Pub food - why is it frequently so bad?
Discussion
Sorry if this comes over as a fairly unstructured rant, but this is something I've been mulling over for quite a while.
I live in rural Dorset. Village pubs (with the exception of the top tier of restaurants-masquerading-as-pubs) seem to be really struggling.
My partner and I go out for a few lunches in pubs when we have time off, as a kind of recce for places that might be worth frequenting more often. I find it deeply frustrating how many miss the target on the food front.
Now, I'm not having a snobbish dig at the level at which bog-standard pubs pitch themselves, but at the way that (in my layman's view) they seem to fail on what should be quite an easy quest. I'm also not really talking about chain eating/managed pubs of the Harvester ilk, but the average tenanted village pub.
I'm sure I don't need to provide endless examples, but how often do you go in to a pub, read the menu and find it to be all the same s
t in all the other pubs, with not one vaguely quirky variant, and end up ordering gammon, or a steak, or pie of the day (which is rarely a pie)? Or go up and ask what soup of the day is, thinking "go on, surprise me", and it's vegetable?
But more to the point, how often do you order something that sounds quite promising, but due to some glaring failing of skill turns out to be st? Like the ginger treacle tart I ordered the other day, which would have been delicious warm, but was a bitter disappointment straight out of the fridge?
I'm quite friendly with my local landlady, and she talks a good talk about revamping her menu now and then, but when it happens, it's invariably a let down. The other week she was proudly announcing she was going to drop the chip-shop-a-like battered fish for something different. Yes, a breaded piece of fish instead...
We've been tossing this back and forth over the last few weeks and come to a few conclusions:
1. The difference in price between a good, individual, pub meal and a generic, badly delivered (usually brewery) pub meal is usually only 20% max.
2. Some customers genuinely don't seem to care, or more to the point don't want anything outside their very narrow comfort zone. We had a very poor pub meal recently and the couple at the next table were virtually swooning over theirs.
3. Pubs seem to think their clients want massive hot main courses all year, and the rest of the menu is an irritating adjunct to best be sourced ready made off the back of a Brakes lorry,
In conclusion again, this is emphatically not a snobbish dig at pub grub, which can be wonderful. But it seems like the difference between good and bad pub food is not a huge one in price but a huge one in effort and perception of what the customer might want, and I'm genuinely interested why some pubs do it well and some badly, because as a punter I just don't get it, when it usually seems to be fairly obvious what is wrong with the menu.
I anticipate the responses saying I'm wrong, but if I am, why aren't average pubs full of diners like the good ones?
I live in rural Dorset. Village pubs (with the exception of the top tier of restaurants-masquerading-as-pubs) seem to be really struggling.
My partner and I go out for a few lunches in pubs when we have time off, as a kind of recce for places that might be worth frequenting more often. I find it deeply frustrating how many miss the target on the food front.
Now, I'm not having a snobbish dig at the level at which bog-standard pubs pitch themselves, but at the way that (in my layman's view) they seem to fail on what should be quite an easy quest. I'm also not really talking about chain eating/managed pubs of the Harvester ilk, but the average tenanted village pub.
I'm sure I don't need to provide endless examples, but how often do you go in to a pub, read the menu and find it to be all the same s
t in all the other pubs, with not one vaguely quirky variant, and end up ordering gammon, or a steak, or pie of the day (which is rarely a pie)? Or go up and ask what soup of the day is, thinking "go on, surprise me", and it's vegetable?But more to the point, how often do you order something that sounds quite promising, but due to some glaring failing of skill turns out to be s
t? Like the ginger treacle tart I ordered the other day, which would have been delicious warm, but was a bitter disappointment straight out of the fridge?I'm quite friendly with my local landlady, and she talks a good talk about revamping her menu now and then, but when it happens, it's invariably a let down. The other week she was proudly announcing she was going to drop the chip-shop-a-like battered fish for something different. Yes, a breaded piece of fish instead...
We've been tossing this back and forth over the last few weeks and come to a few conclusions:
1. The difference in price between a good, individual, pub meal and a generic, badly delivered (usually brewery) pub meal is usually only 20% max.
2. Some customers genuinely don't seem to care, or more to the point don't want anything outside their very narrow comfort zone. We had a very poor pub meal recently and the couple at the next table were virtually swooning over theirs.
3. Pubs seem to think their clients want massive hot main courses all year, and the rest of the menu is an irritating adjunct to best be sourced ready made off the back of a Brakes lorry,
In conclusion again, this is emphatically not a snobbish dig at pub grub, which can be wonderful. But it seems like the difference between good and bad pub food is not a huge one in price but a huge one in effort and perception of what the customer might want, and I'm genuinely interested why some pubs do it well and some badly, because as a punter I just don't get it, when it usually seems to be fairly obvious what is wrong with the menu.
I anticipate the responses saying I'm wrong, but if I am, why aren't average pubs full of diners like the good ones?
Fair point, but the other thing that seems baffling to me is that a lot of small pubs employ a chef full time to produce next to no food, and yet don't seem to be that keen to make them busier.
