Notorious Street food full interview on the Clipper Quay.
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00:00My name's Keele McCourt. I'm the owner of Notorious Street Food A&A, soon to be Notorious Street Food and Clipper Quay.
00:09Let's just make some good food for some good people.
00:13Tell me about Clipper Quay. When was it announced? It was announced not that long ago that you're finally getting inside and you're going to be joining a bunch of other businesses.
00:22Can you tell me what it was like when you first got that call being offered the opportunity?
00:26Well, Dean and Connor called in the van, me and Christy were in here cragging on as we usually do and they approached us.
00:33And they asked, they pitched this idea about a street food market in Derry.
00:38And I just loved it, loved the idea of it, loved it. I thought it was a really cool concept.
00:43I travel all around the UK, maybe as often as I can, I don't know, maybe not as much at the minute, but as often as what I would like at the minute.
00:51Going to different street food markets, it's always something I thought we needed here in the city.
00:56And then when I found out about it, it just caught me instantly.
01:01I didn't even know much about it, I just thought, if there's a street food market coming here I'm going to be part of it.
01:05Stood away, yes. Stood away, yeah, just no problem.
01:08Does it feel deserved? Oh aye, oh aye, oh aye.
01:11I've worked my ass off since I was 15 years of age for what I have right now and I'll never let it go.
01:17What is it that you think makes the tour worthy of being in a location like Athens, not one of the main walks of Derry?
01:26You're going to be in people's eyes now for years to come.
01:30What makes us feel like we're deserving?
01:33We've worked our ass off to get to where we are right now.
01:39This place started off in a food van.
01:42I spent every penny I had to buy that van.
01:45It started off in a car park and we've had a lot of people now come through our doors.
01:49We don't cut corners, we don't cut cost, we don't cut quality.
01:52We're honest. Anybody who comes here will tell you that you come here and you're always getting a laugh or a vibe.
01:58You're just seeing a couple of honest people who are just trying to make an honest living selling good food.
02:03And it seems to be working.
02:06We're serving Derry heads through and through.
02:09Is that important to you to be a Derry chef?
02:12Of course, this city made me who I am.
02:21If it wasn't for the people of Derry I wouldn't be where I am.
02:24There's no business in this town that would be where I am.
02:27Only people of Derry stand behind you and they really try to give you a turn.
02:30I try to support local where I can and give local businesses my hard-earned money.
02:35The same way people come to get mine.
02:37I would never want somebody to come in and earn a wage as hard at the minute for everybody.
02:42I don't want somebody working all week and they get a Saturday night takeaway.
02:46They get frozen food floating in their face and sent on their way.
02:49I want them coming knowing that I really appreciate your support.
02:53I appreciate your customer and I hope you appreciate the hard work I put into this.
02:58I would say it works a lot.
03:00I would say that you are very much appreciated.
03:02What's it like feeding that appreciation from customers and the people of Derry in general?
03:07Unbelievable. Absolutely mind-boggling.
03:11I don't care about money. I don't care about money.
03:15Money comes and goes.
03:17I care about what the food I put in it did.
03:21How people are really talking to it and appreciating it.
03:24They understand what I always wanted to do.
03:27They made my dream come true and I'll be very grateful.
03:30I'll always be indebted to the people of Derry for what they've done for me.
03:34How do you both create a meal that for you as a chef is satisfying and correct
03:40but also create a meal that is cheap for customers to buy
03:45but also falls in the street food category?
03:49How we do that is we source brilliant local produce.
03:55We use expensive ingredients in the sense we use top quality meat
04:02and we use top quality pork and top quality chicken.
04:06We always make sure we have the balance between great food and what we can do with it.
04:11We would be skilled. We're skilled chefs in here.
04:14We can turn nothing into something.
04:18If you look at all our dishes, they're usually all balanced pretty well.
04:23Our meats are always well balanced.
04:25If you look at the dish, it's aesthetically pleasing to eat.
04:28You see the colours, you see the sauces, you see a nice big juicy burger.
04:33That's a lot of that.
04:35Maybe it's just me that sees it like that
04:37but when I see a raw product and what we've turned it into
04:41Most of our dishes go through about 30 steps before they get handed to a customer.
04:46That's all done by hand.
04:48We have a good insight into what the quality is in our food
04:52and what we can do with it and how we can maximise yield.
04:55If it's a certain product, how we can maximise low profit
04:58because as I said, prices are... we've never put up our prices.
05:01It's always been up. Prices have always been up.
05:04At the minute, it's working well for us.
05:08How much has your life changed since you started the business?
05:12How much has my life changed?
05:14A lot. I have a lot.
05:16Usually, when I worked for a different company
05:19I was working 90 to 100 hours a week
05:22chasing something that I had no interest in chasing
05:25but I thought I wanted it.
05:27When I knew this was always going to be something I wanted to do, it was always my dream.
05:31People come up here all the time and they probably think
05:34jeez, that boy's crazy or he's obviously it
05:37but I love my dream every single day of the week.
05:40I'm happy in my work. I'm happy in the things I do.
