Industry expert: Feeding the forces

Alasdair Cairns, food services manager for Sodexo at Colchester Garrison, outlines how his team created a first-of-its-kind authentic gurkha curry menu...

As contract caterers, understanding our customer needs, responding to insight and coming up with innovative ideas, exciting menus and appealing dishes is central to everything we do. Integral to this is a drive to develop our knowledge and experience of a broad range of cultural cuisines. Researching ingredients, following authentic recipes and offering traditional dishes improves diner satisfaction and can be rewarding exercises for chefs, who can flex their food knowledge and broaden their culinary craft.

We have recently seen a positive example of this at Colchester Garrison. In May 2022, the catering team at the base was given notice of the arrival of a company of gurkha soldiers, who would be deploying to the 13 Air Assault Support Regiment (13AASR).

Across Sodexo’s military contracts in the UK, we are already acutely in tune with the need to cater well for the growing number of personnel from different ethnic and cultural backgrounds. It has become an integral part of our ethos to improve the whole ‘lived experience’ on base. Providing a taste of home for the regiment – gurkha food options every evening in our Junior Ranks Diner – was one way that we have enhanced this experience.

Initial conversations with 13AASR centred around their desire for the dishes to be cooked by gurkha chefs, something we were delighted to support, but that raised one fundamental practical question. How could we ensure there was no break in service if the gurkha chefs were called out on exercise? We needed to work with the regiment to provide a solution that would ensure we could serve a delicious dish to the soldiers night after night; for our own team to create a delicious, authentic menu that would surprise and delight our diners during their stay at Colchester.

The operations team sprang into research mode and began to source all the produce and traditional ingredients. There were a few challenges along the way, such as not having wholesale gurkha curry products available to order in, but the team overcame this and worked in collaboration with 13AASR regiment’s gurkha chefs to create the recipes together.

Over a series of weeks, each curry dish went through five stages of refinement and tasting, with 13AASR gurkha chefs providing feedback throughout the development. We also invited other members of the regiment to taste-test the menu as objective critics.

The results were overwhelmingly positive, and we believe the gurkha menu is the first of its kind in the UK; an authentic cook/chill gurkha curry. Each evening, one of our recipes replaces an existing core meal and the option includes a main course, basmati rice, a side of dahl and a whole bird's eye chilli – a cultural norm in Nepal.

The new menu has not only been hugely popular with the gurkha regiment, but it has appealed to the tastebuds of others at the garrison, plus contractors and civilians, improving the lived experience for all, with extremely positive feedback from the military. Captain Aidan Millard from SO3 Log Support said that “it was a privilege to sample the dishes and wonderful to learn of the success of an excellent collaboration. The lived experience for not just the gurkhas, but other soldiers as well, will be significantly improved by this.”

Now, six months after launch, gurkha curries make up 40% to 50% of all evening meal sales. This success has prompted our team to look to expand on the range, adding side dishes and more dry dishes to the menu. We are also developing a function menu.

Our chefs have enjoyed the challenge, learning new techniques and exploring the traditional tastes of the gurkha chefs. It has been a rewarding collaboration for everyone involved, delivered with the pride and passion that gurkhas are renowned for.

You may also be interested in…