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HUNGRY is the podcast for Challenger Food and Drink brands wanting to pour gasoline on their growth. Fancy being kind? Want to feel warm inside? Please hit the Subscribe button. You’d really, really make my week.
00:00:00:00 - 00:00:49:05
Dan Pope
So. Yeah. Sorry. You were saying Tom's been.
00:00:56:23 - 00:01:17:23
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, Tom's been in the company for, 6 or 7 years. Pretty much since we've opened this space and has grown into that role. Now is as head chef, and and he's doing a phenomenal job putting his own, putting his own mark on the menu, running it really well. We needed to make that kind of difference when Nick was head chef here before Nick opened, left and opened his own space.
00:01:17:23 - 00:01:34:17
Tom Kerridge
So Nick was in the company for 12, maybe 13 years. So he's been with this for a long time. What a mission. Sorry. The coach originally was sous chef at the hand opened here. Unbelievable. Cook like I'm just a brilliant all round human. He's such a fantastic guy. But he opened Starling. He left to open his own.
00:01:34:17 - 00:01:36:06
Dan Pope
Business by where I. I'm home.
00:01:36:06 - 00:01:37:00
Tom Kerridge
Is is it?
00:01:37:00 - 00:01:37:16
Dan Pope
Yes.
00:01:37:16 - 00:01:47:23
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. Oh, yeah. So they want to star really quick. Yeah. It's I'm really about. And you know he's a he deserves all that amazing success. So Tom stepping up into that role was Nick sous chef took the head chef's position.
00:01:47:24 - 00:01:48:07
Dan Pope
Right.
00:01:48:07 - 00:02:03:15
Tom Kerridge
I just needed to make a I suppose a differential point in terms of his food style, but still sticking with the DNA, but just trying to make it feel that, you know, it's a it's a different head chef and it's a different space and allow him kind of a little bit of autonomy on the way that he cooks.
00:02:03:15 - 00:02:19:21
Tom Kerridge
And yeah, he's really he's really now into his stride. He's built his own kitchen team. He's got a great bunch of people around him that are all hugely supportive, which is allows him to be things like today help is set up and be just. He's in a really he's in a really good space. He's doing a phenomenal job.
00:02:19:21 - 00:02:20:07
Tom Kerridge
Yeah.
00:02:20:08 - 00:02:37:03
Dan Pope
Well we're going to jump into that. What I'd like to start with is I've just read a wonderful book by Matthew McConaughey who greenlights really good book, and he's like, he just has these sort of wonderful life aphorisms and poems in them. But one of the things he writes is like this little poem called The Future is a monster, says the future is a monster.
00:02:37:03 - 00:02:55:06
Dan Pope
The past is something we're trying to outrun. Tomorrow the monster is the future, the unknown, the boundaries not yet crossed, the potential not yet met. So should we wish we left our heads. Face it straight on and watch it heat. Now I know with your whole illustrious group of restaurants, you sort of see it as a pirate ship, right?
00:02:55:06 - 00:03:11:14
Dan Pope
Yeah. When you. When you look over the tropics of hospitality, like everyone, everyone I'm speaking to on this podcast is like, it is a fucking monster coming. What do you think of the monsters hiding in the water coming up ahead, first question. And then also, what are you doing now to protect the business?
00:03:11:16 - 00:03:31:10
Tom Kerridge
I mean, this is a different thing. And it's funny and I think it's it depends. I imagine it depends on the age and the experience of the people that you're talking to. Sure. So like we've been in business, the hannaford's just been open 20 years and then those 20 years, and I've been a chef for 35 almost. And you look at,
00:03:31:12 - 00:03:49:21
Tom Kerridge
You go through periods and everything always looks frightening. And, you know, we've been through recessions before. We've been through situations, we've been through problems within the industry. Not once, not once, ever since I started cooking to this point now we've always gone, yeah, there's loads of staff. Yeah. We came. Yeah. You got thousands of sous chefs to choose from.
00:03:49:21 - 00:04:11:20
Tom Kerridge
You know, it's never been there. It's never. So there's always there's always those continuous issues. I think what happens at nine the biggest problem is margins. And margins have been eroded completely. So restaurants don't make money I mean even super busy ones. You know, there's a few that operate in London that are absolutely packed the whole time that I'm doing.
00:04:11:20 - 00:04:33:21
Tom Kerridge
Well, everyone else in London is making very small percentage points, like I like up and down the country. I may be even worse outside of the country where like Tuesday, Wednesday evenings, lunchtimes are quiet and, you know, so the margins are completely eradicated. And that's the issue where moving forward, why would you open a restaurant? Why why would you do it?
00:04:33:21 - 00:04:54:18
Tom Kerridge
I mean, young entrepreneurial chefs, people who want to cook with excitement and, oh, front of house teams. They want to create an amazing energy or an atmosphere or a bar or a why would you do it if there's no profit in it, you may as well work for somebody else. Now, where pay is really competitive because everyone's trying to attract staff.
00:04:54:20 - 00:05:13:20
Tom Kerridge
The time off, you know, five weeks holiday, whatever it like, you get all of those trappings. Why would you open your own restaurant to earn less money? Sure. And have less time without without any of the positives that necessarily comes with it. So those are the big issues. I think we have to face as an industry as a whole.
00:05:13:22 - 00:05:34:09
Tom Kerridge
We have to look at the structure of it. We also have to educate. Guest. I mean, we continuously talk on things like this. So every opportunity you go, the only way that any operator makes money, whether it's a small coffee house to a five star hotel, to a two Michelin star restaurant, to whatever is by what it can charge for plate of food.
