Horizons Restaurant

The project:

To create a kitchen to supply affordable and healthy eating to the residents of Blakenall, Walsall as part of the Blakenall Village Centre part of a major regeneration project offering healthcare, leisure, conference/training facilities and resident support services. The kitchens should be designed to double up as training kitchens for community based healthy cooking courses.

The result:

Design and installation of the kitchens was carried out by BETTAquip Foodservice Solutions using equipment from the Electrolux Professional range. 

To make it suitable for a dual training/production kitchen role the central island suite comprises two identical sides of Electrolux 700 line modular cooking equipment combining open gas burners, solid top and twin basket fryers. The cooking island finishes with a pair of Electrolux Air OSteam combi ovens that use steam to cook food faster and with lower nutritional losses than conventional ovens. Backing one side of the island is a conveniently positioned preparation area with refrigerated counters that provide cold storage immediately below the work surface. Cabinet refrigeration and a dishwashing system have also been installed by BETTAquip.

Centre piece of the restaurant is an Electrolux servery that that combines hot and cold display with a cooking zone equipped with an induction wok for theatre style cooking directly in front of the customer.

The response: 

Head chef Andrew Blakemore:

"This is the best equipped kitchen that I have had the opportunity to manage the layout and facilities are fantastic. The designer obviously put a lot of thought into the ergonomics of actually working in the kitchen and everything is just where I want it. I particularly like the way that there is always a work surface close at hand wherever I am working on the cooking suite and the refrigerated drawers below the work surfaces come in really handy. I plan to repay this investment with the equally good food that the kitchen deserves."