Forth Valley College’s Gallery training restaurant has been awarded VisitScotland’s Taste Our Best accreditation once again.
In 2018 the Gallery became the first college training restaurant to be awarded the prestigious award and has further enhanced its reputation by successfully passing a visit by an unannounced secret diner, who critiqued all aspects of the dining experience.
The report from the unannounced diner included the following line: “Something that reflects in a lot of feedback from customers, is that if people didn't know the Gallery was a college training restaurant, they wouldn't actually know and the quality of the food is testament to this.”
Based at the College’s Stirling campus, the restaurant is operated by students in various roles while being supervised by the college’s hospitality team. It is open to the public but as well as preparing quality dishes for its customers, its main priority is to prepare the next generation of chefs and front of house staff for professional life by demanding high standards in a real-life setting.
Students cooking and serving at the restaurant work towards a range of qualifications from City and Guilds to HND level. To find out more about the Gallery and how to book a table visit https://www.forthvalley.ac.uk/the-place/gallery-restaurant/
The anonymous VistScotland critic, continued: “Being open to the public means that the students are benefitting from having the experience of working in a real restaurant environment, which is excellent and I was really impressed with the high quality of the food that the chefs produced and the standard of service and hospitality from the front of house team. I’m pleased to confirm that the Gallery Restaurant has once again achieved the Taste Our Best Award and I wish the students all the best with their future careers in hospitality.”
Iain Calder, FVC’s Hospitality Coordinator, said: “We are delighted to have achieved this award once again, highlighting the high standards of both food and service within the Gallery Restaurant. All of our learners have worked hard to achieve this accolade and we hope that this recognition will continue our success in the future. Well done especially to all the students and staff who worked in the kitchen and on front of house service, on the day in question.”
Diane Creed, Director of Curriculum in FVC’s Department of Creative, Digital and Leisure Industries, said: “We are honoured and delighted to once again be awarded the ‘Taste Our Best’ award. This quality assurance mark gives recognition to restaurants which offer a great choice of quality food while promoting Scottish produce and the best aspects of our tourist and hospitality industries - and this complements perfectly with what we strive to do through our Making Learning Work ethos.
“This award is a great endorsement of the high standards that we strive for each day. To have VisitScotland’s approval through the Taste Our Best award, will no doubt inspire our talented and hardworking staff and current and future students, to improve even further to make the Gallery Restaurant an essential destination for visitors to the City of Stirling, as well as for local people.”