Everyday People's Pete Hewitt is poised for perfection
Everyday People's Pete Hewitt is poised for perfection
We chat to the owner of the restaurant on everyone's lips right now...
We were thrilled to see reviews for Everyday People splash in The Observer (read here) and the Financial Times (read here). In 2022, Japanese restaurant Kushi-Ya were also reviewed by Jay Rayner, and they now hold a Michelin Bib Gourmand and are moving to bigger premises.
We’ve heard amazing things about Everyday People for a while, so we knew we had to head down to try their famous ramen and track down owner Pete Hewitt for a chat ASAP.
If you have any other foodie (or any!) places you think we should be checking out, do send us an email at editor@thenottsedit.com.
“You have to be obsessive about every minor detail” — Everyday People’s Pete Hewitt on perfecting ramen, running a smooth operation, and welcoming in critics
By Eve Smallman
It’s a Friday night, and Everyday People is alive. Walking through the narrow corridor and heading into the bustling restaurant, we head to our small table, which is situated right next to the kitchen that sits as part of the scenery.
Coming in fresh from having restaurant reviews in The Observer and the Financial Times, I wouldn’t have been upset if there was a delay in food or an undercurrent of stress. But everything runs smoothly.
The staff are ready and in control. It’s like they’ve been ready for this for a while.
“You’ve got to be able to deliver a consistent product, whether it's Jay Rayner, Tim Hayward, Melissa Thompson, or anybody walking in off the street,” says Pete Hewitt, owner of Everyday People.
While you can walk into the restaurant nestled on Byard Lane now, catching Pete Hewitt’s cooking wasn’t always this easy. After being a Masterchef finalist in 2015, he started the legendary Homeboys, which toured around street food events and village fairs.
“We would pile everything up into our little VW Golf and drive around the country with little electric fryers — a complete cowboy setup,” he smiles. “We went everywhere we could get our hands on to cut our teeth in the industry.”
From here, they took on a unit at Nottingham Street Food Club in the Victoria Centre (who else misses this?). And then, the pandemic hit. Pete says, “We took on the restaurant premises in January 2020 and everything got locked down in March 2020, so we were standing thinking, ‘What have we done?’”. Luckily, they were able to hit the ground running a year later in August 2021.
Nottingham’s food scene is filled with everything you could possibly want, so they knew they had to find a niche. “We did several ramen pop-ups with Homeboys which we always had a good response to, and the city didn’t have a ramen-specific offering,” Pete explains. “We played around with recipes and perfected them, tested them out, and then ran with the ramen-centric menu full time.”
These aren’t your typical packet noodles, of course. When the bowls were brought out, I was amazed at how packed they were and how rich they were with flavour, too.
“I love everything about making ramen — it has to be an obsession. You can't do it unless it is, as you have to be obsessive about every minor detail,” Pete tells me. “People assume it's a very straightforward dish, but all of those steps to get there have taken days if not weeks to develop.”
The popularity and knowledge of ramen have certainly hit the mainstream. “There’s more understanding about the process and people see the magic in it, which is great,” Pete says. “I think Japanese food and ramen especially is starting to get its day in the sun, which is good to see,” he adds.
While a steaming bowl of ramen is much welcome on a winter’s evening, Everyday People does move with the seasons when it comes to sourcing ingredients and planning menus.
“A lot of restaurants will have a fixed menu run for three months, whereas we have a specials board which is constantly moving and shifting and the process is a bit more organic,” Pete says. “We look at what we’re feeling and what’s good in the market, then get round the table, throw some ideas around, and test.”
Being reactive while having a level of preparedness is always good for a chef to be. But when some of the biggest food critics in the country come in, how do you react then?
“The fear and adrenaline got me through that day — when that goatee walked through the door I had to double-take. I was in disbelief that he'd stepped into our restaurant. But you just treat him like anyone else,” he tells me.
Jay Rayner walked in first, then was quickly followed by Tim Hayward. “We got through the long service, and had a little chat afterwards, where they both expressed they really enjoyed it.”
The fun didn’t stop there though — for the dinner service, Melissa Thompson and Sumayya Usman came by for the last table of the day.
All four were in town recording BBC Radio 4’s The Kitchen Cabinet podcast (you can listen to this here on BBC Sounds), so the word about the good food must have spread between them.
From here, bookings shot up, which is why I found myself jostling to my table. “We were pretty busy anyway, with the cold months being ramen season, but we’re now working out how to keep up with the demand — we might have to hire another chef,” Pete adds.
If you do find yourself able to nab a table, I can assure you you’ll be in for something special. The food is relaxed yet vibrant. I tried small plates like the fried radish cake and delved into the seasonal miso. Every forkful was a fun discovery and I came away feeling like I tried something truly unique.
The atmosphere matches. I loved being seated right on the cusp of the kitchen, watching the cogs smoothly operate.
“Having the open kitchen stems from our street food background — when you’ve got a queue of people peering at what you’re doing, we got used to working like this,” Pete explains. “From a spectator’s point of view, it's the focal point of the restaurant.”
They also have a ‘chef’s table’ where you can perch right on the counter and see everything going on. “You pay the same as everyone else, but you get the show, and it’s fun for the kitchen as they get to communicate and interact,” he adds.
Being part of the restaurant and the dining room creates a real buzz for them, instead of being stuck in a back room. “For the chefs, it’s really exciting to be part of that environment,” Pete adds.
With so much noise around the restaurant, it could be easy to get swept away with the hype and try and ride it — but they’re keeping things calm and collected.
“In this industry, you get bored pretty quick, which is why we change our menu quite regularly just to keep the chefs and the customers interested,” he says. “This keeps us progressing and moving forward.”
Pete finishes by saying, “Maybe in the next six months to a year, we can look at doing something else, but right now? The focus on Everyday People and perfecting the product.”
Whatever happens next, I’m seated — and I think the rest of the city and now the country is, too.