00:05:34:11 - 00:05:57:02
Tom Kerridge
Now everything else that comes with it has to be paid for by the amount of money you pay for a bone marrow, chicken breast or a well, you know, you know, those kind of things that you just go with. So it's an education point of view from a guest and understanding. And it does feel, I think it does take a lot of boxes.
00:05:57:02 - 00:06:23:17
Tom Kerridge
If you if you want to look at negativity for Fear Factor, you want to look. But hospitality has always been one of those industries that it exists. It's not, it needs government help. It needs things like VAT reduction. We need to be taxed. And I know there's so many different people that push and speak to government, myself included, on where taxation in the way it needs to work and taxation needs to come on profit related, not front end but back end.
00:06:23:21 - 00:06:49:01
Tom Kerridge
It needs to not not be on, you know, VAT, it needs to not be on. The front end taxes, it needs to be on if it makes profit, you know, that's where we'll take the tax. But it's also a very difficult space from a social perspective. Yeah. Because if you look at what's happening from a, from a social perspective, it's very, very difficult to then say, well, we're not going to take the same amount of money out of hospitality.
00:06:49:03 - 00:06:49:17
Tom Kerridge
So.
00:06:49:17 - 00:06:58:03
Tom Kerridge
It's quite hard to sell that into the people that make decisions. And there are so many places that are shutting, so many places that are closing.
00:06:58:03 - 00:07:03:18
Tom Kerridge
And how do we get through it? I'm not entirely I'm not I genuinely haven't got the answer.
00:07:03:20 - 00:07:24:15
Dan Pope
The so as you said, mate, in terms of your 20 years in the game, even you know. So it's never, never been easy. It's never been about let's smell the roses. It's been a grind. It's been a graft. If we almost had like a Tom Kerridge cookbook of business principles. One, two, three. Yeah. You know, you've now moved from sort of, as you say, cook to chef to operate a restaurant.
00:07:24:20 - 00:07:27:08
Dan Pope
Yeah. What are some of those 1 to 3 principles.
00:07:27:09 - 00:07:39:01
Tom Kerridge
Never be scared of making the hard decisions. Like never be scared of going. You have to separate yourself from the problem with restaurant ownership. Yeah. It's so much of it is personality and personal.
00:07:39:04 - 00:07:39:09
Dan Pope
Yeah.
00:07:39:10 - 00:08:02:13
Tom Kerridge
So you create you build teams and you build wonderful people around you and you create and you get chefs that cook or you cook food that is so personal to you. You open your heart with what you do, and then you meet other people in the, you know, the fish supplier or your veg supplier or the people that deliver all the grow, you know, you know, wines or brew beer or they're all people that's led with passion.
00:08:02:13 - 00:08:21:13
Tom Kerridge
So you get dragged into being personally attached to every little pinpoint. And those personal points make restaurants busy. Yeah. Because it's a it's a guess and a customer. You come in and you go and this is all magical and it's all about this and the stories. But then you have to separate yourself and it has to be you have to make business decisions.
00:08:21:13 - 00:08:36:07
Tom Kerridge
You have to actually, I can't afford to buy this incredible olive oil that they only make 200 bottles of it a year. And I dress it on because it's beautiful taste, but actually just the truth of that olive oil cost me £3. What? I can't I can't put that down.
00:08:36:10 - 00:08:42:10
Dan Pope
What have been the hardest decisions you've had to make, where you've set out to separate you from that personal tether to those people?
00:08:42:10 - 00:09:02:17
Tom Kerridge
Close closing businesses, closing businesses post-Covid, you know, shutting places down and working out and having to explain to people that this isn't it's not a personal thing, it's not me. But we just can't operate. The businesses don't work. It doesn't make money. We can't do anything about it. That's, you know, we are we have to be. So, you know, we've shut you know, we've shut businesses.
00:09:02:17 - 00:09:21:11
Tom Kerridge
We have to readapt. We have to close. You have to leave. You have to let people go. And those are the really those are the really hard decisions. But you also then have to remind yourself that when you've switched from being the chef in the kitchen and being that person to being a restaurant, so you've then become a business person, you have to put yourself in a.
00:09:21:13 - 00:09:23:12
Speaker 1
Lord Sugar.
00:09:23:14 - 00:09:27:04
Tom Kerridge
Peter Jones style position and go, actually, it's just about one of.
00:09:27:04 - 00:09:34:00
Dan Pope
The I watched I must have been a couple of years ago, that interview you did with Gary Neville? Yeah. When you was at the bully pulpit.
00:09:34:00 - 00:09:35:00
Tom Kerridge
Bear in mind.
00:09:35:02 - 00:09:52:23
Dan Pope
And I thought that was a masterclass in like, I think you really all the some of the hard conversations you have, you got to have difficult conversations. But the way you and Gary just sat there was so sort of, straightforward, very polite to each other and just Frank. Yeah. Like what would you if you what's the all of of having those hard conversations.
00:09:52:23 - 00:10:05:15
Dan Pope
Because it's because I think a lot of people, myself included. Yeah. I've, I've got a hard decision to make it. We've had up with a team with Lech because we couldn't afford to keep someone on doing the editing. And I basically shat myself. Yeah, like to two weeks and then.
00:10:05:15 - 00:10:07:12
Tom Kerridge
Having to worry about having to say.
00:10:07:14 - 00:10:10:16
Dan Pope
Exactly like, what would you say the art of that is? What have you learned? You have to.
00:10:10:16 - 00:10:27:21
Tom Kerridge
Remove yourself from the you have to you have to remind yourself of what you do. And if it's your business and it's your thing and what you're doing, and you have to not be, you have to try and disconnect from the personal attachment that you have so that when you say, look, this isn't this is a situation that is business related.
