W Coffee Talk Acting General Manager Alistair Minty: "We want people to leave feeling very engaged that they want to come back again"

For the interview, I was welcomed to the Presidential suite, a signature suite, where many presidents like Nicolas Sarkozy, Jacques Chirac stayed. Because when the hotel was first open, this floor was for Consulates. It has a separate elevator coming up here for private access, and welcomes very few guest to stay. This is one of the biggest presidential suites in the city. This is where Alistair Minty, Acting General Manager of Sofitel Saigon Plaza shares his inspiring thoughts on Vietnamese cuisine as well as vision on enhancing the guest experience at the hotel.

With experience working in Europe, Korea, Japan, Dubai and now Vietnam, how is Vietnamese cuisine compared to the markets you have worked in? 

Vietnamese cuisine is globally getting awareness now. I think people are now a little bored of Thai, Indonesian, and Malaysian cuisine. They have had it for many years. But Vietnamese is very new for them. 

One of the interesting things about Vietnamese cuisine is extremely diverse. Regional cuisine, from North, Central to South, is actually very varied. Once people have a deeper understanding of those foods in different regions, they realize how vast everyone’s misconception is. Phở is national dish of Vietnam but actually Bún Bò Huế is much more popular. 

Vietnamese food is extremely healthy. Western cuisine, like French or European cuisine, has butter, cream, and oil. So a lot of those can be a little bit unhealthy at times. But Vietnamese people are extremely healthy. The obesity rate in Vietnam is extremely low. Vietnamese people don't over consume food. The portion size is appropriate. 

Secondly, you're blessed with amazing herbs in Vietnam. There's a lot of variety, giving a lot of flavor. So it's a very lighter style of the cuisine, very healthy, like an infusion of herbs. Vietnam has an influence of French cuisine. Bánh mì is like baguette coming from French cuisine. There's lot of different roots from French cuisine.

Now people talk about Michelin. This is a good thing for Vietnam, because it brings more global awareness and recognition. I think now Vietnam finally gets a great recognition for the food, but it has it. And it just started in the last few years. Michelin helped push up the awareness and also the level as well. 

There's certainly more like fine dining or refined dining and concepts coming into the market. More experimental. People try new cuisine or new restaurants.

Even our chefs here want to go abroad to learn in France, Italy or other foreign countries to get training from professional chefs. Definitely chefs are getting more motivated to learn. Not just a job. Thay have passion now and they see the influence that Vietnamese cuisine has grown globally. Vietnamese cuisine will continue to grow and grow for years and years.

With extensive experience in charge of the hotel's F&B department, how does this factor contribute to the overall experience of guests at the hotel, from your point of view?

I've been very fortunate to work in Tokyo, Japan. Actually, Tokyo has more Michelin stars than Paris. Japanese F&B hospitality is very precise, very detailed, oriented, and extremely organized and service focused. It really focuses more on a proactive approach. In the sense of before even the customer coming to the restaurant, or to the bar, what are all the steps in advance we need to consider? There's a lot of detail and thinking. So I think those kinds of facets, which I've learned in Japan, certainly help a lot. When we do specialized events, we try to focus more on the details, the smell, the touch, the feel, all of those elements really have a big bearing. 

We've also tried to elevate the F&B experience in the property. ST25 by KOTO is a great example. One keyword here is “purpose". What is the purpose? When I first came here, we had a beautiful seafood buffet. But every hotel has a seafood buffet. So what's special? We need to rethink what we do in the hotel. 90% of our guests are foreigners. Only 10% are Vietnamese. When you go to Paris, you try French food. When you go to Rome, you try Italian food. It's very simple. And just having Vietnamese food is not enough. The purpose is KOTO. KOTO helps underprivileged Vietnamese youth, giving them a second chance in life. And being able to contribute as a consumer, is a very strong, powerful and meaningful message. All 20 staff who graduated from KOTO were employed by Sofitel. They have a bright future, a chance to work in one of the best five-star hotels in Ho Chi Minh city. KOTO is how we reinforce the message to the consumer that we are making a real difference.

Another great one is working with Robin Mouquet, a very talented French pastry chef in Boudoir Lounge. One of our keywords is French zest, which means the passion and quality for taste, and everything in life. We try to create a new experience for the guest. What is your purpose for coming to Boudoir Lounge? You come for amazing fine French desserts from an amazing award-winning pastry chef Robin worked before with Pierre Hermé, Pierre Gagnaire, and Alain Passard. All amazing top Michelin chefs. We do a collaboration together to really bring a new dimension to the hotel.

