Innovations in the culinary industry in Malta : an exploratory study

Abstract

The primary aim is to research and understand innovations in the culinary industry by seeking to address a gap in the literature, since to date, there is no research that compares the innovations that have taken place in international fine dining restaurants with those in Malta. Although the culinary industry includes various sectors, this study focuses only on fine dining since a lot has been written about chefs in the international scene and there is enough material for research to compare with chefs in Malta. This dissertation is addressed by asking two research questions: (i) What are the main innovations that have contributed to the dining experience in the top ten fine dining restaurants overseas? (ii) To what extent do these innovations compare to the state of the culinary art amongst the top ten fine dining restaurants in Malta? Interviews using open-ended questions were conducted with the chefs of the top ten restaurants in Malta and the results from the overt observations were used to compare with the desk based research carried out on the top ten international restaurants. One of the main findings, is that the majority of the top ten fine dining restaurants in Malta use local fresh seasonal produce as their basis to innovate on their dishes, similar to their international counter-parts. This is critically important and relevant since as claimed by Ottenbacher & Harrington (2009), product quality and seasonality is the most critical aspect of successful fine dining innovations. The top ten international restaurants are situated in larger countries having vast amount of farmland. Lack of land is a limiting factor in Malta that hinders innovation, as some Maltese chefs note. One alternative may be to focus more on fish, since Malta is surrounded by sea. The study concludes by providing a few recommendations for future research and one recommendation would be to update this study and compare international restaurants having the same Michelin stars as those in Malta.