Sophie's Steakhouse

Sophie’s Steakhouses, with sites in Covent Garden and Fulham Road, are passionate about steaks. So much so that they age their foreribs for 28 days, in house, and chefs do much of the restaurants’ butchering. Sophie’s used to hang the meat in coldrooms back of house.

Then they realised that the aging process could be part of the theatre of their restaurants. Now, centre stage in the Covent Garden site, is a Williams coldroom with a huge glass window, displaying the hanging meat. To fit in with the site’s chic industrial décor the coldroom is clad in a ‘rust’ finish.

“We’re all about the whole experience,” says co-owner Sophie Bathgate. “Big steaks, big Martinis, great ingredients served simply and with style – all backed by quality. Quality food, and quality staff – the waiters really know their stuff and the service is efficient as well as entertaining.”

When it came to installing the new coldroom, reliability was critical. “In the Covent Garden restaurant we can get through up to 45 foreribs a week. Since we’re holding a month’s stock at any one time, we have to be able to rely totally on the refrigeration. The stock value of meat alone is worth a lot of money. More importantly, it’s not like we can just order up ready-aged replacements if something goes wrong.”