The other thing I've definitely noticed over the years is that resistance to making the menu a bit more interesting usually seems to come from the chef.
The other thing I've definitely noticed over the years is that resistance to making the menu a bit more interesting usually seems to come from the chef.
super7 said:
Also... Does the Landlord/Lady rely on Chef, A cook, or do they do it themselves. If the Landlord/lady is a dab hand in the kitchen you save a lot of money and don't need a cook/chef to screw it up for you!
This appears to be a common factor, a lot of the time the salaried chef doesn't seem to give a toss.Pubs where one of the tenants/owners cooks seem to be better.
PBDirector said:
Just as a counterpoint, I know of one Cornish publican who jacked it in because he COULDN'T vary his menu because so much of his trade was OAPs from the surrounding villages who still wanted the same spread of junk they enjoyed in the 70s
There is an element of truth in this - the cafe in the garden centre I work at is not half bad, but the food is dull. The demographic is everything you imagine a Dorset garden centre to be. One day I summoned up the courage to ask the chef why the 'soup of the day' was always so boring and he replied "if I try anything vaguely interesting, even a vague twist on an old favourite, the soup just doesn't sell".
Frankthered said:
The Italians are fine, but they're a little generic. Personally, I find the pubs a little more interesting, is that OK? The good ones have a bit more variety on their menus.
That's the thing with chain anythings is you get very little variety. I go in about 20 Prezzos for work, and the menu, the decor, even the muzak and the wall art is the same lol.That's why I despair at little tenant pubs because they have the chance to be different that chain places don't.
Regarding a comment a few above about wanting "restaurant quality food"... I don't, I just want nice pub food that isn't fatally compromised in some way.
The two pub lunches in two days that started this whole debate off for me as an example:
Pub one: Lamb's liver where the lamb had been cooked to the consistency of a blackboard eraser, followed by ginger & treacle tart out of the fridge, so rock hard. Mrs had a steak & ale pie, which was a pie for once, but the crust had been burned to a point where it was impossible to cut, and the innards had been almost caramelised.
Pub two (maybe 10-15% higher price), we both had chicken in a cider and celery sauce. Really plain dish for about 12 quid, but the chicken had been cooked from raw (I know this because they warned us it would take a while) and was quite simply delicious.
Pub one was a managed brewery pub, pub two was a free house.
Last two posts echo exactly what I mean.
All I want from most pubs I go to for a meal is half decent food that hasn't been fatally and needlessly compromised in some way.
When some pubs can do this and some can't (and their table occupancy reflects this) it annoys me that the bad ones just don't seem to be able to grasp what's wrong with their menu.
All I want from most pubs I go to for a meal is half decent food that hasn't been fatally and needlessly compromised in some way.
When some pubs can do this and some can't (and their table occupancy reflects this) it annoys me that the bad ones just don't seem to be able to grasp what's wrong with their menu.
Uncle John said:
Agree most pubs are very hit and miss.
Either going for the Gastro Pub style where it's a bit poncey as well as expensive, or the middle ground where everything is generic, overcooked and out of the freezer.
My main problem though is that I know of not one Pub (near me) that does a decent Ploughmans anymore! On a fine sunny day with a good pint a Ploughmans is bliss, but is alas a distant memory.
They do seem to be dying out, yet I love them.Either going for the Gastro Pub style where it's a bit poncey as well as expensive, or the middle ground where everything is generic, overcooked and out of the freezer.
My main problem though is that I know of not one Pub (near me) that does a decent Ploughmans anymore! On a fine sunny day with a good pint a Ploughmans is bliss, but is alas a distant memory.
Must be all those pesky fresh ingredients and customer demand...
jmorgan said:
Been to a few pubs over the years, up and down the country, that advertise local ham egg and chips. Often a couple of slabs of excellent ham and double fried chips and eggs. Easy peasy. This is a no brainer. And I do not mind a slightly higher markup but to be honest, the cost never registered as silly.
This is what I was driving at. No one who cooks for a living should be able to sell bad ham, egg and chips. And yet they do!
I hope my local landlady isn't reading this!
The food in my local was adequate at best. The landlady's brother is the chef and the difficulty seemed to be persuading him to get out of his comfort zone.
I think she lost patience and has drawn up and implemented a new menu unilaterally, and it's (for pub food) great!
I'd say it's gone from a 4/10 place to eat to a 7/10, just from trying a few more interesting and varied dishes, rather than the same half dozen "pub classics" with lots of chips.
Rumour has it the chef is thinking of leaving, despite being family as he doesn't like "all the cooking".
The food in my local was adequate at best. The landlady's brother is the chef and the difficulty seemed to be persuading him to get out of his comfort zone.
I think she lost patience and has drawn up and implemented a new menu unilaterally, and it's (for pub food) great!
I'd say it's gone from a 4/10 place to eat to a 7/10, just from trying a few more interesting and varied dishes, rather than the same half dozen "pub classics" with lots of chips.
Rumour has it the chef is thinking of leaving, despite being family as he doesn't like "all the cooking".
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