00:10:27:21 - 00:10:46:20
Tom Kerridge
If you meet, you can show them figures. You know, we're very open with actually this is how much money this makes or this is how much it is losing. You know, we have a management meeting every Wednesday where, all of the businesses in Marlow, we have a manager meeting here today. We have a monthly one here. And in the Marlow sites we have one where we visit.
00:10:46:22 - 00:11:05:19
Tom Kerridge
We have on a weekly basis, and we're very happy to have those open conversation going. Listen, last we met turnover net profit was actually a deficit. We did not make money. We lost this. And then at the end of the month, these are the figures. This is it. And if it makes so for example, we might go this month.
00:11:05:19 - 00:11:23:24
Tom Kerridge
This small little site made seven grand net profit. Not a lot of money. It's maybe. But this morning you've come to me and told me that the grill's broken. It's seven years old. You better buy. The options are fix it and it's nine grand to buy a new one. And it's 13 grand. So although we've made seven grand, we've now we now lost some.
00:11:23:24 - 00:11:45:12
Tom Kerridge
It's broken. We got to always remind us. And quite often you got it's good to be open with staff. So they have an understanding of what's going on. Cash flow coming in and out so that when it comes to the conversation point of view, they understand it. And it's it's good for particularly as they grow into come into senior management level because your expectations levels of them are you have to operate as a profit.
00:11:45:12 - 00:12:03:18
Tom Kerridge
You have to you have to be making, you know, I'm not on top of the guys every day of go my wife, we ordered for whole sea bass as opposed to two. You know what? We only need that. Well, we only they have to take responsibility for it. So sense allowing people to become personally and professionally responsible then helps further decision making.
00:12:03:22 - 00:12:12:03
Tom Kerridge
When you explain this is what you've got to do because you can remove yourself from the personality and go, it's a business thing, but it is. It is a really difficult.
00:12:12:08 - 00:12:24:13
Dan Pope
Yeah, yeah. So, so, so when was that? The first principle is, is separate yourself but make make the hard decision. What would you say is the second principle in the carriage cook book of business?
00:12:24:15 - 00:12:38:23
Tom Kerridge
Remind yourself that if it was somebody once said to me when I first opened, if it was easy, everyone would do it. And and you go, okay, you have to remind yourself of that. And, and easy. If it was easy, everyone would do it. And because not everyone can run a business, not everyone can make it work.
00:12:38:23 - 00:12:56:03
Tom Kerridge
And it's. And it's never easy. There's never an easy day. You have to. Also, once you own a business, there's never there's never a day off. You might not be at work, you might not be. But you're all, there's always. You're only a phone call away. There's always an imminent disaster somewhere. Someone, somewhere is doing something stupid in your business all the time.
00:12:56:08 - 00:12:59:19
Dan Pope
Do you like fear? Is that.
00:12:59:21 - 00:13:03:04
Speaker 1
Do I hope fear?
00:13:03:06 - 00:13:16:17
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, I like I like risk about myself. It makes you feel alive that things are going, you know, things are happening. I don't like being a passenger. I don't like being a passenger and watching things go on. I like being in amongst what's happening.
00:13:16:18 - 00:13:21:19
Dan Pope
And what fear is almost like is tailwind. When you're in control of it. It's like when when when you're a passenger.
00:13:21:21 - 00:13:42:04
Tom Kerridge
Like Covid was quite a really horrific time for the restaurant industry. It was a really awful period for work, for what was going on for for staff, for people, for not knowing, particularly the beginning bit where nobody had any idea what was going on, how to deal with it, what was happening so that when.
00:13:42:04 - 00:14:02:04
Tom Kerridge
A bit of infrastructure came in and we all kind of understood how or what we were going to do, and you start to I in a really funny way, I thoroughly enjoyed it because it was that infrastructure of, of business management. How do we get through it? What have we got to do? How do we survive? What decisions have we got to make?
00:14:02:04 - 00:14:18:09
Tom Kerridge
All of those, all of those, I suppose, control or out of your control business, you're navigating the infrastructure of a business and trying to make it not collapse or not. How do you solve those problems? Problem solving? I like the problem solving.
00:14:18:09 - 00:14:18:23
Dan Pope
Solving.
00:14:18:23 - 00:14:37:02
Tom Kerridge
I don't get me wrong, I hated it. We lost an absolute ton of money and we lost some amazing people. But I the decision making, the process of going through it in a really weird way. I quite enjoyed the chat. The chat. I quite enjoyed the challenge. I never want to do it again. Don't get me wrong, I never want to do it again, but I.
00:14:37:04 - 00:14:47:08
Tom Kerridge
I quite enjoyed the thinking process. Start with, managing director having conversations every day about, well, what do we do? How do we solve that where so I.
00:14:47:10 - 00:15:01:04
Dan Pope
You know, you know, pizza ovens, you know. Yeah. Thank you. Tom Gosney, he's an absolute legend. And he was saying when you've got a business, you've got a thousand. You're gonna wake up every day. There's going to be a thousand missiles pointed at your head, and you're gonna have to sort of navigate that when you've got set on this whole group.
00:15:01:04 - 00:15:15:05
Dan Pope
Tom, you've probably got thousands of missiles pointing your head. Yeah. What is the the how do you solve problems? You need to be like the problem solver and be like, how do you actually solve them when you've got where do you start? Just what I'm saying. This as you said, it's something it's broken. There's a team member.
00:15:15:07 - 00:15:33:13
Tom Kerridge
You I've learned very that's the one difference between being a chef and then a restaurateur and an owner is to not be reactionary. Chefs have to operate in a kitchen on a reactionary basis. So you you can be proactive in a kitchen, you can have all your infrastructure in place, you can get all your mise en place and all that understanding of what's going on.
