months • Aussies are eating out less frequently but spending more: Consumers are eating out slightly less frequently than last year but are spending a little more, with an increase of $0.37 on 2013/14 • Spend concern: The average spend in restaurants has increased by only $1.00 in three years. Automation is critical to reduce costs and boost profit margins at a time of increasing rent and labour costs, Dimmi says.

• Men vs women: The gender gap is closing but males still spend more than females when eating out – $61 and $53 respectively.

Males also make more spur of the moment reservations, with 36 percent of bookings made by men in the 24 hours prior to dining.

This compares to 28 percent for women in the same period. @Hospitalityed

hospitalitymag

Hospitality Magazine

BOOKING

LEAD TIMES.

V I S I T W W W. D I M M I . C O M . A U / D A D I

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newsonline

Source: Dimmi Australian Dining Index 2015

DIMMI AUSTRALIAN DINING INDEX 2015 BOOKING TRENDS COMPARED TO LAST YEAR.

MOBILE VS. ACT

-9.2%

-6.8%

DESKTOP

SA

QLD

VIC -4.4%

WA -0.9%

NSW 0.2%

7.6%

For the first time, mobiles have overtaken desktops as the preferred booking method for restaurants.

HOW THE STATES MEASURE UP. After a rollercoaster year ending on a slight decline the average national spend increased by $0.37 per person.

M

T

W

T

F

S

S

$52

$52

$51

$53

$56

$59

$51

32

%

LAST MINUTE

BOOKINGS <24 HOUR

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CORPORATE BOOKINGS ON THE RISE.

41

%

PwC

CBA

FROM TOP 10 CORPORATES

ERNST & YOUNG

NAB

ANZ

hospitality | September 2015

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newopenings

Passiontree Velvet

With a business model designed around making high tea more affordable, Passiontree Velvet blends the characteristics of an English tea house, a Parisian patisserie and a Belgian chocolatier to create a unique and approachable high tea experience. Four high tea options are available including Devonshire Cream Tea, Chocolatiers High Tea, Teddy Bears Picnic (for children) and The Full Duchess High Tea. The venue has hired an experienced team of pastry chefs, and a French trained chocolatier who have crafted a menu of breakfast items, lunch-time savouries and sweets in addition to the high tea offering. Light meals include a croque monsieur; baked stuffed avocado; and a smoked salmon and cream cheese baguette. The beverage offering includes a suite of Harney & Son’s teas.

Project manager: Christopher Sheldrick Where: 322 Moggill Rd, Indooroopilly, QLD Open: Tues – Thurs, 3pm – late; Fri – Sun, 11am – late Email: info@passiontree.com.au Web: www.passiontreevelvet.com

Saint.Urban

Martin Pirc of Punch Lane and chef Daniel Schelbert have opened Saint.Urban. Located on Swan Street, Richmond, the menu at Saint.

Urban has been designed to attract guests at all hours of the day and night. Snacks on the terrace include oysters, cheese and charcuterie along with sheep’s haloumi with peppered wild figs and pork trotter croquettes. More substantial dishes include gnocchi with burnt butter, pumpkin and amaretti; wagyu bavette, harrisa, charred onion and watercress; and confit duck leg with parsnip puree, cumquats and sorrel.

The wine list showcases both Australian and European varieties, with 16 drops offered by the glass.

Owners: Martin Pirc and Daniel Schelbert Head chef: Daniel Schelbert Where: 213 Swan St, Richmond, VIC Open: Tues – Thurs, 3pm – late; Fri – Sun, 11am – late Web: http://sainturban.com.au

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Italian Street Kitchen

The brainchild of the Seagrass Boutique Hospitality Group, Italian Street Kitchen will be taking over the former home of Mauro Marcucci’s Enopizzeria. Designed by Otto Design Interiors, the venue’s interior has been inspired by the streets of Italy. The space will feature a simple neutral colour palette with natural timbers, polished concrete and plaster which contrasts with raw and refined black steel elements. The menu comprises antipasto (arancini; fried and baked cheese; salumi and formaggio; and meatballs) along with wood fired oven pork roast, and lamb or chicken spit roast cooked on an open flame barbeque. Traditional offerings such as freshly made pasta and wood fired pizza will be the standouts.

Owner: Seagrass Boutique Hospitality Group Where: 5/19-21 Grosvenor Street, Neutral Bay, NSW Open: Monday – Sunday Web: http://italianstreetkitchen.com

Yayoi, The Galeries

A second Yayoi venue has now set up shop in Sydney, this time at The Galeries Victoria. The venue boasts an extensive food menu comprising famous Japanese home-cooked style meals known as ‘teishoku’, which consist of rice as the centrepiece served with miso soup, a main dish of meat or fish, and a side of vegetables or Japanese pickles. Other signature dishes include the Yayoi Gozen, a set ‘tasting plate’ style meal that comes in a traditional box and well as unique Japanese dishes such as Natto, a fermented soybean dish served with rice and Tororo, which can be described as a sticky potato also served with rice. Yayoi also offers a broad range of authentic sakes, Japanese and Australian beers and international wines.

Owner: Plenus Co Ltd Where: The Galeries Victoria, 500 George Street, Sydney, NSW Open: Mon – Sun,12 – 10pm Email: reservations.sydney@yayoi.com.au Web: www.yayoi.com.au

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beverageswine

10 reds to treasure We might be heading into the warmer months, but these drops are worthy of a spot on your wine list year-round. By Christine Salins.

T

reasury Wine Estates is a global company with wineries in key Australian and New Zealand regions, so when it holds a tasting to show-off reds from across its portfolio, you know it’s going to be a mixed bag of styles, flavours and prices.

And so it was when winemakers from the company’s brands were asked to select a couple of wines each for a Regional Winter Reds tasting.

What follows is a pared down selection of the wines they chose, with no particular thread other than that they are all fine reds worthy of a place on any wine list.

1. Seppelt 2012 Original Sparkling Shiraz, VIC $26.99.

Although there are no precise records, Seppelt was probably experimenting with sparkling reds as far back as the 1890s. This incredible record is not lost on winemaker Adam Carnaby, who aims to harness the strengths of each viticultural region he draws on.

Most of the fruit for this sparkling wine is from the Grampians, which Carnaby says produces “mediumbodied fleshy styles.” There’s also some fruit from Bendigo and Heathcote, adding lovely spicy notes.

2. Abels Tempest 2013 Pinot Noir, TAS $31.99.

Tasmanian Pinot is enjoying a stellar role on many restaurant lists and this Heemskerk wine deserves to be amongst them. It’s vibrant and flavoursome with cherry and red

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hospitality | September 2015

berry notes, and subtle, toasty oak.

Winemaker Peter Munro says Tasmania is a very exciting up and coming region for Pinot, with fruit from the Coal River Valley providing structure and fruit from the Derwent Valley providing plushness and richness.

3. Matua 2013 Lands & Legends Central Otago Pinot Noir, NZ $29.99.

Across the Tasman, Matua is one of the largest Pinot producers in Central Otago. Winemaker Nikolai St George says the 2013 vintage was a little warmer than usual, producing a bigger, riper style that is elegant and brooding.

The fruit for this wine is sourced from two sub-regions. The Bannockburn fruit, in particular, “shone every time we looked at it. You don’t have to do anything to it in the winery.”

