Aristocratic standards
Cliveden gained the highest rating in Egon Ronay's Cellnet Guide 1995, Hotels and Restaurants. With a 92% rating for the quality of its food and accommodation, this stately home turned country house hotel in Taplow, Buckinghamshire, crept ahead of Claridge's and the Dorchester, each rated 91%.
At the same time, Cliveden's main kitchen, the subject of a ú300,000 refurbishment over the past three years, was nominated Kitchen of the Year, a new award sponsored by hygiene consultant National Britannia.
The double accolade clearly demonstrates that a well-designed kitchen helps chefs achieve high food standards. However, Cliveden's achievement is even more remarkable when building constraints are taken into account. Sited within a historic National Trust property, the Cliveden Hotel is subject to stringent planning controls which make it virtually impossible to expand the kitchen outside the existing basement area.
Yet since the hotel's opening in 1986, kitchen output has expanded substantially, with a new function suite and an increase to 37 bedrooms recently. Head chef Ron Maxfield estimates that the average numbers of covers has doubled in the past two years, with the kitchen brigade rising from nine to 24 chefs.
The main kitchen, which was conceived in Cliveden's old "house party" days, needed to catch up. The hotel must meet the needs of a demanding clientele, split 50-50 between corporate and individual guests. Meat, fish and vegetables are purchased fresh daily from the big London markets so the main kitchen layout, developed over the past two years, emphasises separation between its cooking and preparation areas. The latter comprise fully equipped facilities for butchery, fish and vegetable preparation, and bakery and patisserie sections.
All these areas are contiguous but in self-contained sections just off the main workflow route, thus minimising the potential for congestion or the risk of cross-contamination.
Facilities were very different when Maxfield joined Cliveden eight years ago from the Waterside Inn at Bray, Berkshire. The main kitchen had just one solid top range and two ovens, placed against a side wall. Food storage was scattered across a variety of upright refrigerator cabinets, larder units and walk-in coldrooms with relatively poor separation between key processes.
"It was terrible, with dirt-traps everywhere and difficulties in getting behind the equipment to clean," says Maxfield. One of the biggest problems at many kitchens, in his view, is that designers don't have to work in the kitchens they create while chefs are not asked to contribute to the kitchen design. Maxfield was determined to make his needs felt and worked closely with suppliers of key equipment.
Cooking suite
The focal point of the present kitchen is the central island suite. At peak times, this area can occupy up to 15 chefs so the cooking facilities had both to fill the limited available space as effectively as possible and make all the key processes ergonomically accessible.
This highlighted the scope for a bespoke suite. Maxfield had investigated some of the long-established French suppliers like Charvet, Bergeran and Rosiers on a visit to France's Equip'Hotel exhibition in 1991, but while he saw some impressive - and expensive - products, none seemed to fit Cliveden's needs.
Maxfield started looking at UK installations and was impressed with a bespoke range installed at Scotland's Gleneagles hotel in the Dormy House kitchen on the hotel's golf course. The range had been custom-made by the new special development unit at Falcon Catering Equipment.
Further research by Maxfield, including a kitchen design session on Falcon's computer-aided planner, resulted in the purchase of a new gas range which offered a mix of solid and open burner sections within a smart dark blue stove, with an enamelled one-piece exterior casing.
While based on oven carcasses from Falcon's heavy-duty Chieftain series, the unit followed Maxfield's specific needs closely, with such inclusions as a char-broiler and Rosinox salamanders in the upper section. "We could have had a bain-marie unit, like you find on most ranges, but we preferred to locate our bain-marie alongside the main servery/workbench and this has meant more cooking space on the range," says Maxfield.
Another useful inclusion is built-in constant running water so that any spillage from cooking drops into the water and is flushed away.
Cliveden also purchased a six-grid Convectasteam combi-steamer from Falcon. This lies against a wall close to the range and its main use is on roasts and large quantity work for functions rather than, as on the central range, individually prepared entrées. Other cooking appliances include a deep fryer, convection oven, large boiling kettle, bratt pan and stockpot stove.
