The gastropub is the biggest food revolution in this country. Britain has come a long way since The Eagle opened its doors in Farringdon in 1990, and now nearly every town of any size has at least one. Not that everyone’s happy. Critics complain that the gastropub has been diluted, hijacked-by-the-big-boys, bastardised…
Some operators have jumped on the bandwagon, and there are plenty that definitely don’t
do what they say on the tin; and yes, even some of the best practitioners hate the word. But the fact remains that the gastropub is here to stay and something Britain can be increasingly proud
of. ‘It’s the biggest story of the last decade,’ declares Derek Bulmer, editor of the Eating Out in Pubs guide, who puts the success down to a change in British drinking habits.
Beef not beer
‘More and more pubs are finding it difficult to survive on wet sales alone, what with drink-driving laws and the smoking ban etc, so they’ve had to align themselves to food,’ he says. ‘Plus they
are attracting chefs with good CVs, who are a bit older, who have children, who want to go back to their
roots and get a life.’
But what of the moans that many of them are just restaurants in the shell of a pub, which charge accordingly? ‘Sure, some have lost sight of what they were originally about,’ he says. ‘But does it bother me? Yes and no. No, because I’m all for improving standards. Yes, because we don’t want to lose the charm of our pubs.’
Generally then, the rise of the gastropub has been a good thing, and it’s not a trend that shows any signs of slowing down, either. The South East, of course, is well represented, as are the Cotswolds, Thames Valley, North Yorkshire and the South West, but there are plenty of opportunities elsewhere in Britain, too.
‘There are 60,000 pubs in England and Wales alone so there’s scope for many more – and breweries are recognising their potential,’ says Bulmer.
But can they cook?
One thing holding back any major increase – and something that is often criticised in existing gastropubs – is the standard of cooking. To put it bluntly, are there enough good chefs out there to deliver this higher level of pub food?
Mark Sargeant, for one, reckons not. The executive chef of Gordon Ramsay at Claridges is tasked with heading up the company’s burgeoning gastropub business and is seriously looking at
centralising the cooking after the third pub, The Warrington, opens in Maida Vale. ‘We want to have total control of
the food,’ declares Sargeant, who dislikes the term gastropub.
‘I prefer pub,’ he growls. ‘For me gastropub now means something flash, charging £28 for sea bass, and trying to show off. Our pubs are going back to what they should be – honest British cooking in nice surroundings serving a proper pint.’
And if you’re thinking of opening one yourself, then listen to Sargeant. ‘You can’t be too greedy. You can only charge a certain amount on the food offering – your most expensive main course should be £14. We never try and make money on the food – we like to be generous. But you need to be clever with your drinks list, where you can make the money – it needs to be comprehensive and well-thought out, but not too expensive.’
And before you say, ‘how can he sell fillet steak for £14?’ the answer is simple: he doesn’t. ‘Look at cheaper cuts of meat,’ suggests Sargeant. ‘Our braised pig cheeks are a favourite. And if you do offer something more expensive, don’t charge through the nose for it, just balance it out with the cheaper cuts.’
The british bistro
Stephen Bull is another top chef who owns a gastropub but hates the word. ‘I could rant on about that for ages,’ he splutters. ‘Since the concept was taken over by pub chains, the word has been devalued. Anyone can do a gastropub these days – or so they think: buy a job lot of old furniture; add a few mirrors in gilt frames, throw in an identikit menu.’
Bull upped sticks at the end of the 1990s, abandoning his Michelin-starred London restaurants for the country. These days he leaves the cooking at The Hole in the Wall in Cambridgeshire to
his head chef Chris Leeton, preferring to run cookery classes from his home. But as one of the first big name chefs to make the move into gastropubs, he is well worth listening to.
‘The future is very bright for the gastropub – it’s the British bistro,’ he predicts.
‘There’s bags of scope as the market has only really just started, and with pubs closing all the time, there’s a huge well of opportunity.
‘It’s also a painless entry for chefs who want to go into business themselves – especially if they can buy the leasehold, and especially if they do their research. The main thing is to make sure
you
have enough working capital – people always underestimate the costs when they’re starting out. And you must get the pricing right – you can always put the prices up, but never down. You must also
realise that you can’t be all things to all people – decide what your market is and don’t deviate from that. And you should never, ever, get pretentious – remember that it’s a pub!’
Some might think The Mason’s Arms in Knowstone, Devon, is a bit pretentious – having a chef/proprietor who was cooking up a storm at Michel Roux’s three Michelin-starred Waterside Inn not that long ago. But at Mark Dodson’s popular gastropub, you won’t pay any more than at any other good gastropub, with a nice plate of crab at £5.95 and mains between £12 and £15. ‘Actually, I’d rather be seen as a restaurant than a gastropub, but there’s no other word to cover what we do,’ says Dodson, who opened in June 2005.
Go local
He has some good advice, too. ‘The main risk for anyone wanting to come into this business is lack of experience. You need to become a head chef first, and really learn the trade. Also, beware of over-staffing – it’s your biggest overhead and you can really do this on a small scale. And don’t be over-ambitious – we started gradually, building up trust, adding on £1 here, until we were comfortable.’
Dodson also advises pushing local ingredients wherever possible. ‘Customers really like to see it – even more than whether something is organic,’ he says. It’s also important that any new gastropub keeps the bar side of things going. ‘Yes, we could put in more tables, but if you take away the pub in a village, you take the heart out of a community – and they’ll thank you for keeping it. Anyway, we find the bar ticks over nicely and it adds instant atmosphere.’
Multi-award-winning drinks writer
Food
and wine writer, co-author of An Appetite for Ale
Restaurant critic and consultant
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