4. Coldstream Hills 2013 Reserve Pinot Noir, VIC $84.99.

Pinot has a remarkable ability to adapt to the warmer seasons of the Yarra Valley, according to winemaker Andrew Fleming, who says they also rely on viticultural techniques to produce the best fruit they can. Yet they don’t produce a Reserve every year - Fleming has made seven in 14 years. When they do, it has to be exceptional. “It has to have that velvety texture we’re looking for, that silkiness,” he says.

5. Coldstream Hills 2013 Reserve Shiraz, VIC $44.99.

Yarra Valley Shiraz is typically medium-bodied and this is a particularly

delicious example, silky and concentrated with seamless French oak. It has interesting nuances such as olive, chocolate, five spice and star anise, and although it is already drinking beautifully, it will keep for a long time yet.

6. Seppelt 2013 Chalambar Shiraz, VIC $26.99.

You can’t have flagship wines without taking care of the bread and butter, and as far as bread and butter is concerned, this Victorian (mostly Grampians) wine speaks of consistency, quality and value. Seppelt Chalambar is celebrating its 60th anniversary release with this vintage, a bright, aromatic wine that winemaker Adam Carnaby says could be cellared for 15 years or more.

7. Saltram 2012 No 1 Shiraz, SA $99.99.

At this price, you’d hope it would be good, and it is. Amazingly, Saltram has had only nine winemakers in its 160year history, so winemaker Shavaughn Wells has big shoes to fill but she does it well. She has fond memories of the 2012 Barossa vintage, a cooler harvest that followed wonderful rainfall in 2011. “I’d never walked into a vineyard where it was ‘let’s leave it (the fruit) a few days’. It was just lovely.”

8. St Huberts 2013 Cabernet Sauvignon, VIC $34.99.

Although St Huberts’ early trophy successes were with Cabernet, it can be hard to get right in the

Yarra Valley, where the climate according to winemaker Greg Jarratt is halfway between Bordeaux and Burgundy. But both 2012 and 2013 were “cracker vintages”, producing a medium-bodied wine with typically leafy undertones and great depth of flavour. “You’ve got your luncheon claret which is Yarra Valley and then you have your dinner red which is Coonawarra.”

9. Wynns 2012 Childs Single Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, VIC $79.99.

Wynns winemaker, Sue Hodder, is chuffed at Jarratt’s analogy. “Coonawarra is probably more similar to the Yarra Valley than other South Australian regions we talk about.

These are medium-bodied wines, not big fruity, punchy wines.”

This is the first time Wynns has selected the Childs Vineyard for its single vineyard label. “We love the purity of the fruit from the Childs Vineyard. Each year is so expressive; it’s never big and heavy.”

10. Saltram Mr Pickwick’s NV Tawny, SA $74.99.

Falling into the ‘rare’ category, the oldest of the four tawny categories, Mr Pickwick’s is produced by a solera system with an average age of 20-plus years. It consists mostly of Shiraz and Grenache from more than 35 vintages, at least one of them older than 50 years.

Soft and nutty, elegant and complex, it has a lingering finish, making it the perfect conclusion for a fine meal.

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beerpairing

Taps beyond

TRADITION

Food and wine is a natural marriage, but the complexity of brews born from the thriving craft movement means beer is giving vino a run for its money, writes Aoife Boothroyd.

Beer and charcuterie at The Grosvenor Hotel

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beerpairing

“E

veryone knows that wine matches with food but craft beer has so many different styles. The variation is huge, so you can pick out different flavour notes to match with food really easily.”

Mark Jensen of Sydney’s Red Lantern along with his more recent ventures Pork’d and Salmon and Bear, has long been an advocate of food and beer pairing. While the offering at Pork’d – American-style low and slow barbecued meat – is a natural match for beer, what Jensen is doing at Red Lantern and Salmon and Bear is letting the complexity and nuances of craft beer shine through by matching brews with more refined dishes.

Salmon and Bear is a casual seafood eatery specialising in local craft beers and sustainable seafood that is charcoal grilled in the venue’s Spanish Mibrasa oven. According to Jensen, the quality of the beer at Salmon and Bear is just as important as the food.

“Beer obviously plays a very important role,” says Jensen. “We’ve got the Willie The Boatman Old Salty which is a beer made with Himalayan sea salt. It’s really crisp and refreshing and as a result it has a really nice salty finish that goes really well with fish and it’s a beer that was specifically brought on board for that reason.”

On the menu at Salmon and Bear you’ll find brews from Willie The Boatman together with Rocks Brewing Co., and the Batlow Cider Co., each of which has been thoughtfully chosen to complement the venue’s dishes, which include grilled Ora King Salmon, Spanish Mackerel and Barramundi.

However it’s at Red Lantern’s sister venue, Red Lily that specially curated food and beer matching events take place. Jensen’s Beer and Clams events are held roughly every month and have proven to be exceptionally popular since their inception 18 months ago.

The events are a casual affair where Jensen talks through dishes that he has created in collaboration with a specific brewery. A representative from the brewery is also present during the event to talk through each of the matched brews.

“I actually go through the brewer’s range and either taste the beers, or exchange tasting notes in order to create clam dishes to match – it’s very specific matching the flavours of individual

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Beer and Clams at Red Lily

Beer and food options at the Local Taphouse

brewers to the clams. The events themselves are really casual and people get really into them. We find that we don’t so much [attract] the beer nerd, but more the people that are kind of interested both in beer, and the idea that we are using food to match with beer rather than wine.

“I think beer and food matching has got more legs than just being a trend. I think beer will soon sit quite comfortably beside the wine matching menu.”

A natural pairing Steve Jefferies, co-founder of The Local Taphouse (St Kilda and Darlinghurst) says that the first objective of both venues when it comes to food is to get the basics right by creating great quality, honest pub food. Jefferies says that it’s only been in recent years that the venue has started to experiment beyond traditional pub fare, offering more refined dishes that match well with beers of the same standard.

While these dishes are created more for special events than as core menu staples, Jefferies says he’s been in the beer game long enough to know the current momentum towards food and beer matching is no ‘passing fad.’

Boasting one of the nation’s most extensive craft beer selections, both Local Taphouse venues tap around 450 different beers each year, making regular food pairings quite challenging. To get around this, Jefferies and his team are in the process of developing technology to automate the pairing process. Whenever a new beer comes onto the premises, the core flavour characteristics of the beer (hoppy, malty, roasty, smoky etc.) are entered into the system via a tick-box process. A similar process occurs in the kitchen whenever a new dish is added.

“The kitchen staff will input the dish into our system and list the prominent characteristics of the food using a tick-box process. For example smoky or spicy, and by doing that it allows us to automatically make suggestions for any beer which is on at that time because the beers will have been entered into the same system,” says Jefferies.

“We’ve been investing a lot of time and money in this system and the feedback that we’ve got from it has been fantastic. Beer and food pairing is something that really plays

a part in the whole craft beer excitement if you like, but it’s only a part of it. We try and tread a fine balance between becoming a bit too similar to wine – you know the whole wine thing has characteristics about it that we don’t want beer to emulate. Beer was, and always should be, an every man’s drink – you should be able to enjoy it almost without thinking. That said, I definitely think that there will continue to be people who are particularly interested in the pairing of beer with food, and anyone who has done their homework will know that beer is a more versatile drink than say wine when it comes to pairing it with a whole variety of food styles.”

