Tag Archives: reviewers

‘Restaurant Babylon’: are SA restaurants snorting, spitting, and swearing too?!

Restaurant Babylon 2The ‘Babylon’ book series by Imogen Edwards-Jones, written on the basis of interviews with staff from the relevant industries, has become highly popular for its depth of behind the scenes insights told in a 24 hour operating day.   Her latest book is ‘Restaurant Babylon’, which was published last year, sharing the ‘saucy secrets of the world’s finest kitchens’.

The fictional Le Restaurant,  brasserie Le Table, and Le Bar are located within close proximity of each other in London, Le Restaurant being Michelin-starred.  The narrator is the restaurant owner.  For her book the writer interviewed sommeliers, chefs, maître d’s, owners, and ‘insiders’ working in the restaurant industry in the UK.

As Valentine’s Day is around the corner, it is apt to start with this event, being one of the most lucrative for the restaurant industry, with mark-ups and heavy drinking generating good profits for restaurants.  Christmas Day lunches and New Year’s Eve events are equally profitable.

Some of the key insights into restaurants are the following:

*   restaurant staff survive on extremely little sleep, as they enjoy a drink or more after they finish service, being hungover the next day.  Alcoholism is rife.

*   chefs burn out, due to the long hours, the stress, and lack of light in closed kitchens.  This leads to absenteeism, temper tantrums, and inconsistent cooking.

*   drug-taking is rife, to cope with the pressure and to stay awake, to cope with the hangover, or to be ‘sharp’ for service!  ‘Cocaine is everywhere‘ said the author in an interview.

*   claiming ‘organic’ ingredients ‘just makes the place look amateur‘.   The origin of one’s fish, meat, and vegetables is far more important to patrons.

*   some chefs over-order, and sell on their surplus, pocketing the income.

*   theft by staff is common, especially in the bar, selling bottles out of the back door and pocketing the income,  or pocketing cash income.

*   mark-ups are better on pizzas than they are on 7-course tasting menus!   Side dishes of chips, Continue reading →

Eat Out DStv Food Network Restaurant Awards: Cape Town Gourmet Capital again!

Last night the country’s top restaurants and their chefs were crowned in the annual 2011 Eat Out DStv Food Network Restaurant Awards, held at the Bay Hotel in Camps Bay.  Despite controversial changes to the running of the Awards, most attendees appeared happy with the results, which saw Cape Town regain its crown as the Gourmet Capital of South Africa with five Top 10 restaurants, after a dip last year.  Stellenbosch has three Top 10 restaurants, and Franschhoek and Johannesburg one each, giving the Cape nine out of the Top 10 restaurants.

Eat Out Editor Abigail Donnelly came under fire this year, for announcing herself as the sole judge of the 1000 restaurants in South Africa, letting go of her fellow judging panel of Pete Goffe-Wood, Arnold Tanzer, and Anna Trapido, and instead relying on the 70 000 Eat Out ‘reviewers’ posting on the magazine’s website, with the risk of them being open for manipulation, and not necessarily ‘fine-diners’. In the Eat Out 2012 magazine we received last night, 19 ‘reviewers’ were listed, being ‘these people ate their way around the country on our behalf’.  The reviewers include bloggers Andy Fenner and Dax Villenueva, as well as food and/or wine writers such as Graham Howe, Greg Landman, Fiona McDonald, and Clifford and Maryke Roberts.

The Cape Times on Friday described Mrs Donnelly’s judging criteria of the ‘hidden gems and forgotten favourites’ restaurants (this description was not a reflection of the Top 10 list): that the chef had been at the restaurant since last November (an exception was made with the Azure chef, who fell a few weeks short of this criterion), the owners and chef must be passionate about their business (odd in that Mrs Donnelly did not chat to all chefs of the restaurants that she visited, booking under a false name often), must be dedicated to ‘upliftment of the industry’ (a new criterion), the chefs must care about the sourcing of their produce, and the restaurant must be consistent in everything it does.  Food counts for 70% of the evaluation, and is scored on menu composition, seasonality, presentation, taste, price and value, wine choice, and dishes eaten.  Within menu composition, Mrs Donnelly evaluates choice, cooking techniques, variety of ingredients, and dietary requirements.  For seasonality, the variety of ingredients is evaluated, as is use of ‘local ingredients’, choice of fish, use of imported products, and out of season produce. Food presentation is judged on visual appeal, reflection of menu description, garnishing, and plates used.  Taste of the dishes is evaluated on balance, texture and complementary flavours.  Additional criteria are food and wine pairing recommendations, service levels, linen, cutlery, the bathrooms, reservations and arrivals, and the billing.  Interesting is that Mrs Donnelly says that 2011 is the ‘year of the egg and the wild sorrel’.  She adds: “Many chefs have displayed a strong sense of nature through foraging in forests or veggie gardens, and pure South African storytelling has also been celebrated”.

