Unlocked and Inspired: August 30, 2023

Forest City Culinary Experiences and Chef/Experience Facilitator Bryan Lavery

Forest City Culinary Experiences and Chef/Experience Facilitator Bryan Lavery

A quintessential entrepreneur, Bryan Lavery is a chef, restaurateur, food writer, experience developer, retailer, Tourism London Board member, and member of a community of tourism innovators. In the most recent issue of the Southwest Ontario Culinary Guide, Blackfriars Bistro identifies as an authentic Farm-To-Table Experience. Specifically, it says, "The cuisine at Blackfriars combines precise technique and skills with quality, hand-selected ingredients. The restaurant supports and depends upon indie farmers, sustainable fisheries, local artisans, and craftspeople for seasonally changing offerings." 

• Why are these values important to you? 

Ethical eating is conscious of our food consumption choices regarding its environmental, social, and industrial impact. Simply, it means that the food we choose must minimize the harm caused to the environment, consumers, farmers, etc. Eating ethics include an essential awareness of farmers' wages, sustainable food production, plant-based alternatives, carbon footprints and biodiversity.  

• Why have you championed Slow Food and local food for so long? 

Thirty years ago, I worked as an Executive chef at a dinner club in Chandler's Ford in Hampshire, England, just as mad cow disease evolved from a cryptic veterinary problem into an epidemic affecting 120,000 cattle. Speculation about mad cow's relationship to Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans had created a state of panic. I realized that I had been naïve to put my confidence in the perceived safety of our food chain. At this time, I became politicized about food security and began questioning our food and farming policies.

A decade later, I was part of a Canadian chefs' contingent to partake in culinary education with seven chefs in the Italian region of Emilia-Romagna. Several founding members of the Slow Food Movement taught us. This journey was my initial introduction to "slow food" and the movement to safeguard authentic regional specialties, traditional techniques and farm-to-table cuisine. On this trip, I had an epiphany about food that boasted of its regional authenticity and became a dedicated proponent of homegrown terroir, "slow food," and culinary tourism.

The main philosophy behind the Slow Food movement envisions a world in which all people can access and enjoy food that is good for them, those who grow and harvest it, and the planet. Our approach to Slow Food at Blackfriars is based on ethical food concepts defined by interconnected principles: good, clean, fair and sustainable. The Slow Food Movement 

encourages critical thinking and actions advocating for preserving time-honoured food practices, traditions, and environmental considerations around food harvesting and processing. Slow Food believes food systems should be environmentally, economically, and socio-culturally sustainable. It should preserve biodiversity and natural resources while generating long-term income for farmers and farm workers and guarantee access to fundamental human rights and well-being. One of Canada's most recognizable expressions of the local food movement is farmers' markets, which are producer-only farmers' markets, not allowing resellers into the mix. 

• Why is this culinary experience essential for the consumer taking part in your culinary experiences? What are they looking for that you can deliver on? 

The gastronomic tasting experiences are essential from a culinary education perspective. One of my goals is to help create a better understanding of gastronomy – capable of linking the politics of eating with farming while helping us consider vital issues such as fair remuneration, sustainability, health, and climate change. It's a way to condense consumer education that has taken my entire career to acquire into a few hours with consumers. 

• What did you take away from the Unlocked and Inspired training that you found relevant and have now applied? 

The training solidified my ability to connect many concepts that I have been thinking about and writing about for a long time. It gave me a professional framework to develop my experiences in a tested and proven methodology. The template is the benchmark for best-in-class experiences. It helps me to marry the conceptual side of tourism experiences with the economic side of these practices, providing a balanced approach for an experience developer. The Experience Planning Template and the 12 ingredients of an experience were game changers for me. It helped with the flow of the experience itself. Celes made himself accessible post-training. He was open to new ideas and continued to adapt the program based on our input. I appreciated that aspect of co-creation. My expertise and experience were acknowledged and valued, too.

• What experiential concepts and experiences have you created in the London area? What are your guests saying about these experiences?

In 2018, in partnership with Chef Thomas Waite of Spruce on Wellington and the In-Home Chef (now owner of Prim Peony Catering) & Chef Brian Sua-an of Reverie, Michelle Pierce-Hamilton of the Tea Lounge, Alieska Robles of the Forest City Culinary Cookbook and Farmer Paul Spence of Thamesville's Culinary Farm, we piloted Planting Seeds for Experiential Tourism.

In 2019, in partnership with Museum London, I helped pilot a scavenger hunt and black box competition experience at the River Room and the Rhino Lounge called Where Gastronomy Meets Art.

In 2019, I was also part of a group of community experience facilitators developing and piloting several new experiences in Old East Village and Downtown London.