Brewing success Like Jensen, Jefferies believes that the idea of matching craft beer with food is more than just a trend. Looking at markets where the craft beer scene is more mature, like in the US, the notion of pairing quality beer with quality food and incorporating beer into the cooking process has become almost second nature.

“There are a number of quite

hospitality | September 2015

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beerpairing

Beer at The Grosvenor Hotel

high-end restaurants in America that specialise in this, which they call Cuisine de la Biere. It hasn’t come to Australia to that extent [and I’m not] convinced it will, but what has already started here is that restaurants at the higher end of the spectrum are starting to understand how suitable beer is for pairing with their food and as they have discovered, there is a growing number of their customers who are interested in that sort of experience.

That’s really exciting for me because it shows that craft beer is growing beyond the bubble of inhabitants that are at the pointy end, or nerdy end of the market, if you will.

“For events like Good Beer Week and Craft Beer Week, the event organisers have been really proactive in working with restaurants in Melbourne such as Vue de Monde where they do a lunch with a beer suggestion and a wine suggestion for every dish. There is an element of fun competition as to which drink pairs best with which particular dish, and I think for the past two years beer has won both of those events – perhaps not surprisingly.”

The food and beer movement

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hospitality | September 2015

Alastair Dobbs of St Kilda’s Grosvenor Hotel is another strong proponent for the beer and food matching movement.

Similar to the boom in consumers’ wine knowledge in the mid-2000s, Dobbs says that consumer interest in the depth and breadth of craft beer has encouraged people to look at the beverage in a different light.

“I think what’s happened in the last couple of years is that craft breweries have stepped up their game and come out of eclectic parts of town and more into the mainstream so now, people are

starting to treat beer as seriously as they treat wine,” says Dobbs.

“Right now there’s a food movement and a beer movement, and when those two circles overlap, you have people that are looking either for food that matches beer, or for beer that matches food. At The Grosvenor, we’ve done a lot with stouts such as the Mountain Goat Milk Stout, and the Mornington Brown Ale with dishes like our braised lamb shoulder. Then with more of the hop-driven North American-style pale ales such as Barrow Boys Pedlars Pale, we’ve matched their stuff with more spicier dishes where the acid in those styles of beer really helps to accentuate the spice.”

Dobbs says that as beer has such a large aromatic component, different styles can lend themselves particularly well to a broad range of flavour profiles, some of which are not traditionally recognised by wine.

“Quite often bitterness is considered a fault in wine, while in beer it’s almost imperative to a lot of the styles, so it opens up opportunities to explore a whole different food genre. You know, you’re avoiding bitterness at all costs with wine and generally with the food and wine pairing. Sometimes you’re looking for bitterness to accompany beer so you can do things like a confit duck leg with a honey and coffee glaze to counteract the bitterness of the beer.

I think it’s a really exciting product to work with.

“There is a huge demand for people who are just right into the craft beer scene, which is exciting for us as purveyors of good quality beer and it’s exciting for brewers, so it’s the public that’s the winner. There’s some really cool stuff out there.”

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socialmedia

Mastering the art of

INSTAGRAM It’s free, it’s fun and (for now) it’s friendly. Instagram is an easy and enjoyable way for you to promote your food and beverage offering.

Danielle Bowling spoke to three operators using the social media platform to their advantage.

A breakfast feast at The Grounds of Alexandria.

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hospitality | September 2015

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socialmedia

A

picture says a thousand words. People eat with their eyes. These cringeworthy clichés are overused for a reason: they’re true, and perhaps no more relevant than in the foodservice industry where people judge your offering in an instant.

Restaurateurs have a range of social media platforms to consider when deciding how to promote their business. Facebook is great for sharing news, photos, event updates and for building communities; Twitter is probably less valuable for restaurants and cafes, but is still an effective way to learn about what’s going on in the industry.

Of course there’s also Pinterest and YouTube and then a whole heap of other, less relevant sites including LinkedIn and Google Plus (was that ever really a thing??).

But the social media platform offering perhaps the biggest opportunity for restaurants and cafes is Instagram, a photo- and video-sharing social networking service. It’s the most visual of them all, and is a favourite amongst food-loving consumers all over the world.

Modern day marketing Darren Robertson, co-owner and chef at Three Blue Ducks in Sydney’s Bronte and The Farm by Three Blue Ducks, which opened in Byron Bay earlier this year, says Instagram represents a valuable marketing opportunity for foodservice businesses.

“It’s a great way to get a message or information to potential guests, locals or regulars. It also gives people a chance to do the same. They can tag us, leave comments, leave feedback, ask questions, or all of the above,” he says.

Unsurprisingly, Three Blue Ducks and The Farm post pictures of food and menu specials, but also of producers and staff members because Robertson has noticed that the public is genuinely interested in the people behind the businesses. “[When launching The Farm] we documented what we were doing and I think it helped in cultivating interest. We were posting stuff since the day we first went there, when there was nothing. It cultivated interest without us having to shout it from the rooftops.”

The Three Blue Ducks Instagram page has almost 19,000 followers, with

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both the Sydney and Byron Bay venues sharing the one account. Despite the growth of the page, Robertson doesn’t feel the need to hand over responsibility to a marketing professional.

“I think you can tell when it’s a third party [posting photos],” he says.

“We have someone that will post weekly, and then we fill in the gaps.

We’ve got an outsource advising us, just because a few of us have access to Instagram, and if you just bombard it I think people will get a bit put-off by it. But we have someone orchestrating our feed, so it’s still organic and used by us, but there are rules now.”

One of these rules is to not clog up users’ feeds. “I think you can overdo it. If you continuously bombard someone’s feed, that’s not ideal.

“There’s definitely a balance. I think when you are just using it to sell stuff all the time and shove stuff down people’s throats, they can see past that. If you’re continuously plugging your place I think people get bored of it and see straight through it.”

Roasted beetroot, caramelised whey, horseradish cream with a hazelnut and coco crumb at Three Blue Ducks

Less is more Despite having an impressive 6,600strong Instagram following, The Town Mouse in Carlton, Melbourne, posts a photo, on average, once a month.

“We try to put up good photography and we try not to do it too often,” says co-owner Christian McCabe. “I know a lot of social media strategies say that you should do one post a day or one post or week, or you should connect with this many people over this amount of time for it to be effective, but I see it in a different way.

If I’m constantly seeing things from a place in my feed, it’s like I’ve seen enough and I don’t need to go there.

So we don’t do it very often and I feel that’s more effective for us.”

McCabe agrees with Robertson that the “softly softly” approach works best.

“Instagram is good because you can just put up an image and it shows something, without it being the whole experience …it suits us well because the way that we try to promote the business is to create interest and intrigue around it, rather than tell people exactly what it’s all about. I think it’s a more powerful message … with a business like our’s, sometimes too much interaction and too much of a conversation outside of the restaurant is counter-productive.”

In regards to what posts work

Bronte’s Three Blue Ducks

10 INSTAGRAM ESSENTIALS Ken Burgin from Profitable Hospitality has the following pointers for any foodservice operator looking to get snap happy on Instagram.