It's the 6th Saigon Gourmet Week. What makes this year's edition different from the previous ones?

We have more Michelin chefs than previous years. The total number was the most with 14 chefs. This year, we had five Michelin chefs, one from Saigon, two from Bangkok and two from France. I guess the most varied as well, the different Taiwanese chefs and Japanese, Thai, French, Danish chefs and Thảo Na,  Vietnamese chef. The real difference is the more diverse approach of different cuisines. People could eat French at the core. And around the core, we had chefs from different nationalities that could contribute different angles for the event. 

This year for Sofitel was our 60th anniversary globally. So one of the key concepts was diamonds and stars dinner. So for the diamond anniversary for Sofitel, we bring the Michelin stars in. It was a unique gala dinner, having so many Michelin chefs cooking for that one, and celebrating 60 years of Sofitel globally.

We do some new concepts this year. One of the adventures is our French Japanese. Two Japanese chef, two French chefs combined the opening dinner on the first night with artistic harmony. Female chefs are welcomed, good for diversity and encourage more female chefs to come and join their talent in different ways.

How does Saigon Gourmet Week contribute to the vibrant culinary scene of HCMC?

It helps bring more global awareness and it also brings to the Vietnamese community within Ho Chi Minh city. Because probably, around 70% to 80% of our guests were Vietnamese. It helps showcase what are the new and innovative chefs that want to come to Vietnam and learn more about the cuisine. 

By joining one of the cooking classes, they could be able to learn to cook with the Michelin-star chef. It also gives more expertises, even for our chefs in Sofitel Saigon Plaza. They are so motivated and learn many new techniques and skills from such talented Michelin chefs coming in, the flavor composition which works well with each one. It helps bring all of these elements up to the next level. 

Gathering up to 14 chefs with 8 diverse experience sessions from cooking class to live interactive brunch concept, when did the preparation for this event start? What difficulties and successes did it achieve?

We've been planning for one year. We paid for the chefs to come in, to really help create a big buzz about this growing week. Having 14 chefs is really a big challenge but a very positive one.

The first challenge is probably communication. Because we have some chefs from Thailand, some from France. So two of the French chefs could speak very, very basic English. So we have to go from English to French to Vietnamese. Sometimes we go from English to French to Japanese. 

I speak English, intermediate Japanese and basic French. I can’t speak Vietnamese. So it's sometimes a little bit of communication.  We need like translator. For example, our sous Chef, chef Tùng speak English, Vietnamese and French as well, so he can help on French side. I help on the Japanese side, so sometimes we have to go from Japanese to French to Vietnam. Like in the press conference, we need to make sure that much of Vietnamese but sometimes the chef answered French, so we have to go from French to English, then English to Vietnamese.

Sometimes the chef wants to serve a very specialized product. A lot of the chefs wrote their menu before they came to Vietnam. But once they come to Vietnam and they try some new item, they remove and change to use that item. I rêmember chef Vanessa from Taiwan. She wanted to use some like peach or sweet fruit, but she decided  to change to the Hanoi plums. She tried it when she arrived and said “this will really balance well. So sorry Mr. Minty, we need to change the menu again". When chefs come here, maybe they want to order duck from France. We cancel that and use Vietnamese duck as much better. The volume is a little bigger and more tender. If we bring the duck from France, maybe it comes frozen, because it takes like one day to come here. So it can not be fresh. But of course, the Michelin-star chef never tried Vietnamese duck so he doesn't know. So yeah, when he tastes it “this is amazing. Let's change again". So we changed the menu. 

Could you share some spectacular numbers on the events? 

Five of the events were sold out. The other three events were like 80%, just a few tables remaining. Certainly, for all the dinners, we were sold out, which was fantastic. I think we did close to 400 covers, over the 8 events. Two lunches, two cooking classes, two dinners, one gala dinner and one brunch. Plus a press conference of 35 people. so that was very positive that we could also get the media involved and get that awareness. 

What is your vision or plan to enhance the guest experience at the hotel?

The focus is on two things, one is purpose and two is experience. We want people to leave feeling very engaged with the brand of Sofitel that they want to come back again. So we need to create those unique experiences for our guests. Whether that is Saigon Gourmet Week, art exhibition or wine dinner. A really essential purpose is that people want to come here for those unique events or unique purposes in the city. The vision is to create those unique experiences and a distinct purpose. The more and more we do, the more and more we evolve ourselves. We have the opportunity to really get more traction in the city.

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