Taste of the Alps goes down a storm in Crieff
From SLTN on Thursday, 19 March 2009
The slopes of Chamonix and the sleepy town of Crieff provided the unlikely back story as a country house restaurant marked its first anniversary earlier this month.
It was in the family restaurant at the foot of the French Alps that chef Yannick Grospellier learned the rudiments of cooking and hospitality he eventually brought wife Shari to the Perthshire restaurant they launched 12 months ago.
On the 15th of this month they staged a thank you party for the loyal customers, suppliers and other supporters who helped make their first year of trading a memorable one. The celebration came shortly after the couple had unveiled a new conservatory, built by Mozolowski & Murray to provide some much-needed extra covers – an indication of the impact the restaurant has had in a relatively short time.
“The conservatory has added six new tables, which gives us 18 more covers,” Shari told SLTN last week. “Before then we were turning away 30 to 40 customers every Friday and Saturday night, so the whole point was to bring them in.
“We were worried some people were going to give up coming because they couldn’t get a table.
“It [the conservatory] has also freed up more space for the staff – they used to have to walk between tables sideways!”