Part 20. Walk On By

A bag of chips each, special agent Keanu, and tricky finances.

Quick update before we start. There won’t be a weekly recipe from now on, instead, we’ll do one food post a month. Why’s that you ask? Vanilla Black was well known for it’s quirky vegetarian/vegan dishes, which we’ll still mention in the stories. But we feel that the food side of things from Vanilla Black isn't being given enough attention or discussion. One reason being, many of the recipes from the restaurant are too complicated or require specialist equipment to recreate so it isn’t ideal to share some of recipes. But now having a monthly food post we can write about the thought process and the thinking behind our menu/dishes over the many years.

Also, we have so many stories we want to share and we feel it is tricky to get everything in one Post. Each week Donna and I chat and plan what will be in the next post, and each week the list is very very long. So, we need a change a little rearrange, or tell less stories, and that isn't going to happen is it?

So, moving forward we’ll dedicate one post a month to food. We’ll discuss and divulge the theory behind the quirky dishes from the restaurant. We’ll talk about dish development, plating, cheffy techniques, food history, our inspiration and anything else which comes to mind..

There will still be a recipe on that monthly post, it may be something directly from the restaurant, or reworked from our cookbook, or something new. But each time, we’ll chatter about how it came about and each recipe will be Vanilla Black stamped.

Oh, and of course we’ll add in a few funnies. So there you go, you’re up to date, any comments, tell someone else. But hopefully you’ll keep reading, with your eyes.

Anyway, here we go, Part 20 of running a restaurant. Now, as you can probably tell, the restaurant was running well, especially bearing in mind we had only been open for around three months. So all was fine and dandy and we had zero regrets about leaving our jobs and taking a chance.

In fact, it was so good, we even employed another member of staff. You see, our Keanu was in the kitchen with me, and Tricky Vicki was working front of house with Donna. However, as Vicki had a full time job, she couldn't work for us during the day.

And so, on the recommendation of Andy The Chip (remember, the guy who owned the fish and chip shop) we added to the team. We won’t give you the real name of this person, you’ll find out why later, so let’s go with Cheryl. Now, Cheryl was quick and efficient, she was good with customers and always worked hard. Cheryl was a gem. Cheryl was too good to be true.

So, everything was great, we were getting there.

Couldn’t find the Uri Geller plate but there were a few tatty things lying in the cupboard.

But, life is never smooth is it? Let’s think back to when we were all kids. OK, you’re in the living room and you’re messing about, either with a friend or a sibling. You're running around, play fighting and generally being a boisterous brat. Then your Mam bursts into the room to tell you off, “Stop messing around, it’ll only end in tears.”.

Obviously you ignore her, you carry on with the game. You’re giggling and laughing, you're running a circuit around that living room, chuckling and chortling as you go. Hiding behind the sofa, leaping over the coffee table. Such great fun, such happy times. Then one of you falls over and cracks your forehead against the Amstrad TS-35***. Or you stumble into the Schreiber wall unit and smash a lava lamp, glass everywhere.  Or even worse, someone trips over that tortoise shaped pouffè and injures themselves so badly, that their spleen ends up hanging out. So your Mam was right, as always. Hang on, if you’re not from the north east, it’s Mum.

Well, that happens in adult life also, not the bashy forehead thing, or the splitty spleen situation, well, maybe it does. No, the peaks and troughs of life, you know, everything is going great, life is smooth, you're on a high, and then fate gives you a kick in the shin and a poke in your left eye. Well, this also happens in the restaurant world.

Let’s explain. It was a Saturday, we had set up the restaurant for lunch as usual, prep in the kitchen was spot on, our Keanu had a crispy white chefs jacket on, and Tricky Vicki was chomping at the bit.

This is how it needs to be on Saturday, you have to be more than ready. Extra glasses polished, milk jugs topped up and sat ready in the fridge. Side salads bowled up and lined up in the fridge, sink filled up with frothy water ready for a mountain of washing up, and loads of change in the till. And Cheryl was already running, even though the diners haven't arrived yet.

Then at noon, Tricky opened the door, and ran back to her spot, ready with her order pad and pen. And we waited a little longer, like sprinters waiting for the starting pistol to go off. Then it was ten past twelve, usually we would have had a few tables by now. Then we relaxed a little. Then it was twenty past twelve, still nobody.

Me and our Keanu quickly became bored, so we started discussing the super hero talents of Tony Cannelloni (the imaginary member of staff, remember?).

“Hey Keanu, did you know that Tony Cannelloni was so thirsty last week, that he drank the Atlantic Ocean?”. This probably went on for way too long!

A tatty starters menu.

And then twelve thirty came around, still nobody. I mean, there were people in the streets, but they didn’t even look at the restaurant, they just strolled past. This was weird, we should have been packed by now, Saturday is the day we make the most money. Saturday pays for the quiet days at the beginning of the week. Not having this busy day isn’t good. This is like, if you have a regular job, working your five days, but only getting paid for three days.

So we did the only thing we could think of at the time, send our Keanu on a walk about to see if everyone else was quiet. (Every restaurant owner across the land does this, but they don’t admit it). We would often catch the eye of staff from other restaurants peering in our window, hoping we hadn’t noticed. Ha, we saw ya.

