Oh for goodness sake what now, Humble Crumble? I saw this window in Covent Garden and they just sell fruit crumble in little pots and apparently this is what people want these days. At £7.15 a shot! Who are these fools?
I say £7.15 but that's the basic cost, they want you to boost the cost with extras. You start by choosing apple or rhubarb, although the rhubarb sold out early yesterday, that's your basic. Then if you want custard it's 50p extra, or indeed whipped cream and/or blowtorched marshmallow and/or chocolate sauce. Honestly, the extra people'll pay if you promise to blowtorch their food.
They serve it in a tub on a tray to prevent spillage, which is hardly eco-friendly but very important presentation wise, because what most purchasers intend to do with their food is pose with it for social media, perhaps grinning inanely before uploading to TikTok. Food should be filling rather than something to show off to your friends, but that's Gen Z aspirational priorities for you.
You pay out front at the cheapest set-up possible - two tablets beside two contactless terminals - because why hire staff when the customer will do all the work themselves? The company must recognise the drawbacks because the only other things stuck to the wall are two bottles of hand sanitiser, all the better to reassure foreign customers who saw the 'viral sensation' online and flew in to swap hard currency for scant reward.
Apple crumble's one of the easiest desserts to make - even I can do it! - not to mention cheap because sugar, flour and butter substitute aren't exactly expensive. You just knock it up in a dark kitchen somewhere, dole it out at prices high enough to pay for city centre rents and laugh all the way to the bank. The staff are called Crumble Artists, for heaven's sake.
Humble Crumble it may be, but Mugs Tubs would be more appropriate. | | Oh for goodness sake what's your problem with Humble Crumble? Everyone loves fruit crumble, it's one of the great British pudding staples, so why not serve it as fast food rather than dull ice cream or stodgy donuts?
£7.15's nothing in the grand scheme of things these days, you'd pay more for a teensy slice of cheesecake in a typical restaurant, plus here you get to personalise your pud the way you want it. They even do vegan options because not everyone appreciates dairy, and if you allow people to select their ingredients they feel they've been creative and everyone walks away happy.
The pots are 100% biodegradable I'll have you know, though not technically recyclable nor much use in your compost if you live in a tiny shared flat. Also they do a raft of artisanal specials which changes each month, so for September it's cherry bakewell and next month it'll probably be pumpkin. This is what you need if you want people to keep coming back, which they plainly do.
I don't know how you've only just noticed Humble Crumble, they started out in 2018 at Maltby Street Market and now have outlets at Camden Market, Spitalfields Market and Borough Market, all the better to catch London's interminable grazing hordes. They even have a kiosk at Bicester Village which tells you everything you need to know about the intended clientele, happy to pay whatever in a currency that's not their own.
20 year-olds are never going to own a house so they get their joy where they can in shared experiences. Far better to be spending under a tenner on fruity carbs than blowing £30 on a trumped up digital experience in a converted warehouse. A warming treat on an autumn day ticks all the boxes, so long as you don't take the more negative Tripadvisor reviews too seriously.
Humble Crumble, I'd humbly suggest, is a dollopy entrepreneurial marvel. |
