Chapter 5 : THE MENU

Hiiiiii hellloo annyeonghaseyoo mushi-mushii, and Assalamualikummm...

So today, i wanna share with uolls about what i have been taught on Chapter 5 ; THE MENU by my handsome lecturer, Sir Azwan.


INTRODUCTION

All of you have been to a restaurant, isn't it ? So, I bet you know what the Menu is.
Menu is the most important tool if you wanna start a food service operation. If you don't have the menu, then when people get into your restaurant, they will make this face to you. HAHA

Plus, a well-planned menu serves as catalyst that drives all operational functions from Purchasing, Production, Assembly, Distribution, Service and Sanitation.


Menu Planning

There are 3 factors of influence in making the menu ;

• Organizational

          - to plan a menu, it is need to be reflect to the organization's mission and goals.

• The customer
• Demographics - We need to know the trends of a population based on factors such as age, race, sex, economic status, level of education, income level and employment to plan the menu.
• Sociocultural influences - The factors that greatly impact the menu planning such as marital status, lifestyle, ethnic background, values, and religion of the customer.
• Eating habit 
1. Nutritional Requirements
2. Recommended Daily Allowance
3. Dietary References Intakes
4. Food consumption, trends, habits, and preferences
• Operational and managerial

Budget Guidelines

- In retail operation, the amount to be budgeted is based on the projected income from the sale of           food.
- The income must generate adequate revenue to cover back the amount to buy raw material, pay          employee salary, operating expenses, and of course we need some PROFIT.

If you don't have the profit, it is mean that you dah bankrappp T_T .
You need to prevent that problem happen to you, so pandai2 lah budget yeeee :D


Production and Service Capabilities

a) Equipment and Physical Facilities

• to complete the menu planned for any given day, the work space and all of the equipment should be available.

The work space and also the equipment are completely PERFECTO ~~

b) Personnel

• Skilled labor must be hired in determining the complexity of the menu.

Haaaa.. did u see that ? Terserlah tak PRO dia ? haha

c) Availability of food

• Make sure source of the raw materials can easily to be obtained and near to the food service operation. (logistic)
• Dynamics of the market can affect what foods are available on the menu.

d) Style of service

• the distance between kitchen and point of service should be near to each other and accessible.
• some food are more suitable to seated service, and so on.

The foods are being serve to the customer properly.
Ala-ala fine dining gitu haa...

e) Extent of selection

• Selective menu : there re more than 2 choices of food in each type of menu such as appetizers, salads, soups, main courses, and desserts.

One of the selective menu example

• Semi-selective menu : have one or more choices of food in at least one menu category.

As you can see, it is only one category of menu ( burger ),
 but still have choices of burger kan ?

• Non-selective menu : offers no choice of food item, single menu only.

For your info, there are five types of food menu in the foodservice operation :

1. Static menu - Same menu items offered every day. These menus usually are laminated for easy cleaning and reuse or printed on wall. The foodservice operation that usually used this type of menu is restaurant.
2. Single-use menu - Planned for service on a particular day and not used in the exact form a second time. Often used in on-site food service such as catered event and holiday.
3. Cycle menu - Different items each day on a weekly, bi-weekly, or some other basis, after which the cycle is repeated. Usually used in healthcare institution and schools.
4. Table d'hote / Prix-fixe menu - Items grouped together & sold for one price.
5. Du jour menu - These menus change daily and are focused on seasonal ingredients, preparing the freshest food possible.
   

What is menu Pattern ???

What i understand about the menu pattern is when you follow that same Menu Plan-most of the times the Menu Pattern is regarding a one day Menu Plan. For example, lets say you eat cereal in the morning, a sandwich in the afternoon, and a steak for dinner. A pretty boring Menu plan, but if you eat this everyday; that is what you call a menu Pattern.



Food Characteristics and the Combination

When we talk about food, it must be perfect isn't it ? I mean, who wanna eat the food we don't even like kan ? Senang cerita, makanan yang tekak kita tak boleh nak terima. kalau makan sampai muntah2 haa. "blarrghh" kata Sir Anizan :P

So, we need to consider the characteristics when preparing a food such as :

• Presentation
• Color of the food
• The texture should be al-dante
• consistency must be right
• Shape and size of the food
• Flavor combination yang awesome

haaaaa.. look interesting kan ? Ni pon dah boleh buat kita laparr T_T
That is why the food characteristics are very important yaaa....

Menu Writing

Here are the steps in menu development :

1. Entrees
2. Soups and sandwiches
3. Vegetables and "sides"
4. Desserts
5. Garnishes
6. Breads
7. Breakfast items
8. Beverages

• Checklist for menu evaluation 
• the menu need to be evaluated prior to use, and on an ongoing basis.

Example of food evaluation form

The Printed Menu

• Menu design and format
• the menu must be appeal to the customer, stimulate the sales, influence the guest, and be clean and simple in design and format.
• Descriptive wording
• The spelling should be accurate and no typo ya. Besides, the picture of the food also need to be right. The food that not available must be remove from the menu card.
• Truth-in-menu legislation
• Require the menu accurately describes the foods to be served. If you give the misleading names to the menu, it is ILLEGAL.
• Menu marketing
• The manner of the food being presented  to the potential customer can increase the sales volume.
• Spoken menu
• Communicating the menu choices by read the menu to the customer.

Customer Satisfaction

The most important things when we operate the food service establishment is the customer satisfaction. The satisfaction of the guest will bring them back to our restaurant at another time.

The customers feedback can be done by :

• Surveys and comment cards
• Can be done formally via written surveys and comment cards.
• Frequency rating of popularity index
• Established by formal or informal surveys, where the customer are asked to rate the most menu items that they love to eat.
• Sales data
• Tracked by modern registers can be used to revise an existing menu or plan a new menu.

Some example of menu...

Fuhhhhh.... Done for chapter 5.

Hopefully, I can remember all of the knowledge that have been taught by my lecturer.

Thank you Sir Azwan :)