The Secret Recipe HAM Restaurants Founder, Dom Hamdy, is Using to Build an Empire.

The man behind Bistro Freddie, Crispin, Bar Crispin and Crispin at Studio Voltaire reveals how he’s growing London’s hottest new restaurant group.

The thought of opening a restaurant terrifies me.

London’s deadly competitive landscape kills off up to 60% of all restaurants within their first three years of operation. Despite this, every year the capital is flooded with would-be restauranteurs looking for culinary fortune. All are gutsy and ambitious, few are successful.

Yet, as evidenced by their 100,000+ followers and coverage from Vogue, Financial Times, The Independent and Esquire, four thriving restaurants in London’s brutally competitive dining scene fill their tables every night with the city’s sexiest, chicest and hungriest food fanatics.?

They all have one thing in common: Dominic Hamdy (or Dom, for short).?

Dom, emperor of London’s latest burgeoning gastronomic empire launched his first East London restaurant, Crispin, in 2018 with no investors, business plan or prior restaurant experience… and in his twenties.

Given his roaring success, despite the odds stacked against him, the question is ‘How does the man do it?’.

Today, I’m going to ask him that question.?

He’s agreed to meet me at one of his restaurants, Bar Crispin in Soho, Carnaby Street, to share his secret recipe for thriving in the cutthroat world of big-city restaurants.

Stumbling through Bar Crispin’s emerald green frontage, I’m greeted by a tall bespectacled man, whose Clark Kent-ish looks (must be a tough gig) and broad smile comically contrast my state of Soho-induced fluster.

“Can I get you a glass of wine?” Dom offers without taking a beat. That would be lush, but alas, I’m sober, which feels like sacrilege in the presence of one of London's largest selections of natural, low-intervention wines.

Water placed on the table, we get right into it.?

I: So Mr Hamdy, what’s your secret?

Through his strained winces as I clumsily refer to his collection of 5-star dining spaces as a “chain”, Dom recounts his journey of growing up in the London restaurant scene

D: I really didn’t consider myself business-minded, things just fell into place for us. Starting fresh out of graduation with our scotch egg and cocktail stand, Scotchtails, based in Borough Market which really quickly saw a lot demand. Soon after we were opening brick and mortar venues across London, going strength to strength each year. Now, six years since our first restaurant opened, we have three more and they’re all flying.”

Scotchtails

I: That’s a very humble point of view, but these things don’t just happen by accident. Focusing on the beginning, what do you think made your Borough Market stall so successful?

D: We took inspiration from BubbleDogs, a stand selling champagne and hotdogs, which was crazy busy. Seeing this opportunity to take a product everyone was familiar with and elevating it like they had. We weren’t proper businessmen, but it didn’t matter because the product was fantastic and the street food phenomenon was only just kicking in. So, there was very little competition and we fully rode that wave. At our peak we were selling up to 1,500 scotch eggs a week.

Lundenwick

I: And from there, you graduated your operation into a permanent space with your coffee shop ‘Lundenwicks’. How did you know this had the potential to be a success?

D: I suppose we didn’t know that. Lundenwick came from the discovery of the perfect space. It was central, with high footfall, low competition from other independents and cheap rent. Once we saw the space we knew we could take inspiration from the Copenhagen artisan coffee shops that were beginning to become popular in the UK.

I: So, you didn’t start with the concept in mind?

D: No, and we never do. Lundenwick is like all our restaurants: starting with the venue and from that creating a concept that was fairly nondescript apart from good product in a nice space with friendly staff.

This surprised me, as a lot of the industry works around selling a scalable concept to investors and then finding a venue to fit.?

I: Okay, so if you don’t do it like everyone else, how do you launch a restaurant?

D: We simply focused on hiring the best people we could afford, sourcing the very best ingredients and working our way back from there. The restaurant’s concept evolved from those key pillars. It wasn’t like “here’s a concept, let’s sell that to an investor and find a venue and ingredients that fit the financial expectations”

Crispin

In 2018 Dom launched his first restaurant, Crispin. And, as Crispin really began to blow up, cementing his future as a restaurateur, he sold Lundenwicks.

