Local entrepreneurs make bringing home the bacon even easier
Gathering family for a healthy meal can be a chore by the time
grocery shopping, food preparation, cooking and kitchen clea- up is
finished. But two local businesses are taking the hard work out of
dinner when busy schedules take minutes away from mealtime.
The Running Rooster in Hollister and The Dinner A’fare in Morgan
Hill are offering healthy alternatives to other take home dinner
options for San Benito and South Santa Clara County families.
Local entrepreneurs make bringing home the bacon even easier
Gathering family for a healthy meal can be a chore by the time grocery shopping, food preparation, cooking and kitchen clea- up is finished. But two local businesses are taking the hard work out of dinner when busy schedules take minutes away from mealtime.
The Running Rooster in Hollister and The Dinner A’fare in Morgan Hill are offering healthy alternatives to other take home dinner options for San Benito and South Santa Clara County families.
“It’s a trend, whether people are commuting or cooking less and less,” said Jim Chapman, co-owner of the Running Rooster. “A lot of meals are picked up at a convenience store or a grocery store.”
Chapman and his wife, Brenda Black, wanted to offer an alternative to quick meals that would be made with high-quality ingredients that are locally grown and cooked just the way a traditional home-cooked meal would be. The two started with a delivery service in Morgan Hill and Hollister. They partnered with local daycare operators with a program called “Grab and Go.” Parents who placed an order with Chapman and Black by 1 p.m. picked up their meals with their children at day care before ending home.
In October 2004, they started a general delivery and pick-up service in Hollister out of a commercial kitchen. They have expanded to a retail front on San Benito Street where customers can order ahead or simply stop in on the way home from work to pick up a meal.
Home meal replacement, the restaurant industry term for meals that are taken home to be eaten, is nothing new. The National Restaurant Association wrote on the trend in 1996, when a study showed that consumers opted for take home dinners 61 percent more often than they had in 1986.
A 2005 study by the National Restaurant Association found that one-third of consumers use take-out services. More than 50 percent of sit-down restaurants reported an increase in take-out revenue from two years ago.
The most common forms of home meal replacement include fast food take-out, curbside pick-up at sit-down restaurants and supermarket delis. But the Running Rooster and The Dinner A’Fare are distinguishing themselves from other HMRs with unique offerings.
“HMRs have been around since the early ’80s when supermarkets expanded their deli sections,” Chapman said. “But they didn’t have the culinary skills.”
He and Black spent two years researching the industry, using many of the business skills they gathered while working for start-up companies in Silicon Valley.
“What we saw was a lot of low-end quality. Or restaurant take-out was expensive or not easy to get to,” Chapman said. “We saw a place in the middle for people, ordinary working folks, middle income, who drive a long way.”
The Running Rooster offers four to six entrees a day along with side dishes and freshly baked desserts such as jumbo chocolate chip cookies. Each day, the owners and their crew offer wood roasted chicken, Memphis barbecue ribs and lasagna, but other main courses vary throughout the month.
“There is a legacy in America and other countries of traditional meals that are handed down, wonderful recipes,” Chapman said. “We take the time to make it great.”
The owners refer to their comfort food recipes as “heritage” foods and each item is sold a la carte. The roasted chicken, plus a vegetable and mashed potatoes would cost about $6.99 per person for a family of four. Other dishes, especially gourmet items, such as the lamb shanks, are priced higher. All items are chilled and just need to be heated through when customers get home.
Since opening, the couple has found a wide customer base far beyond the busy parents or commuters they expected to see and they plan to expand their retail outlets to other cities within the region.
“We’ve got busy parents, commuters, empty nesters with just one or two people to cook for,” Black said.
They also see people coming to them in times of need.
“We were surprised. It is rewarding to be a service to people at difficult times,” Black said. “When there is a death in the family, sickness or even for a new mom with a new baby.”
The owner of the Dinner A’Fare is appealing to South County residents who want to eat a healthy meal, whether it is an everyday meal or food for a time of need. At the Dinner A’Fare customers save on the shopping, food preparation and clean-up but they put together their own meals for the week.
“It’s a fast pace and most people commute from the San Jose area,” said Pamela Gonzalez, the owner of the franchise that will open Jan. 14. “I’m not the only one in the world who says there’s got to be an easier way to eat something healthy.”
At the Dinner A’Fare, customers sign up for a two-hour “cooking” session where they put together gourmet recipes that have been developed by the company, including chicken marsala with mushrooms, potato crusted salmon or pork tenderloin with mango chutney. All of the ingredients are set up at individual stations, already chopped and ready to be tossed into a ready-to-freeze package.
“This Dinner A’Fare goes by Weight Watchers. Or you can limit salt,” Gonzalez said. “If you don’t like something, you don’t put it in.”
Like the Running Rooster, the Dinner A’Fare ingredients are fresh and delivered every day. The store offers three packages to customers, starting at $140 for six meals with four to six portions. The price can seem hefty, but it comes out to less than $4 per person per meal.
Gonzalez’ nephew, Ken Wright, and his wife Stephanie developed the concept of the Dinner A’Fare in Atlanta, Ga., where they opened their first store in July 2004.
“Sometimes people still like cooking,” Gonzalez said. “They just don’t like figuring out what they are going to cook or what ingredients they need.”
Gonzalez holds two sessions a day and for customers who don’t have two hours to throw their meals together, they can hire a stand-in chef for $35 on some days. At the end of each session, customers take their six or 12 meals home and pop them in the freezer until they are ready to pull them out and cook them.
“It’s very flexible and it can be a supplement during the month,” Gonzalez said. “Some people love cooking, but there are those days when you have to take one child to soccer and another to football.”
For more information:
The Dinner A’Fare, 408-779-7520 16965 Monterey Road, No. 120, Morgan Hill
http://simply-supper.com/
The Running Rooster, 831-634-0135, 800 San Benito St., Hollister http://www.runningsrooster.com/
