With uncertainty clouding the prospect of restaurants opening for dine-in even when the lockdown is lifted, restaurants across the country have opened for delivery. With their main revenue channel shut, this, for many, is the only way to stay afloat in a crisis that threatens to sweep away many businesses.
Several restaurants are offering a limited selection of dishes from their existing menus, given that they have to work with curtailed resources, including supplies and staff, and that demand itself is anywhere between 30 and 70 percent lower than in pre-lockdown times. Concerns about hygiene among customers is a reason as is the enforced return to home cooking.
Still, there is only so much sourdough bread and banana cake that can satisfy, and customers are bound to want to order in from their favourite restaurants. We should take it for granted that compliant businesses will do everything in their power to follow best hygiene practices. Having managed that, they will have to put out food that appeals to customers who have been eating home cooked meals for weeks together or had to rely on deliveries from a limited number of restaurants.
So, perhaps, restaurants and chefs should begin to think of giving an extra edge to their delivery menus, and think beyond a mere abbreviation of existing ones. We’ve been inspired and impressed by what Alinea, the three-Michelin star Chicago restaurant, has managed to pull off. A few weeks into the lockdown this restaurant, the city’s priciest where meals begin at around $ 300, put out takeaway menus that averaged at under $ 50 per meal. Orders have come pouring in and the waiting list is long. The small menu that rotates on a weekly basis revolves around comfort foods that are nothing like the dishes crafted from Chef Grant Achatz’s culinary wizardry, but are made of top quality ingredients and perfectly cooked/ pre-cooked. Customers have been posting pics on Instagram of beef Wellington, mashed potatoes 50/50 – half potato, half butter, reminiscent of Alinea’s famous hot and cold potato soup – and crème brulee. Dishes comes in containers ready to be baked or heated and allow diners a gourmet experience at home.
Alinea group CEO Nick Kokonas rejigged the reservation app, Tock – of which he is a founder — to include what he described as ‘elevated takeout’. The app helps restaurants schedule pickup and delivery times to avoid a rush of orders and tracks inventory, taking off items when a restaurant runs out.
The listings on Tock are not mere takeaway menus. Here’s what a Nashville restaurant was offering in a smartly worded description: ‘Travel to Machu Picchu through the cities of Peru. Start with a Hamachi Ceviche and Shrimp Adobo Soup, followed by a choice of Roasted Chicken or Lamo Saltado with a side of Papa a la huancaína. You are going to finish your meal with a dessert trio of Suspiro de Limena, Arroz Zambito, Leche Asada.’ In a time when wanderlust is acute, it seems a great idea to take customers on a culinary journey with takeaway offerings.
In Bangalore, the unique Bengaluru Oota Company has devised a small takeaway menu comprising mainly hit-the-spot pulaos and biryanis, made in the restaurant’s usual style with the freshest ingredients and from family recipes.
This, then, might be the time for restaurants – especially those that have an established reputation for their food — to focus on crafting menus that are small, elegant and packed with delicious comfort foods, to break out of jaded norms and give the delivery customer a truly satisfying experience, one that they would be willing to pay for, while we wait for dining out to return to our cities again.
The pricing has to be carefully considered. Most customers seem to be cutting down on discretionary spending and are unwilling to splurge. If restaurants promise a meal that costs much less than when dining in and deliver great food they should be able to manage a delivery business that allows them at least to survive this crisis.