00:15:33:15 - 00:15:56:09
Tom Kerridge
But you're reactionary to service. So a plate comes back or a steaks overcooked or a chef's, you know, dropped something coming up to the PA or there's the sauce isn't ready or that. So you have to be ready to be reactionary very, very quickly. When you are having to make business decisions and you'll have you become a restaurateur, you have to then look at a much bigger picture.
00:15:56:11 - 00:16:12:22
Tom Kerridge
So if you react to something, it might cause a domino effect in business or to emphasize, hey, so you have to take a step back and you have to go, you have to analyze and you have to think. You have to think 3 or 4 steps ahead of everything else. Because what does that affect to that, to, to that, that, that and that.
00:16:13:01 - 00:16:26:18
Tom Kerridge
Whereas a chef suddenly goes the the sauces dropped on the floor. Got a new fucking sauce on quick now move because the sea bass is there. That's ready to go. Okay. For an advice you can take that. That sauce will be ready in time so you can react real quick. In business you have to go okay. That's that's a problem.
00:16:26:18 - 00:16:34:22
Tom Kerridge
That's an issue. Right. Let's just stop reset. Think about it. Work it out. You have to give yourself time. And those are the I think the big differences between.
00:16:34:24 - 00:16:38:04
Dan Pope
That is that been the hardest thing moving from chefs based on the.
00:16:38:04 - 00:16:38:15
Tom Kerridge
Restaurateur.
00:16:38:15 - 00:16:40:13
Dan Pope
Yeah. It's interesting
00:16:42:05 - 00:16:48:17
Dan Pope
is an example, but maybe other than Covid of where you've had to go through that process of thinking three steps ahead.
00:16:48:21 - 00:17:04:14
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. I think all the time when you're like opening businesses. Yeah. Changing the strategy. For example, the chalk that was set up originally is one particular pieces. You know, you rebuilt, you open a place, you spent loads of money trying to get it right, and then it doesn't work. And you have to go, okay, so you have to go.
00:17:04:14 - 00:17:06:01
Tom Kerridge
You have to work out. Right. Are we going to.
00:17:06:03 - 00:17:06:24
Dan Pope
Was that the butcher's.
00:17:06:24 - 00:17:11:11
Tom Kerridge
The butcher's shop? And go and you go, okay. So it half works. It works at a weekend.
00:17:11:17 - 00:17:14:06
Dan Pope
Because I've been to the one in Marlow and it was banging on.
00:17:14:08 - 00:17:38:11
Tom Kerridge
Marlow one works. You thought it would work in Chelsea? Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. If the business isn't busy enough, Thursday and Friday would be busy drinking. But the revenues are on burgers and maybe a high end steak every now and then. Then the revenues aren't enough to justify the space being open from the beginning. Also, you go, actually, people in Chelsea want to make a reservation.
00:17:38:11 - 00:17:49:14
Tom Kerridge
They want to book. They want to know that they're going out on a Friday or Saturday night. They want a table as opposed to just turning up where's Marlow is that we've already got the handle flowers, and we've already got the coach where you can book and go in the butcher's tap.
00:17:49:14 - 00:17:50:11
Dan Pope
On halo effect.
00:17:50:11 - 00:18:04:24
Tom Kerridge
Almost. Exactly. So you go, right. Okay, so we need to re rethink this. How do we do people want to put they want to know that going out. So you you have to you have to you have to take steps back and understand. And then you can reevaluating the cost of redoing and what do you do. And then you go, okay, well this is something that we've got to do.
00:18:05:01 - 00:18:25:17
Tom Kerridge
So so that's a prime case of instead of being reactionary to it, you have to analyze and where kind and hope that the new infrastructure works again. And you go, right, okay, let's see what happens now. And then you have to decide whether you're going to fail quickly or whether you're going to keep going or whether what you're doing is working, and it's tweaking and it's turned around.
00:18:25:17 - 00:18:29:24
Tom Kerridge
You can feel the, you know, the green shoots of growth beginning to come through growth.
00:18:29:24 - 00:18:39:22
Dan Pope
Yeah. And when they when they sort of begin to sprout, you pull. Okay. Wonderful. What have you. So working with Gary Neville. Yeah I he's I think it's his business. Relentless. Cool. Relentless isn't it. Oh
00:18:39:24 - 00:18:41:20
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. One of the, one of the he's a great. Yeah. One of his.
00:18:41:22 - 00:18:49:02
Dan Pope
If you learn from like via osmosis, from working closely with him or speaking to him. Yeah. He taught you about business or life?
00:18:49:03 - 00:19:06:16
Tom Kerridge
I learned a lot from Gary. Gary's, We have a great relationship. Still, Gary was actually, when we opened here, was for the first guest through the door on day one of opening. So Gary stays at the hotel. So when we open this seven years ago, he was the first guest through the door at lunch. Like it? And so then his conversation came.
00:19:06:17 - 00:19:17:21
Tom Kerridge
Listen, I've got a space. Would you like to come and look at it in Manchester? I need some help with it. So we were like, okay, let's go and have a look at it. And Gary has this almost bounding enthusiasm and energy.
00:19:17:23 - 00:19:18:24
Dan Pope
Yeah.
00:19:19:01 - 00:19:41:07
Tom Kerridge
For buildings, for creation, for Manchester. His love of that was amazing. So you learn again, it doesn't matter if you come from a chef background or Gary's background that the passion for something is always a really good driver like that. You have to have that level. But I think the biggest thing that I learned from Gary is we both come from a socialist point of view.
00:19:41:07 - 00:20:03:10
Tom Kerridge
We both come from a it's about workforce and it's about people, and it's about trying to make people, feel comfortable that they're cared for and they operate. And Gary just operated that on next level. He really he was such a, he is such a phenomenal, supporter of his team and his people. And I again, I imagine a lot of that comes from his background.
