Fastfood, casual or fine dining? (Part 1)

The question of whether to have a fast food, casual or fine dining kind of service in your restaurant would have to be one of the first questions you have to answer. Of course, there are other choices like cafeteria style (where guests queue up with trays and point to the food they like). In the Philippines, it is called turo-turo or point-point because you point the food items you want to order. There are also family dining restaurants, bar-type and eat-all-you-can.

For this article, let me discuss fast food, casual and fine dining.

Fast food service is when guests line up to order, tell the order taker what they want, pay, wait for their food and carry their tray or food to their table.
Food prices: are expected not to be expensive
Service: courteous but don't expect to be treated regally
Food presentation: usually none or very minimal
Plates, glasses and utensils: not fancy but decent, usually plastic or of melamine

Advantages: It is ideal for office or business district lunch destinations. When working people have only one-hour breaks, they cannot eat in a restaurant where they have to wait for their food to be served after 15 or 20 minutes. The number of people you have to employ for service can be reduced to 1 staff for every 10 or 15 tables since they only have to take away the trays and utensils and clean the tables. The dining table staff do not have to be bothered with having to know menu items by heart since the cashier or order taker takes care of that solely. Kitchen procedures can be simplified and batch-cooked as food has to be ready in advance. Knowledge of how many orders of each menu item is ordered has to be established as it is critical. Kitchen and purchasing need these data to just about right as to the number of menu items to be cooked.

Disadvantages: Like in any restaurant, food wastage and spoilage is the scary part as fast food restaurants need to pre-cook or at least pre-prepare food. Every item has to be standardized down to the number of minutes it takes to cook one item.

(to be continued in the next post)