Big Chef, little Chef
- Thread starter janeb
- Start date
danny la rouge
Ninja swords for all disabled people
Yeah, because mad science celebrity chef takes over motorway caff is more highbrow, eh?Shakes head sadly
I always used to love Little Chef as a kid too, but then most fast food seemed impossibly exciting back then, and with a space-aged motorway setting to boot...
I don't think their food's got worse to be honest. Just that fast food's got far more popular and refined elsewhere and that they haven't moved on. Add to that they've standardised and rationalised their menu into consistency by making cooking a process of assembling preprocessed ingredients that you can now buy from Iceland rather than offering a genuinely distinctive cook to order proposition. They offer a menu at what you'd consider premium prices that you could trump in Wetherspoons or your local caff. In times of greater choice, and with a M&S concession in the local service station, it's no longer looking so appetising.
OMG that so & so in charge of Little Chef came over as so paranoid about what sort of budget he could allow Heston Blumenthal to work within (perfectly reasonable information). Surely he could have agreed to give him the required figures off the record & unfilmed?
The thing is, unless you know the budget limit, it's difficult being creative, unusual, and still appealing to the sort of person who'd choose to go to a Little Chef for a meal.
Didn't help that LC clientele probably don't know much about the sort of food Heston Blumethal does, so IMHO he really needed to explain his menu more. eg "scrambled egg with smoked salmon is a classic combo, given a darker smokey twist by adding a splash of (wood smokey tasting) Lapsang Souchong tea".
I felt quite sorry for him because his efforts weren't appreciated. FFS 3 mins for (water bathed instead of microwaved to death) scrambled egg isn't too long to wait.
The kitchens were IMHO appallingly equipped - I thought most commercial kitchens had moved away from depending so heavily on the microwave.
The thing is, unless you know the budget limit, it's difficult being creative, unusual, and still appealing to the sort of person who'd choose to go to a Little Chef for a meal.
Didn't help that LC clientele probably don't know much about the sort of food Heston Blumethal does, so IMHO he really needed to explain his menu more. eg "scrambled egg with smoked salmon is a classic combo, given a darker smokey twist by adding a splash of (wood smokey tasting) Lapsang Souchong tea".
I felt quite sorry for him because his efforts weren't appreciated. FFS 3 mins for (water bathed instead of microwaved to death) scrambled egg isn't too long to wait.
The kitchens were IMHO appallingly equipped - I thought most commercial kitchens had moved away from depending so heavily on the microwave.The kitchens were IMHO appallingly equipped - I thought most commercial kitchens had moved away from depending so heavily on the microwave.
Not sure if that's true. It's more that the cooking processes normally expected at a Little Chef were replicated in every other chain pub and cheapo restaurant. H&S, low staff wages and consistency encourages idiot proof cooking processes. A pasta meal microwaved in a Pizza/Pasta Hut ain't going to be that dissimilar to one in a Little Chef either.
My money's on Blumenthal doing a little bit of a Gastropub thing by improving/branding the standard of the ingredients and achieving little more. Which wouldn't be a bad thing perhaps
maximilian ping
Grrrrr
i think the Little Chef lot needed to be patronised
The staff on minimum wage?
Or the people who made the decison to remove saucepans from the kitchen, and real meat from the burgers?
sorry didn't watch this and guess I have no right to comment but, as has been said before, it's hardly a good match... Little Chef is fucking up... I know what it needs.. liquid nitrogen!
That was pretty much it. 'Cept this time he didnt have fawning sychophants on hand to tell him how revolutionary it was to pour liquid nitrogen over chocolate icecream.
Emperors new clothes, customers saw right through it.
Heston didnt do half the customer research he should have done. He deserved to fail.
softybabe
one merlot then two....
softybabe
one merlot then two....
even the kiddies werent fooled
no research=fail defo...rule 1 Heston should know this...he wont get away with a fat duck in Bromley made of fail from day 1 ...why did he think he could get away with one at a motorway pit stop even the kiddies werent fooled
That's not Heston's fault, it's the CEO. Heston was told repeatedly that he was there to deliver 'blue sky thinking' and innovative, Heston-esque cooking, not do a customer survey.
Although I think we all know how these reality shows work by now - it wouldn't have been much of a show if they hadn't set up the conflict at the outset. And as tarannau says, they'll end up with better sausages and a happy ending by episode three.
