14 minute read
FEATURE: BISTRO CLASSICS
A classic dining experience
Deb Jackson speaks to some of the finest clubs and RSLs around the country for advice on creating an awardwinning bistro menu and experience.
WHETHER IT’S A Sunday roast, a chicken parma, or fish and chips, there is nothing more Australian than heading down to the local club or RSL for a meal with family and friends. But with peoples’ palates evolving towards either a cleaner or sometimes more adventurous style, how can club bistros ensure that their menus are hitting the spot for a wide range of patrons?
Club Management spoke to clubs around the country to find out how they have curated their award-winning menus to have broad appeal and a unique offering.
Michael Donnolley, head chef at Rosebud RSL in regional Victoria, whose award-winning menu offers a wide assortment of meals including the classics, said it can be a challenge to strike the perfect balance between offering enough variety to guests, while ensuring his kitchen staff isn’t overwhelmed.
Rosebud RSL was the recent joint winner for Best Community Club Bistro/Restaurant at the Community Clubs Victoria awards, and the menu offers an extensive selection of pasta and seafood, meats, burgers, and a range of vegetarian options.
As with any menu, the food needs to be consistent. Customers should be able to come back and enjoy the same meal, just as much as the last time they had it at the venue. Consistency is key.
-Jackson Donaldson, GM Food Services, Ocean Grove Bowling Club
Donnolley says that a major driver of new menu items is the weekly specials board, which is a great place to trial and experiment with new dishes.
“My team all contribute to weekly specials as well as menu ideas. As we have a larger than normal team of chefs and a vast variety of cultural and levels of experience, gained in a myriad of hospitality/catering settings, it allows us to introduce new and sometimes exotic dishes that are generally not common on pub/club menus.
“As much thought however goes into each individual section’s workload and expected output. Staff in their areas need time for prep/ presentation so their workloads are constantly reviewed, and while we try to keep our menu as diverse and different as possible, our specials board can be a major driver of new dishes,” he says.
Sammy Carbone, head chef at Bankstown Golf Club, which has recently undergone a summer menu refresh, also uses the weekly specials as tool to find out what is hitting the spot wit h the club’s members.
“I always use the specials as a trial period to see what sells and what doesn’t and then depending on the season, we’ll take that into consideration for our next menu. I like to change the menu twice a year, so we’ve got Autumn/Winter and Summer/Spring, and if something has worked particularly well on our specials board, then we’ll definitely be adding it to the next menu,” he said.
And when it comes to maintaining smooth operations within the kitchen, Carbone’s advice is to utilise ingredients that overlap between menu items, to minimise prep and food wastage.
“What I mean by that is to think about an ingredient, so bacon for example. I already know that I need bacon for my Caesar Salad, so I’ll make sure to also utilise bacon somewhere else in my menu or on my specials. That might mean including something like a Carbonara on the specials board, and this way I’m not creating extra prep for my kitchen staff,” he says.
Is there such thing as too much variety?
When it comes to staple menu items like burgers and pizzas, it is typical for a bistro to offer more than one variety. But is there such thing as having too much variety? According to Donnolley at Rosebud RSL, too much variety can be a curse.
He says: “Generally I would accept that a beef, chicken, and vegetarian burger is the limit. A sports bar orientated menu may comprise of a couple more and might include a steak sandwich, club sandwich or a cheeseburger, but there are plenty of specialty burger places out there offering six, 10 and more varieties. I feel we need to offer our patrons a taste of a variety of dishes rather than pigeonholing ourselves as having too many burgers or capitalising in the one stream.”
Speaking from experience, Troy Young, general manager at Norths Leagues & Services Club, says that offering too much variety can be problematic from an operational perspective.
“When we first launched The Precinct, our menu was pretty extensive, to the point where there was almost too much choice.
Initially there was more than 120 meal options, which to consumers looked fantastic, but from an operational point of view it wasn’t quite hitting the mark. So, we have refined it quite a lot and our current menu is fantastic,” he says.
