Always a Fry day at Wagamama's
6th May 2010
Wagamama’s is one of the success stories of the past decade. Starting out in London back in 1992, the company now boast 65 pan-Asian inspired noodle restaurants in the UK, with a further 30 across the world. With a philosophy to combine fresh and nutritional food in an elegant yet simple setting, Wagamama’s has been voted London’s most popular restaurant four times in the past five
years by Zagat readers.
Such an operation requires equipment that is built to withstand a 14 hour service and therefore when it came time to upgrading the fryers, Wagamama’s Group Executive Chef, Steve Mangleshot, called in specialist equipment distributors CRIS, to help with the decision. Steve explains:
“We wanted to ensure that we were purchasing the best kit in the market at a price we could afford. We put a number of brands through their paces before narrowing the choice down to two brands”.
With a quarter of the Wagamamas menu reliant on the fryer, the decision had to be the right one, but in the end two key factors came into play; as Steve continues:
“There was a significant difference in the technology between the two brands and in the end the benefits of the Frymaster open tank became very clear. Not only is it far easier to clean, with no tubes getting in the way, it also has a much greater efficiency”.
Ultimately it was an easy decision for Steve and he installed double suited Frymasters in all of the restaurants. Cooking a variety of items, including prawns, dumplings, vegetables and chicken, the fryers are responsible for some of Wagamama’s most popular dishes, including the famous Chicken Katsu Curry, which sells over 32,000 portions a week.
One of the benefits of the new fryers is the filter, which Steve believes is already helping the longevity of the oil:
“We have always purchased filtered fryers and have achieved a noticeable reduction in the amount of Rapeseed oil required and a better quality end product across the group. This obviously adds to the environmental benefits that the fryer brings”.
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