To keep costs down, the chef says he is “very tough with suppliers” — many of whom he has been working with for 10 years. A lot of ingredients from Turkey are also being imported, such as lamb, honey and fish to name a few, as part of the team’s determination to retain the DNA of Anatolian cuisine.
“The quinoa even comes from a farm Umut owns near Syria,” Clague notes.
Özkanca says that finding suppliers in his homeland was not difficult due to the many years of experience both he and his father have working in Turkish hospitality. Rüya is, in fact, “the 16th or 17th outlet” the restaurateur has opened in his career.
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“We are buying produce from all over the country; butter from a village in the Black Sea; pistachios from Gaziantep; and olive oil from the Aegean part of Turkey,” he says.
Also hailing from Özkanca"s native country are some of Rüya’s workforce, namely for key roles in the kitchen. Other staff members were recruited through Clague’s F&B connections.
“I am lucky as I spoke to lots of the guys I’d worked with before, told them I was doing a new place, and they said ‘count me in’. A lot of the guys I have worked with are Turkish anyway, such as my sous chef and junior sous chef in Zuma Istanbul, Zuma Dubai and Qbara,” the chef comments.
He also reveals that he received about 180 CVs after one of the team made a short film about Turkey and posted it on Facebook with an announcement about a Turkish restaurant opening soon.
While the team seems to have sidestepped the difficult challenge that the recruitment process usually poses, there is no denying that launching a new concept in Dubai is not easy, especially at the moment when, as both Clague and Özkanca acknowledge, the health of the emirate’s economy this year has caused some concerns. Nevertheless, the pair remain confident in the concept and the reception they see it receiving in the market.
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