Beverage Systems

¡Ay, Barista!

These days cappuccino and espresso are can hardly be called 'specialities'. Customers increasingly expect to be offered them in almost any catering outlet - the lunchtime sandwich bar, the pub, the gourmet restaurant... There's no doubt it's getting easier for the caterer to supply good coffee, with a vast range of machines of varying complexity and sophistication on offer.

The chief problem is quality: the espresso can vary from a bland, watery mess to a ground-filled cup you can stand a spoon up in. A master barista may well be able to make a superb espresso from a spoonful of beans and a string vest - but are your staff master baristas?

Luckily the increasing sophistication of today's espresso machine means even relatively untrained staff can deliver a great coffee, sometimes even at the touch of a button. But it's essential that staff are trained to ensure they know how to meet customer expectations, and how to keep the machine clean - coffee grounds and milk are neither hygiene-friendly nor computer-chip-friendly!

Coffee is hugely profitable of course. 15p-worth of ingredients and energy can convert into £1.50, £2.50, £3.00 or even more with a bit of imagination and effort. That's a truly magnificent return on investment (just ask one of the big coffee chains). A top of the range machine can be a major investment, so if you're on a tight budget it's worth considering a loan machine, which ties you in to a coffee provider. The coffee pays for the machine, and so costs more, but it can still generate profit without capital outlay, allowing you to allocate more of your budget to other vital equipment.

Tea, urn?

Moving away from those upstart espresso machines, good old boilers and urns are still amongst the most useful pieces of kit for beverage service, in all catering sectors. Many modern units have features like flat elements, which help eliminate limescale problems and also reduce the overall size of the unit. They're also better designed when it comes to service and maintenance, so its both easy and quick to keep the unit clean and working efficiently.

When you're considering which boiler to buy there are various considerations. Do you want a manual or plumbed-in model? How powerful does it need to be? A 6kW will be faster than 3kW, of course, but there's a cost involved, not least in terms of the energy required, so does your operation need the extra speed?