1. Post often and get in close for small details 2. If you can’t manage daily posts, there is absolutely someone who would love to do this on staff, under your direction 3. Edit photos before posting – zoom in closer, crop out eyesores like the garbage bin, and brighten or fix the colours 4. Instagram photos will get best response if they have ‘personality’ – and that doesn’t mean people have to always be in them 5. Ensure your business’ account is public, and keep your personal account separate 6. Connect your Instagram page to the business’ Facebook page 7. Practice with 15 second videos 8. Use relevant #hashtags to connect with people 9. Celebrate the ‘small moments’ in your business 10. Consider using Instagram as a way to promote or host competitions

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socialmedia

Cidered pear, chocolate, pumpkin seed, licorice & brown bread ice cream at The Town Mouse

Sweet creations are always a hit on The Grounds’ Instagram account

The Town Mouse’s charred rhubarb, sorrel, camomile & white chocolate sherbet

best, McCabe says food shots tend to outperform photos of wine, but The Town Mouse also shares photos of its producers and suppliers, images of the restaurant itself, and perhaps a job ad or two when appropriate.

“We’ve got a couple of professional photos, but most of them we just take on our phones. We don’t use filters or anything, we just try to get somebody that knows how to take a good photo.

For each photo that goes up, there might be 10 that got taken to get the right one,” he says. “There’s no point making a nice looking plate of food and then posting a crappy looking photo of it.”

More than meets the eye Last year, Sydney institution, The Grounds of Alexandria was the sixth

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most Instagrammed place in Australia. With almost 80,000 followers, the popular café concept takes its social media very seriously. Where some restaurants and cafes simply point, shoot and post, The Grounds labours over each and every shot taken.

“We have a photographer that’s hired by The Grounds and we do photo shoots every week,” says Rebecca Fanning, senior marketing executive. “We decide what we want to do, then our photographer and stylist will go take those photos, and they probably have hundreds of photos that they choose, and out of those that they’ve culled down, they’ll pick, say the top 10.

“Because we have a huge bank of images which we can use, nothing is 100 percent in real time, so it is very

much a process of we style the shot, shoot it and maybe a few days later we put it up … One photo could take three hours to get right.”

Instagram worthy shots at The Grounds range from pictures of the pastry chefs’ latest creations, floral arrangements created by the café’s onsite florist, coffee, cocktails, weddings hosted on-site, The Grounds’ resident pig, lamb or pony … the list goes on.

With such an extensive offering (a café, a bar, outdoor markets, events, yoga classes, coffee classes, a bakery, a garden….) part of The Grounds’ social media strategy is to educate potential diners about the different arms of the business.

“Trying to tell the difference between our spaces is a huge thing as well. We get a lot of enquiries from people wanting to book at the café, and if we’re booked out we’ll suggest The Potting Shed (the bar), but sometimes they don’t know what The Potting Shed is. So it’s about trying to convey that message, but not in a marketing sense; we’re not trying to sell them the space. On a Friday night we’ll post an image of a cocktail or a cocktail and some food, just to get people in the mindframe that they can

come here on a Friday night and have drinks and some food and relax in a bar-style setting.”

Despite the general assumption that photos on Instragram are published in real-time, Fanning says many restaurants take the time to ensure the photos they’re sharing are not only high quality, but are also in-line with the business’ goals and the tone or voice that it wants to portray online.

“If you see a place like Bennelong (Peter Gilmore’s new venue at the Sydney Opera House), their photos aren’t in real-time either. You can tell they’re taking the time and focusing on the images because they’ve got to convey a certain message as well.

They’re not fly by the night, just taking a photo here and there and posting it on Instagram, that’s not how it works for them either. It’s very curated. As we are, they’re trying to portray a certain image. We put all this time and effort into what we do, and if you’re doing that then you should definitely be showing that to the people that want to know.

“The foodie scene is growing so much; people want to see this sort of stuff, why wouldn’t you show them?”

hospitalitymagazine.com.au

glassware

Savings that Sure, you may have more important things to worry about, but looking after your glassware and minimising breakages can lead to serious savings. By Malcolm Richardson.

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glassware

I

n today’s modern restaurant or food venue, glass is everywhere. In the bar, the face of your venue is displayed in the quality of your glassware. When you serve a meal, your food is supported by the plates and tableware. All of these glass items are not only the base for your service, but often a very large part of both your set-up costs and your wastage costs.

Over time the quality of your tableware degrades, there are breakages, and even thefts (Donut King I have one of your cups!). These all hamper the product and the bottom line.

If we take a look at the glassware you have in service, we may find that there are a number of factors we can deal with to help prolong and even recycle most of your collection. There are many options available and a wealth of tips to help you get the most out of your current stock, and a number of things you should take notice of when buying new kit.

Cleaning The first and most noteworthy thing to take into consideration when looking at glassware is the way you clean and dry it. The choice of who cleans it, what products you use when cleaning, the methods and of course the handling all have an impact on the life of your glassware. While glass washers or dishwashers are a requirement by law, the style of washer can vary and choosing the right one will help your cause.

A cheap washer can cost you money in the long run by damaging your glassware. Incorrect temperature or pressure in the washer can cause issues from the first wash. A high quality washer that is set-up and installed by a professional will treat your glasses the way they should be. Using the correct washing and drying formulas in the washer will of course help as well. Speak to the glassware supplier and ask for their input. They may be able to recommend products that the manufacturer has trialled with the glassware. If you find no joy here, speak to several chemical supply companies and get a broad range of opinions. All of this will help you make an informed choice of washing and drying solutions.

Storage Storage of your glassware is just as important, as this is where your glassware will spend most of its time. Timber, glass or metal shelves? Hanging or standing? Rim up or down? All very valid questions. All very complex in their own right. While you may think that hanging flutes and cocktail glasses is the way to go, take into account that this puts pressure on the stems and can reduce the age of them standing. Then again, standing also puts pressure on the stem. What to do? Talk to the supplier!

When selecting glassware, always make a list of what you need to know and ask a lot of questions. If the store can’t answer them, email the manufacturer for advice. Questions like ‘what is the best way to store, clean and serve my glassware’ should be quickly and easily answered by the manufacturer, after all they made them.

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Service Serving glassware is often overlooked when looking at the life of a glass. If you rest the rim of a glass on a beer tap while pulling, or rest the bottle there while pouring, you risk cracks and even chips, which left unchecked can injure patrons. Even unthought-of things like dropping ice cubes into a glass can damage them. Take a close look at your glassware. Is it solid enough for a large ice cube to bounce off the side? These little things are almost always overlooked, but are incredibly important.

There is a very technical aspect of service as well that is never considered in drink service: carrying.

If you have a glass holding a cold drink, and you carry it to a table by hand, the temperature difference between your hand and the contents of the glass can place small stresses in the glass. I know it sounds crazy, but this little stress, as minute as it is, multiplied a few hundred times can cause the failure of the glass. Carrying glasses a tray not only looks better but increases the lifespan of the glass.

A small point which most venues will be aware of, but which is still noteworthy is the filling of ice.

A number of bars I have visited still fill the glass with ice by driving it into the ice maker or tub. This is a huge no no because it poses a huge risk of chipping and breakages in the tub. Worst case scenario, a patron could find a glass shard from a previous glass that you have placed in the tub. A steel scoop is the best option.

