The French Village Food Hall is now cooking up a storm

The recently opened French Village Food Hall on Belfast’s Lisburn Road is Ashley’s brainchild and is designed to build on the growing trend towards home cooking due to the coronavirus lockdown.

Ashley (35), managing director of French Village, has pivoted the popular restaurant into a spacious and well-stocked food hall which now stocks the best of locally produced food and drink from artisans and farms here with a wide variety of fresh foods such as lasagne, quiche, pies and sausage rolls and premium baked goods from his company.

“The decision to create the new food hall is the outcome of the lockdown which unfortunately halted our catering and restaurant businesses. It’s also a response to strong growth in home cooking which has produced a demand for quality ingredients for meals,” Ashley says. “Another important influence was the success of the call and collect and delivery services we introduced when our restaurants in the city were shuttered.”

The company successfully launched a fry-pan pizza kit during the lockdown for delivery or call and collect.

Ashley was also impressed by the “stunning growth” in artisan food production here, he continues “I’ve been watching the development of this important sector for a couple of years. There’s a vast variety of high quality food now being produced locally, products which deserve even greater support and recognition. It’s now an immensely exciting sector. Younger consumers, in particular, are increasingly buying artisan produce from local suppliers because of the quality, low carbon food print and traceability. The food is fresh, nutritious, wholesome and safe.”

In addition, he chose to transform the Lisburn Road premises from a restaurant into the food hall because of the age profile in shoppers in the area.

“We’ve seen a high proportion of shoppers in the food hall in their late twenties and thirties. The food products include fresh vegetables and fruit along with the artisan produce. Shoppers can also purchase convenient meals prepared by our team of chefs on-site to enjoy at home. And there are hot snacks and pastries they can eat at a tables in the store or on the large patio outside. The food hall is proving very busy all the time now.”

Ashley intends to continue the delivery service of breads, cake and pastries launched during the lockdown for customers.

“The food hall is so successful that I can’t see a return to its previous role as a restaurant,” he says. “I fear it will be many months before the restaurant scene here fully recovers from the lockdown and social distancing requirements. There’s a big fear that further outbreaks of coronavirus and lockdowns could again impact the sector. There will always be a role, however, for quality and specialist food retailing.”

He’s also been encouraged by the enthusiastic response from local artisans to the food hall’s emphasis on and presentation of food and drink produced here.

“I’ve met some really inspiring local companies with marvellously tasty and original products. I look forward to working with them in marketing and selling their outstanding products,” he continues.

The DIY home pizza kit launched during the lockdown, he says, proved to be “an outstanding success” and the pizzas are still available for delivery and can now be purchased in the food hall. Ashley, who had to postpone his marriage plans to next May because the lockdown, took over the family bakery, now based at Montgomery Road in east Belfast, from his father in 2005.

The company now employs almost 300 people as a result of his focus on smart ideas and his willingness to invest in innovation and the development of talented people.

Starting as a chef specialising in bread and patisserie, Ashley has vast experience in running a successful bakery. He’s never been afraid to move the business in different directions such as event catering and now specialist food retailing.

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