You see, what happens is that you get paranoid, you start to think that it’s just you. In your mind, everyone else has heard the starting pistol and they’re packed. But you’re empty, you're the only quiet restaurant in the city, they're all laughing at you. Those people who walked by, are now eating at other restaurants and telling the staff about that empty restaurant they just passed. They're swigging bottles of Moet and cheering at your misfortune.

“Keanu, stick your civvies on and and go see if everyone else is quiet.” Off he went, and we waited way too eagerly for Keanu to come back with the good, or bad news. In the meantime, a few customers arrived, but only a few, not the usual Saturday crowds.

Keanu landed after about ten minutes, we bundled him into the back of the restaurant and prepared him for the debrief. Keanu gave us the information very slowly, too slowly.

“OK, so, The Waiting Room, that has three people, and errrr, the other place close by, I can’t remember what it’s called, the one with the wooden barrel outside.”.

“Come on Keanu, Miss Moneypenny didn’t have to put up with this.”

Our Keanu focused a little more, “Right, I’ve got it. Luigis Pizzeria, four people, errrrrr, Cafe Rouge, nobody, Conways, four people.”

This was looking good, for some reason, if others are quiet, you don’t feel as bad.

“Oh yea”, our Keanu had more, “The Fleece, the pub, that just had a drinkers at the bar.”

We were relieved, it wasn’t just us, so we hadn't done anything wrong after all.

Our Keanu was thanked, and for an hour or so afterwards he was our hero. He obviously milked this a little and started telling us that he had to carry out his mission very carefully.

Apparently, he had a feeling that other restaurants would spot him, so instead of staring through the window, pointing and counting heads, he walked very slowly past their windows, and carefully glanced sideways, just his eyes though, he kept his face forward, and did a head count. But, if he didn’t have enough time to count properly, he did a U turn, and crept past again, then did his special eyes sideways glance thing. Then he added the first figure to the second figure.

“Bloody hell Keanu, you would have been less conspicuous if you went into the restaurant and did a roll call.”

We’ll explain about this later.

But I had an idea, I took off my whites and popped over the road to see Andy The Chip. The chip shop was empty, apart from Andy The Chip, who as usual, was sharpening his filleting knife as he gave me a cheery sneer.

So I picked his brains, “Andy, where is everyone? It’s dead.”

Andy The Chip was nodding slowly as I asked my question, it was as if he knew what I was going to ask.

“Yea, I thought you'd be worried, I saw one of your guys go for a walk to check out other places.”

Eh? How did he know Agent Keanu went out on a mission? Oh hang on, because everyone does the same thing, of course.

And in the wisest of tones, and like the made man that he was, Andy The Chip gave us some thought provoking, and deep advice.

“Look mate, if you’re not getting a slice of the cake, none of us is getting a slice of the cake.”

I remember digesting this for a few seconds, and when I worked out that Andy The Chip hadn’t actually said very much, but it kinda answered my question. I thanked him and reported back to the crew.

If you like reading this, and fancy buy us a three quid pot of tea, well thank you.

I told Donna, Tricky, Cheryl and our Keanu that Andy The Chip was quiet also, and apparently everyone is. So that was it, it was just quiet, nothing we could do about it but wait it out.

One bonus from the quiet lunch service was that we hadn’t sold out of our world famous Mature Cheddar and Savoy Cabbage Puddings. So, after the few stragglers left, Tricky popped over to the chippy to buy us each a bag of chips with salt and vinegar, perfect to pair with the cabbage puddings.

What a glorious staff meal it was! And so healthy!

Anyhow, we learned a valuable lesson from that quiet time in the early days. The money you make when it’s busy, can’t actually be relied on.

Let us explain, imagine a business is busy and turning over ten thousand quid  (rough figures) a week for two weeks out of the month. This looks good to the owners, however, let’s say that on week three, the turnover is only four thousand quid, and week four, it’s five thousand quid.

This means that your turnover for the month is twenty nine thousand pounds. That takes your weekly turnover to seven thousand, two fifty. So if your break even is eight thousand quid a week, you’re short. So basically, the good times need to always be good.

When you start to look at it like this, it gives you a jolt.

But this is a good lesson, and it may sound like common sense, but common sense ain’t common. Plus, when you’ve had a regular job all your working life, you didn’t need to think about such things.

It made us realise, we had to watch the figures constantly. We even set daily break even targets to ourselves, again, sounds like common sense.

So when those good busy days came back, we didn’t get too comfortable, we had learned that there will be quiet days around the corner.

Yet we’ve seen many restaurant owners have a busy couple of months, then go out on a spending spree. Then, a couple of quiet months arrive….. along with the bills. They became too comfortable. No chuckling and chortling for them.

Remember what our Mam said, “Stop messing about, it’ll end in tears.”.

Oh yea, meant to tell you. We finally had an offer on our house in Stockton on Tees, that meant we could move to York and reduce the commute. So we added house hunting to our list of jobs. This was an exciting thought, we would have 10 hours less driving time a week, ten extra hours of sleep.

That in itself felt like a healthy profit to us.

Oh yeah, one last thing, some money went missing from the restaurant.

Immediately afterwards, Cheryl went missing from the restaurant.

Join us next week as other things happen.

***Did you know that Alan Sugar called it his company,  AMSTRAD, for this reason, Alan Michael Sugar Trading.

You’ve seen this before.