Shippou-Sensei
4:1:2.5
it's stupid heston does unique foods there is no fucking point having heston in a little chef if all he is going to do is serve better quality little chef food..
and yes people laugh at egg with tea in it.... because people are not chefs
fucking eat first complain later if you just going to laugh at something because it's strange and exotic yyou should be condemed to eat microwaved burgers for the rest of your life
and yes people laugh at egg with tea in it.... because people are not chefs
fucking eat first complain later if you just going to laugh at something because it's strange and exotic yyou should be condemed to eat microwaved burgers for the rest of your life
joustmaster
offcumdun
The director of the chain was a bellend. he'd obviously read one and a half business managment books, got an idea and was sticking to it, even if it was a terrible one.
fair play to the manager who stood up for him self said something like "i'll not have you taking the piss out of my little chef"
but then - to be fair it deserves it.
if i paid 7 quid for that hawian burger in such a dirty restaurant, i would have said exactly what the fatduck chefs said.
great car crash tv
fair play to the manager who stood up for him self said something like "i'll not have you taking the piss out of my little chef"
but then - to be fair it deserves it.
if i paid 7 quid for that hawian burger in such a dirty restaurant, i would have said exactly what the fatduck chefs said.
great car crash tv
internetstalker
Get naked!
mrsfran
Well-Known Member
even the kiddies werent fooled
He didn't though, did he? Cooking scrambled egg in a bag in water rather than in a microwave, or adding an oyster to a lancashire hotpot isn't exactly off the scale of weirdness. He was trying to tone it down, the MD was the one saying "We want your weirdness" and Heston was saying "I can't do that for this sort of money".
That said, I don't understand why he didn't just say "Okay, we can pare down the menu and just use better ingredients". That big breakfast costs £7.25! You can get decent ingredients for that sort of money.
g force
Affects Shatner's Basoon
Yep he said that 4 times I believe as well as "outside the box"....typical management-speak type, hides behind phrases because he can't articulate what he wants because he doesn't actually know
mattie
missing in inaction
Agreed, I'd have thought the first port of call would have been to get a decent set of ovenware in, source better ingredients and start getting the basics right.
Too many mixed messages in this, Blumental (sp) looked, more than anything, confused over what exactly was expected and how he was supposed to acheive it.
And fuck me those two chefs need a good dry slap.
mattie
missing in inaction
The kitchens were IMHO appallingly equipped - I thought most commercial kitchens had moved away from depending so heavily on the microwave.
It's dreadful, isn't it.
My mate's missus used to work selling commercial kitchen fittings, she was scathing about the quality of some places - as I understand it, Yates (granted, not reknowned for quality) order only microwaves and deep fat fryers. Apparently, the over-riding concern is for quick food which is consistent. It'll be consistently bad, but you won't have complaints over burnt or undercooked food as timings for deep fryers and microwaves are pretty much idiot-proof. Aligned to this is the reduced need for a skilled chef, which of course costs them money.
* Saying that, we once went to Garfunkels to get a quick lunch and they managed to balls up microwaving our starters. Incompetence squared. Seeing as we chose to go there - speed was a factor - we brought it on ourselves to some extent, but Jesus, they're shockingly bad.
They were cunts, but those burgers were rank.
bouncer_the_dog
Well-Known Member
The clientel of the little Chef don't want anything other than stodge. The MD wants cr-a-z-ee Heston food. What a great clash. i like the way H dealt with the MD on the phone...
Mrs Miggins
Eternal
....because he can't articulate what he wants because he doesn't actually know
Exactly - what a knob. No wonder the chain is going down the tubes with that eejit in charge. He really irritated me when he said there wasn't enough on the old menu for "women" to eat. Like fish.
It seems perfectly obvious what Little Chef needs: Decent ingredients to produce a fairly limited menu including a decent fry-up/burger/meat pie/[any other trad Brit food] plus a couple of healthier options at a reasonable price, all cooked in a proper bloody kitchen. That's what people want at a service station. Can't be that hard. Can it?
Bob_the_lost
Elsewhere
How does one make perfect scrambled eggs?
5t3IIa
Registered User
In a microwave!
Saw this tonight, missed the first part.
As a child I used to enjoy Little Chef, parents took me there usually on motorway trips, say ~10-15 times a year i'd guess.
Grown up a bit now, probably not been in the last ~10 years.
I want it to succeed, as a brand, but it's like Woolworths really, while the likes of Tesco and Wilkinsons had stolen Woolworths market share, so have Mc Donalds, M+S food outlets, KFC, Petrol station baguettes, etc etc....IMHO to succeed, it's not really about the direct quality of the food (in terms of ingredients, people eat any old rubbish these days) , more presentation and gaining market share it would seen, the people in the restaurant, they were already in the door, but HB/Little Chef don't seem to work on this -Also many of the customers were 'getting on a bit' in terms of age - no attempt to look out for the future Little Chef eaters.
