Development

From planning to plate the Product Development team are the lifeblood of apetito, drawing together departments from all over the business, to ensure our dishes are consistently as tasty and healthy they can be - all within the confines of our strict specifications for varying, and often vulnerable markets.

With a dedicated New Business Development Team, headed by Pam Jones, apetito remains at the forefront of the industry, identifying new business and market opportunities and establishing whether a need exists for new markets or products to take the business forward.

In the kitchen, Phil and Shiva brainstorm, identifying new concepts and flavours to see what might work and have mileage. With their combined talent and culinary inspiration they are often given open briefs for new dishes - drawing together concepts from what's appearing in both retail and restaurants, recurrent trends and identifying what will work for the format.

But whether working from scratch or to a detailed brief, the dish must be bursting with the flavour notes detailed in the description, considering seasonality and anticipating the taste preferences of the customer.

In Phil's own words "We work to challenge what we do all the time, and are actively benchmarking ourselves at a higher scale, on a par with top end retail outlets for real quality dishes".

Phil and Shiva's combined, practical understanding of food, its provenance and the importance of flavours, be they regional, the inclusion of a local wine in a dish, or the increasing use of British meats throughout the Select range, means we're producing dishes with a difference.

apetito and its culinary creations are on a journey - and this changing philosophy towards food should filter down to the customer base, and it is important to continue to innovate and meet changing consumer expectations as well as satisfy their needs.

"We're proud of what we do and we want to shout about it", says Phil, "our strength lies in our honesty and our ‘foody' philosophy and policy. And we're not just concerned with new meals - working for an elderly market we champion evolution, not revolution, be it improving sauces or sourcing cleaner ingredients."

There is a continual drive to investigate new ingredients and deliver cleaner, healthier, tastier products to the consumer - reflecting our passion to provide great food, every day. This is achieved through the strong relationships the team foster with suppliers, missing out the middle man and leaving no doubt about our needs, setting a high benchmark to meet Phil's exacting expectations.

"We're creating a strong food culture and I'm passionate about delivering it. There's more to my role than creating a dish and I relish the challenge and constraints that come with the territory.

"From concept, testing and assessing customer need and profile, to amending packaging and sourcing tastier cuts, I have a hand in every area of the approval process - and I'm quite hard to please!"

Once a meal is created, the dish is presented to our Purchasing and Technical teams to assess the feasibility of it passing through Manufacturing. It takes years of experience to translate a dish for production in the factory, and that's where Process Technologist Nora acts as a link between Manufacturing and concepts, to develop a product and ensure it meets targets such as wastage, price and consistency through production trialling.

With a strong working knowledge, together with help from Phil and Shiva, Nora knows how to make an idea feasible for the factory, eliminating inefficiencies in the production process and, critically, making sure our quality standards are delivered in the factory.

Liaising with all areas of the business, the journey from plate to production is not as simple as it seems but a group effort on all sides. Development Technologists Peter, Charlotte and Vicky assess how viable the meal is, whether it will meet our nutritional standards, varied dietary coding to suit our customer base as well as working alongside Purchasing and TAYGO to source and approve the high quality ingredients required and estimate usage, minimum orders and lead time.

Catering to their individual markets the trio assist Nora in trials to ensure meals are safe, feasible for production, the freezing and regeneration process, and to ensure it meets expectation and its brief in terms of diet coding and cost, as well as checking out the competition and evaluating the market.

Coordinating with Manufacturing and Marketing to produce recipe cards, PI sheets and meal photography, they set the standard and spec the product, but it isn't just new meals apetito lavishes with such attention.

With a strong team relationship, the three work alongside the chefs, re-evaluating recipes for nutritional content and to ensure it hits the all-important flavour profile, and playing an active part in the complaints process to address any issues that could lead to redevelopment.

Even without the pressures of concocting a new range the building is always a hive of activity, with the team always looking into ways to better hundreds of our dishes in a bid for continuous improvement - be that flavouring, accompaniments, cleaner ingredients or recently lowering salt content, experimenting with herbs and seasonings to attain the same taste and perfect our comprehensive diet coding.

The diversity of the team and the experience and qualities that are brought to the table ensures Development works as a multifunctional department on a large scale. Each member possesses a unique function, but coordinates as a team, to create, innovate and ensure consistency and efficiency in the manufacture of our products, and manage risk assessment and food safety for our customers.

It's a big job, but size is of no object at Team apetito - our staff are dedicated experts in the industry - and it shows.