Page 18 - BusinessWest May 16, 2022

Restaurants
Continued from page 16
costs is unpredictability of what will be affected next.
Andrew Brow, chef and owner of Highbrow Wood Fired Kitchen in Northampton said all restaurants plan their menus with a balance of higher-cost items such as filet mignon and less expensive ones such as pasta. In the past, Brow bought braised short ribs at $5 per pound rather than New York strip steak which costs $10 to 12
“We used to plan out the business to see where we would be in five years, then it went to five months, and now it feels like it’s five minutes.”
a pound. Supplies are so mixed up now, that the short ribs cost as much as the New York strip which hasn’t increased in price.
“There’s no rhyme or reason to the price hikes,” Brow said. “One week mushrooms will triple in price, the next week it’s chicken and spinach.”
Food for Thought
Creating different dishes is one way restaura- teurs are adjusting to the chaotic, soaring prices. When scallops escalated from $108 for an eight-
pound case to $223, Collins created a new dish that included shrimp, which has held a more stable price. Instead of an entrée with six scallops, he offered in its place a shrimp and scallop entrée using three scallops and three shrimp.
“This way we can keep the dining price where it is and still offer delicious fun food that people expect when they come here,” Collins said.
Gas and electric bills are another area where prices are going up with no end in sight. Santaniello explained that res- taurants, by design, are energy intensive with usage increasing in the summer.
“We have air conditioning running all day and night in the summer because when it’s 98 degrees and humid outside people expect to be comfortable when they go into a restaurant.”
It’s not surprising that take out con- tainers spiked in price and were difficult to find at the height of the pandemic. Supply-chain issues also affected restau- rants in less obvious ways. Santaniello said he needed a part for an oven door, something that would normally take a week to get, if the repair person didn’t already have one in their truck.
“We waited two months for the part,” Santaniello said. “So, we were down an
oven for two months, and that’s difficult in a busy kitchen.”
Santaniello and Telle are experiencing busier than normal kitchens because as customers are returning to their respective restaurants, labor shortages have forced both men to cut back on
Andrew Brow says there has been “no rhyme or reason” to price hikes on food
in recent months.
the hours when they are open.
“Business has been great because of the pent-
up demand of people wanting to go out to eat,” Santaniello said. “Our biggest issue is keeping up with that demand because we’re still looking for employees.”
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