As others have said Little Chef management seem in a different world....in many ways the most dedicated people were the staff, can't imagine there much above minimum wage, but they seemed committed and happy enough.
Bye Bye Little Chef...Can't see it lasting another 5-10years. All this program has taught me so far is that a)the cooking is even more basic than I imagined (I didn't really need to see that) and b)Little Chef management are lost to the world.
I do the like way the management chats/coffees are held in hotels etc....Clearly Little Chef can't do coffee for travelling businessmen, or it;s not good enough for the Little Chef team, what hope have they anyone else would go there?!!!
As a child I used to enjoy Little Chef, parents took me there usually on motorway trips, say ~10-15 times a year i'd guess.
Grown up a bit now, probably not been in the last ~10 years.
I want it to succeed, as a brand, but it's like Woolworths really, while the likes of Tesco and Wilkinsons had stolen Woolworths market share, so have Mc Donalds, M+S food outlets, KFC, Petrol station baguettes, etc etc....IMHO to succeed, it's not really about the direct quality of the food (in terms of ingredients, people eat any old rubbish these days) , more presentation and gaining market share it would seen, the people in the restaurant, they were already in the door, but HB/Little Chef don't seem to work on this -Also many of the customers were 'getting on a bit' in terms of age - no attempt to look out for the future Little Chef eaters.
As others have said Little Chef management seem in a different world....in many ways the most dedicated people were the staff, can't imagine there much above minimum wage, but they seemed committed and happy enough.
Bye Bye Little Chef...Can't see it lasting another 5-10years. All this program has taught me so far is that a)the cooking is even more basic than I imagined (I didn't really need to see that) and b)Little Chef management are lost to the world.
I do the like way the management chats/coffees are held in hotels etc....Clearly Little Chef can't do coffee for travelling businessmen, or it;s not good enough for the Little Chef team, what hope have they anyone else would go there?!!!
That does seem to be becoming more and more obvious doesn't it. The boss must have thought he'd thought of a foolproof idea to boost sales but now (what with Hestons enthusiasm to expand his childish madness in Littlechefs across the country) its starting to backfire on him. You can see the panic in the bosses eyes everytime Heston asks for something in writing.
But even Heston should have realised this and not served up stuff thats on his normal menu at the FatFuk! Talk about make your own bed " I'm cheffing in a fast (fried) food restaurant, lets serve them up earl grey tea flavoured ice cream!!! What an idiot!
Entertaining telly but a complete waste of time for both Heston and Littlechef. What would have been better for Littlechef is maybe getting someone in like Gordon Ramsey or similiar to hard sell the original menu but with quality cooked food. Surely??
weltweit
Well-Known Member
Yes, perhaps people up the thread have thought this dunno.
It is now my view that the MD of LC decided this program could be some good publicity for LC at low expense. His challenge to Heston B was one that Heston was almost certain to fail, create a new menu and then beat the LC menu in a LC resteraunt. People entering the resteraunt were expecting LC food not Heston Blumenthal's. He then would probably not have to pay the full £300k odd fee that Heston was asking for.
So a publicity stunt, no more.
It is now my view that the MD of LC decided this program could be some good publicity for LC at low expense. His challenge to Heston B was one that Heston was almost certain to fail, create a new menu and then beat the LC menu in a LC resteraunt. People entering the resteraunt were expecting LC food not Heston Blumenthal's. He then would probably not have to pay the full £300k odd fee that Heston was asking for.
So a publicity stunt, no more.
Orangesanlemons
Inamorati Anonymous
Just seen the second show, really disappointed as I enjoy HB's more esoteric experiments. The Jamie Oliver's School Dinners template is followed religiously, right down to the annoying old bat who's "central" to the new menu (what happened to the other girl btw when she eventually decided to show up, you know, the one who actually did all the work - didn't see her after that ).
Misguided garbage - worthy of a half hour Ramsay Kitchen Nightmares where he shows up, simplifies the menu, uses local seasonal produce and tells them to "grow some fucking bollocks". No more, no less. Heston is an appalling choice for this show, bar the fact he was named after a frigging service station. I want to see him try to make the perfect baked alaska using quantum theory, not teach unskilled catering drones how to make scrambled eggs ffs. His chefs are absolute bellends too.
Apart from that I quite liked it.
).Misguided garbage - worthy of a half hour Ramsay Kitchen Nightmares where he shows up, simplifies the menu, uses local seasonal produce and tells them to "grow some fucking bollocks". No more, no less. Heston is an appalling choice for this show, bar the fact he was named after a frigging service station. I want to see him try to make the perfect baked alaska using quantum theory, not teach unskilled catering drones how to make scrambled eggs ffs. His chefs are absolute bellends too.
Apart from that I quite liked it.
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