In the past the Top restaurant was usually awarded the Awards for Service Excellence and Chef of the Year too, but this year this was awarded separately, making the top accolade shared across three restaurants:

Restaurant of the Year: The Greenhouse, with Chef Peter Tempelhoff

Chef of the Year:  Luke Dale-Roberts of The Test Kitchen

Service Excellence Award: The Roundhouse

The Top 10 Restaurants were announced as follows:

1.  The Greenhouse, with Peter Tempelhoff, Cape Town

2.  The Test Kitchen, with Luke Dale-Roberts, Cape Town

3.  The Tasting Room, with Chef Margot Janse, Franschhoek

4.   The Roundhouse, with Chefs PJ Vadas and Eric Bulpitt, Cape Town

5.   Overture, with Chef Bertus Basson, Stellenbosch

6.   Terroir, with Chef Michael Broughton, Stellenbosch

7.   DW Eleven-13, with Chef Marthinus Ferreira, Johannesburg

8.   Jordan Restaurant, with Chef George Jardine, Stellenbosch

9.   Nobu, with Chef Hideki Maeda, One&Only Cape Town

10.  La Colombe, with Chef Scot Kirton, Cape Town

The other restaurants that were Top 20 Finalists were Azure Restaurant, Babel, Bosman’s Restaurant, Hartford House, Pierneef à La Motte, Planet Restaurant, The Restaurant at Grande Provence, Restaurant Mosaic, Roots, and Tokara.

The winners of the newly introduced Restaurant category Awards were announced at super-speed, and what was interesting was that no nominees nor finalists were mentioned per category (some had been announced for some categories in the Eat Out newsletter in the last few weeks), with the exception of the Boschendal Style Award. We requested details of the nominees of the categories, but were refused these, only being sent the Boschendal Style Awards nominees list.  No criteria were revealed for these awards, and seemed to be Mrs Donnelly’s personal pick:

Boschendal Style Award: Makaron Restaurant at Majeka House was the winner, a surprise in two respects – the R10 million newly constructed and decorated restaurant only opened its doors in September, a month before the Eat Out magazine went to print, and Mrs Donnelly is a consultant to the restaurant!  The designer was Etienne Hanekom, the art director for VISI, a sister publication to Eat Out at New Media Publishing!  The other finalists, out of 18 nominees, were Babel, Kream in Pretoria, Hemelhuijs, and, very surprisingly, The Test Kitchen!

Best Steakhouse: The Local Grill in Johannesburg (29 nominees)

Best Italian Restaurant:  No other contenders appear to have been evaluated, the award predictably going to 95 Keerom.  (The full list of Italian restaurant contenders was revealed today – 23/11)

Best Asian Restaurant: Kitima in Cape Town (no nominees list)

Best Bistro: Bizerca Bistro (43 nominees)

Best Country-Style Restaurant: A surprise win for the unknown The Table at De Meye, no nominee list having been revealed

City Press ViP Sunday Breakfast Award: Salvation Café at 44 Stanley in Johannesburg (this award was not pre-announced, and does not even appear in the Eat Out magazine with the other award listings).

