There's a buzz back in the air at St Vincent, where a staff training day is under way and Terry Laybourne and his team are busy gearing up for the restaurant's big March 9 reopening day after three long years of closure.
St Vincent, in Broad Chare just off Newcastle quayside, shut its doors in March 2020 when the Covid crisis hit and now it is all set for a relaunch and restaurateur Terry is delighted. "It's a lovely space," he says of the vibrant dining area which adjoins Live Theatre and soon will be including pre-theatre deals on its new menu. "It feels great."
Customers have asked repeatedly about when St Vincent would reopen. "It's a relief more than anything to be able to tell them something definitive," he says. Of the restaurants in his 21 Hospitality Group, which include his signature 21 nearby; The Broad Chare gastro pub just down the road and - in Fenwick Food Hall - Saltwater Fish Company and Porterhouse Butcher & Grill, this is the last to reopen following the pandemic - although it was the first to close. And he remembers the night well.
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"I got the staff together and said I'd see them in three weeks and genuinely felt that's how long it would be," he says. "Then came the stark realisation that is was something far, far more serious and trying to understand the implications of what it meant for people and the business.
"It was quite traumatic trying to figure it out - but once we did, I had a great time!" The lockdown was to provide Terry with time to relax, think and rediscover the love of cooking which drove him as a young man to embark upon a now 40-plus year career in the industry, opening his first Newcastle restaurant 21 - then in Queen Street and now in Trinity Gardens - and becoming the first chef to earn the city a Michelin star.
"Up until then I'd worked for the best part of 40 years and never had more than a fortnight's holiday, other than once, so it was a prolonged break, staying at home where I've lots of outside space. I was cooking as lot at home which I never had an opportunity to do.
"It was a joy, it really was." Things changed, of course, as lockdown dragged on and some of the staff became restless and keen to find new ways to be creative, coming up with the idea of launching a '21 At Home' food collection service. He recalls: "I was being my arrogant bullish self, saying I haven't spent 40 years in my career to end up putting food in cardboard boxes! Two weeks later that's what we were doing.
"I put my foot down and said if they wanted to do it, and they wanted that stimulation, then to do what they want; I'd sanction it, I'd write the menu for the recipes - and that's it." The St Vincent kitchens were used to provide the new service and it was a huge hit - keeping creative minds busy, making money and maintaining a connection with customers - so much so that it remains part of the business.
"It's been great," laughs Terry. He opened up his other restaurants as soon as restrictions allowed but not St Vincent which, named after the patron saint of winemakers, he had launched in September 2018 in the former home of Caffe Vivo where its France and Italy-inspired menu and wide range of wines proved a big success.
He says of his other restaurants: "I took a pragmatic view. I just made a decision to get those nailed first, get them stabilised and then to deal with St Vincent."
Keeping it ticking along in the meantime was hugely costly "but at least I knew what the cost was". There was never any risk of it staying closed for good and the initial hope had been to reopen in October but things changed and Terry says: "We didn't want to disrupt or destabilise the other restaurants we had got back up and running."
Instead he kept the focus upon those for longer and they enjoyed their first proper Christmas in three years. But now it's St Vincent's turn, despite the cost-of-living crisis now hitting the hospitality industry with rocketing energy bills and ingredients costs, just as it was recovering from the effects of the pandemic.
"It's a constant battle," says Terry. "It's been a challenge but it's been manageable." He adds that after lockdown "the supply chain was not quite as it was and quality of product was not quite what it should be." There were difficulties re-forging connections, including the contacts he'd built up over the years with suppliers in Italy and France, already made trickier by Brexit.
Things are back on track now but it took a while. "If you're a little bit creative and persistent you can get over all the hurdles but there's a bit of a cost," says Terry. The cost-of-living crisis has made him more careful, even more technical, in his approach to his menus whose prices have inevitably had to rise.
He works out costings more than he used to. "Previously I was always pretty gung-ho. Suddenly I was looking a lot more closely to make sure costs balance." But, he points out, "that's quite a healthy exercise".
Staffing has been difficult throughout the industry but not to the same degree as in London.
"Historically we've always employed a high number of students," says Terry but with the pandemic disrupting university life just as much it's only been this September that they have seen a normal intake.
As for the city restaurant trade as a whole, he thinks "it's stronger than it's ever been", mentioning the dining scene which has taken off not just in the city centre but in areas such as the Ouseburn and Heaton's Chillingham Road. Newcastle Restaurant Week is a big deal in the city and he himself has supported and taken part in it since the beginning.
He says: "It feels the right thing to do; there's so much goodwill about it" and he thinks it has a positive impact on the city where, like everywhere, people's dining patterns have changed and their behaviour has morphed into becoming more flexible and casual.
"That's not a new thing," he says. "An example is when we first opened at Queen Street, we'd get to about 7.45pm on a Saturday night before we got the first people through the door. These days - if there's something in town or at Sage - 21 can have something like 80 people through before 7pm."
He's willing to adapt too. When St Vincent first opened, its focus was upon offering tapas-style small plates, as the dining trend then was seeing people explore a more Mediterranean style of dining. When the restaurant reopens, its regulars will find that while it looks just the same, its menu is different with a more traditional three courses on offer alongside its renowned selection of wine which includes organic, 'bio-dynamic' and natural types.
Terry says: "The menu is more conventional: there's the opportunity to have a starter, main course and dessert - but we're more than happy for people to 'graze' as they did before!"
Terry has always been involved with nurturing young talent and maintains close ties with Gateshead College. When his team got back together after lockdown, they came up with the idea of taking on five apprentices at once. He remembers his reaction was "we can't take on this many" and adds: "Again I was wholeheartedly wrong." The five were like a support network for each other and all are now still employed in the company, switching between the restaurants.
His team at St Vincent will see chef Martin Malinowski, who has worked in most of Terry’s restaurants, in the kitchen alongside Richard Wheatley, who jointly owned Bao Bar in Chillingham Road, while Matt Clarkson returns as general manager.
Terry describes his general role as being something of a facilitator and jokes of his staff: "They do the creative stuff and I get the credit - what's not to like!" then he says: "Seriously it's a joy."
As for what's next, he says he'll see St Vincent settled in and then will decide but it's all about what stimulates him. Despite his intentions and however much he enjoyed his lockdown holiday, he seems to find it hard to resist a new challenge. He even opened a new Café 21 in the York branch of Fenwick between lockdowns.
After its launch on March 9, St Vincent will open from Tuesday to Saturday - less than its original seven days but manageable for now with potential to be extended in the future. Terry says: "I'll get this open and stabilised and then I'll think about the next step. Never say never!"
At uncertain times he says "you've got to be a little bit prudent, cautious" but the natural next step would seem to involve teaching others, something which, after all, he's done throughout his career. He's now 67 and says: "You can't help but think how do you capitalise on this or package 40-50 years of doing what you're been doing.
"Education, teaching, training is an obvious one." A cookery school, he muses, would be defining and something nice to grow old with. He laughs: "Sometimes I feel like a striker whose knees have gone and has to arrive at the realisation he can't do it anymore. I've got to prepare for that!"
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