Four Corners
UNITED STATES Seasonal variations on a theme
We are seeing a strong movement in the US steering away from everyday mass-produced foods to a world of farmers’ markets, artisan food stores and ‘gourmet food trucks’- yes, you heard right, look it up online! These ‘trucks’ are appearing in
David Loft
vp sales and service, Flying Food Group
“Do I need to eat strawberries in
winter when they taste of little and are very highly priced?”
AUSTRALIA Celebrity chefs – when did that start? Pat Osborne
sales director Alpha Flight Services Australia
I was trying to figure out the other day just when did the humble chef become a celebratory? Some websites suggest the world’s first celebrity chef was French-born Alexis Soyer, born in 1810, who became famous for good soup and a few books. Surely it wasn’t that long ago
“A descriptive
menu means the food itself
becomes the celebrity”
when people chose a restaurant because it had a reputation for good food, reasonable prices or a nice atmosphere. I certainly didn’t have a clue who the chef might have been back in the 1970s and 80s. Now people apparently make their decision based on the chef that runs and, in many cases, owns the restaurant. The reason I raise this is that many
airlines choose to use ‘well known’ chefs from outside the industry to develop menus and then credit that chef through an article in the onboard menu or general publicity. The development of menus for use onboard airlines is an art in itself and can be a steep learning curve for chefs who have no experience in airline catering. There are challenges such as the preparation and timing needed to load upwards of 1000 meals on an A380; the skill of putting together more than 60 First and Business meals in a very confined space, and limited heating and chilling facilities. Back in the kitchen I think what surprises many non-airline chefs during menu development is how
important it is to design menus that have a limited number of movements. By this I mean that every item that goes on the plate, or in the foil, has labour attached to it. That extra sprig of parsley costs, not just the parsley, but also the seconds to place it there. One train of thought when it comes to producing a descriptive menu for passengers, why not describe the region where the beef comes from, the cows where the milk and cheese come from and the clear waters where the fish are caught? This way the food itself becomes the celebrity. I have a huge collection of menus
and very few promote the products – many promote the chef.
www.onboardhospitality.com 41
many cities over the US and serving items such as braised duck, grass- fed beef burger with arugula and cambozola cheese, escargot puffs, grilled sweetbread with sherry, frogs legs, lobster with orange salad and maple braised pork belly, many of them locally sourced and organic. All over the country (especially in summer) we have farmers’ markets in small villages selling local fruit and vegetables as well as artisanal oils, honeys, breads and pastries.
Restaurants wax lyrically on
their menus about which farm or locality their products come from, demonstrating a support for local businesses, a desire to avoid transporting food all over the world and to get back to the time when food was eaten within season and really tasted perfect. In pursuit of efficiency and purchasing power, our industry ships products globally to enable us to have standard menus, products out of season and fashionable items on menus for the sake of it. Do I need to eat strawberries and raspberries in the winter, when they are of questionable quality, taste of little and are very highly priced? Of course not, when there are many
other tasty fruits in season and readily available. We rotate menus to keep our regular passengers happy, without thinking that a particular rotation could be totally unsuitable for a specific season from a particular destination, rather than setting the rotations to tie in with the seasons and the local product availability. Whilst our industry is starting to
focus in this direction, there is a lot we can learn from these businesses. We need to spend more time researching the local market to enable fresh products to be used in the menu design, highlighting the local taste and seasonality in order to provide our customers with good, wholesome, tasty food!
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