All ab oard!
There is one train in the UK that stands apart from the rest. Instead of being tarnished with the usual perception of rail travel in Britain - overcrowding, delays and dirty carriages - the British Pullman, sister of the world-famous Orient-Express, offers passengers all the romance, elegance and luxury enjoyed by the wealthy classes of the 1920s and 1930s.
The train, which is fitted out with wood-panelled walls, mosaic floors, plush armchairs, velvet curtains and brass lamps, runs on average four excursions a week - a range of day trips to historic sites and sporting events, or simply lazy journeys through the English countryside. And on all of the trips, food is one of the main attractions. Depending on the time of day of their trip, passengers are served a hearty brunch, a four-course lunch, afternoon tea or a five-course dinner.
For a number of years the upmarket catering firm Leith's was responsible for providing meals on the train. However, late last year Venice Simplon-Orient-Express (VSOE), which owns the British Pullman, took the decision not to renew the Leith's contract and to bring the catering in-house from spring 1999.
One of the main reasons for this decision was that the company wanted to make the food more elaborate than it had been in the past. Mindful of rapidly increasing competition in the London restaurant scene with which the train competes for customers, it was felt to be important to "push forward the boundaries of the cuisine served on the train". And in the longer term, VSOE also began to develop the idea of establishing its own event-catering arm and cookery school.
"Leith's always did a very good job with the food, but VSOE did not have the control and flexibility that bringing the catering in-house has achieved," explains Simon Tanner, the chef recruited to overhaul its menus and establish a development kitchen for the British Pullman.
An unglamourous beginning
Tanner, who formerly worked on transatlantic liner the Queen Elizabeth II for nine years - latterly as chef de cuisine, took up his role with British Pullman in February. His first task was to oversee the installation of a kitchen in the unglamorous location of a disused warehouse in railway sidings close to London's Victoria station.
"When I arrived, all I had was a warehouse full of pigeons. But we decided this was the right location for the kitchen because it's adjacent to where the train sleeps at night. We brought in a firm to fit it out, I hired a team of eight to work with me, and we took over cooking for the train in April," says Tanner.
He explains that meals for the train have to be prepared in his land-based kitchen, then chilled and regenerated once on board, because the tiny galleys on the train will not allow for anything else. "The operation has always been cook-chill because on the train there are so many constraints - small ovens, stewards coming in and out to collect dishes, lots of movement, pots falling over," he says.
"But because we're now situated right next to the train we can prepare the food much closer to the time of the train's departure than the previous caterers were able to. The maximum delay between a dish being prepared here and being served to a passenger is around 12 hours, which is very short for cook-chill catering."
Tanner says that he faces a number of other challenges in devising his menus. For a start, space constraints in the train's fridges and ovens mean he cannot offer a choice of dishes - everybody has to eat the same meal. "Obviously we look after vegetarians and those with dietary requirements, but otherwise it's one menu for everyone," he says. "That means I have to come up with dishes that hold appeal for people from all walks of life."
Time pressures on serving the food
Secondly, because the majority of trips on the train last three-and-a-half-hours, there are also time pressures for serving the food on board, particularly as all 250 passengers understandably expect to get their meals at around the same time.
"Everything has to be paced properly," says Tanner, "so I can't put a hot starter and then a hot soup on the dinner menu, for example, because it makes life very difficult for the chefs who regenerate the food on board. I have to make one or the other of them a cold dish."
Yet another limitation is the aim of the British Pullman to give its passengers, many of whom are foreign tourists, a "quintessentially British experience" and this means using largely British ingredients and basing dishes on British classics.
All these factors mean there is a lot of trial and error involved in coming up with a menu that both works well on the train and wows passengers, says Tanner.
But winning menus are what Tanner believes he has put together for the current season (see panel on page 54), and of all the dishes he is making, it is probably the halibut (see recipe on page 55), that Tanner regards as his piäce de résistance. This is because of the novel method he has developed for seasoning and flavouring the fish, which is proving a great success.
"I take fresh, unsalted butter, whip it double, then blend in mustard, a mixture of pistachio, hazelnuts and cashew nuts and chopped herbs, lemon juice, salt, paprika and breadcrumbs. I then spread it thinly on to a sheet pan, put some clingfilm over and freeze it. When it comes out of the freezer, it comes easily away from the clingfilm and I'm left with a big sheet of butter with the nuts in it.
"I cut that butter into equal slabs and then put it raw on to the individual pieces of halibut. All the chef on the train has to do later is put the fish in the oven to cook - the butter melts as it's cooking, seasons it and the breadcrumbs also give it a nice crust. There's no interference, no touching of the fish on the train.
"These type of dishes wouldn't have been served in the past, so we're already pushing the boundaries," asserts Tanner. "My aim is to constantly upgrade the menus and serve better food than has ever been available before on the train." n
Next week: catering aboard VSOE's new Great South Pacific Express in Australia
