"GASTROPUBS"-A DECLINING TREND

In what way a pub is different from a restaurant? The answer is very simple. Pub is the place where one goes for having a "drink" that is inebriating while people depend on the restaurants to experience gastronomical pleasure from the fares served there. What can be a Gastropub different from the above two institutions? Well this is a place where one can have both drinks and food! Though the term Gastropub started popular only during the last two decades, there has been a silent change in the industry with many pubs quietly starting food service without calling themselves Gastropubs. To day most people expect good food service in pubs and it is very difficult to survive i the market without pampering to the taste buds of the patrons who frequent such establishments.

The gastropub is off. The formerly much-loved eateries and watering holes of choice of metropolitan foodies look to have had their day. This week the death knell will be sounded when The Good Food Guide, which has chronicled the nation's best restaurants for 60 years and is about to publish its 2012 edition, will deem the word unpalatable in these tough economic times. It has banned it from this and future editions of the guide. Widely credited with launching the gastropub revolution in 1991, the Eagle in Clerkenwell, London, began offering customers quality food from an open kitchen alongside the bar, starting a trend that many followed. But Elizabeth Carter, consultant editor for the guide, believes that the term had become a byword for an establishment's ambitions and, at a time when pubs have been hit hard by the recession, this inflexible attitude was becoming a thing of the past. "Our feeling with the gastropub was that it was a bit of a bandwagon that a lot of people have jumped on to. A lot of chains have taken that gastropub style. "I think customers are getting bored with it. Pubs have to be socially diverse, they have to offer many things whether you pop in for a drink and a snack or you want a proper meal." This view is supported by a Leisure Wallet report released last week by financial advisers Zolfo Cooper, which showed that the average number of pub visits per person a month had dropped from five to four in the past year and that the average spend per visit was down by 19 per cent to £15.08

There is an impression that those who frequent bars and pubs, care more about the drinks and food is only secondary in their scheme of things. Besides those who take a couple of drinks can hardly distinguish between good and indifferent quality dishes! But one thing that makes gastropubs a more acceptable place is that when drinks are consumed along with foods, the alcohol in these drinks may be less dangerous to the health. Generally the safety and hygiene aspects in any food and beverage establishment are monitored by food safety personnel while bars and pubs do not come under any government overseeing department though Excise officials have the responsibility for checking the quality and safety of alcoholic drinks served in there. Whether effect of unsafe foods will be less harsh if alcohol is also consumed along with is not certain.

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com