I: What was the watershed moment though that took Crispin from a nice restaurant to something loved by everyone??

D: Strategically we saw major success once we managed to attract both lunchtime and dinner crowds, even though they wanted very different things. It’s challenging building different audiences for those different offerings. But the real winner is when you build a customer base who wants every element you do, the diners come in for breakfast and vice versa. Then you’re onto a winner.

I: In hindsight, was this when you began to really solidify a secret recipe for repeatable restaurant success?

D: Correct. On top of cracking lunch and dinner offerings, we kind of discovered a winning formula for the Crispin brand: small plates paired with natural low intervention wines - which it seems like everyone’s doing now, but at the time this was another wave that we jumped on early.

Bar Crispin, Bistro Freddie & Voltaire

I: Bar Crispin opens and now you’re officially a ‘restaurant group’. What allowed this transition to be successful rather than a distraction?

D: I believe the secret to sustainable long term success in a restaurant portfolio is having a diverse portfolio of different brands that share key similarities in terms of concept but manage to maintain their own individuality.

For example, Bar Crispin is an extension of the Crispin brand, but we introduced a wider drinks menu and a more experimental food menu. Bistro Freddie is a more timeless restaurant concept with hearty food fit for sharing and a classic interior. Our most recent project, Crispin at Studio Voltaire takes our winning formula of produce-focused dishes with modern takes on British and European classics but in this incredible working art gallery. The artists come in everyday to eat and the dishes are affordably priced

The Secret Recipe

It appears that Dom has the Midas touch where every small venue, mid-market eatery he starts turns to edible gold leaf. Yet, it’s clear he has a very uncomplicated view on achieving this success.

I: Okay, break it down for me, what should be the core focus for any burgeoning restaurant?

D: Always start with a great venue, then understand what concept makes sense for that space. Focus on hiring the best people you can afford with different perspectives and experiences. Doing that specifically has been a big turning point in the businesses success. Then, simply source the very best ingredients. From there it’s no more complicated than dedicating yourself to sustainable daily improvements across the whole business.

I: But, many restaurants have tried and failed with similar strategies. You clearly have an edge. I’m going to be blunt, why do you think your restaurant thrives while other restaurants fail??

D: We don’t have investors and never have. In the first two years of Crispin, if we had investors with expectations of revenue and profitability, they’d have pulled the plug. But we were working on the floor itself and had total belief that the business would work, we just needed to make X number of tweaks to get there.

D: We’ve never really had a defined end goal in mind. We knew what we’ll be doing in five months, but five years from now, not so much. This gives us creative freedom and this is why we’ve never taken investment. We value this freedom to grow the business incrementally and don’t want to be tied to a concept that an investor has bought into. So many investor-led venues almost force a vibe and it’s too box fresh. It’s extremely hard to build something authentic when there’s pressure from investors.

I: And what’s next for HAM Restaurants?

D: Bistro Freddies marked a true change of direction for the group, so we’re looking for the next venue to continue this more timeless route. This will likely be somewhere larger that will allow us to explore new dishes. Groups like Corbin & King, JKS and MJMK being my key inspirations for this next phase.”

I’ll admit it, I do secretly fantasize about opening a low-key-glam-artsy-restaurant that East London meme pages would satirise and chi chi crowds would fill out every weeknight. And Dom’s common sense approach may almost convince me. Yet, it’s clear that in the 10 years since the emperor flogged his first scotch egg, he’s worked his fingers to the bone to build the HAM empire.

Common sense prevails, I snap out of my culinary daydreams and check for the nearest Lime bike back to Waterloo where I belong. The tappy-tappy of computer life beckons me. I’m quite happy sitting on this side of the kitchen.

The bill, please!

—?

Dom’s Top Three Restaurants Recommendations

“Brawn on Columbia Road is really nice, French house in SoHo and Kiln, also in Soho. I think that’s a nice spread.”