Aviko UK-Ireland, the Blackburn, England-based division of Steenderen, Holland-headquartered value-added potato producer Aviko BV, has announced the winners of its Great British Breakfast competition.
Gustavo Galvoa, UK food support manager at Belushi’s, triumphed in the Best Breakfast Bap category for the “Badass Breakfast Bap.” The hefty serving features two rashers of smoked back bacon, a fried egg, hash browns, pork sausages and homemade BBQ Jagermeister baked beans in a toasted brioche bun.
Meanwhile, Amy Devenish, owner of The Gloucester Old Spot in Bristol, took the top prize with “The Big One” in the Best Hot Breakfast group. The dish uses locally sourced smoked back bacon, sausages and black pudding with vine tomatoes, garlic, portobello mushrooms, hash browns, spinach, baked beans, eggs and the pub’s signature rosemary and smoked paprika potatoes.
Belushi’s £5 Badass Breakfast Bap boasts two rashers of smoked back bacon, a fried egg, Aviko hash browns, pork sausages and homemade BBQ Jagermeister baked beans stuffed in a toasted brioche bun.
While celebrating his victory, Galvoa explained that since giving the morning menu at Belushi’s a recent overhaul and introducing traditional cooked breakfast at the expense of lighter options, the bar has seen a whopping 70% increase in breakfast sales.
With the exception of the pancake stack, all breakfasts served at Belushi’s include the round version of Aviko hash browns.
“It’s a great product,” said Galvoa. “They taste brilliant and don’t need to be seasoned at all – and give us great value for money. I love that the ones we use are round in shape, which fits really well when stacking on the Badass Breakfast Bap ,and also look interesting on the plate when customers usually expect triangles.”
With nine sites across the UK and five in Europe, Belushi’s caters to students and office workers with its keenly priced, American-inspired breakfast, lunch and dinner menu that satisfies hearty appetites. A sister-company, St Christopher’s Inns, also draws in the backpacker crowd. This enables Belushi’s to combine hostel accommodation upstairs with the sports bars below.
“When I first joined Belushi’s, we used to offer things like Eggs Benedict, Eggs Florentine and yoghurt with granola and blueberries, which is not what we, or our customers, are about. They want a ‘pick-me-up’ breakfast with all the works, so we developed the menu to be more on-brand,” said Galvoa.
Gustavo Galvoa and members of the crew celebrate Belushi’s victory in Aviko’s Great British Breakfast competition.
Off went the granola and yoghurt and in their place came fully loaded cooked breakfasts – the most popular being an English version, aptly named The Resurrection, and The American, which also comes with pancakes and maple syrup. As well as a vegetarian option and a pancake stack, Galvoa also devised a signature hand-held Badass Breakfast Bap combining all the big breakfast favorites such as bacon, sausage, eggs and hash browns, in a toasted brioche bun with homemade BBQ Jagermeister baked beans.
Another savvy move by Galvoa to boost the morning trade has been the introduction of a hostel breakfast upgrade where backpackers pay just £2.95 to swap the free buffet breakfast they are entitled to upstairs for The Resurrection, which is normally priced at £6.
“It was a missed opportunity to not target the backpackers previously,” said the UK food support manager. “We never had an upgrade option, but now we’ve introduced it, we have additional customers coming through the doors from upstairs.”
With one of the biggest challenges for a growing chain being consistency, Aviko’s hash browns have enabled Belushi’s to maintain standards across its various sites, even though the skills sets of the chefs often varies.
Galvoa commented: “We were struggling to achieve consistency across sites, and it’s important for us that customers visiting each one of our bars gets the best breakfast of their life. We wanted to make things easier and Aviko’s hash browns enable us to do that. By cooking them from frozen there’s no prep involved and no wastage –operationally it makes sense and I would definitely recommend them to other businesses.”
The UK food support manager concluded: “Two of the most important things to our customers are speed of service and value for money. Our breakfasts are really quick to prepare and when they come out with the hash browns on, they look massive – the customer feels like they are getting something bigger and better, but for us the cost of the hash browns is low. It means we can offer value for money and still bring in the margins, so it’s win-win.”
The American Breakfast at Belushi’s features two rashers of streaky bacon, two fried eggs, pork sausage, two American-style pancakes, two Aviko hash browns and maple syrup – all for £6.