Collection, particularly in a bar environment, is a major consideration. How many times have you seen a ‘glassy’ carrying a tall sleave of glasses up over the shoulder? It is a very common sight and you may be surprised to know that this has been a common practice for many, many years. It does, however, cause the most loss and damage to your collection. Stacking like this puts stresses on the rim of glasses and cracks them quickly. The obvious cure is to carry on a tray, but this also poses issues to service. Collecting a large stack may return 15+ glasses at once, but

if you weigh this productivity up against the cost of the glassware, I’m sure you’ll find that using a tray is cheaper than replacing glasses.

In restaurant settings, you will find that some diners will stack glasses on plates when they finish their meals. A good table service method is to have floor staff focusing on collection of empty glasses as they pass tables. This not only helps with glass preservation but it puts the option of upselling more drinks right in your hand. Resist the urge to enforce a ‘charge per breakage’ rule in your venue when staff members break glassware. Not only is it illegal under most awards, it can sour your staff’s opinion of management. Consider more training and perhaps a reward target for reducing breakages.

Glassware in today’s venues is a very small part of the operation. In saying that, it is also one of the things that can see you wasting profits. Care and attention to these simple points will see the life of your investment extended. Consider putting a guideline or instruction sheet near glass storage areas outlining your methods for cleaning, storage and service. Ensure staff are aware of the risks of contamination from glass chips, the costs of broken glassware and the importance of following cleaning methods as written. Taking a proactive approach to the smaller parts of your collection will ensure your time and money can be better spent in other areas.

Consider for a minute, if two glasses are broken in every shift (average) over the course of a year, at a cost of $9 each. That totals out to a possible $6,500 per year you are spending on replacing glassware.

While $9 is what you’d spend on an expensive cocktail glass, and you probably won’t break as many as two per shift, even averaging out a beer glass at $4 every service over the year means you are still looking at around $1,500. That’s a nice HD television over the bar that you’re missing out on.

Malcolm Richardson is senior consultant at Hospitality Consultants Australia.

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lobsterrolls

Lobster rolls from Johnny Lobster

ROLLING WITH THE PINCERS

Australians love a good burger, but lobster rolls are fast becoming our new favourite US export, writes Aoife Boothroyd.

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hospitalitymagazine.com.au

lobsterrolls

“I

think what people like about lobster rolls is that they’re so simple. They almost bring a sense of childlike joy to people. There’s no technique to it, there’s no art to it, it’s just something that is intrinsically delicious.”

Matt Swieboda, co-owner of Potts Point’s Waterman’s Lobster Co., says the idea to open a venue that specialises in lobster rolls came about around two to three years ago when his business partner, Tristan Blair was inspired to open Australia’s own version of the hugely popular Luke’s Lobster in the US. With a keen determination to create a venue that closely modelled that of their American muse, Swieboda, Blair and their third business partner Nate Hatwell, made the decision to use only imported Maine lobster in the two mainstays of their menu: The Connecticut, and The Maine.

“The local product is crayfish and the flavour is completely different,” says Swieboda. “What we see across the Pacific and in most of the warmer climates waters around the world is a very different creature to what grows in the cold waters of the Atlantic. The flavour of the meat is much more intense than the local variety as it has a very strong lobster flavour, whereas we believe that the local crayfish – while still being quite delicious – doesn’t really have that strong flavour.

“Because our rolls are dressed so simply, the produce really needed to stand out on its own. For our Connecticut style, all we use is a bit of warm butter and some seasoning, and with the Maine, it’s just a light dressing of our own mayonnaise with a little bit of celery and that’s it. So it’s really the flavour of the lobster that’s most important.”

Swieboda says that Waterman’s initially copped a bit of negative feedback from some circles due to their decision to use an imported rather than a local product, however in order to create the product that they wanted to sell, crayfish simply wasn’t an option.

“The tradition in Maine has always been to use tails in fine dining restaurants while reserving the claw and knuckle meat for lobster rolls. It’s basically impossible to use a crayfish for that because they don’t have the big claws like the American species, so we felt that there was no other way to do things. The sustainability practices in Maine are also really advanced com-

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Connecticut lobster roll from Waterman’s Lobster Co.

“There’s no technique to it, there’s no art to it, it’s just something that is intrinsically delicious.”

Waterman’s Lobster Co.

pared to most places in the world. The Maine lobster industry each year catches 80 million pounds of lobster and in order to do that they have to make sure that the larger lobsters – which are the

best breeding stock – are left alive and not captured, as well as all pregnant lobsters and small lobsters, so it’s actually a really good product.”

In addition to the Maine and

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lobsterrolls

Daniel Wilson from Mr Claws

Lobster rolls from Mr Claws

CHARDONNAY + LOBSTER As a sommelier by trade, Matt Swieboda is well aware of the natural marriage that is chardonnay and lobster rolls. But what makes the two match so perfectly, and which styles of Chardonnay perform the best?

“I’ve been a big proponent at my wine bar, Love Tilly Devine, in promoting contemporary Australian Chardonnay styles which are picked earlier and usually without that sort of buttery aspect to it. They are much fresher and a little bit closer to what the French produce in Chevaline and places like that, but [at Waterman’s Lobster Co.] I’ve had to be really pragmatic about the wines that work best with this type of food. We started to really look back at those slightly more old fashioned styles of Australian Chardonnay, where the wine has seen a little bit more oak and has had malolactic fermentation to give a buttery character to it. They are just richer, riper and more generous wines.

And to be frank, drinking those with the lobster rolls is just really, really great. Some days, two out of three bottles of wine that come out of the restaurant are Chardonnay. It’s pretty incredible.

“I think a lot of people never really stopped liking those old styles of Australian Chardonnay and now that we are sort of bringing it back; I think they really enjoy it. We have a little description under each of the wines and the ones that I’ve described as being the biggest and oakiest tend to be the ones that sell the most.”

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Connecticut style rolls, Waterman’s does have a few other rolls on the menu including the scallop, prawn and smoked eel roll, and a Balmain bug roll once the season comes into full swing.

However, it’s the Maine and Connecticut style that the punters are returning for.

“To be brutally honest, lobster rolls make up maybe 80 percent of the rolls that we sell and the other five rolls sort of vie for that last 20 percent. I mean, it’s partly marketing too. We have the word ‘lobster’ in our name and everyone knows us for our lobster rolls so that’s certainly the first experience that people want when they come in.

“It’s just incredible to see how much people enjoy this style of food.

It really took me by surprise; I didn’t expect to get the response that we’ve had and I didn’t expect for people to almost start craving them right after they had their first one. We have people that come in like once per week to have lobster rolls now, when it was not part of their diet up until two months ago, so it’s been really interesting.”

Contemporary claws Chef Daniel Wilson together with his business partners at the famed Melbourne burger joint, Huxtaburger, and finer diner Huxtable, decided to venture into the world of lobster rolls late last year with the launch of their pop-up venture, Mr Claws.

Mr Claws operated out of a brick and mortar shop on Smith Street, Collingwood over the 2014-15 summer, but has since become a venture that pops-up at events and festivals around Victoria.

Wilson said that the initial idea came about when a supplier of Maine lobster approached him with a proposal, and the rest as they say, is history.

