Starting a Continental Breakfast

The bonus of a continental breakfast – a complimentary morning meal served on the premises – can sway guests into booking with you because it checks two important boxes on their list of considerations: free amenities and overall value. In fact, 70 percent of leisure travelers and 63 percent of business travelers claim that the availability of a continental breakfast is influential in which hotel they choose.¹ If you hope to add value to your hospitality business by offering a continental breakfast, use our guide to decide which hotel breakfast equipment and supplies you need to get started.

Table of Contents

• Why Is It Called a Continental Breakfast?
• Planning Your Menu & Choosing Equipment
• Serving Unrefrigerated & Cold Food
• Offering Hot Food & Custom Cooking Stations
• Providing Beverages & Condiments
• Continental Breakfast Requirements & Licenses

Why Is It Called a Continental Breakfast?

The term is generally traced back to the late 1800s, when "continental" referred to light, European-style breakfasts that began to rise in popularity over heavier, meat-centric morning meals. Hotels began catering more to European tourists and middle-class Americans, and it became standard practice to include the cost of that continental breakfast in the price of the room. Thus, the phrase became synonymous with the "free" morning meal that's still popular today.

The quality and diversity of a continental breakfast varies, but in modern-day American hotels, the phrase lacks any European connotation. Instead, it brings to mind a buffet-style spread that, depending on the business's licensing, can offer everything from baked goods, cereal, and yogurt to freshly cooked waffles, sausage, and eggs.²

Planning Your Continental Breakfast Menu

Although the term "continental breakfast" may have initially described a light breakfast, guests' expectations have grown. While some businesses choose to keep their offerings light with pastries and fruit, many have chosen to add hot items – such as waffles, eggs, and meat – to their hotel breakfast. Below, you'll find some ideas for your continental breakfast menu as well as the equipment you may need to safely prepare and serve each item.

Serving Unrefrigerated & Cold Food

Fruit. A few popular options include apples, oranges, bananas, strawberries, blueberries, grapefruit, grapes, and honeydew, served individually or combined in a fruit medley. Apples, bananas, and oranges make great choices for busy guests who don't have time for a leisurely sit-down meal and want to take a snack with them.

Yogurt. Offer a variety of flavors or toppings, including low-fat or sugar-free options for those with dietary restrictions. Providing chopped fruit and granola for guests to build their own parfaits can elevate yogurt as a meal option.

Cereal. Whether it's available in individual servings or dispensed from a dry food dispenser, cereal remains a popular morning food for adults and children. Remember to include health-conscious options, such as those using whole-grain ingredients, to balance out sugar-heavy brands.

Prepackaged snacks. Display grab-and-go snacks, such as breakfast bars and crackers, to provide morning meal options without investing in a great deal of equipment for storing and serving food made on-site. Although this option lacks the indulgence of a hot meal and limits the variety of your offerings, guests may appreciate being able to grab a few snacks to keep with them during the day without visiting a vending machine or convenience store.

Breads and pastries. Baked goods – including bagels, biscuits, croissants, donuts, muffins, and toast – are popular breakfast options, whether they're made in-house, arrive prepackaged from a mass distributor, or are sourced from a local bakery. Bagels, biscuits, and toast can be paired with spreadable toppings such as cream cheese and jams or jellies, while donuts and muffins can be eaten without any utensils.

To add these menu items to your continental breakfast, you should consider purchasing the following equipment:

• Pastry display cases offer storage for pastries, doughnuts, bagels, and muffins. These often open from the front so guests can select their own items.
• Buffet stands and risers can be used to keep your serving area organized and create a sanitary, appetizing display guests can use to browse their options.
• Dry product dispensers can store bulk amounts of cereal, toppings, and other dry foods and then dispense them in portion-controlled amounts.
• Cooling tubs and frost tops can cool prepackaged items that require refrigeration.

Offering Hot Food & Custom Cooking Stations

Although fruit, baked goods, shelf-stable food, and refrigerated options provide guests with basic meal options, cooking and hot holding equipment can expand your continental breakfast menu and improve guests' overall satisfaction with the amenity. There are two main ways to offer these foods: Prepare it in bulk and hold it on a serving line in chafers, or set up made-to-order stations manned by cooks.

If you're using a traditional buffet... You can easily offer sides such as scrambled eggs, cubed potatoes, hash browns, casseroles, and grits. Sausage, bacon, and ham are popular choices for breakfast meats and can be paired with biscuits and other sides to create a hearty meal. Depending on your setup, these can be kept warm in:

• Countertop food warmers, which use wet or dry heat to maintain temperatures.
• Countertop buffet warmers, which keep several food pans warm at a time.
• Traditional chafers, which are easily portable and require chafing dish fuel.
• Induction buffet warmers, which can be placed on a countertop or dropped into it.

