We came, we saw, we… Well read the blog for the results. Monday afternoon we collected together the paraphernalia and ingredients for the trip to London to compete in the Gastropub Challenge in the Restaurant Show ’09 http://www.therestaurantshow.co.uk/page.cfm/link=106 We were invited to enter as either or both the Garrick’s Head pub and the King William pub. We entered as the King William http://www.kingwilliampub.com/ with a team comprising staff from all three pubs in the group.
After dropping most of the equipment at Earls Court 2, see previous picture, we headed to leafy Clapham to drop off sleeping stuff and Charlie and Amanda’s children with Granny. After a short walking tour of south London, thank god for GPS, we arrived at the Anchor and Hope, The Cut, Waterloo, London (seems they have no website), to drink a pint or two, eat, drink a glass of wine and discuss the final plans for the competition the next day. Without turning into a reviewer, all grand on the Anchor and Hope’s product: nice beer; sensible no reservation policy; good wine (same supplier as us http://www.lescaves.co.uk/ ); fairly bright service considering they were heaving on a Monday night; and most importantly great ‘gastropub’ food. Collectively we had smoked whitebait, smoked cod’s roe, a whole crab, charcuterie and a rather super salt beef broth, ‘just’ to start. Then shared a superb slow-cooked shoulder of lamb with Dauphinoise potato. A bottle of Grüner Veltliner with starters, then a surprisingly zingy Beaujolais with the lamb (turns out neither of these from Caves de Pyrene).
Morning of the competition and London traffic crossing the Thames was grindingly slow as ever, so we were last to arrive at the competition. The arena comprised four equal kitchen and dining spaces for four teams of four; two chefs and two front of house. The competition was http://www.millbrookinnsouthpool.co.uk/index.asp ; http://www.thecrookedbillet.co.uk/ ; http://www.theploughwavendon.com/ ; and us http://www.kingwilliampub.com/ . The teams all said hello and good luck, this was a ‘friendly’ and the organisers were very helpful, introducing us to three runners from Westminster College who pointed us in the right direction or ‘ran’ off to get us missing bits n bobs. As previously posted, I was pretty nervous, as I imagine all of us were. We had a bit of time to get our bearings and switch on the ovens etc. The start was 10.30 so no cooking or laying up ‘til then. Each team had two hours to cook and serve a main and dessert to twelve diners (three tables of four) with two more servings for the judges.
Nice aprons! Chefs got jackets, we got monogrammed aprons, so named and logoed the event began. We were issued our wines from our sponsors, Brown Brothers, so in the fridge with the bubbles and whites. Table cloths went down; napkins were folded; cutlery placed; glasses buffed and repositioned for maximum sparkle; menus placed in our rough-hewn display blocks, then turned and turned to be facing just the right direction; cold-pressed rapeseed oil placed centre table as our emblematic local fine product. Chefs chopped; creamed; ice-creamed; seared; sautéed; sausaged; butchered; boiled; dirtied bowls and handed washing up to me, which I judiciously handed to Jason to wash up.
Each team’s fourth person got the lofty title of ‘gopher’, i.e. washer up, they formed a bond in the backup area swapping detergent and scrubbers until the hot water duly ran cold halfway through service. All the while judges noted and ticked away, marking each team for hygiene, professionalism, communication, organisation and efficiency. Our tables looked nice, but had we gone a bit pared down? The tables of the other pubs had a bit more flare and finish. Also we hadn’t quite got the right end of the stick regarding wine service, having brought the correct glasses for what we would recommend, but weren’t going to serve. Turned out we were serving the provided wines, had we got flutes? No! Thankfully the sherry schooners were miniature flutes, it made a talking point.
Midday neared and guests/judges started to arrive. We were being scored on greeting, seating and service. So charm and natter I did. The rules did not permit any wine or food service ‘til 12.30, but what to do with already sat guests whilst they had a talk from Paxton and Whitfield Cheese? Quick word with the compere and rules bent, of course any pub wouldn’t have sat customers without serving a drink. Out came the bubbles, Brown Brothers Prosecco (no I hadn’t ever seen Prosecco from outside Italy before either) and ‘Restaurant Show’09’ water.
Service time beckoned and hopefully I’ll get all the menus emailed back from the other pubs to include in the next entry.
No comments:
Post a Comment