00:20:03:10 - 00:20:13:17
Tom Kerridge
It's all about team players. It all comes about from where you learn and what that infrastructure in that arm that you put around people. So those synergies were quite an interesting thing to learn from. Gary.
00:20:13:19 - 00:20:20:10
Tom Kerridge
The ability to have a conversation across, being point blank and fair, I think those are really good.
00:20:20:14 - 00:20:20:21
Dan Pope
Again.
00:20:21:00 - 00:20:24:19
Tom Kerridge
So point I'm blank fairness like straight.
00:20:24:20 - 00:20:25:21
Dan Pope
Okay. Sorry. Yeah, yeah yeah.
00:20:26:02 - 00:20:45:15
Tom Kerridge
Straight to it's we're all in this world where, And it's funny, I had a conversation about yesterday that, you know, when you meet somebody that you're going to have a business decision with, the first thing you do is you have a coffee and house business and you go through the whole thing. But actually, that's not the point of your conversation, the point of your company that you've arranged stuff that meeting with is this.
00:20:45:17 - 00:20:59:00
Tom Kerridge
So why don't we just talk about that straight away? Why don't we talk about and I think that comes from kitchens where your reactionary, your chef, you go, no, get that done. Now I need that. Now move move move. Let's hop. I'm the same as a football player on a pitch is you ever got time for nicety? Yeah.
00:20:59:00 - 00:21:21:15
Tom Kerridge
It doesn't mean it's personal. It just means make that happen. Now let's go with that. So conversation with Gary was always great. They were always to the point. Everybody always knew where they stood. And there was no animosity. There was never any ill feeling that was ever. It was an understanding of sometimes everything gets sugarcoated to the point of I'm not in it, but I know there's a whole world of email culture that is out there that people, I hope this email finds you well, I never send emails.
00:21:21:15 - 00:21:37:24
Tom Kerridge
I, I don't care if the email finds you well, like this is the point. I'm, you know, we need to discuss. I know there's an issue with I don't know the lights haven't been fixing in particular like so I constantly say to Alex, who's my PA? Like, would you send him? When are you coming? Like, well, when is this going to get repaired or what's the like?
00:21:38:00 - 00:21:53:17
Tom Kerridge
Let's not pretend. Let's just get it to the point. It's not rude. It's just misses the point. Yeah. So that was a good that's a really good thing that I learned with Gary. Business relationships don't have to be about email culture and nicety. You can be completely respectful, nice and kind.
00:21:53:18 - 00:22:03:21
Dan Pope
Mad though. Well I hadn't well I never proved that. I love linking things together. So the link between being reaction and point blank with fairness and straightness in the kitchen. Yeah. As well. On the football pitch, I never crossed that that the.
00:22:03:21 - 00:22:19:24
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. And that's why I think when people look at it from the outside and they think kitchens can be brutal places, I mean they're mean. They're not mean. It's the same as being in a game of football. Right? So if it's someone's put a stray pass or they're in a hurry up, get it to mean, I mean, maybe people like Roy Keane would be clapping his hands and shake the people.
00:22:19:24 - 00:22:20:22
Dan Pope
Okay. Yeah, yeah.
00:22:20:24 - 00:22:34:03
Tom Kerridge
Afterwards they're all mates. The team mates, they're trying to solve a problem. That's the same as in a kitchen. It's not bullying. It's not being nasty. It's not. It's being reactionary to a situation there and then and afterwards. Well, the chassis go over the road for beer.
00:22:34:04 - 00:22:34:15
Dan Pope
Yes.
00:22:34:15 - 00:22:47:02
Tom Kerridge
They're all they're all team mates. They're all. And it's the same with the best football teams. Gary Neville arguably played for the best football team in the 90s, and they want so many different things because they work together as a group and it's the same as in sports.
00:22:47:02 - 00:22:52:03
Dan Pope
He talked about winning that you could pull from football pitch to kitchen.
00:22:52:05 - 00:23:07:11
Tom Kerridge
I think it's that relentless. Never give it. I think he's about training. Pushing is that you have to take personal responsibility is huge. Yeah. But nobody else is going to make you a brilliant chef. You can work in brilliant kitchens that you can learn from, but nobody else is going to make you that brilliant chef. Nobody else is going to make you that brilliant footballer.
00:23:07:11 - 00:23:08:07
Tom Kerridge
You have to take personal.
00:23:08:07 - 00:23:19:13
Dan Pope
Responsibility with yourself, mate. How much would you say was natural giftedness versus like almost workaholism? But where were you on that scale?
00:23:19:15 - 00:23:37:12
Tom Kerridge
All of it is where all I. But I love of what I do. Sure, if you love what you do, you then push. You push it and it doesn't feel like work. And then when you realize that actually you loving doing this and you're loving pushing so much, you might be in a chef isn't actually about the cooking process.
00:23:37:13 - 00:23:58:05
Tom Kerridge
It's just it's about how you operate within a kitchen, how you operate within that team, how you understand how a kitchen works, how you whether if you get in half an hour earlier than everyone else, you can get all the best pans and hide them and your your job becomes easier. So if you've, you understand the rotation and the were in the buzz of a kitchen in that space, you can become a better chef.
00:23:58:11 - 00:24:29:01
Tom Kerridge
And that's because you love being in the space, not necessarily because you love food. Now there's chefs out there that are absolutely obsessed by ingredients and flavor and food, not the kitchen space. And they're also wonderfully creative and magical. I've learned a trade. So I think, yes, I see myself as like a builder, like a carpenter, that I've learned building blocks of flavor and understanding in that trade, and then being able to put into place through graft and hard work, I would I would back myself with my taste buds.
