For us, this winter is about one thing. It's called Trinity Kitchen and, having been to the launch last week and seen the place ourselves, here's what's to know:
3) It features 5 street food traders on rotation each month run by Richard Johnson and British Street Food Awards. We will be there from December 15th.
I think it is something of a first for the UK. Those who are aware of it already will know that it is, ultimately, a shopping centre food court. It is a) in a shopping centre and b) where you go and get food. Nothing new so far. However it's when you stop to think about how it's managed to progress from idea, through design and build and finally come to be in existence that it's importance truly becomes clear.
Y'see grand commercial projects like this involve large and complex teams of developers - different people with varying remits who operate in contrasting styles. When combined and put to work though, teams like these are the opposite of traders like us. It's normal that the more people that are involved in any given decision making process, the more conceptually diluted it becomes as the initial vision is compromised to suit the design tastes, financial and operational constraints placed around it by people whose very job's it is to do so.
Furthermore, with Trinity specifically, the developers could more or less rest easy in that being the newest and most prominent city centre retail complex in town it was going to be busy enough and all that they'd need to do is make sure there was food to go around and rent coming in. They could've gone down the route they knew and installed investment vehicle chain 'concepts' that guarantee operational stability, financial security and familiar please-all options for the punters that would draw, if not excitement, at least acquiescence.
Instead they've not only managed to see past this, but actually go past it and opted for something new, something unknown and something challenging. A hole cut in the exterior wall of the building, a custom scissor lift commissioned to get the vans up there, specialist gas engineers to rearrange mains gas into something that mimics the LPG bottles we're used to and teams of hard hats and hi-viz laid on to provide 24/7 assistance in keeping us up and running. These are all obstacles that have so far presented themselves specifically because of having 'us 5' instead of 'one of them' there but all of them have so far been overcome and hopefully so will the ones that crop up in the future.
The point is that instead of taking the easy route up the hill, they've chosen the one you have to work hard for but which will, at some point, yield up the best views.
As for us, it offers up a chance to swim in the size of pond normally reserved for fish many times bigger and we're relishing it. We're whittling down suppliers we're happy with so we can have everything Yorkshire-sourced, Tom's Harrogate twang is thickening up in preparation and we have a couple of upgrades in the pipeline but as yet under wraps. We'll be doing our damndest to make sure we do ourselves proud and, if you get the chance and fancy Breakfast or Burgers, we'd love you to drop by and say 'ey up'. Until then,
PS keep an eye on facebook for pictures as and when we get them innit
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