"When it comes to delivering the best dining experience to customers, taste is a given. The most important thing is whether that taste is reproduced exactly the same at every Ashley Queens store."
At 10 a.m. on the 7th in the research and development (R&D) room on the third basement level of the E-Land Group Global R&D Center in Gangseo District, Seoul, a member of the Ashley Queens menu development team, asked what matters most in new menu R&D, said, "Even for menus that are complex and labor-intensive, we have to simplify the recipes as much as possible so anyone at the store can make them easily," adding this response.
The E-Land Group Global R&D Center researches and develops so that menus created by chefs can be implemented exactly the same at all 115 Ashley Queens stores nationwide. In addition to menu development, tastings and cooking training are conducted. This space is a restricted area for anyone other than development personnel.
The R&D room is equipped with the same ovens, counters, and utensils as Ashley Queens stores. On the worktable that day sat a bowl of perilla oil buckwheat noodles under development. After about 30 minutes, development team staff tasted the noodles again to check whether the noodles had gotten soggy and whether the flavor had changed compared with right after cooking.
A member of the Ashley Queens menu development team said, "Because the skill level of staff who cook in stores varies, we are simplifying recipes and steps so anyone can achieve a consistent taste," adding, "By nature, buffets cook a large quantity at once and must maintain quality for a set period. We are testing whether taste and form hold over time and finding the optimal time to roll out new dishes."
Ashley Queens is the core brand that accounts for about 70% of total sales at E-Land Eats, the food and beverage (F&B) affiliate of E-Land Group. According to the Financial Supervisory Service's electronic disclosure system, E-Land Eats last year posted sales of 568.5 billion won and operating profit of 45 billion won. Those figures rose 20.8% and 41.1%, respectively, from a year earlier.
Menu development here is closer to designing a system that maintains the same taste at every store. The key is simplicity and standardization. From the development stage, menus are designed to minimize in-store cooking. Afterward, at the CK (preprocessing) plant, ingredients are prepped and some cooking is done to form a semi-finished product. In stores, only the final steps—such as baking or roasting—are performed.
In fact, the Ashley Queens manual specifies measurement standards for sauces and ingredients in ounces (oz) or grams (g). For some ingredients like vegetables and meats, even thickness and length are regulated to be uniform. Cautions during cooking, methods for maintaining quality, cooking times, and holding times are broken down in detail.
A representative menu is lasagna, to be unveiled in May. The product, once sold as an à la carte dish, has been converted for the salad bar, changing the cooking method. In the past, stores had to spread sauce and stack noodles, but now the process is simplified by using par-cooked noodles and a special ragù sauce. In stores, a lasagna block that has gone through preprocessing (frozen and shipped to maintain quality) is thawed, topped with cheese, baked in the oven for about 14 minutes, then cut into bite-size pieces and displayed.
A member of the Ashley Queens menu development team said, "To present lasagna with the same taste and quality at every store, the ragù sauce alone was revised 15 times, and it took one to two months to find lasagna noodles suited to buffet conditions," adding, "Process work for preprocessing also took nearly a month. There were cases where the shape collapsed or the quality changed during logistics and delivery, and solving this took quite a long time."
Behind the emphasis on standardization is high turnover. According to E-Land Eats, Ashley Queens draws about 80,000 to 90,000 visitors per day on weekends. On average, about 800 people visit Ashley Queens per day. In a situation that requires repeatedly cooking large quantities in a short time, simplifying and standardizing processes is essential to present the same dishes, flavors, and quality created by chefs at every store.
Menu development does not end after passing tastings. Staff and part-time workers cook at test stores, and even customer reactions are checked. If cooking is difficult or quality varies during this process, the company's quality and standardization team steps in to modify processes and supplement manuals. After that, in-store cooking methods are conveyed through employee training.
An E-Land Eats official said, "Ashley Queens is a brand that proposes a new dining experience, not simply serves food," adding, "We continue to focus on research, development, and standardization so customers can enjoy the same taste and quality anywhere nationwide."