We are the 2020 Culinary Tourism Award of Excellence winner for our Forest City Culinary Experiences. The awards are a celebration of success and an opportunity to recognize those who have made significant contributions to Ontario's tourism industry. These awards are jointly presented by the Tourism Industry Association of Ontario, the Ontario Tourism Marketing Partnership Corporation, and the Culinary Tourism Alliance.

Guests said they didn't realize London had such a diverse culinary offering. They say our experiences support team building, creating new bonds and connections with other participants. 

Forest City Culinary Experiences in collaboration with Blackfriars Bistro:

Italian-inspired Gastronomic Tasting Experiences

Slow Food-Inspired Gastronomic Tasting Experiences

Sardinian Gastronomic Tasting Experience

Filipino Gastronomic Tasting Experience

On the Forks Culinary Experience

Covent Garden Market Culinary Experience

Ultimate Forest City Gastronomic Tasting Experience

Blackfriars Bridge Scavenger Hunt & Tasting Experience

In 2023, we have offered a wide range of food and drink-focused walking experiences and gastronomic tasting experiences to mainly corporate clients. Out-of-town guests have mostly booked our Ultimate Forest City Culinary Experience (which is now on hiatus.)

• You have always championed community and business collaboration. What are some crucial considerations in forming alliances that endure? 

Collaboration is more than an opportunity to work towards shared goals with like-minded partners. It supports creating new opportunities and new revenue sources and attracting potential new customers. It's a way to raise awareness and heighten the profile of the collaborating businesses and the community in which they operate. Collaboration often leads to economic spinoffs with current and future potential revenue. Collaborative partnerships are an excellent way to encourage innovation and creativity. When collaborators with diverse cultural expertise, insights and backgrounds come together, it leads to the exchange of unique skill sets and perspectives and a culture of innovation and engagement. Collaboration can result in more innovative ideas, solutions, creative problem-solving and storytelling. Crafting stories of our culinary champions reaffirms the food and beverage industry's strategic role as advocates of change and sustainability.

• How do you market your experiences? How do prospective clients book your experiences? 

Word of mouth has been essential for us. Through Ontario's Southwest, we have been in the Globe and Mail. We are grateful for the support of Ontario's Southwest, Tourism London and Ontario Culinary Tourism Alliance, who have been instrumental in helping us to gain a wider audience for what we do. 

 • What's next?

Last year, we were excited to announce that we completed the audit process with the Canadian Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce (CGLCC), and both Forest City Culinary Experiences and Blackfriars Bistro & Emporio became officially Rainbow Registered. Rainbow Registered is a national accreditation and means that our organization meets stringent standards to ensure LGBTQ+ customers feel safer, welcomed, and accepted. We look forward to continuing our partnership with the CGLCC in the future. Our intention is to further that conversation and incorporate those values in a more high-profile way. We will also work to customize and market experiences for this community. Wouldn't it be incredible to assemble a tour of Rainbow Registered businesses and make them available to the community? 

Whether you are an individual, a start-up, an established small business or a non-profit organization, there can be many challenges and barriers to bringing a new tourism idea, experience or partnership to fruition. I am a member of the "Spark" community of tourism innovators, idea makers, partners and supporters providing mentorship.

I am a board member of Tourism London.

We plan to continue championing diversity, equity and inclusion in our community. When providing culinary experiences, there should be no distinction between immigrant and non-immigrant cuisine. Like its people, what is considered Canadian cuisine is a wide-ranging mix of appropriated indigenous and immigrant cultures, traditions and tastes that have adapted to the people who have immigrated here and call Canada home. At their best, authenticity and cultural exchange are the willingness to respect and value another culture's food traditions. As a food writer and experience provider, I want to encourage more inclusive voices of a diverse restaurant diaspora of immigrants, women, LGBTQ2S+ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer or Questioning, and Two-Spirit Plus) and BIPOC (Black, Indigenous and People of Colour) in our local food media. We recognize that the BIPOC population currently comprises 27% of Canadians who are also travellers and diners with eclectic tastes, and we will find ways to market directly to them. We need to find different ways to write about and collaborate with the restaurant diaspora, immigrant chefs and food spaces that are equitable and inclusive. 

Working with Downtown London BIA, we are developing some Downtown Experiential Trails to adapt these same practices to a more urban setting. Cities also offer a wealth of experiences, and while we don't traditionally think of urban businesses as tourism destinations, we understand that both locals and visitors support these often unique, owner-operated enterprises, and more can be done to create and grow their experiential offerings to attract more customers. Our first offering is a Scratch Bakery and Patisserie trail, followed by a Holiday Traditions trail, which we will dovetail with the Downtown for the Holidays campaign in November and December this year. 

I'm returning to food writing with a column for eatdrink magazine, where I will continue to champion my values and practices, highlighting unique experiences in the local and regional community.

Booking and more information online:  

https://www.forestcityculinaryexperiences.ca/