If you're using made-to-order cooking stations… You can give guests the opportunity to customize waffles, omelets, and crepes; if you're catering to health-conscious clientele, a smoothie bar might also be a worthwhile option. Manned stations require a larger labor investment than those that let guests prepare their own food, but they provide greater variety and a more satisfying meal while eliminating the risk of guests injuring themselves or misusing the equipment. If you go this route, consider purchasing:

• Waffle makers, which are generally simple enough for guests to use without assistance.
• Crepe makers, which might require more preparation than guests feel comfortable handling themselves.
• Induction cooktops, which are available in countertop and drop-in varieties for temporary or permanent setups.
• Cooking carts and mobile cooking stations, which can be wheeled into your dining room and then stored when not in use.

Providing Beverages & Condiments

To offer guests a complete continental breakfast, plan which beverages and condiments will be available. If you don't offer hotel room coffee makers, it's especially important to serve coffee in the dining room or lobby. Other popular beverage options include tea, milk, juice, and chilled water. Beverage equipment that can be used at a continental breakfast includes:

• Commercial coffee makers capable of brewing low-, medium-, and high-volume batches into decanters, airpots, urns, or dispensers.
• Hot water dispensers can be standalone units that are plumbed or manually filled; some coffee machines also include a hot water dispenser. Hot water can be used to make tea and hot chocolate as well as single servings of packaged oatmeal and grits.
• Glass beverage dispensers and plastic beverage dispensers often come with ice tubes, which keep drinks cool without watering them down, or infuser tubes, which can be filled with sliced fruit to provide flavored water.
• Milk dispensers can store and dispense large quantities of milk into cereal bowls or cups for drinks.

Individual cartons of milk or bottled beverages can be kept cold in cooling tubs, ice wells, or chilled food pans. These are also great solutions for properly storing individual packages of butter, creamer, and other condiments or toppings that need to remain chilled.

To keep shelf-stable toppings and additives organized, place them in condiment holders and caddies or in larger condiment bins and organizers, which have several compartments that can contain a variety of creamers, sugar, jelly, and honey.

If your continental breakfast has a waffle bar, French toast, or pancakes, keep plenty of syrup dispensers on hand to ensure guests can add as much to their plates as they'd like; choose electric topping dispensers to offer syrup that's heated instead of room temperature.

While the list above may seem overwhelming, you don't have to serve everything every day. Many hotels choose to rotate their continental breakfast menu daily between two or three versions. Once you've decided which items you want to offer, it's time to determine what the licensing requirements are for serving a continental breakfast in your city or state.

Continental Breakfast Requirements & Licenses

Because your location and the specifics of what you serve will determine if you need a license to serve a continental breakfast to your guests, your first step should be to consult your local health department to determine if you need to acquire additional permits. What constitutes a "continental breakfast" may be defined differently by your county, city, or state, but most guidelines agree it includes "non-potentially hazardous" foods and beverages.

For the most part, if your food is prepackaged or prepared by a licensed restaurant or your business already serves food in some other capacity, your current food license or business permits may cover continental breakfast.³⁴⁵ However, some licenses cover only very specific applications, so consult local resources to be sure you remain on the right side of the law while adding a continental breakfast to your amenities.

Below are examples of food that businesses are commonly allowed to serve without a foodservice license.

• Dry, packaged oatmeal, to which guests add hot water
• Packaged dry cereal or dry cereal dispensed from a bulk dispenser
• Raw, uncut fruit (such as unpeeled bananas and oranges or apples and grapes)
• Baked goods purchased from a licensed foodservice business
• Shelf-stable, refrigerated, or frozen foods (such as waffles) that are reheated via a toaster or microwave oven
• Individual cartons or bottles of milk, juice, and yogurt
• Beverages such as coffee and tea

If you determine that you need a food service license, study your area's health code regulations and be sure your preparation and serving areas are up to code before you apply for the license. At the bare minimum, you will need a hand sink, a three-compartment sink or commercial dishwasher, and equipment for storing, preparing, and serving food at proper temperatures.

In some cases, employees who handle food are required to take a food-handling course to ensure they know how to properly prepare and distribute food. Once you have a food permit, remember to check the requirements if you add menu items since some permits will only cover certain types of food.

Resources

1. Appetite Grows for Free Hotel Breakfasts. CNN. Accessed April 2021.
2. What Makes a Continental Breakfast Continental. Slate. Accessed April 2021.
3. Continental Breakfasts for Motels / Lodging. Michigan Department of Agriculture. Accessed April 2021.
4. Continental Breakfast. Cobb & Douglas Public Health. Accessed April 2021.
5. Hotels, Motels and Bed & Breakfast Regulations. Tulsa Heath Department. Accessed April 2021.