Shambles Kitchen, a unique York-based business which has both a sandwich shop on the Shambles and a burrito smokehouse on the Shambles Market Food Court, has recently branched out with a series of asado themed pop-up events which have proved immensely popular.
With Covid-19 impacting on their wedding catering and events side of the business, Shambles Kitchen have been looking for ways to diversify and try new things whilst also maintaining their existing business at the shop and the Shambles Market Food Court stall.
Holding their first pop-up event on Shambles Market, the team served up a delicious four course Argentinian themed meal, cooked all day using only fire. Using only local produce, the ingredients were sourced from other Shambles Market traders – including Swains Butchers, Cross of York Fishmongers and the fresh vegetable traders. This included a fish, veg and meat courses of cedar plank salmon, rescoldo beetroot and lamb a la crux and a dessert of caramelised peaches and mascarpone.
The event was hugely popular, with the hundred tickets for the two nights selling out in just twenty-four hours. The team worked hard to implement safety measures to ensure social distancing at all times, with a thorough risk assessment taking place. Measures included limiting ticket numbers to fifty to ensure spacing between guests, a table service only system and a safety briefing at the start of each night.
Simon Long, Owner of Shambles Kitchen said, “With the impact of Covid-19 meaning a lot of our wedding catering and events have been cancelled, we were keen to try something new by putting on own events in the city. The idea was inspired by our love of Asado and Argentinian food and wanting to do something a bit different!
We had amazing feedback following the initial event at Shambles Market both about the quality of the food and the overall experience. The safety measures we put in place worked really well so that everyone could just relax and enjoy the evening.
Since the event at Shambles Market we’ve done some further pop-ups as the Sol Ast tipi – continuing with the Argentinian theme on Fridays and also doing Sunday roasts. Both of these have been really popular and it’s been great to see how supportive local people have been of these events. We would love to do more of these at other outdoor venues around the city – so watch this space!”
Russell McCartney, Head of Commercial at Make It York said, “We were delighted for Shambles Market to host such a unique event which had a real community feel. The market is an ideal location for such events and it was great to see local businesses working together – with Shambles Market traders providing the locally sourced produce for the night.
Our market traders and independent businesses all support local jobs – and money spent with these businesses and events supports local families and our city more widely. It’s been particularly pleasing to see residents keen to support their city centre and repay Shambles Market traders who had stayed open during lockdown to serve the city.
Looking ahead we would love to see more of these kind of events taking place at the market – bringing a new audience to the space and supporting local traders and businesses across the city.”
Details of the upcoming Shambles Kitchen events can be found here. In the meantime, you can also visit their sandwich shop on the Shambles and try their new creation – the ‘Guy Fawkes’ – including smoked brisket, blow-torched cheese, gherkins, Shambles Mayo, Sriracha and chipotle gunpowder.
For more information visit www.shambleskitchen.co.uk/ and keep up to date with the latest news on Twitter and Instagram.
