The Big Smoke

From the moment I wanted to be a chef my mother told me I had to think beyond Hastings. ‘You need to go to London to learn and be the best at what you do. You’ll never achieve anything here.’

I decided to write to as many hotels in London as I could to see if any would take on a second commis chef, just out of culinary school. In May 1992, on my eighteenth birthday, I received a letter from Le Méridien Hotel in Piccadilly Circus offering me a position at the Terrace Garden Brasserie Restaurant. I was over the moon but scared as hell.