Le Gourmet Café
A café concept born from Le Gourmet Burger’s Middle East expansion, developed into standalone cafés with their own identity, menu, and operating systems.
More than a dessert menu
The original burger restaurant had a simple dessert offering: brownies and vanilla ice cream. The larger restaurant format gave us room to take that further.
As we began franchising Le Gourmet Burger and developing the concept for the Middle East, we saw an opportunity to broaden the dessert offering and introduce a café experience. What started alongside the burger business became Le Gourmet Café, a separate concept that also operated as standalone cafés.
Learning, sourcing, and building
I visited food trade shows across Europe, the Middle East, and North America to develop the offering and find suppliers. That work brought together Portuguese nata pastries, English sticky toffee pudding, Belgian waffles, German croissants, and cookies from the United States.
I also took gelato courses in Milan and Palermo, and we ended up sourcing our gelato ingredients from Palermo. The aim was to build a broader coffee, pastry, and dessert menu, supported by the production processes, equipment, and operating systems needed to deliver it.
From restaurant extension to standalone cafés
We also developed a breakfast menu, with hot breakfast dishes, breakfast burgers, and waffles.
Le Gourmet Café carried the same attention to product and experience as Le Gourmet Burger, with its own logo and identity. Developing it meant working across the concept, menu, suppliers, production, and operations, so it could stand on its own as a café business.
A selection from Le Gourmet Café: breakfast plates, pastries, coffee and desserts.