01 March 08

Features

The Chain Gang

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Let’s face it, where restaurants are concerned, the word ‘chain’ is shorthand for mass-market and mediocre. Or at least, it used to be, before the multi-outlet eateries were wrestled from the dark ages by a series of enlightened entrepreneurs.So, now that the latest wave of restaurant chains has arrived, what can the customer expect? As well as carefully sourced produce, season-sensitive menus and reliability without blanket repetition, you’re likely to find a very 21st-century commitment to the environment. Truly progressive pit-stops.

Leon

‘Chains are the only realistic way to improve health through restaurants and this one, with its low GI approach and superfoods, is clearly the way forward,’ says Giles Coren of The Times. Indeed, this is fast food without the fast-track to morbid obsesity. Since its launch in 2003, the nine-strong London chain has laid down the blueprint for simple, nourishing food on the go. So chicken nuggets are freerange, meaty and veggie soups change daily, and salads are souped up with seeds, nuts, dried fruit and sprouts. The wheat-free chocolate brownies are unbeatable. And you can be in and out with your tucker in a recycled paper bag in 60 seconds. McWho? BRANCHES ACROSS LONDON, WWW.LEONRESTAURANTS.CO.UK

In 1990, Belgian chef Alain Coumont opened a bakery and café in Brussels to showcase his perfect bread recipe. Eighteen years later, there are more than 80 LPQs worldwide – 25 in Belgium. The communal table remains the centrepiece in each, and breads, pastries and cakes are the main attraction, but the company is also committed to recycling, has an organic certification on the way, and serves healthy food. Breakfast, for example, might be organic softboiled egg and sourdough toast, while lunchtime tartines modernise the open sandwich.
BRANCHES ACROSS BELGIUM AND EUROPE.
WWW.LEPAINQUOTIDIEN.COM

The well-cut chino of the restaurant industry, Vapiano combines dressed-down style with an accessible Italian menu. Dubbed ‘the future of fresh casual’, the German chain, conceived by an ex-McDonald’s employee, has already exported its 21st-century canteens to Vienna, Antwerp, The Hague, Stockholm, Zurich, Budapest and Istanbul, and aims to open a whopping 100 internationally within six years. It’s a simple concept, well executed. Freshness is paramount, from the blackboard menus to pots of fresh herbs, and vinegar and oil on the chunky wooden tables. The offering is deliberately limited: fire-roasted pizza, fresh homemade pasta and gourmet salads, all cooked to order at food stations, banded A, B, C, D by price and charged to a tab card, the balance on which is settled before you leave. The first UK franchise will open in London in May this year.
BRANCHES ACROSS GERMANY AND EUROPE.
WWW.VAPIANO.DE

Grom

Despite its less-than-delicioussounding name, this 18-strong northern Italian ice cream chain puts the ahhhh into gelato. The owners opened their first parlour in Turin in 2003, basing the concept on old-fashioned ice cream-making techniques (sugar and fat content is kept low), exacting standards of production and painstakingly sourced raw produce. Viennetta this isn’t; eggs are organic, fresh fruit seasonal, and colourings and additives not invited. If you’re wrapping your chops around one of their regular flavours, rest assuredthat lemons are from Amalfi, pistachios from Bronte and chocolate from Ecuador, while the owners have just founded a fruit farm to source their own fruit.
BRANCHES ACROSS NORTHERN ITALY, INCLUDING TURIN, GENOA, VENICE AND MILAN.WWW.GROM.IT