The Lannice Snyman Lifetime Achievement Award : Garth Stroebel

In the past the food has always been prepared by Finalist chefs, and increasingly those invited to prepare the food were the ones that did not make Top 10.  However, this year each one of the invited chefs was from a Top 10 restaurant.  One admires the challenge of the chefs to prepare the meal for 360 persons, and Pete Goffe-Wood was the co-ordinator of the event on the food side.  Chef Peter Tempelhoff made the canapés, but these were not seen when Boschendal Grand Cuvée Brut 2007 was served on arrival.  The ‘bread’ came from Giorgio Nava, it was said, but was croissants and other sweet pastries from Caffe Milano, it appeared.  Chef Hideki Maeda prepared a baby spinach salad with dried miso and crayfish starter, which was paired with Groot Constantia Reserve White 2009.  This was followed by Chef Luke Dale-Roberts’ Ballotine of rabbit and gammon, duck liver purée, red cabbage crumbs and relish, and Everson’s pear cider jelly, paired with Chamonix Chardonnay 2009.

Michael Broughton’s trompette dusted fillet of beef with cep butter sauce, baby beet, asparagus and parsley was my favourite, for its sauce in particular, paired with Kleine Zalze Vineyard Selection Cabernet Sauvignon 2009. George Jardine served his dessert of Valrhona Ivoire torte, raspberries and Ivoire chantilly on a slate plate, and this was paired with Jordan Mellifera Noble Late Harvest 2010.

The food and wine service has been disappointing for the past three years that I have attended the event, with serving staff contracted in, last night’s staff leaving much to be desired, there being no wine service initially, no ice buckets on the table for the white wine and water, and bottles arriving at the table but not linked to the course they were meant to be paired with, and other wines not listed on the menu arriving as well.  What the event needs is a Manager on the service side, walking the floor, to check on the satisfaction of the guests and the smooth flow of the event.  There were no steak nor fish knives, and many of the aspects which Mrs Donnelly mentioned as her criteria in judging the Top 10 restaurants were lacking on the food and wine side of the event.  The Eat Out Restaurant Awards should be a showcase of food and wine service perfection, at R1000 a ticket, but this has not been the case in the past three years, and particularly not last night.

The Eat Out DStv Food Network Awards did not award any Top 10 positions to any new restaurants, a disappointment, all restaurants making the Top 10 list having been on it before, with the exception of Nobu, but some with new chefs.  Some excellent chefs were overlooked, in our opinion, ‘safe’ selections having been made!. Perhaps a Top 20 finalist list should not be pre-announced, as was the case in the past. The Restaurant category Awards may need some consistency in announcing all or no finalists/nominees, and in providing a motivation why a restaurant has won a category.  Scope exists for different categories, while some current ones could be dropped. The conflict of interest by Mrs Donnelly acting as a consultant to restaurants cannot be acceptable.

POSTSCRIPT 21/11: On Twitter this morning, in reaction to this blogpost, there is feedback that The Table at De Meye is owned by an ex-photographer for TASTE magazine, a sister publication to Eat Out, and of which Mrs Donnelly is Food Editor.

Eat Out 2011: www.eatout.co.za Twitter: @Eat_Out

Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter: @WhaleCottage

The Squashed Tomato and wine.co.za Blogs ‘paired’ at Food & Wine Bloggers’ Club

The first Food & Wine Bloggers’ Club meeting for 2011 kicks off on Wednesday 26 January at well-known Pigalle Restaurant in Green Point, and ‘pairs’ highly knowledgeable Dusan Jelic from wine.co.za and Linda Harding, who Tweets and blogs as The Squashed Tomato.

Dusan comes from Serbia, yet has the most amazing command of English, and can wax lyrical about wines and their character.   He is highly regarded as a wine writer.   He has a BA in Sociology and Russian, and a Masters in Cultural Management.  He has done a number of Cape Wine Academy courses, and is continuing with a diploma course at the moment.  He has worked as a translator, and in administration.  Dusan is the Social Networking and Media Manager at wine.co.za and Tweets as @StefanLuka and @winecoza.

“Superb wines from Dalmatian region of Croatia started shaping my palate some twenty years ago as well as a great passion for wine which my dad always communicated to me”, says Dusan.   Dusan’s blog on wine.co.za expresses his special wine moments.   His goal is to publish at least one blogpost per work day.  Dusan says he works in a field which he loves and enjoys immensely.

