How a super-affordable bakery chain became a British culinary icon

For most of this bakery’s millions of devotees, the idea that the “Steak Bake” could be “eliminated” lies somewhere between folly and heresy. It brings together beef cubes, gravy and crispy puff pastry in perfect harmony. It cannot be improved, improved or increased. It has already reached its highest form.

Its popularity is a testament to that. The bakery, Greggs, a family chain founded in 1939 to deliver baked goods door to door to mining communities around Newcastle, England, sells hundreds of thousands of them every week, usually to customers who walk into one of their more than 2,300 branches in Britain and take them with them in a paper bag, to eat warm on the go.

Mark Reid and Kieran McBride, from chic Newcastle department store Fenwick, decided to just play with it a bit this autumn.

Mr Reid, the shop’s head chef, and Mr McBride, the director, had about two months to turn Greggs’ menu into a refined bistro experience that would fit easily into Fenwick’s own more refined environment .

Mr. Reid’s idea — pairing the Steak Bake with dauphinoise potatoes and a bundle of fine green beans — was simple, Mr. McBride said. “I think most chefs would have done the same thing,” he said.

What mattered was the final flourish: sprinkling the whole thing with shaved truffle. “We wanted to go one step further,” Mr McBride said.

At first glance, Greggs Bistro, a month-long pop-up restaurant in Fenwick’s flagship branch, seems like an awkward fit. Although both companies have their roots in Newcastle, Fenwick opened there in 1882 as Mantle Maker and Furrier which sells silks and furs, and now has nine stores in Britain – they cover different sides of the market.

Greggs’ goods are designed to be quickly gobbled up by hungry people: for example, the chain sells 130 million sausage rolls every year (priced at an affordable price of 1 pound 20 pence each, about $1.50).

Fenwick, meanwhile, sells brands like Ralph Lauren, Victoria Beckham and Eileen Fisher, and was long home to a French-inspired restaurant with silver service, complete with starched linen tablecloths, tie-clad servers and fine china.

However, both saw a collaboration as an opportunity to blur the lines a bit between what is perceived as high and low culture, to “play with the form and add a bit of irony,” as Mr. McBride put it.

It turns out the mix has a more natural fit than you might think. For example, a Steak Bake works great with shaved truffle. Another Greggs favourite, the seasonal ‘Festive Bake’, filled with chicken, stuffing and cranberry sauce, is accompanied by roast potatoes with duck fat, smoked pancetta, chestnuts and Brussels sprouts, and served under silver cloches that are discarded at the table. Gravy is drizzled by impeccable wait staff.

Even more complicated for Mr. Reid were the desserts. The ‘Yum Yum’, a rolling pin covered in icing, a Greggs specialty, is served with caramel sauce and macadamia brittle, an amount of sugar that, admittedly, might set some people’s teeth on edge.

And the donut – well, the donut was a problem.

Mr. Reid realized that there is no way to play with the innate structure of a doughnut. A donut is also a perfect whole. Instead, the chef tried to capture its essence. With the help of Mother Mercy, a local cocktail bar with a branch in the basement of Fenwick, he made it a success a drink: raspberry, apple and “donut flavour”, supplemented with Prosecco. “It definitely smells like a doughnut,” Mr. McBride said.

The results were spectacular. Reservations at the bistro were sold out and there was a steady stream of walk-ins. The “Pink Jammy Fizz” cocktail has been such a hit that Mr. McBride expects it to appear on the basement bar menu once the bistro closes. “It will have to be done,” he said. “Otherwise people will ask for it.”

That Greggs has transitioned so seamlessly and so successfully to its own tongue-in-cheek version of fine dining should come as no surprise. After all, it has managed to conquer almost every other aspect of British culinary existence.

It now has more branches in Britain than any other fast food restaurant. In many small towns, especially in the north of England and Scotland, it is not unusual to see two Greggs within walking distance of each other.

In addition to space, Greggs has come to dominate time. Roisin Currie, its CEO, proudly claimed it had overtaken McDonald’s this year to become ‘No. 1 for breakfast” in Britain. A number of branches with seating areas have been opened. “We are a food-to-go brand,” Ms Currie said. “But sometimes you just want to sit down along the way.”

A growing number of outlets remain open in the evening, to catch consumers looking for a quick dinner. Greggs’ partnership with the delivery service Just Eat accounted for 5 percent of sales in 2022. The ambition, Ms Currie said, is to meet customers “whenever and wherever.”

In her eyes, this is just the beginning. Greggs may dominate the high street, but there are other areas – airports, industrial and retail parks, hospitals – that feel like they have barely penetrated.

Her goal is to expand further, but she is aware that this comes with a risk. “We are aware that it is dangerous to appear ubiquitous,” Ms Currie said, “but we don’t think we are there yet.”

Britain as a whole seems to agree. Perhaps the most striking aspect of the country’s transformation into sovereign Greggs territory is the extent to which the conquest has been welcomed.

Most of the ubiquitous chains cluttering Britain’s dwindling high streets are at best tolerated, or at worst vilified. Although Greggs has attracted some criticism for its high-calorie products, with more than half of the UK population being overweight or obese, it remains popular.

Last year, Greggs launched several ‘drops’ of branded clothing with retail giant Primark, and they all sold out. At least two documentaries have been made to discover the secrets of the Steak Bake. And during the first UK Covid lockdown, the company shared the recipe online, so robbed customers could make their own.

It is seen as a “crutch, a helping hand, an umbrella on a rainy day,” according to journalist and author Joel Golby. wrote in The Guardian. “If you don’t love Greggs, you don’t love life.”

There are several possible explanations. Greggs brand director Ian White puts it down to nostalgia. “People grew up with Greggs,” he said. “It reminds you of your childhood. You feel like you own it.”

Ms Currie believes the “secret sauce” is Greggs’ staff – encouraged to build relationships with regular customers – and its prices. Greggs coffee is significantly cheaper than many rivals at around $2 per cup. With average food prices in Great Britain increased by 27 percent Since 2021, affordability has been crucial.

The final ingredient is a self-aware sense of humor that British people love. There are, famously, exactly 96 layers of dough in the company’s best-selling sausage roll – the 97th is perhaps an irony.

As a brand, Greggs has an almost unifying quality. “Our customers come from all demographics,” Ms Currie said. And because everyone goes to Greggs, expressing allegiance is a way of encoding a lack of pretension. The actor Jake Gyllenhaal, not exactly the target group for a Yum Yum, has admitted this before indulging in his Greggs habit on trips to London.

Instead of resisting that excitement, the company has bought into it. Mr White described his approach as ‘not taking ourselves too seriously’. There is a realization that Greggs is a bit of a “secret delight” for most, he said.

In 2019, professional culture warriors reacted furiously to Greggs’ launch of a vegan sausage roll: television presenter Piers Morgan spat one out on live TV, describing the company as “PC-destroyed clowns” online. Unlike Mr Morgan, Greggs did not bite. “Oh hello Piers, we were expecting you,” wrote it on what was then Twitter. A month later, the chain attributed a 10 percent increase in sales to the vegan sandwich.

The clothing line, the decision to reward British rapper Stormzy with a ‘concierge card’ and the silver service bistro, it all comes with a similar wink and wink. They are not taken as a sign that Greggs is getting above his means, but as evidence that he is in on the joke.

“We know who we are,” Mr. White said. “We are part of the fabric of the country.”