00:24:29:01 - 00:24:49:19
Tom Kerridge
But I think that's only because of experience. And I think that's only because of, time spent, time served, not necessarily some like Lionel Messi of a kitchen, like some God giving gift of like, yeah, you know, I'm a I'm more like a Steve Steve Bruce central defender. Like I've done it. Yeah. Got a few England caps done right, but only because I worked really hard.
00:24:49:22 - 00:25:04:07
Dan Pope
I like I like those, I like those, Those what? I asked Michel Roux like out of, Gordon Marco and, Marcus Wareing. Who's the least naturally gifted I like that, yeah, that's the graft and graft and graft and then become someone.
00:25:04:07 - 00:25:05:01
Tom Kerridge
Who did he say?
00:25:05:01 - 00:25:20:06
Dan Pope
He said Marcus. They said there. He said they were all incredible. Yeah. And he was like putting in the extra work, as you say, getting in early when you know, to get the pans. Yeah. Yeah, it was him. And I just thought it was really interesting because he was almost people asked me he's the most naturally gifted is I know people who just fucking work.
00:25:20:12 - 00:25:29:08
Dan Pope
Yeah. Would you say was your, like, biggest weakness that you had to really just just attack every single day. Every single day?
00:25:29:10 - 00:25:51:21
Tom Kerridge
I think it's a particular skillset. I never spent a huge amount of time on pastry sections. Yeah. So when it came to pace you, it now pace you. I'd say he's one of the strongest sections at the hand and flowers and always has been. But that's not because we trained pastry chefs. We have had a pastry chef there that been with us for a long in, and I work with this and I worked with for over 20 years on and off in different sites over my whole career, and a no.
00:25:51:23 - 00:26:11:02
Tom Kerridge
But when it came to the desserts and that pastry section, because we were all hot kitchen chefs, that mostly made it work, you would you would have to teach yourself the understanding of that particular dish. If we went with right, we want to put a souffle on, we're going to put it. But how do we make a soup for.
00:26:11:02 - 00:26:26:18
Tom Kerridge
It's not like something that we know as pastry chefs. We've been taught we go, right, we've got to do it like this and this and this, and you just hone a particular skill and go, that's how we do it, and that's how we create that space. Well, that's how we create that dish and that's what we do. So it becomes from a point of weakness to a point of strength.
00:26:26:24 - 00:26:44:06
Tom Kerridge
Now we're not great pastry chefs. We're not we can't just suddenly go in and go, oh, let's make you know, something completely different. Yeah, we'd have to if we wanted to change dessert. We have to then go, okay, let's do all the research and what we're going to do and how we're going to do it. We have to go where it's like reading manuals and understanding it.
00:26:44:09 - 00:26:52:16
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. So I think pastry is also was one of the weakest points, but also it's become one of the strongest because of the, the attitude towards it.
00:26:52:18 - 00:26:56:16
Dan Pope
And what that in business, the weakness that you've had to drill.
00:26:56:18 - 00:27:19:19
Tom Kerridge
I, I think, I think it's the understanding of, reactionary to, big issues, has to be controlled and thought through as opposed to small issues, which you can, you can change very, very quickly. You can go, right, let's move things. We can move fast. If there's a small issue, if there's a set lunch price needs changing with whatever.
00:27:19:22 - 00:27:39:02
Tom Kerridge
You can react to all of that quickly. Bigger issues need a lot more time to step back and take, and that we've learned that we've learned not the hard way. I mean, I try to be honest, I don't think there's any. When we look at a journey of over 20 years of being in business, we've done we've made money, we've done very well the businesses we've done very well.
00:27:39:02 - 00:27:57:20
Tom Kerridge
There's, you know, there's properties and rooms and there's situations that work really nicely that go alongside the hand of flowers. And we've grown as a company, but we've also lost loads of money like we've we've also we've made really poor decisions or situations that have come across that are out of our control, circumstantial decisions or things that have happened.
00:27:57:20 - 00:28:00:19
Tom Kerridge
And then you just go, well, but they're all part of the.
00:28:00:21 - 00:28:07:11
Dan Pope
Process of those decisions because I think the bigger, the deeper the wound, the deeper the wisdom that when you.
00:28:07:13 - 00:28:27:14
Tom Kerridge
Partners with people partnerships that you work with people that you you think are going to. Yeah, I think the hardest thing always is business partnerships. Within company infrastructure, because then you have to rely on somebody else as well, and they have to rely on you and you have to, you know, 50, 50 give it two ways. Is it always working?
00:28:27:20 - 00:28:56:10
Tom Kerridge
You know, partnerships like the work in the hotel here, it's very different to a partnership that works within like a joint venture of a business of a restaurant. I mean, and you learn, you learn to go through an understanding of people and process. And that's. It trust it. Trust is a big thing because when you you trust people to do a job that they're 50% of their partnership, you and you trust them to do that and it doesn't work out, then you have to understand how do you unravel it?
00:28:56:10 - 00:29:19:07
Tom Kerridge
Well, how do you make it? So we've been in business with 2 or 3 different individual people, and that then just hasn't worked out. Whether it's from our point of view, with their point of view. But they're also not they're not failures. They're just learning curves. They're all all of business is about learning because not for everybody. So I'm quite good friends with Peter Jones from Dragon's Den, for example, who lives nearby.
00:29:19:07 - 00:29:36:08
Tom Kerridge
Marlow has always been very supportive. And I then I was, you know, on the board of or CEO of, I don't know, up to 100 companies whatever. Yeah. And you know, we we actually went out for dinner a week, a couple of weeks ago that we would have sat there having a curry. The four of us, main patron of two lovely wives.