Jackson Donaldson, GM Food Services at Ocean Grove Bowling Club (OGBC) agrees, saying that there is such thing as too much variety and that consistency is key.
OGBC was the other joint winner for Best Community Club Bistro/Restaurant alongside Rosebud RSL at the Community Clubs Victoria awards, and it offers an extensive bistro menu with an international lean to it.
“When it comes to burgers and steaks there definitely can be too much variety,” says Donaldson. “You want to make sure that there is a smaller number of these items. At OGBC, we make sure that the quality is to a consistent high standard with every meal we serve.
“It’s important to have your own traditional version,” Donaldson says. “As with any menu, the food needs to be consistent. Customers should be able to come back and enjoy the same meal, just as much as the last time they had it at the venue. Consistency is key.”
The vegan movement
At Rosebud RSL, steaks, parmas, burgers and seafood are the bestselling meals on the bistro menu, but Donnolley says that he’s been noticing an increased demand for vegan and vegetarian options.
“The ‘vegan movement’, and I say movement as it is not just a trend, is becoming a most popular addition to our menus,” he says.
“The diet of our clientele has changed dramatically [and is] a long way from the offerings of 30-40 years ago. The modern diner is more learned and informed now so, say in the case of a vegan, the expectation is not for what in days gone by was a simple vegetarian stir fry.
“At Rosebud RSL we offer on our current menu Golden Lentil Dahl with a turmeric roasted cauliflower coconut yoghurt and coriander mint chutney; Bang Bang Cauliflower; and Zucchini Tonkatsu with pickled vegetables and Asian inspired salad; which all do reasonably well. A good vegan menu for a venue of our size makes us a ‘go-to’ place for groups. For example, a table of 10 going out for dinner will have a variety of dietary needs so if we can appeal to the broader cross section then people feel catered for and comfortable.”
Further to the vegan movement, chefs are seeing more people requesting gluten-free meals, and this is taken very seriously at Norths Leagues & Services Club, according to Young.
“There is obviously a huge difference between someone who prefers to avoid gluten and someone who is celiac and can’t have it at all. So, we have a separate gluten-free fryer in the back of the kitchen, which is dedicated to cooking chips and things for our members and guests who are completely celiac. We make sure to ask our guests if there are completely gluten-free, so our kitchen staff know exactly what level there needs to be and where the food needs to be cooked. We really try to accommodate as many of our patrons as much as we possibly can,” he says.
Elevating the experience
Norths Leagues & Services Club’s restaurant, The Precinct, features four separate kitchens, each offering a different cuisine, including Italian, The Grill, Asian, and Smokehouse, so there is something for everyone on offer.
James Bennett, marketing manager at Norths Leagues, explained to Club Management, that this leads to a very “well-oiled machine” where the meals are split between all four kitchens and members can order exactly what they want and share it amongst themselves.
“We’re quite unique here where we have two real demographic splits. We’ve got our club classics menu, which we run at both dinner and lunchtime but at lunchtime we have them starting at $10.90. So, we see a lot of seniors and older Australians coming in and a lot of parents with young kids popping in on the weekends to grab those. I think it’s really where we’re seeing people looking for value with the cost-of-living crisis that’s happening at the moment.
“Then when we get into the evening, we see a real mix of cuisines being ordered. Steaks are always popular but we’re also seeing a lot of the more unique dishes being ordered, such as from our Asian kitchen, which is particularly popular on Friday and Saturday nights. We have a really authentic offering through the Asian kitchen being cooked by chefs who have been cooking Asian style meals for years.
“Our executive chef Hossein Moshtaghi runs an incredibly well-oiled machine in the kitchen and has a really fantastic group of chefs who know the menu back to front. But also, on that, the menu has plenty of variety throughout it and we are really trying to embrace that shared style of eating among our patrons.
“What we’ve been able to bring to the table here is very unique to licenced clubs here in Queensland and it’s been an outstanding success,” says Bennett.
Over at Rosebud RSL, the bistro is a warm and friendly place to dine with comfortable and wellspaced seating in a modern environment with easy access.