05:43When I'm serving good food and seeing people's reactions
05:46and seeing them... somebody comes up to me here and says
05:49that was one of the nicest things I've ever had.
05:52That means more than somebody coming up with a hand on me and packing full money.
05:55To me, that drives me and keeps me thinking
05:58the whole team here is on the right path.
06:01We're doing something right.
06:04Every time I come here, there's always music blasting.
06:07Typically, when I come down here, I'm quite important as having music again when you're cooking.
06:11It's essential to me.
06:14Music, music... everybody will say the same thing.
06:17When they come here, they'll notice that straight away.
06:20Music is a massive... has always been a big part of my life.
06:23It's always been a camping point to me.
06:26Sometimes you'll come up here and it's chaos
06:29but when the music's playing and you're cooking
06:32and the music's playing and you're just on your zone
06:35and you know what you have to do, your mind's not focusing anywhere else
06:38because the music's keeping your mind from ticking over.
06:41The music's just keeping you focused and helping you.
06:44It plays a big part for me and it just gives you a hype up.
06:47Do you ever go to a gym, put on music and you feel like you can do more?
06:50It's the way we feel at work.
06:53Coming back to the food side of things,
06:56at the Maritime Festival, are you bringing anything special or are you sticking with your three classics?
06:59We're sticking to what has got us this far.
07:02I'm not going to change it.
07:05There's going to be a flock of people coming from all around us just to try our food
07:08and I want to give people our core dishes
07:11for them to enjoy.
07:14People have probably seen us on TikTok, they've seen us on YouTube
07:17or whatever it may be but I want to give people
07:20what they've seen on their socials and whatever else.
07:23I'm not going to just go and change it up now because it works.
07:26It's time to change.
07:29We do do specials and we might change it up a bit
07:32but we always have our core elements for my menu.
07:35I know you're a family man.
07:38I've read a previous interview you did with us
07:41and I wanted to ask you, how do you strike that family life balance
07:44but also being the hard worker Jeff
07:47and building your own business?
07:50How do I strike the family life balance?
07:53As I said I was working 90 hours a week, average week
07:56never took days off, worked myself under the ground.
07:59Now I close on a Monday and Tuesday.
08:02If my kid's sick I'm not going to work.
08:05If my kid wants to look out for his birthday every year
08:08we're taking a week off, we're going on holidays
08:11and that's my time to spend with my wife and my kid when I'm here working.
08:14My wife works here too as well, she does work in our prep kitchen.
08:17She does a lot of prep, she looks after my family
08:20she looks after me, she does everything my son needs.
08:23I have a good support system
08:26and I have a good team here with me too
08:29I have my best mate Chris there and my brother.
08:32If I need something, if I need a day off
08:35my kid needs a sports day or he's having an assembly
08:38or whatever it may be, I'm going to make an appointment to go get it.
08:41Same way as he, those guys need something, they're going to make an appointment to go get it as well.
08:44This is a family run business
08:47this is at the forefront of our operation.
08:50This isn't like a chain where people are just saying
08:53no you can't take this off or whatever it is.
08:56If something pops up and it's more important than here
08:59if something comes up within the family it's more important than coming to work
09:02we're one of their family every step of the way.
09:05For years I didn't and I never want to do that again.
09:08So now I have that as a game, the people there help me get this far.
09:11I'm privileged to be able to say that
09:14I get to take two days off and I really spend my life with kids
09:17and if something ever comes up then I can just close the door and go see my family.
09:20It's really inspiring to hear something like that.
09:26People coming to the Narcanay Festival
09:29people obviously from Belfast, maybe down in Southfield
09:32people might not know of you, if you were to say anything
09:35to them on their way here what would you say?
09:38I'd say we're just a bunch of crazy individuals
09:41we're crazy but we know what we're doing
09:44and you're guaranteed to have a good night.
09:47That's what I would say.
09:50That's what we're all about.
09:53We're probably the craziest people that have ever came to Narcanay
09:56but that's just who we are, we're characters
09:59we have a certain energy, we have a certain buzz about us
10:02we're just not wise
10:05but we know what we're doing
10:08so we always deliver a good fit
10:11but we're just crazy in the back end as well.
10:14Last question, looking past the clubber
10:17what's in the future for Notorious?
10:20My future for Notorious is to just
10:23maintain the level we're at
10:26just maintaining this level
10:29would I like to see more Notorious open? 100%
10:32but would I like to see more open for the sense of profit?
10:35I would like to see more open
10:38so more people get to try our food
10:41but I'll never sacrifice quality, I'll never sacrifice service
10:44just to make more money
10:47so hopefully this one open marketing works
10:50because I really do believe it's going to
10:53but as I said I have a good core team around me right now
10:56to help us keep the standards that we have
10:59keep the good customer bases, keep the energy we have
11:02I like to just maintain the level we're at right now
11:05Definitely, that's class
11:08Anything you want to bring up chef?
11:11Probably not, just a thank you to all my family and my team
11:14and all the people out there
11:17for supporting my dream so far
11:20and I really really appreciate it
11:23and it would be amazing if you just kept coming
11:26and buying more food, that would be fantastic