“It’s like welcoming a long-lost relative back into the fold,” says Chris Carr, “Great Yarmouth is where the Zaks story started and we’re delighted to be back.”

Chris and business partner Ian Hacon have bought the Yankee Traveller in King Street in Yarmouth which was first in the Norfolk-based burger restaurant chain back in 1977.

The pair have both been associated with Zaks for many years: collectively as the management team from 2005 to 2016 and as business owners since 2020.

The Yankee Traveller, meanwhile, has been part of the Yarmouth eating-out scene for almost 50 years and can boast that it really WAS an authentic taste of America.

Offshore drilling for oil and gas began off the coast of Great Yarmouth in the 1960s and the industry attracted many families from across the UK and further afield.

American oil workers living in Yarmouth would, when returning from a stint at sea, crave the food they missed so terribly from home: the Yankee Travellers needed a taste of the States.

Two women, whose husbands were on the rig, decided to open a restaurant that offered the dishes that their family missed most: cheeseburgers, fries, Coke floats, chilli and ribs.

The Yankee Traveller opened on King Street in 1973 offering a taste of home – and their chilli and ribs recipes were so good that they’re still used by Zaks today.

Meanwhile in Norwich, a converted caravan opposite the city’s castle had started to offer authentic American-style foil-wrapped burgers to customers.

Local musician and entrepreneur Harvey Platt had been keen to bring a slice of America to Norwich after visiting San Francisco to meet up with his former musician friends.

When the caravan – people remember it as a sleek Airstream, but in truth it was more of a red-and-white striped mobile home – on Farmers Avenue near Castle Meadow came on the market, Harvey snapped it up and the Zaks story began.

Opening in May 1976 and serving the now-famous chargrilled burgers cooked to order, it is a fond memory for many people who were enjoying Stateside flavours for the first time.

By 1977, the American oil rig workers were returning home and the Yankee Traveller became available: already popular with Yarmouth diners, Mr Platt seized the opportunity to grab a corner of Americana by the Norfolk coast.

The distinctive Tiffany-style Zaks-branded lampshades, the memorabilia-lined walls, the jukebox, the neon, the Zaks’ red blinds, the wood panelling, the stars and stripes on a flagpole outside: Zaks Yankee Traveller was an exciting addition to Yarmouth’s restaurants.

In Norwich, a bricks and mortar Zaks restaurant followed at Mousehold in 1979 and in the mid-80s, the caravan shut for the last time, just a few years before the opening of Zaks Waterside opposite Cow Tower in 1988.

Mr Platt passed over the reins of the Norwich restaurants to the family-run business Blue Sky Leisure in 1998, which added Zaks Poringland to the portfolio in 2005 and Zaks Thetford in 2015 (which has since closed).

The Yankee Traveller left the Zaks family in 1998 but after almost 25 years, there’s set to be a family reunion.

Co-owner Ian Hacon originally trained as a chartered accountant and spent 15 years working for Zaks’ parent company Blue Sky Leisure, including nine years as CEO.

During his tenure, he helped the group win the Archant Business of the Year award and encouraged a major cultural change programme with a focus on team and customer experience. He also runs digital health platform Energise.me.

Fellow owner Chris has more than 30 years of experience in the hospitality sector working for national and local brands. The pair, who both live in Gorleston, acquired the business in January 2020.

“We are so excited to bring the story full circle and bring the Yankee back into the Zaks family,” said Ian.

Chris added: “The Yankee Traveller is hugely loved by people in Yarmouth who have grown up with it and have such fond memories of it from the past 50 years.

“People are really passionate about the Yankee and it has its own story and its own journey to continue, we’re going to take a little bit of time to get to know the community and the customers but in time, it’ll become the Zaks Yankee Traveller.

“I think what we’ll eventually see is some Yankee dishes being used by Zaks and some Zaks dishes being used by the Yankee.

“You walk in and it already feels like a Zaks, even though it technically hasn’t been for almost 25 years! We both live close by so it feels like coming home.”

Handing over the reins to Chris and Ian are Oliver Hurren and Charles Thurston who bought the business in July 2019 after it closed unexpectedly at the end of 2018.

“Oliver and Charles have done a great job bringing the Yankee back to life and they should definitely be given credit for that,” said Chris.

“We started discussions a few months ago because we knew we really wanted another restaurant and this one felt so right. It felt like unfinished business for Zaks.”

Oliver and Charles said: “We are so proud to have been part of the Yankee Traveller’s story, it’s a restaurant we visited as kids and we’re happy to pass it on to its next owners for a new chapter.”

With no interruption to business and no big changes on the menu yet, Chris and Ian can’t wait to have a restaurant close to home (“if nothing else, it means when my kids are older I can get them to work there!”” laughed Chris).

One thing is certain, the chilli and ribs recipes won’t be changing – but just what did those Yankee Travellers from 1973 add to their magical mix of ingredients to make them so moreish?

“Ah,” says Chris, “that would be telling. But really, it’s more about the technique…”

The Yankee Traveller is at 36 King Street, Great Yarmouth, 01493 857065, details will be added to Zaks' website in coming weeks.

Cookery teacher and food writer Zena Leech-Calton holds a special place in her heart for the Yankee Traveller.

“I think I’d have been about 10 when I first went to the Yankee Traveller: I used to have the children’s meal: I’d look at everyone else’s plates with absolute envy,” she said.

“My dad Terry always had the Combo, which was chicken, coleslaw, ribs, sweetcorn and fries or jacket potato and it was a mountain of food, I used to just look at it and be amazed!

“When my parents moved abroad, when mum [Irene, known to many from her singing days as ‘Reny Lee’, her stage name in the days of New Faces] took me for lunch, it was always at Zaks in Great Yarmouth.

“She’d written a book and we’d sit at the back of the restaurant and she’d read me a chapter after we’d had our meals: I’d look at the traffic lights, full up and just listening to mum. We took all the nieces and nephews, it was our favourite place.

“The staff knew us so well we didn’t need to say what we wanted, but I can still remember my mum’s order now: the Deluxe with no onion and extra tomato.

“I just loved the condiment tray: the onion relish, the tomato relish, the ketchup – a friend even bought me my own tray so that I could recreate Zaks nights at home!

“It was a touch of America in Norfolk and it felt so glamorous. I’m sure that when my brother Karl and I went to America with our parents, it was down to Zaks and spending so much time there, it made us all want more!”

Zena added that there’s another reason that the Yarmouth restaurant will always be special to her family: “It was the first place that I went to with my then-boyfriend and now husband Nick with my parents and sadly the last meal that we all had together with mum.

“Nick still has the receipt from Zaks from when he paid in his wallet to this day, it’s worn pretty thin, but it’s a reminder of a really special moment at a special place.”