Honestly, it’s just consistency, service, cost for the members, but also a great culture within the back and front house teams. If you can get all of that right, then you’re onto an absolute winner.
-Troy Young, General Manager, Norths Leagues & Services Club
Donnolley explains that communication between front of house, bar and kitchen staff is essential in giving the customer a superior overall experience.
“The customer has a valid expectation that if they choose to dine with you that they will be fed in a reasonable time and that they will receive a quality meal that is well presented, so communication between front of house and the kitchen is essential.”
He says it’s important to monitor the bookings and control the walk-ins all to a level that front of house, bar and kitchen staff can all efficiently display their hospitality skills and exceed the expectation of the customer’s overall experience.
“No one likes waiting unnecessary times for their meal or standing six deep at the bar struggling to get a drink. It’s better to service the patrons you can adequately and respectfully rather than destroy their experience with the venue, if they felt they were packed in and just a number,” he says.
OGBC’s Donaldson agrees, saying that making sure the kitchen has a great flow is essential to ensuring that variety can be delivered, and delivered well.
“[Having a great flow in the kitchen] helps to ensure that not only are the meals made in a consistent timely manner whilst maintaining a high quality, but also ensures that the staff are not feeling overwhelmed in the process, due to the smooth structure,” says Donaldson.
In order to have a good understanding of operations in all parts of the kitchen and dining space, Carbone at Bankstown Golf Club likes to spend time in all areas of kitchen operations, to ensure things are running smoothly.
“I’ll never stay in one spot,” he says. “I always tell my staff that there are no borders between stations. If all the orders are coming out of cold order and there’s nothing for the grill, then I tell my staff that the grill team needs to go and help out with cold orders.
“Every week, or even daily I try and go and spend at least half an hour, or even the whole shift in another section to see how they set up and if there’s anything I can suggest to make the section run more efficiently. But I always let them work with the way that they find easier. I always tell my chefs that I will work with them and never against them,” says Carbone.
When asked for his top tips on creating the perfect club bistro menu and overall dining experience, Norths Leagues’ Young offered this advice, which sums things up perfectly: “Honestly, it’s just consistency, service, cost for the members, but also a great culture within the back and front house teams. If you can get all of that right, then you’re onto an absolute winner.”
Perfecting the menu
Michael Donnolley, head chef at Rosebud RSL says that trying to “fit perfection” into a menu of 30-40 options can be challenging from a variety point of view and that staying on trend without betraying the classics can be a challenge, but he offers up five key points of advice:
1. Know your demographic.
2. Research other venues that are doing well and see what they are offering.
3. Think about whether your demographic is locked in, or whether you have other influences such as: a tourist market, young families moving into the area, seasonal events where you can be more adventurous, and reap the results.
4. Most importantly, think about your team’s skill level and their equipment options. These two go hand in hand. Sometimes if you are not blessed with one or both the menu needs to be adjusted accordingly.
5. Lastly, consider your pricing. It must be fair and reasonable.
A shared mentality
At Norths Leagues & Services Club’s restaurant, The Precinct, tables are pre-set with side plates and cutlery, to encourage a shared dining experience.
The Precinct features four separate kitchens, each offering a different cuisine, including Italian, The Grill, Asian, and Smokehouse, so there is something for everyone on offer.
James Bennett, marketing manager at Norths Leagues, explained to Club Management why the club is encouraging patrons to enjoy this more communal or family-style of dining.
“When you think of all these wonderful, authentic dishes from around the world, people form amazing memories around food. For example, when you consider the Italians or the Mediterranean, there is usually all this incredible food in the centre of the table and people just grab what they want and share it amongst themselves,” he explained.
“In our dining space, we have side plates and cutlery all set and ready to go on the tables, so if one meal comes out and you think ‘ooh, that looks good’, you’ve got everything ready to pinch a little bit. That’s what we’ve tried to embrace here as much as we possibly can, and it’s resonated well with our members.”