Linda Harding is a smart young lady, having passed her matric with straight A’s, and with a Bachelor degree in Business Science, passing her majors Economics and Statistics with distinction at UCT.   She started her career in Sales, then became a Research Analyst at Frost & Sullivan, whereafter she joined market research company TNS Research Surveys.  In December she started working at New Media Publishing, as an intern, on Eat Out and Eat In, and writes Tweets, works on their Facebook updates and website, and writes features, articles and profiles.   She is also a wine ambassador to two wine cellars in Constantia.

Linda’s started her blog in May last year, and her blog name came from her favourite book as a five year old, called “The Squashed Tomato Joke Book”, which also had some recipes in it, and this is where her love for food writing was born.  The Squashed Tomato blog focuses on food, wine and fun, she writes.  She was one of top three winners in the Fairview Food Bloggers’ Challenge last year.  Linda will talk about the use of Twitter and Blogger in social media, and how to improve one’s readership, connections and gain friends.  She will also address “the lack of respect that I see on a  daily basis within the industry, particularly from reviewers”.

The Food & Wine Bloggers’ Club was formed to reflect the tremendous growth in and power of food and wine blogs in forming opinion about food, restaurants and wines.  Most bloggers do not have any formal training in blogging, and learnt from others.   The Food & Wine Bloggers’ Club aims to foster this informal training, and to serve as social media networking opportunity.

Each of the two bloggers will talk for about half an hour about their blog, and what they have learnt about blogging.  The Club will give fledgling as well as experienced bloggers the opportunity to learn from each other and to share their knowledge with others.  Attendees can ask questions, and get to know fellow bloggers.  The Club meetings are informal and fun.

Wines are brought along by the wine blogging speaker, and Dusan will share some of the wines from wine.co.za and from his private collection.  Seafood snacks will be served by Pigalle Restaurant.  The cost of attendance is R100. 

Food & Wine Bloggers’ Club, 26 January 18h00 – 20h00 :  Pigalle Restaurant,  57 Somerset Road, Green Point,  Cape Town – entrance is from the back of the building, next to the Primedia and Tafelberg Furnishers entrances, off Highfield Road/corner Somerset Road.   Parking costs R10.  Bookings can be made by e-mailing Chris at whalecot@iafrica.com.

Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com  Twitter: @WhaleCottage

TripAdvisor gets some of its own medicine!

The bane of the hospitality industry is a website called TripAdvisor.com, which carries reviews of accommodation establishments, restaurants and tourism attractions in cities, towns and villages around the world.   The reviews are written by travelers, and are extremely candid in presenting their feedback, often with photographs.

 

Travelers have become very confident in documenting their feedback, especially when it is negative, and so it is quickly evident that the majority of reviews tend to be negative – unhappy guests tend to express their views, while happy ones literally use word-of-mouth rather than TripAdvisor to communicate their happiness with a tourism product.   Yet the website carries a high degree of “credibility” amongst trip planners, in making their accommodation, restaurant and tourism attraction decisions for their holidays.

 

Whilst the intentions of the website owners was very honourable in setting up its website, it appears to not have understood the human nature of both reviewers and of tourism product owners.

 

Tourism product owners have known for some time already that TripAdvisor is used by many vindictive guests, who may have experienced something to their dissatisfaction during their stay/meal/visit, and then tend to use TripAdvisor as a blackmail tool – “compensate us fairly or we’ll go to TripAdvisor”.  Those tourism product owners that stand firm against blackmailing guests run the risk of a string of negative reviews on the website, and unfortunately one negative review can set off another reviewer and colour the content of the reviews.   Tourism product owners have also observed that in their vindictiveness, the reviewers do not hold back in their abuse in disparaging the management of the establishment concerned, in exaggerating detail, in dishonestly describing the details, and in not giving credit for any reductions, freebies or any other compensation given to the guest.   Guests who have read the negative reviews, and still decide to visit a tourism product, are much more sensitive and judgemental, and could become negative reviewers themselves.

 

TripAdvisor offers tourism product owners the opportunity to send a Management Response, but they have very strict guidelines in the content they allow – one may not say that the guest (reviewer) is not telling the truth, one may not mention the name of the guest (most are written anonymously), one may not disparage the reviewer in any way, even if the management have been disparaged, or if the guest made mistakes or broke the rules.   A Management Response on TripAdvisor can come across as being very defensive, especially when written by an emotional owner/manager, and may do more damage than not responding at all.

