FNH200- Group L

Background Information

     Saowanee Baser is a manager at Thai Flavours Restaurant in Edmonton Alberta. She has been working there for a very long time. Unlike other managers, she is not only the manager that oversees the staff; she also works with the staff by cooking the meals and helping them with the setups. When I went to visit her for the interview, she was in the back room helping the staff, which I found very surprising because not every manager help their staff to cook and prep the meals for their customers. 

Justification

     Saowanee Baser’s experience is mostly in cooking and the kitchen setting, she became a manager because she’s been working there for a very long time and has a very good experience with the restaurant especially with the special dishes she is very well experienced and familiar with. She decided to take the manager role because she wanted to turn the bad reviews into good reviews and with her past experience training the staff how to cook specific dishes, she was chosen to become the manager of this restaurant. Baser not only manages Thai Flavours restaurant, she was also involved in Edmonton’s Heritage Festival, the Thai pavilion. In 2014, she appeared on CTV Edmonton Morning Live show where she was the winner of the Thai pavilion and cooked traditional Paad Thai on television. Her experience at the Edmonton’s Heritage Festival allowed Baser to become a well expertise on cooking Thai food, which made her restaurant, Thai Falvours become well known in Edmonton. Therefore, I believe that Baser was a interesting and very good choice of interviewee for the topic of consumer trends because in her interview, she provided me with very useful information from her past experiences.

Summary

     When asked in how government regulations affect the work of management team, the interviewee was somehow hesitating to answer this question because according to the interviewee, the government does not normally have any negative affect on the work that the management team do in their restaurant. Although this restaurant is very well known in Edmonton and have people with different race and ethnicity visit them daily, the interviewee stated that the government does not affect them in any way long as they provide foods that are clean and eatable. The interviewee stated that government regulations mostly have their concerns when it comes to the operation that is followed by food and safety, in terms of how to prepare the food and keep the food in their storage. This brings up the topic of the food and drugs act; the consumer protection law prohibits that foods should not be delivered or provided to any consumer when they are poisonous or harmful to the consumers, there should be no food that are rotten or contaminated meat or vegetable substances. During my visit to this restaurant, I was able to go in the backroom and look around how the staff members were cooking and cleaning, in this restaurant, since the government regulation does not have any negative affect on their work, they tend to keep their food very clean, the outlook and their decoration of providing the food to their consumers is very well organized thought through.
     The interviewee described ways in which her work is affected by consumer trends not based their food and restaurant but instead she stated that people are changing towards all restaurants. She stated that in our society today, people prefer to buy their lunch and dinner at a grocery store instead of eating out at a restaurant; this is also due to people wanting to eat healthy and fresh meals. During my visit to this restaurant, I did not happen to see a lot of people there, although it was middle of the day I was only able to spot elderly people rather than young adults or families. According to the interviewee, people prefer more of the frozen food or TV dinner meals than coming out to the restaurants and this could be due to their socioeconomic status. Since there are many fancy restaurants that overprice their meals, people are starting to become less in favor of visiting restaurants and instead doing their grocery shopping. However, this brings up the topic of enzymes endogenous to foods. In most restaurants, we as a consumer are able to tell if the food is freshly made because if it is not fresh, we are able to see chemical changes in the food this applies to enzymes that catalyzes reactions. For some food, the change in flavor and color happen because of the way the foods are being placed in storage and after packing and unpacking the foods. According to the interviewee, people are in favor of frozen food instead of coming to the restaurant because it is cheaper and less time consuming when preparing. Although some frozen foods are not fresh after preparation at home, people tend to judge the restaurant meals more when they are not freshly made and this is due to the fact that people pay higher price at a restaurant and their expectation of getting fresh food being served to them is not always reached at the restaurants.
     The interviewee described ways in which her work is misinterpreted in the media and popular culture by the reviews they receive from the consumers. According to the interviewee, the outlook and the price of the food they provide to consumers is very important because according to the reviews that this restaurant have received from the past, people are complaining that the price of the dishes are too high and the portion of the food is too small but the taste of the food they like. The misinterpretation in the media and pop culture does not have any affect on the service the people in this restaurant provide for their consumers but they are more concerned with the pricing and the portion of the food they receive. This brings up the topic of sensory perceptions of foods. Sensory perception of food is very important and one of the biggest pointers to all restaurants because it indicates to what types of food consumers may want to choose. In terms of sensory perception of foods, in the Thai Flavours restaurant, appearance of the food and the texture of the food happen to be very important to the interviewee because the appearance of the food is overseen by a number of elements, such as the portion and the size of the food. Although the flavor factors of the foods in this restaurant have good reviews, people are still misinterpreting the fact that the portion of the food is too small with high price. For some people, the portion and price of the food is not an issue because they can afford it, but what is important to them is the flavor, the smell and the taste of the food. So in this restaurant, the full-bodied flavor is not still perceived because in order to be fully perceived, there should be both good perception (which in this case the portion of the meal) and the taste.
     In conclusion, without consumer trends, food science industries or other food nutritionists and restaurant owners would not be able to develop their industries. It is all based on what the consumers require and how it should be provided to them, In our Canadian food act and policies, food handling and food processing happens to be something that all food science industries must take into serious consideration before providing them to the consumers. This is not only happening in Canada but also in other countries and this is due to the fact that without the consumers, industries cannot develop and produce foods.