The Westin Jakarta, all-day-dining kitchen. (2017)
017PUBLISHER
(^) +
PERSPECTIVE
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Peter A Knipp
Turn to page 27 onwards to read about the
opinions on the subject of kitchen space and
designs from chefs and kitchen consultants
across the world.
The Investors:
Cheap Decisions For The Long Run
Before a kitchen can even be designed, a menu
must be created. Know exactly what you want to
serve and not in the short term. As a consultant, I
allow the chefs to have a 20 percent input.
I have worked in numerous well-known properties
and again and again I’ve seen: The head office
puts a design out and the regional office makes
adaptions. At a later stage, the F&B director,
general manager and the chefs come on board.
In the end, the kitchen might not be built to what
the original requirements were. Wake up people! If
you use a cookie cutter for the kitchen design but
the whole menu will suffer later. Or you get the
chefs who create those concepts to have a say in
the design process or else, thousands of dollars are
wasted. CWA
Serviceability Of Equipment:
The Deal Breakers
Having said that, yes, we are also biased. Sometimes
I’m asked, biased towards what? To me, it’s all
about right equipment at the right place for the
right purpose, but even more importantly, in many
countries we are biased towards serviceability. We
work with one kitchen manufacturer very closely
and this same company in South Africa used to
have a very bad reputation. Not because the
equipment is different – equipment is exactly the
same everywhere but because their serviceability
was absolutely non-existent. The aftersales
service really makes or breaks the manufacturing
companies. A branded combi-oven manufacturing
company once decided to move out of Singapore
and now they’re living on their past reputation.
After many years, they came back to rebuild that
reputation whereas the companies that stayed
A kitchen designer has a few main responsibilities:
one being they should not be tied to any single
foodservice manufacturers. There are many
manufacturers that carry the perfect equipment,
but, they are unique to specific needs whether for a
restaurant of 20 people or a fast food restaurant or
a commissary kitchen or a catering facility for 3,
to 4,000 people. Equipment is designed for specific
purposes. As kitchen designers, we are completely
independent and we need to stay impartial.
and continued yearly to upgrade and educate their
service personnel, increased not only their sales
but, also their reputation. One of the factors to be
considered is that the modern day requirements
are such that the designers have to make sure that
equipment should be interchangeable and are
equipped with latest proven technology.