To wonder how much in restaurants is actually made from scratch

[MsKLo]

Have had quite a few dissapointing outings to all different kinds of restaurants the past few months and a friend told me they were talking to a catering supplier who said that lots of restaurants get thing in made already and frozen roast potatoes are especially popular etc

Do many restaurants do this? Doesn't anyone peel ans roast potatoes or thick cut 'homemade' Chips anymore? Is that cottage pie home-made or bought in?!

I just want to go to a nice restaurant or pub and have nic foooooood!

If it advertises home cooked food then no, it's bought in frozen stuff. Home made means they made it. Rather like the difference between freshly made sandwiches and freshly cut ones.

What county are you in? Maybe people can recommend places for you. Round here there's a definite split between places doing bought in stuff and places that actually do nice food. A price difference too though lol- £20 plus drinks for two people, two courses v. £40-£50 plus.

Depends on the restaurant ime.

I worked as a waitress when I was a student. We made our own bread from our own wholemeal stoneground flour (owner owned a water powered mill, made our own cakes and scones and shortbread from this flour.

We used our own eggs and supplemented the supply from nearby farms where we got our vegetables, milk, butter and cheese from. Soup was made daily from fresh vegetables .

Some people actually complained about this and one woman was horrified we used stone ground flour from as local as possible wheat. She loudly asked if we had heard of supermarkets .

Depends on the restaurant. You'd be surprised how many "gastro pubs" buy in certain key dishes (paellas and beef wellingtons and that kind of stuff) - you wouldn't necessarily know, but you might suspect, if you were looking out for it. It doesn't always mean the food is bad.

A lot of serious restaurants do everything including their stocks and butcher a lot of their own meat and the whole lot.

I suspect a lot of your carvery style pub with a-la-carte menu buys in a good 30% of what is on the menu.

I've been known to take a "wrong turn" on the way to the loos back in my home town (in another country) to check out their stock cupboard and see just where they cheat. Some really renowned pasta restaurants buying in drums of tomoato based sauces, tsk tsk. Buildings are different there with outdoor style loos so you can get up to all sorts of mischief.

YANBU (for once)

I have a food intolerance (gluten) and so every time I eat out I have to discuss menus with the chef, and I'd say most places rely on at best a mix of home made and bought in.

A dead give away for bought in food is a wide selection of food.

family run Italians and Mediterranean restaurants seem to be the best for home cooking.

If they can adapt a menu to suit allergies then it is homemade if all they can do is leave off the sauce or give you a salad it is bought in.

but to be fair if some of the food wasn't bought in the meal would have to be more expensive.

And interestingly restaurant microwaves don't ping when the food is ready

Brakes supply the food for most country pubs.

I agree that if you have loads of different styles of food it is usually a sign that there's no proper chef.

However, when I worked in a country pub, we made our own starters, side dishes, and most of the desserts. It was most of the mains that we largely bought in pre-packed.

There just weren't enough kitchen staff and the customer numbers weren't regular enough to justify more or not have some long-life food IMO.

It was also still really nice food.

my two favourite restaurants have open kitchens. you can see them making everything from scratch - chefs prepping for the evening towards the end of the lunch service. one downside of this is that they have often run our of a few dishes if you've got a late table.

My DH is a chef, and says most places are a mix. Wetherspoons is almost all microwaved, apart from the steaks and deep fried stuff. Even the places that rely on bought in normally have "proper chefs" though. They just aren't cooking everything from scratch. Agree family run Italians and similar are best for freshly made.

There are a few clues along the way. If you ask for a menu variation and they accommodate easily, they're probably cooking from scratch. If the food comes very quickly and/or there's a long menu, they're probably not. I'm happy to accept that some places just heat up frozen stuff as long as that's reflected in the price and speed of delivery.

I once found the snipped off corner of a plastic packet in my dinner at Cafe Rouge!

Lol Tattydevine that was quite funny!

I think I am mostly referring to those fancy country pubs that charge a fair bit but the food is not that great - and there is some bad customer service out there too. I have worked in catering and would never have dreamt of displaying some of the attitude I have seen.

I think a lot of mainstream places are going downhill - I used to love places like Fridays and Franky and BEnnys for a quick nosh up but the quality of foo is rubbish compared to what it was

Although the costly restaurants mostly deliver but they do cost a fair bit!

Yep cafe rouge is another one
I have had some horrendous meals there and they charge a fortune! You expect more from them and they used to be another 'chain' that was really good but not now

What are the best ones? I find bella italia totally overpriced too but Ask is ok

I'd normally assume that anything below a certain price point will be largely produced on an industrial estate in Kettering and reheated on site, but industrial estates can produce some surprisingly good meals.

If it's a chain restaurant, it is almost guaranteed to be Brakes or 3663 or one of the other food suppliers.

So places like TGIF and Franky and Bennys will mostly be pre-prepped frozen stuff.

where I used to work was part of a big chain of different pubs. We were aimed at less discerning customers, some of the other pubs were "gastro-pubs" though and charged a fortune for exactly the same stuff we were serving.

I tend to avoid most chains, not because I know most of the food is pre-prepared, but because the quality seems to have really gone down hill recently. I'd rather eat out less and go somewhere were the food is obviously cooked from scratch.

Although I still have much love for Nandos and Pizza Express

It Is a shame as places like frankie and BEnnys used to do really lovely authentic tasting pasta dishes (but am talking eleven years or so ago)

Sometimes when I out and need to go somewhere quick the choice is samey and so disapointing

I would say most chain restaurants use mainly pre prepared or frozen meals, even the expensive chains. Pizza Express is great, cheap, and all fresh stuff!

It's kind of to do with making sure the standards are the same across the board. If you have 100+ restaurants, you can't have one with an amazing chef, who cooks excellent meals, and one who doesn't give a crap and sends out crap food. Companies would prefer their food to be the same and maybe a bit average, than vary wildly in quality.

It is a bit disappoint though, I agree. I had a spate of very unsatisfactory meals at various chains a few months back, and I've sort of sworn off them as a result.

As most places don't want to pay the going rate for a pukka chef they buy most of it in. The sign of a good restaurant is a small menu. This will most likely mean that food is made on the premises from fresh ingredients.

Is all the pasta/pasta sauce fresh at pizza express then?

My guess is - I shouldn't think so. Perhaps somebody has worked there and can prove me wrong

No, it's not MsKLo. I've insider knowledge see

Check out the delivery bay at 11 am.

A Brakes Brothers lorry is a dead giveaway.

yep see far too many of them!

don't know about the sauces because I didn't ask, but the pizza express bases are delivered frozen