“No one was really doing it here, and because we had someone who could provide us with the product, we just went for it,” says Wilson.

Like Waterman’s, the lobster meat used at Mr Claws is sourced from North America, but in contrast to the traditional Maine and Connecticut styles, the menu comprises more contemporary fillings such as miso and wasabi, sriracha-spiced mayonnaise and buttermilk ranch. Wilson

hospitalitymagazine.com.au

lobsterrolls

Johnny Lobster

says that the inspiration behind creating a more contemporary offering was drawn from the menu at his Collingwood fine diner, coupled with the desire to do something a little outside of the box.

Despite the more modern approach, Wilson says that there are three main components to creating the perfect lobster roll that should never change.

“First, don’t be stingy on the lobster. Second, have a nice complementary dressing without being too over the top, and third, you need a nice soft, warm bun. We put clarified butter on ours and toast them on the outside so they are crispy on the outside, but kind of steamed in the middle.”

Wilson puts the growing popularity of lobster rolls down to a few reasons.

“They’re different, they’re new, and they’re bloody tasty,” he says. “I think it’s also because it hasn’t really been a particularly accessible product, in general, because [lobster] is so expensive.”

The modern fish ‘n’ chipper Located on Sydney’s lower north shore, the boys behind Crows Nest’s Johnny Lobster made it their mission to create a modern take on a traditional fish ‘n’ chipper, so naturally a perfect lobster roll was high on the agenda.

“We thought about what modern seafood places were doing really well, and from there we thought that we could do a really nice lobster roll, and that’s how it all came about,” says Andrew Summers, co-owner of Johnny Lobster.

“We took a lot of inspiration from places in America as well as in Europe, like Lobster Burger over in London.

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There was a lot of online research that we did to create a vision of what we wanted the store to be.”

Despite the name, only one style of lobster roll graces the Johnny Lobster menu. Using Canadian MSC certified lobster meat, the roll comprises the knuckles and claws of the lobster, mixed with potato salad, dill and mayonnaise. Other dishes on the menu include the grilled or battered fish roll, prawn roll, soft shell crab roll, fried chicken roll, lamb shoulder roll and falafel roll as well as a selection of sides and fish ‘n’ chipper classics. It’s the lobster roll, however, that’s proven to be the star.

“The lobster roll performs really, really strongly,” says Summers. “We spent a long time working on it because lobster is quite a hard thing to get right, and it did take us a long time to get it to where it is now. But as it compares to the rest of the menu, obviously a lot of people order it because it’s the name on the front of the store, but we do get a lot of people coming back in. It’s not like they try it once and forget about it, they definitely come back for more.”

Like Swieboda, Summers says that the perfect lobster roll is all in the flavour and quantity of the meat.

“For me there’s got to be a strong lobster flavour – it has got to taste of lobster. It’s got to be buttery with a little bit of complexity but it’s definitely got to be strong on the lobster. We put a fair bit of lobster in our rolls. A lot of places will slog you with $25 and then you can hardly tell that there is any lobster in there.”

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industryobserver

HOW USEFUL IS YOUR

NET WORK? There’s so much more to networking than accepting friend requests and endorsing LinkedIn profiles.

Picking up the phone and building real relationships still has serious value, writes Industry Observer.

I

was pondering the other day how we get our start in life. There are the Richard Branson types who seem to wake like the Duracell bunny every morning with a new cunning plan to take to the world, or there are the Murdoch and Packer types who, try as they might to move away from the family way, end up being dragged back to the family business mothership. Branson is a pioneer in every meaning of the word and tremendously successful, but even he needed his mum to bail him out at one stage. This had me then thinking about how we need and use our ‘networks’.

In the olden days (for many of you this means before 1990), there were clubs that men of a certain parentage could become members of and many a deal was done with the nod of a head or the right introduction and they still exist – be it the Melbourne Club, Royal Sydney Golf Club or the local Rotary or footy club. Could have been a chat at the bar or a round of golf, but there have been people linking up contacts of value with each other since before the times of Machiavelli. Nowadays a gentlemen’s club generally means nothing of the sort and linking people is often done via an app – and there is certainly a place for that. Social media like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are great for letting other people know where you have been, what you ate/ drank, and who was with you at the time and LinkedIn is a way of letting everyone know what a top employee you have been – and you can get people to second your opinion of yourself.

That’s not meant to denigrate or belittle the platform, as I know of several people who have been headhunted for a new role because of their LinkedIn profile. There are probably many more

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who have not got jobs because of their social media profiles.

What I am more interested in is the real art of networking and how it still has a role in this modern, digital age.

The Chinese even have a term for the specific application of the art of networking, “Guan xi”. Networking has been a part of civil society for thousands of years and still has a role to play in making the business world go ‘round. It is critical in the early years of your business life – how did you get your first job? For most of us it was either thanks to a family member or someone your parents knew – and so it should be for a number of reasons.

Generally, you are young and naïve and with few marketable skills other than youth and enthusiasm – and while they might help you once you have a job, they are not a great help in

getting one. Past experience in youth and enthusiasm, check. Carried any plates? Worked a register or pulled any beers? Nope. Sorry you’re not hired. We often need the ‘leg up’ that a first job gives us and we can build our skills, confidence and experience from there.

Unfortunately, it is not just at the start of a career that we need this assistance. All too frequently now, I see peers fall victim to the great re-structuring overlord and they are out hunting for work (and I have not been immune to this) but what struck me was not just the loss of a job; that was bad enough, but you can also lose your status, your routine, your self-worth and then your ‘people’. If that happens, it is incredibly isolating. Now when I know of a friend in this situation, I make sure to keep in touch to

let them know that they are still part of the circle, still engaged with their network, still valued. It can be more helpful than you realise.

From someone who has spent much of their life in the hospitality, food and drink sector, the ability to pick up the phone and call ‘someone’ when you need something is extremely valuable – and this is the next layer of your network and another topic of discussion on its own. The important thing in all of this is to nurture your network, provide assistance to those who can help you and don’t become known for asking and not delivering. Be mindful of your ethics and do what’s appropriate – it is too easy to get help from the wrong person and end up needing more help in an uncomfortable situation. Reputations are one of those valuable things that are hard to gain and easy to lose.

hospitalitymagazine.com.au

managementcomment

RURAL RECRUITMENT: how to get it right

It’s not a case of out of sight, out of mind. Just because you’re operating in a regional area doesn’t mean you can’t find great staff. Ken Burgin has some pointers for you.

I

t’s true – city people don’t want to hear their country cousins complaining about staff shortages. They’ve got the same problem. It’s time for rural operators to update the job offers and promote them in a new way – you have a lot to offer.

1. Promote the benefits of where you are. Check the local council’s website: they’re in the business of positively promoting the area. Country rents and real estate can be much less expensive than the city – don’t forget to mention this in your advertisements. Your website should include information about local attractions and lifestyle, as well as opening hours, facilities and menus. Include photos of the best features in your town. This could be the chance for someone to buy their own house, which they could never afford in a big city.

2. Advertise positions so the whole country can read them. Use your own website and national job websites. Regional areas need to be even more web-savvy to overcome distance – savvy candidates will check your website, and won’t be impressed if it looks old or ugly.