00:29:36:08 - 00:29:56:12
Tom Kerridge
And you sit there and you talk about things in business and whatever. But at these businesses, some are absolutely losing loads of money, some are breaking even, some are doing really, really well and you just have that. Not every business is a surefire success. And then it comes right, and you just have to be able to roll it and move it, rather than thinking, this is a nightmare to you just have to roll with things.
00:29:56:12 - 00:29:58:01
Tom Kerridge
And that's probably one of the biggest things we've learned.
00:29:58:04 - 00:30:10:15
Dan Pope
So interesting. I want to talk about, I've heard you say about putting putting your personality into your food. I know, like Oasis is one of your I think it was your was it your mastermind or was it.
00:30:10:16 - 00:30:12:16
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. That wasn't a mastermind, I think.
00:30:12:16 - 00:30:34:12
Dan Pope
Like, I went to go and see Oasis recently, and I think out of all the bands I love, you know, the Beatles, the stones, Joy Division, Stone roses. But I think I've actually put in their personality, in their art. No one does it better than Oasis personally. What have you learned? I think you hung out with them that what you learned about putting your personality and being not right.
00:30:34:14 - 00:30:45:08
Dan Pope
This is a Tom Kerridge dish. And it's and it's no one else's. I think that's easy. That's quite on paper. That's easy to understand in practice. That's really fucking hard. Really hard.
00:30:45:08 - 00:30:51:14
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, I, I think and that's, I think what happens there is you have to learn craft first. So.
00:30:51:17 - 00:30:52:03
Dan Pope
Right.
00:30:52:07 - 00:31:18:13
Tom Kerridge
If you think of infrastructure in the way the businesses work, and the way that great restaurants operate and the way that there's so many and I think it's probably best described when people talk about the difference between one Michelin star and two mission star. So there's over 100 singular Michelin star restaurants that are all fantastic and all amazing and all brilliant, and they've concentrate on consistency and beautiful produce and fantastic service and nice ambiance.
00:31:18:13 - 00:31:35:19
Tom Kerridge
And they're they're all they're all great. But there's a lot of them that if you looked at them, a lot of the main courses would look the same. They follow an Instagram fashion of food and they go like we could, that's how we wind stars and that's and that doesn't take anything away from them because that is amazing.
00:31:35:19 - 00:31:53:10
Tom Kerridge
And what they do in the food is beautiful. And then, then the difference between, one, two, then a two star restaurant, it's what are there? There must be, what, 25 two star spaces in the country? I think if you put a main course from every two star chef in front of you, I reckon you'd be able to go.
00:31:53:10 - 00:32:16:08
Tom Kerridge
Okay. That is, you know, that's Brett's, that's that's, that's that's from it, not Brett's. That's, Daniel. That's from Humble Chicken. That one's sap beans. That one's, that one's Claude's. That one's. Yes. You know, you would be able to go. Okay, you can see a personality difference and change. And then when it goes to three, like the I take the other day and you see.
00:32:16:08 - 00:32:35:07
Tom Kerridge
And it was just on Instagram. Oh, it was amazing. Really just absolutely magical. And it's gone from individual unique personality to something that's just next level, the same as Claire. But, core is same as Simon. I put it on claim and you save it and you just go. There's another thing that clicks in, and I think.
00:32:35:07 - 00:32:38:19
Dan Pope
What is the other thing would you say? Is it like, I can sense.
00:32:38:21 - 00:33:02:21
Tom Kerridge
I think it's, a whole combination of it, an expression of not just great food, but also luxury in terms of, from a from a from a front of house perspective, from a to say every, every single moment and walking into the restaurant to the moment you leave is being thought through, not just going in how to plate food in it.
00:33:02:21 - 00:33:30:14
Tom Kerridge
Great. You know, there's plenty of Michelin star, singular Michelin star space. You go and have a great plate food and you leave, you goes, brilliant, what great. But I think when it gets to three star, there's everything that is so, so different. And I think when you were a chef, you learn a one star level, which is giving you consistency and it's giving you an understanding of produce, and it's giving you a foundation of, a network of producers and supply chain and everything.
00:33:30:16 - 00:33:49:23
Tom Kerridge
And, and then from that foundation, you can then start going, okay, well, what now? How do I differentiate myself from everybody else? How do I become Gareth Ward? How do I become, you know, what do I do that makes me because of Gareth, for example, and Tom Spencer, we both spent so much time with SAP, for example.
00:33:49:23 - 00:33:51:17
Dan Pope
They don't actually in a few weeks.
00:33:51:17 - 00:34:19:04
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So they cooked at SAP. So they, they've learned this amazing infrastructure of brilliant food and understanding how to operate and flavor profiles and grow. But then how do they differentiate themselves from that skill set that they've learned to being in that you then go, oh yeah, that's Gareth's food. Or that comes with, yeah. And and that takes time and it takes confidence and it takes self-belief because cooking at that level, it's very you can become quite okay safe.
00:34:19:04 - 00:34:34:06
Tom Kerridge
It's safe I know what I'm doing. We've achieved a michelin star to take that next step and become an individual who suddenly becomes, feels risk taking, feels exposing. It feels, yeah. Now you're going to get judged on something that's your own and that makes it worse.
00:34:34:06 - 00:34:50:20
Dan Pope
That's also like an oasis. You need to be yourself. You can't be. No one else like that is. I think it's the best. Yeah, best. But how do you do that? How do you be the most extreme version of Tom and, like, move from that one starter to because if it was easy. Yeah. Way more than 25. Yeah.
