To most of this bakery’s millions of devotees, the idea that its “Steak Bake” can be “lifted” is somewhere between absurdity and heresy. It combines diced beef, gravy and crisp puff pastry in perfect harmony. It cannot be improved, or ameliorated, or heightened. It has reached its highest form.
Its popularity proves that. The bakery, Greggs, a family chain founded in 1939 to deliver door-to-door baked goods in the mining communities around Newcastle, England, sells hundreds of thousands of them each week, mostly to customers who walk into one of their more than 2,300 branches around Britain and take them to a paper bag, to eat hot, on the go.
Mark Reid and Kieran McBride, of the upscale Fenwick department store in Newcastle, decided this autumn to play it up a bit.
Mr. Reid, the head chef of the store, and Mr. McBride, its director, had about two months to take Greggs’ menu and turn it into a sophisticated bistro experience that sits comfortably within Fenwick’s own, slightly more refined environment.
The idea of Mr. Reid — pairing Steak Bake with dauphinoise potatoes and a bundle of delicate green beans — is honest, Mr. McBride. “I think most chefs would do the same,” he said.
What matters is the final development: sprinkling the whole thing with shaved truffle. “We want to take it a step further,” Mr. McBride said.
At first glance, Greggs Bistro, a monthly pop-up restaurant located inside the flagship Fenwick branch, seems a little restless. While both companies have their roots in Newcastle – Fenwick opened there in 1882 as a Mantle Maker and Furrier selling silks and furs, and now has nine shops around Britain — covering different ends of the market.
Greggs’ products are designed to be eaten by the hungry in a hurry: The chain sells, for example, 130 million sausage rolls (priced at an affordable 1 pound and 20 pence each, about $1.50) each year.
Fenwick, meanwhile, sells brands including Ralph Lauren, Victoria Beckham and Eileen Fisher, and has long been home to a silver service French-inspired restaurant, complete with starched linen tablecloths, tie-clad waiting staff and fine china
Both, however, saw a collaboration as an opportunity to blur the lines between what is considered high and low culture just a little, to “play with form, inject a little bit of irony,” as Mr . McBride put it.
The blend, it turns out, is a more natural fit than one might imagine. A Steak Bake, for example, works well with shaved truffle. Another Greggs favourite, the seasonal “Festive Bake,” filled with chicken, stuffing and cranberry sauce, is accompanied by duck-fat roast potatoes, smoked pancetta, chestnuts and sprouts, and served under silver cloches thrown on the table. The gravy is poured by the impeccable wait staff.
More complicated, for Mr. Reid, the desserts. “Yum Yum,” a twist of dough covered in a sugar glaze that’s a Greggs specialty, is served with caramel sauce and macadamia brittle, a magnitude of sugar that might, admittedly, turn some people off.
And the donut – well, the donut is an issue.
There was, realized Mr. Reid, there is no way to play with the natural structure of a donut. A donut, too, is a perfect sum. Instead, the chef tried to capture its essence. With the help of Mother Mercy, a local cocktail bar with a branch in the basement of Fenwick, he did it a drink: raspberry, apple and “doughnut flavor,” infused with Prosecco. “It actually smells like a donut,” Mr. McBride said.
The results are amazing. Bistro reservations were sold out, and there was a steady stream of walk-ins. The “Pink Jammy Fizz” cocktail was such a hit that Mr. McBride that it will go on the menu in the basement bar when the bistro closes. “Need,” he said. “People will ask for it otherwise.”
That Greggs has moved so seamlessly, so successfully into its own tongue-in-cheek version of fine dining should come as no surprise. It has, after all, managed to conquer almost every other aspect of Britain’s culinary existence.
It now has more branches in Britain than any other fast-food outlet. In many small towns, especially in the north of England and in Scotland, it is not uncommon to find two Greggs within walking distance of each other.
As well as space, Greggs has come to dominate time. Roisin Currie, its chief executive, boasts that this year it has overtaken McDonald’s to become “No. 1 for breakfast” in Britain. It has opened several branches with seating areas. “We are a food brand -to-go,” Ms. Currie said. “But sometimes, you want to sit down for a few minutes when you’re on the go.”
An increasing number of outlets are staying open late at night, to catch shoppers looking for a quick dinner. Greggs’ partnership with delivery service Just Eat accounts for 5 percent of sales by 2022. The ambition, Ms. Currie, is to meet customers “whenever, wherever, however.”
In his eyes, this was just the beginning. Greggs may dominate the high street, but there are other territories – airports, industrial and retail parks, hospitals – it feels it has barely penetrated.
His goal is to expand further, but he is aware of the risk. “We know that there is danger that seems to be everywhere,” said Ms. Currie, “but we don’t think we’re there yet.”
Britain, on the whole, seems to agree. Perhaps the most striking aspect of the country’s transformation into Greggs’ sovereign territory is the extent to which occupation is accepted.
Most of the omnipresent chains that dot Britain’s dwindling high streets are tolerated at best, or vandalized at worst. Although Greggs has faced some criticism for its calorific products when more than half of the British population is overweight or obese, it remains beloved.
Last year, Greggs launched several branded clothing “drops” with retail giant Primark, and they all sold out. At least two documentaries have been commissioned to uncover the secrets of the Steak Bake. And during Britain’s first Covid lockdown, the company shared a recipe online to make their own customers lost their lives.
It’s seen as a “crutch, a prop-up, an umbrella on a rainy day,” says journalist and author Joel Golby. wrote in The Guardian. “If you don’t love Greggs, you don’t love life.”
There are several available explanations. Ian White, Greggs’ brand director, traces this to nostalgia. “People have grown up with Greggs,” he said. “It reminds you of your childhood. You feel like you own it.”
Ms. believes Currie says the “secret sauce” is Greggs’ staff — encouraged to form a bond with regular customers — and its prices. Greggs’ coffee, at around $2 a cup, is significantly cheaper than many rivals. On average food prices up 27 percent in Britain from 2021, affordability is key.
The final ingredient is a self-aware sense of humor that Britons love. There are, famously, precisely 96 layers of pastry on the company’s best-selling sausage roll — the 97th may be ironic.
As a brand, Greggs has an almost unifying quality. “Our customers cross all demographics,” said Ms. Currie. And since everything goes to Greggs, expressing sincerity is a way of coding a lack of pretension. Actor Jake Gyllenhaal, not exactly the target market for a Yum Yum, once admitted indulging his Greggs habit on trips to London.
Rather than fight that frisson, the company leans into it. Mr. White described its approach as “not taking ourselves too seriously.” Aware that Greggs, for most, is a “secret pleasure,” he says.
In 2019, professional culture warriors reacted angrily to Greggs’ launch of a vegan sausage roll: television host Piers Morgan spit one out on live TV and described the company as “PC plagued clowns” online. Unlike Mr. Morgan, Greggs didn’t bite. “Oh hello Piers, we’ve been waiting for you,” it wrote on Twitter then. A month later, the chain attributed a 10 percent increase in sales to the vegan roll.
The clothing line, the decision to give British rapper Stormzy a “concierge card” and the silver service bistro have similar winks and nods. These were not taken as a sign that Greggs was elevating its station, but as proof that it was in on the joke.
“We know who we are,” Mr. White said. “We are part of the fabric of the country.”
