Cinnamon Brick Lane Restaurant - Essay Example

Cinnamon Brick Lane Restaurant Cinnamon Brick Lane Restaurant is among the best restaurants in London, specializing in serving delectable Indian cuisine. A brief interview with the manager revealed great insights on quality. The manager acknowledges that quality is crucial in ensuring that an organisation, such as theirs, conforms to the highest standards expected from food establishments. He revealed that quality is actually synonymous with freshness – ensuring that fresh food is served every day. To ensure freshness, the manager disclosed that part of the secret lies in finding trusted suppliers for their various raw ingredients. 1 The process that was undertaken necessitated selecting only the best suppliers from among many. When they started, the manager revealed that they used to test many different suppliers in order to choose the best ones. After this process, and through experience, now they already know who the best is and they buy only from them. Concurrently, the manager also noted that some of the sellers are actually friends with people that work at the restaurant. They purchase ingredients, such as meat, fish, vegetables and other fresh stuff, on a daily basis at local Indian/Bengali shops. Accordingly, there are plenty of them in the neighbourhood, as there are 50 Indian, Bengali, Thai, and Asian restaurants in this area. So they tested different suppliers and chose the best ones. It was emphasized that it took years of experience. Now, the Cinnamon Brick Lane Restaurant is acknowledged to be the best, legendary, and renowned. The standard of quality also means possessing secret recipes appreciated by the worlds best chefs. 2 The fact that food critics who graced the restaurant provided exemplary reviews evidently indicates that the establishment is viewed as one that serves high quality food, diverse menus and exemplary service. The official restaurant’s website cited the results from two of the food critics who visited their establishment that: “Among our many accolades include food critic and Michelin chef Pat Chapman, in the Cobra Good Food Guide, and Humayun Khan - from TANDOORI MAGAZINE, who gave rave reviews on his last visit to Cinnamon for his favourite dish, the LEMON-GRASS CHICKEN, recommending Cinnamon as one of the best Indian/ Bangladeshi restaurants in Britain. View London also highly recommends Cinnamon as one of the best in Brick Lane”.3 Likewise, due to the high quality, great taste of its food, exemplary service, and consistently positive customer satisfaction ratings, the Cinnamon Brick Lane Restaurant have been patronized by celebrities and famous personalities such as Jeremy Guscott, a former England and Lions rugby player and Shepard Fairy, a famous jigsaw artist.4 From the above, quality can be defined in two ways in the view of the organization. First, quality can be viewed as conformance to established standards in the industry. Secondly, quality is producing products in accordance to the required specifications. Accordingly, the organization takes two views in definition of quality. These views are the product-based emphasis and manufacturing emphasis. 7In the product-based view, quality is related to the features or type and quantity of the ingredients used. Manufacturing emphasis is about conformance to specifications of the product. How does it monitor and control quality? The manager revealed that part of his roles and responsibilities are to monitor and control the quality of the food products and services at the Cinnamon Brick Lane Restaurant. Monitoring quality of the product means inspecting conformity to standards of freshness and adherence to size, color, and volume of food products purchased on a daily basis.5 Likewise, it was also revealed that he ensures that these products are packed in clean receptacles prior to being shelved in their respective areas.6 Further, one crucial aspect in monitoring quality integrates cleanliness of the working environment as well as the internal and external premises of the restaurant. It also necessitates maintaining the right temperature for the entire restaurant (balancing coolness and warmth), as well as maintaining the necessary freezing temperature for storing food items. In addition, aside from monitoring the current and future supplies of ingredients and observing inventories and re-order points, the manager also emphasised that part of the monitoring phase is anticipating any significant changes in the external environment that might affect the restaurant’s operations. Assuming a proactive stance means being vigilant in the demand and supply of their regular ingredients to ensure that there are no abrupt changes in prices, which could reverberate increased prices of food offered to their clientele. In terms of control measures, the manager disclosed that these entail strict compliance of personnel with the efficient and effective use of the establishment’s resources: ingredients, utilities, labour and policies that clearly stipulate the personnel’s code of discipline and behaviour at all times. Likewise, control measures necessitate defining standards of quality (freshness of food, cordial and exemplary customer service, conducive atmosphere for the clientele, and safe working environment for the personnel). From these standards, control measures are undertaken to implement consistency in the supply of high quality of ingredients, in minimising costs through the effective use of resources and utilities, as well as in meeting targeted financial goals. The management employs the Deming Wheel, acceptance sampling and statistical process control as tools for monitoring quality.8 Acceptance sampling involves taking random samples of items and testing them for conformance to standards. At cinnamon Brick Lane, all supplies are randomly tested to ensure they conform to standards. Supplies tested on a daily basis include fish, meat, vegetables and others. If any of the samples taken at random fails the test, then the whole of the batch is carefully analyzed. The manager also uses statistical process control to monitor quality. In particular, control charts are used to monitor the number of defective supplies to the hotel, such as the number of broken eggs. This enables the hotel to identify the best suppliers and recognize problems in the supply chain early enough. The manager employs the Deming Wheel in making decisions. 9Deming wheel comprise of four steps namely Plan, Do, Action, and Check. In planning, the manager involves all employees regardless of their rank. The plans formulated are then implemented and then analyzed to see whether they achieve the expected results or whether they help the restaurant attain the set goals. If there are problems or discrepancies with the new plans, the manager takes corrective actions. Overall, through monitoring and control procedures, the Cinnamon Brick Lane Restaurant maintains its distinct reputation of serving the best Indian cuisine in its locality through high quality of food and exemplary customer service. 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Schilling, E., and Neubauer, D., Acceptance Sampling in Quality Control, Second Edition,Boca Raton, CRC Press, 2012. Suganthi, L., and Anand, A., Total quality management. New Delhi, Prentice-Hall of India, 2006 Read More