Facebook advertising is also an excellent option. It can be targeted to a particular area

hospitalitymagazine.com.au

or type of person – few restaurants and pubs are doing this. It’s not complicated. Check the video lessons on Profitable Hospitality for how to get started.

3. Build a relationship with your local school.

Hospitality is a popular subject, and your teamwork with dedicated teachers will mean you are the first to hear about their best students. Host site visits and work experience students, offer to be a guest speaker and find out what they need to improve school-to-work transition. Make friends first and the favours will follow.

4. Keep in touch with former staff. Facebook is the best way to do this: invite staff to connect with your page – social media means friendships don’t have to be lost or forgotten. Keep posting photos of staff enjoying their work, as well as the usual food and event shots. Every month or so ‘boost’ a post about happy staff to your fans, so they all see it.

5. Find work for the partners. If the new chef is arriving with a family, chances are her partner needs work too. How can you help with this?

6. Jump onto the training bandwagon. It won’t take long to find a training provider who will

Ken Burgin

support with supervision, materials and even a subsidy. Everyone needs to start ‘growing their own’, and the hospitality training sector is highly developed. Another thing that will be appealing to local teachers.

7. Work with local parents. They see the job advertisements and wake up sleepy teens. If they know you’re offering work with a future, they will make a strong effort to support you. And bad news spreads fast in the country, so make sure you play fair and pay properly.

8. Think outside the square about who you will employ. You may prefer a low cost 16 year old, but the 45 year old mum could be more stable and flexible, even if you need to ‘untrain’ a few habits as well as instilling new ones. Set your standards high – if the applicant doesn’t meet them but has a good attitude, get the coaching and feedback underway.

9. Prepare a modern pay and conditions package.

Being regional doesn’t mean you can plead ignorance of changes happening in the 21st century workforce. Check the Fair Work website or talk to your industry association’s industrial relations advisers about what to include.

hospitality | September 2015

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managementcomment

It’s time to

EAT YOUR WORDS Why is the industry so determined to make a song and dance out of things that should be considered the norm? When did menus become marketing material?

Tony Berry lists a few of the most cringe-worthy buzzwords floating around today’s kitchens.

M

arketing people have always had a way with words. Not necessarily a good way, but a facility to use them to some purpose nonetheless.

And the purpose is generally to promote and publicise the services or products of those from whom they squeeze their usually excessively large fees.

Success can often be measured by the extent to which the phrases coined by these wordy warriors enter common parlance. They become buzzwords, which is in itself a buzzword, a neologism of fairly recent vintage.

The foodservice industry is awash with them. Everywhere we see dishes described in flowery language and excessive verbiage. This achieves little other than to confuse and puzzle diners. What is intended to enlighten, merely bewilders.

The clever thing is that it is done knowing that few will ever question this excessive prose or seek clarification.

That way lies an admission of ignorance and the spin doctors are well aware that few customers are brave enough to so demean themselves in front of their companions or snooty young waitstaff.

Right now my inbox contains a message asking if I have ever wondered what “clean eating” is and whether it’s a trend to be cashing in on. The answer: no and no again. Regardless, I am informed that “at its core” (more wasted words) this purportedly exciting development “involves consuming the most natural and purest form of ingredients possible.” We are urged to “think fresh fruit and vegetables, meat, wholegrains …”

Eh? Isn’t that what we all aim for, and have always aimed for? Who in their right mind would strive to seek anything that wasn’t the freshest avail-

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PLATED C L E A N

FORAGING

able? But in their promotional wisdom, the pushers in the backroom have decided “clean eating” is all the go and it’s a fairly safe bet we will soon be awash in places offering such alleged innovation. Amongst their most loved ingredients are sun-blushed tomatoes (they are no longer sun-dried apparently), chards of skin, toffee or anything else that can be crisped and toasted, pucks, trios (why no quartets or septets?) and grainfed, hand-reared or any similar cosy phrasing designed to soften the realities of how that steak reached our plate.

One dictionary defines ‘buzzword’ as an important-sounding and usually technical word or phrase, often of little meaning, used chiefly to impress laymen. Precisely.

E A T I N G

FRESH

Tony Berry

The latest in the long line of culinary labels to achieve this objective is the bucolic sounding “foraging”. Any chef worth his salt (natural or pink and gathered from remote mountain lakes) now forages for their ingredients. It is no longer sufficient to have them delivered to your door or even venture out to the market.

To stay ahead of the game it is necessary to don wellies, waders and work boots and go tramping via paddocks, streams and woods gathering the fruits, greens, herbs and nuts wherever nature has spread them.

Tosh! What under-staffed, overworked and busy kitchen has time to

go traipsing off in search of fish, fowl and greenery? Foraging indeed. The most that can be expected is a quick dash out the back door to grab a few herbs from the window box alongside the outdoor dunny. And even then, where’s the noticeable difference in what ends up on the plate from what is achieved by simply having a good supplier? The only likely difference is the higher price charged by those able to persuade diners that a bit of foraging (it hurts me even to type such a meaningless word) merits extra dollars on the bill.

In tandem with these attempts to make the ordinary sound extraordinary, numerous chefs seem to think they are setting themselves above the opposition when they stress their dedication to using fresh ingredients. Time and again we hear them boasting of the freshness of their product. What else should anyone expect of a kitchen other than to use fresh ingredients?

Not even the Restaurant Australia’s praiseworthy triple-chef promotion of the country’s culinary excellence escaped the use of weasel words. To negate our prawn on a barbie image it served up “fire-roasted seafood” which is … er … prawns on a barbie.

What it is to have such a way with words. Like the chef scheduled at this year’s Fine Food tradeshow to serve up a “plated breakfast”. Gee whiz; how’s that for innovation?

hospitalitymagazine.com.au

workplaceissues

CHANGE

is in the air …

While the final recommendations are still being established, the initial findings of the Productivity Commission’s workplace relations inquiry are, in general, quite promising for Australia’s hospitality industry, writes Restaurant & Catering Australia.

T

he Productivity Commission’s inquiry into the workplace relations framework has recently released its draft report.

Hearings and further examination is still to come, however the initial findings set out a largely positive reform agenda. The key findings were: • The Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) and sometimes the Fair Work Commission can give too much weight to procedure and too little to substance, leading to compliance costs and, in some cases, poor outcomes. Issues that need to be addressed include: o some minor procedural defects in enterprise bargaining can require an employer to recommence bargaining o an employee may engage in serious misconduct but may receive considerable compensation under unfair dismissal provisions due to procedural lapses by an employer.

• Penalty rates have a legitimate role in compensating employees for working long hours or at unsociable times.

They should be maintained. However, Sunday penalty rates for cafes, hospitality, entertainment, restaurants and retailing should be aligned with Saturday rates.

• Enterprise bargaining generally works well, although it is often ill-suited to smaller enterprises.

• The ‘better off overall test’ used to assess whether an agreement leaves employees better off compared with the award can sometimes be applied mechanically, losing some benefits of flexibility for employees and employers. Switching to a no-disadvantage

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hospitality | September 2015

test with guidelines about the use of the test would encourage win-win options. The same test should be used for individual arrangements.

• There is scope for a new form of agreement – the ‘enterprise contract’ – to fill the gap between enterprise agreements and individual arrangements. This would offer many of the advantages of enterprise agreements, without the complexities, making them particularly suitable for smaller businesses. Any risks to employees would be assuaged through a comprehensive set of protections, including the right to revert to the award.

