Award winning Cumbrian butchers sees huge benefits of installing Rational cooking systems
The last couple of years have illustrated the importance of being able to adjust your business as circumstances change. Modern technology like Rational’s cooking systems give businesses the ability to respond to new situations and the flexibility to stay one step ahead of the issues they face.
Based in the small Cumbrian town of Grange-over-Sands, since opening in 1983 Higginsons has established a reputation and won a range of awards for its locally sourced meat and its freshly made products. The tourists who visit Grange have helped them to develop a mail order business for customers far beyond the town itself, thanks to its award-winning products such as Cumberland sausages and pies.
Replacing old appliances with two multifunctional cooking systems has had dramatic effects on energy usage at Higginsons. “With prices soaring at the moment, the potential for Rational cooking systems to help us bring our energy consumption down has become very appealing,” says Mark Porter, General manager at Higginsons. “Now we’re only cooking when we need to – with the pressure-cooking option, the iVario Pro can cook pie filling in 90 minutes compared to four hours on the gas stoves, it’s a massive difference.”
Mark started working at Higginsons in 1994 at the age of 14 and has seen the industry change a lot in that time. When the pandemic hit in 2020 he had to find new ways to adapt and thrive. “Grange is a small rural town, and lockdown meant that there were no tourists,” he says. “We looked for ways to serve our local customers better by widening our range of ready meals for delivery, but we quickly reached the limits of what we could do with our old kitchen.”
The kitchen at Higginsons is in the basement, which means space is at a premium and presents issues with ventilation. “The heat from the gas hobs was always a big challenge for us,” says Mark. “We would have twelve burners going constantly for eight hours a day, which was OK in winter but miserable in summer!”
Seeking ways to increase productivity, Mark wanted to invest in the latest cooking systems. “Rational have a great reputation,” says Mark. “We were looking for something that would help us to do more and reduce cooking times.”
He worked with Lakes Catering Maintenance and Adam Binks, Rational’s regional sales manager, to identify the right systems for Higginsons. “On average we prepare 1000 pies and sausage rolls a day, as well as roasting joints and preparing ready meals, so we need a wide range of cooking processes.”
Getting both an iVario Pro and iCombi Pro was the ideal solution. Their iVario Pro L has a 100-litre capacity pan and is capable of boiling, searing, frying and deep frying, sous vide and pressure cooking. “The iVario Pro has simplified the way we make our pies enormously,” says Mark. “We can sear the meat in it, then we can add liquid and other ingredients into the pan and pressure cook it to perfection in a fraction of the time it took with gas burners.”
The shorter cooking times of the iVario Pro are made possible by the powerful iVarioBoost heating system. Specially designed ceramic heating elements enable the pan base to heat up to 200°C in less than two and a half minutes and maintain any required temperature precisely. “The iVario Pro lets us prepare batches of meat of up to 50kg at once. It can just get on with it and only alert staff when something needs to be done, which means they can get on with other stuff and not have to constantly monitor it to ensure we get the right results,” says Mark.
Once the filling has been cooked the pies are finished in the iCombi Pro. “The way the iCombi can control the cooking climate is amazing,” says Mark. “It lets us get the pastry golden and crispy, time after time, but it’s also great at making succulent joints of meat.” Preparing joints of meat requires precise control over the cooking processes. “The key to roasting meats is cook them slow, then cook them fast,” explains Mark. “Cook them slow to make sure they stays moist, then give them a blast of heat at the end to get them nice and brown. The iCombi Pro gives us great results time after time, improving the yield. Plus, with the automatic programs, anyone can set it going. We used to need one person dedicated to cooking meat, but the iCombi handles it all now.”
The level of control in both the iVario Pro and iCombi Pro are made possible by the iCookingSuite ‘intelligent assistant’ technology. This allows operators to select their desired results from fully customisable recipes via the intuitive touchscreen menu. Powerful sensors in both systems precisely regulate and adjust the cooking conditions throughout the process to ensure those results are delivered every time. “Adam showed us how easy it was to set up and alter recipes,” says Mark. “It’s so simple to use, it lets us get our products exactly how we want them.”
The efficiency of Rational systems is helping Higginsons to become more sustainable both in terms of energy use and increasing yield, as well as helping it to navigate the staffing issues currently facing the industry. “It’s been difficult for everyone to find good staff at the moment, but the iVario Pro and iCombi Pro mean that fewer staff can do much more work,” says Mark. “It also helps to attract younger staff into the profession – seeing that we have modern multifunctional cooking systems, that will save them time and make the work easier, is a big draw for them.”
Further increasing time savings, Rational’s ConnectedCooking system lets Mark and his team add or tweak recipes from a computer, as well as automatically recording HACCP data. “Not having to do the paperwork is another big plus for us, while giving us peace of mind that we have full, precise records for everything we do,” says Mark.
Mark’s favourite timesaving feature on the iCombi Pro is the iCareSystem, the combi oven’s self-cleaning function. “Nobody enjoys cleaning, so being able to pop in a couple of tablets at the end of the day and knowing it’ll look like new in the morning is fantastic,” says Mark. “It saves us hours every week and while cleaning the iVario Pro isn’t automatic, the non-stick pan and the curved edges means it only needs a quick wash and a wipe and it’s ready to go right away.”
The support and training provided by Rational was enormously important for Higginsons. “They’ve been with us every step of the way, from showing us how quickly we would repay their investment with the energy savings, to checking both systems could fit down the stairs to the basement, and making sure we were confident programming and using them,” says Mark. “It’s been great knowing that we can pick up the phone and ask Adam and the team anything at any time, too.”
Mark’s advice to anyone considering Rational cooking systems is to take a look at what they can achieve. “High street butchers are becoming rarer, but what we do here – offering pre-prepared food and finding ways to go beyond what butchers have traditionally been – has been made much easier with the iVario and iCombi Pro. There might be cheaper alternatives, but they don’t last and they’re not as flexible – Rationals are solid, they just keep going!”
Mark is sure that Rational is going to play an important role in Higginson’s future. “We’re looking to be the future of UK butchery,” he says. “It’s why we’re investing in the future, not just by training apprentices but by getting systems in place that let us change as circumstances around us change. We’re already planning on getting two more iCombi Pros in the next twelve months, and that’s just the beginning!”