 

Something tourism product owners have also picked up over time is that some negative reviews are written by competitors, who wish to slate their fellow hoteliers, restaurants and tourist attractions, to gain more business.   This is a low form of doing business, but is not visible to guests.   TripAdvisor would listen to an owner’s feedback if such a review has occurred, but the affected party will not be able to prove who the perpetrator is, and that it is not a guest writing a review.

 

It has also understood that some tourism guests are offered incentives by tourism product owners to write positive Tripadvisor reviews.

 

Now the shoe is on the other foot, in that TripAdvisor has received negative media publicity about its shortcomings, and has had to admit that many positive reviews have been written by the owners/management of the tourism products, a practice that product owners have known to be going on for many years.  News reports of late show that a number of TripAdvisor’s 400 000 products have been flagged as such by TripAdvisor on its website, until the owners can prove the contrary, reports Die Welt.  The red box next to a product states that TripAdvisor has reason to believe that the property has tried to manipulate the popularity index and rating of the product. As soon as the products show they are keeping to the rules again, the warning is removed by TripAdvisor.

 

Where does this leave travelers who want to plan their trip, and who relied heavily on the website?   Perhaps they should consider the following:

 

  1. How long ago was the review written?  Most establishments are devastated in seeing a review, and will address a reported deficiency immediately, if they have not done so at the time that the guest stayed. 
  2. How many reviews are there per year/month?  The average guest house would have about 100 couples visiting in a month, and if a review frequency is only every 6 months, then the review only represents 0,2% of the total visitor numbers, and therefore should be ignored. Even one review a month represents 1 % – no establishment can run at zero defect, and because product staff are human, and their guests are human, it is inevitable that one cannot please all the guests all the time!
  3. Is the review constructive, even if it carries negative information, and does it praise at least some aspects of the product?  If there is nothing to praise at all, the reviewer shows his/her bias
  4. Read between the lines – put yourself in the owner’s shoes, and evaluate whether the response and actions attributed to the owner/manager are reasonable, especially if the product has been operating for a number of years.
  5. Check for a pattern – is the same complaint coming up, or is it a rant about a different aspect of the property each time.  Understand that maintenance and repairs are a constant challenge for hospitality establishments, and it is reasonable to expect that something could be operating less than satisfactorily.  The establishment must be given a chance to fix the problem or to make good to the customer in another way, before TripAdvisor is approached.
  6. Read other websites to obtain a full-rounded picture of the establishments, and do not rely on one website such as TripAdvisor only.   In South Africa all professional accommodation products are graded between 1 and 5 stars, and every year the properties are re-assessed, adhering to ever more stringent guidelines.  Check with the Tourism Grading Council if the TripAdvisor reviews reflect the property, for an alternative opinion.
  7. Try to speak to guests who have stayed there before – they will be best able to give a fair review, even if they have not written a review on TripAdvisor
  8. Check the length of the review – the longer it is, the angrier the reviewer is, and the less likely it is to be balanced.
  9. Check the rating of the review – it is evident that most reviews are 1 out of 5, or 5 out of 5, rarely in the middle.   This does not provide a balanced picture, and often a pattern of a positive, followed by an extremely negative, review is observed.  No product can range between extremely fantastic one month to extremely terrible the next month.  What usually differs is the guests, and not always the product.

The writer of the Hotel Marketing Strategies blog spoke to Michele Perry, Vice President of TripAdvisor, and asked her for some guidelines regarding TripAdvisor.  Her advice was as follows:

 

  1. Owners should read the feedback and should improve problem areas.
  2. Do not offer any incentives to guests in exchange for a review – “a free night, a coupon off the next stay, a discounted meal, etc. – is strictly against our rules”.
  3. Owner are invited to register on www.tripadvisor.com/owners, to learn about the TripAdvisor tools for owners/managers.
  4. Negative reviews should be addressed via the Management Response service on the website.   “…how a property reacts to the criticism is more important to prospective guests than the negative comments themselves.”

Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com