• While the Fair Work Commission undertakes many of its functions well, the legalistic approach it adopts for award determination gives too much weight to history, precedent and judgments on the merits of cases put to it by partisan lobbyists. A preferred approach to award determination would give greatest weight to a clear analytical framework supported by evidence collected by the Commission itself.

The draft report highlights some key areas of the workplace relations framework that are in need of reform. In particular the recommendation to alleviate penalty rate burdens across the hospitality industry for Sunday work will come as welcome relief to many operators.

A recent survey by Jetty Research suggested that roughly 40,000 new jobs could be created by reducing penalty rates, demonstrating the deleterious effect penalty rates have on employability in the sector.

The much-maligned BOOT (better off overall test) looks set to be examined

“In particular, the recommendation to alleviate penalty rate burdens across the hospitality industry for Sunday work will come as welcome relief.”

more thoroughly after the commission found that a no-disadvantage test, similar to that of tests that existed in previous legislation, would be more appropriate to facilitate ‘win-win’ enterprise agreements.

The Commission also focussed on the relative underutilisation of individual flexibility arrangements which currently exist in Modern Awards. The draft report found that individual agreement making needed to be overhauled, and one initial suggestion is the development of ‘enterprise contracts’. This proposal would allow an individual to negotiate with their employer a variation, or series of variations to the relevant Modern Award before having it tested against the no-disadvantage test.

Once approved the employee would be protected by strict safeguards, allowing for a review after 12 months whereby the employee could choose to stay on the agreement or revert back to the award.

This flexibility measure would make for a more dynamic, tailored workforce.

The protective measures would alleviate any adverse risks that may arise from employee-employer power imbalances.

Several changes were also floated in relation to the powers, functions and structure of the Fair Work Commission; as were a range of measures to reduce over-compliance issues. These changes along with many others mentioned in the 1,000 page draft report will form part of the Commission’s upcoming hearings and eventually their final report and recommendations. Stay tuned …

This article was written by the Workplace Relations Team at Restaurant & Catering Australia. Contact them on 1300 722 878.

hospitalitymagazine.com.au

shelfspace

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4 1. Nespresso extends range Nespresso Business Solutions has added two new varietals to its Pure Origin Grand Cru out-of-home range: Espresso Original Brazil and Lungo Origin Guatemala. Both are made from beans from a single country of origin and bring the number of coffee capsules available for out-ofhome consumption to 11. Espresso Origin Brazil is a delicate blend best suited to mild espresso lovers with a round and smooth character, while Lungo Origin Guatemala is a blend of Arabica and Robusta from Guatemala that will appeal to coffee drinks looking for greater intensity. www.nestle-nespresso.com

2. An Australian first Australia’s first digital cloakroom for nightclubs and event spaces, Cloakr allows venues to automate the cloaking process while also capturing data about customers’ demographics and patronage habits. Cloakr works by allowing patrons to enter their

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5

contact details onto an iPad, as well as the number of items they want to cloak, before a ticket is printed wirelessly. SMS and point of sale software are expected to soon be integrated into the program. http://www.cloakr.net

3. Inspiring whisky drinkers The Singleton of Duftown Single Malt Scotch Whisky has added Spey Cascade to its range – a smooth, rich and balanced whisky created using a balance of European sherry and American bourbon oak casks. The Singleton aims to make it easier for consumers to “get to grips” with this traditionally complex category, and it represents the third instalment of a range of flavours including Tailfire and Sunray. www.diageo.com

4. Edlyn gets saucy Edlyn has added three new products to its Wood’s premium condiments

brand: Roasted Garlic Aioli, Tartare Sauce (with baby capers) and Mild Chunky Salsa. The Wood’s Roasted Garlic Aioli is made with a free range whole egg mayonnaise base with an infusion of garlic pieces. The Tartare Sauce combines mayonnaise with baby capers and fine gherkin pieces creating a zesty flavour, and the Mild Chunky Salsa is made from diced Australian tomatoes and capsicum, combined with a blend of onion, jalapeno and spices. All are packed in a 2.2kg pail and are shelf stable, gluten-free, have no artificial colours or flavours and are made in Australia. http://woodscondiments.com.au

5. Cider with a Mexican twist In collaboration with Casa Mexico, Sydney Brewery has launched Agave Ginger Cider, which is made from Sydney Cider, organic agave and ginger. The cloudy cider which is 4.5 percent alc/ vol has a cloudy appearance and is very lightly filtered in order

to retain its bold flavour. Agave Ginger Cider can be consumed immediately or used as a base ingredient for milled cider, along with cinnamon, star anise, cloves and orange peel. http://sydneybrewery.com/agave

6. Beer in the clear The Op Tik translucent beer-fount technology ensures venues keep their beer lines clean, while also adding a sense of theatre for draught beer or wine-on-tap drinkers. Designed and fabricated in Australia with the highest quality materials, the UV filtration on the sight glass maintains the flavour of the draught beverage being served. The sight glass can also expose system problems like beverage break up and poor sanitation. Op Tik is designed for installation into new or existing Ice Bank (0c) or Glycol (-2c) dispensing systems. www.streamline-beverage.com.au

hospitality | September 2015

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eventscalendar

hospitalitydiary SEPTEMBER

NOVEMBER

20 - 23, Fine Food Australia Fine Food will be returning to Sydney with a new home - Sydney Showground, Sydney Olympic Park. Highlights include the Australian Culinary Challenge where chefs compete in a live kitchen, and Bake Skills, where apprentice bakers compete across 26 different categories. Other highlights include the Les Toques Blanches Live demonstrations, the Official Great Aussie Pie Competition and the Talking Food Stage. www.finefoodaustralia.com.au

13-15, Wine Island festival For the first time ever, Clark Island on Sydney Harbour will be transformed into a wine lover’s paradise for the inaugural Wine Island festival. The three day festival will feature a crew of Australia’s most exciting winemakers, sommeliers and chefs who will showcase their best food and wine through cellar door experiences, gourmet food huts, a VIP Island Bar and complimentary masterclasses hosted by Wine Australia. Guests will be transported via vintage ferries from three central Sydney wharves, where they’ll indulge in over 100 new wave and traditional wines from Australia and New Zealand. www.wineisland.com.au

OCTOBER 11th, Hunter Valley Uncorked Balmoral festival The Hunter Valley will once again be taking over Sydney’s lower north shore with the 10th annual Hunter Valley Uncorked Balmoral festival. The food and wine event will showcase more than 20 of the Hunter Valley’s wineries, restaurants and producers on the shores of Balmoral Beach. Guests will be able to purchase a glass and tasting coupons on arrival and speak with winemakers and restaurateurs from the region. http://winecountry.com.au/events/ hunter-valley-uncorked-balmoral HO0 9 1 5 _ 0 0 0 _ KUV

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16 - 17, Drinks Industry Show The Drinks Industry Show will be held at the Crystal Palace, Luna Park, Sydney, connecting producers and distributors of alcoholic beverages with buyers from bars,

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The Drinks Industry Show will be co-located with Inspire EX, which targets the business and special events industry. www.drinksindustryshow.com.au

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