Lining the walls on either side of the kitchen are counter refrigerators for holding work-in-progress, with the different groups of ingredients - sauces, garnishes, fish, meat, prepared vegetables, and so on - kept in their own separate sections and accessible via door (flat-trayed items) or drawer (deeper containers for items such as sauces).
"We aim to have enough fridges here to keep everything separate," says Maxfield. "You go to a lot of kitchens and they have food crammed into fridges all over the place." This not only invites cross-contamination but fails to match storage temperatures correctly to individual items, he points out.
Bespoke server
The counter fridges were supplied to Gastronorm sizes by Foster and Williams and lie beneath continuous runs of stainless steel worktop. Further extensive worktop space is provided on a bespoke counter/servery. This was produced, like most of the stainless steel fabrication around the kitchen, by Cavendish. It has hot cupboards underneath and stainless steel open over-shelves. A bain-marie and double sink is built alongside.
In Maxfield's view, plentiful worktop space is absolutely critical. Despite the restricted dimensions of the kitchen, he reckons on his chefs being able to lay out up to 100 plates at convenient working height for plating up.
Areas available for meal assembly or general handling/prep work are further expanded, both in the cooking area and other kitchen sections, by the neat expedient of flush-fitting plates which drop into sink tops when required.
Pot wash
Just off the main cooking area is a vegprep section and a large double pot-wash sink and associated racking. Maxfield has had quotes for potwash machines but is unconvinced of their value. For one thing, they need a lot of room. "Also, you get bits of food left in corners of pots so they still have to be scrubbed manually," he says.
The kitchen seems to work. Maxfield says there have been no significant breakdowns or teething troubles. Stuart Smith, environmental health consultant at National Britannia, is likewise enthusiastic. On his last inspection of the hotel in November, Smith gave it his highest-ever rating (94%) as part of National Britannia's food safety scheme.
Under the scheme, NB's environmental health consultants inspect about 150 properties on a twice-yearly basis, checking for minimum cross-contamination, correct temperature control, staff hygiene standards, stock control and good structural condition.
Scores above 90% are, Smith says, very rare. An average score on a first inspection is typically 70-75% and would be expected to rise to 80% on a second visit and maybe 85% the third time.
As well as praising the kitchen design for its hygiene attributes, Smith also rates Maxfield for the tight controls maintained on food suppliers. These and other disciplines are particularly important because of the hotel's very high reliance on fresh ingredients.
Features of special merit include the separation of the kitchen into self-contained sections and plinth-mounting of much of the equipment. This prevents debris dropping between and underneath equipment. However, Maxfield emphasises that solid plinth mounting - on to concrete - is important; hollow plinths, as found under some modular kitchen units, can be a popular hiding place for cockroaches and mice.
On UK catering standards generally, Smith believes personal hygiene of staff is top of the agenda now. Cliveden's kitchens have plenty of wash-handbasins in different areas and all staff have had at least basic hygiene training with some senior members qualified to advanced level ("still very unusual," Smith observes).
There is, Smith believes, a pressing need for more recognition of kitchen standards. "If things go wrong in the kitchen on the hygiene side it can have a devastating impact on the business, especially at very prestigious places like Cliveden," he says. "They have an awful lot to lose."
Improvements
Major drainage improvement beneath the kitchen floors with new ceramic tiles
Mounting of most counters and cooking appliances on sealed tile bases, which makes equipment impervious to spills and seepage
A central bespoke island suite in the main cooking area, with central overhead extraction canopy with return air system
A large bespoke heated servery counter, located between the cooking suite and the kitchen's central access corridor, for issue of plated meals, under silver cloches.
All point-of-use refrigeration located beneath worktops
Improved walk-in coldrooms for meat and provisions
Sinks adjacent to all prep areas