00:34:50:21 - 00:34:56:22
Dan Pope
So what what did you do. Maybe we this way we can bring in the pirate stuff because. Yeah. How's the pirate on a plate? Maybe I don't know.
00:34:56:24 - 00:35:23:15
Tom Kerridge
Was kitchens have run like pirate ships. Yeah. Like if you look at it, they are, you know, our analogy, my analogy that is that, you know, you can have they're a complete, pirate ship of, of leftfield thinking, misfits, you know, that are quite often, you know, people with, neurodiversity, people with addiction issues, people who just didn't fit in at school, people took cover from head to toe and tattoos.
00:35:23:15 - 00:35:48:16
Tom Kerridge
People that come from it doesn't matter race, religion, sexuality, it doesn't matter. On educational background, economic background. Kitchens are just full of this wonderful, eclectic mix of people, a bit like a pirate ship. They're not all the same. There are so many different people. They come from so many different backgrounds, so many different walks of life. But then the vision is to create this one space where you're all moving forward and it works in perfect harmony, and you try.
00:35:48:18 - 00:36:08:01
Tom Kerridge
So the skill set of the head chef is to try and make all of these people believe in you, that you're then driving towards this greater goal. And that great goal might just be this beautiful bowl of soup. The guest is having. But you're trying to create that energy in that space. And you're trying to drive that belief so that pirate ship thing comes through.
00:36:08:01 - 00:36:26:09
Tom Kerridge
And then once you can build this foundation, this where everybody's working in synergy and in a beautiful motion, you can then start becoming your your own self-belief starts becoming stronger and harder, and you can start thinking, okay, how am I going to what am I going to build, how to work well, how would I do that differently? And what do we represent?
00:36:26:11 - 00:36:56:23
Tom Kerridge
You know, the hand flies. I've always been. We always wanted to just be a part of. I wanted us to be able to be, a place where people wanted to go, myself included, on our days off and represent food that people recognize. And I think one of the things that we've been most proud of is the fact that we might be some people's first experience of a michelin star restaurant because they feel that it's safe, because it's a pub, you walk in, there's a bar there, you can have a pint of beer, and then you can have so that sense of being something for the masses, something for, you know, I come from a
00:36:56:23 - 00:37:18:19
Tom Kerridge
working class, but I come from an estate in Gloucester. I come from like my people are like builders and lorry drivers and, you know, people that work and work in trades and jobs that are, you know, I didn't go to university, I didn't go to, you know, I, I've, I've never worked at a desk job. I've never done I've never had to wear a shirt and tie to work.
00:37:18:20 - 00:37:37:00
Tom Kerridge
Like I've never like my world. Is it by. And so essentially I cook dishes that I hope people recognize that they're not intimidated by, that they don't feel that they've got to. You know, obviously there's some form of creativity that goes into it when it becomes at that two star level. But also there's always safety dishes on there.
00:37:37:00 - 00:37:51:20
Tom Kerridge
There's always like a party or a a soup or a steak or creme brulée or, there's always something that people will recognize and feel that they're in safe hands. But then I think when you start going. But then how do we do that better? How do we make that the best? How do we how do we improve.
00:37:51:20 - 00:38:05:05
Tom Kerridge
So you start going where there's the base level. That's what we're aiming at now. How do we make it the best ever? How do we make it the best? Have it primarily are these four ingredients right. So how do you improve that. Rehearse it and you just practice it again and again and again. It's egg sugar, vanilla and cream.
00:38:05:05 - 00:38:14:02
Tom Kerridge
You go right now you know how do we make that. So it's just process on learning a trade practicing it again and again and again.
00:38:14:03 - 00:38:32:21
Dan Pope
So interesting. Almost as I said I ate there last week. And now seeing I actually speak to that, that how that working class background, that council estate in Gloucester, the trade element. Yeah. Then when you actually eat it. So. Oh wow. That is. Yeah. Still to this day, the most unique burger I've ever eaten is at the coach.
00:38:32:21 - 00:38:33:15
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:38:33:15 - 00:38:43:20
Dan Pope
So that's like told me through that because it's really what women this goes out live. I'll put a picture on the screen. But yeah it's essentially and that is so unique. Yeah. So I don't know maybe describe like.
00:38:43:20 - 00:38:48:07
Tom Kerridge
It's kind of it's like so, so the basic the whole idea that was how.
00:38:48:09 - 00:38:48:16
Dan Pope
You or.
00:38:48:20 - 00:39:00:24
Tom Kerridge
I do we make that look like the most ridiculous burger in the world? how do we make that look like Scooby Doo? You know, like Scooby Snacks at the end of, like, Scooby do the cartoon. The old school one when he used to have, like, a sandwich. Yeah, yeah, yeah. How do we make that look like that?
00:39:00:24 - 00:39:17:08
Tom Kerridge
Like, how do we make, like. It's really awkward. Sweet. It's not supposed to be like, a burger that we get so much stick for. Go. And I start a burger less. You guys, I want to say a burger is a piece, like it's a beef patty. So between two buns, it can be tall, flat, whatever you want. I mean, you can get if you're getting angry about the height of a burger like less.
00:39:17:10 - 00:39:44:05
Tom Kerridge
But for us, it was a then a case of going, how do we do it? So it's pink in the middle, but meets environmental health, tick boxes. So actually that whole process was that put together by Nick who's now owns styling. He's a very bright superintelligent. So is about an understanding of the burger mix. Then cook it on a low slow temperature and a roll so that it stays nice and pink and it's cooked.
00:39:44:11 - 00:39:59:00
Tom Kerridge
And then we set it, and then we take the slices of the burger so they quite fit. And then it's all it's almost a region process of frying them. So it goes crispy in a burger, but it stays pink in the middle which means it's beautiful. It's full of flavor. It's super tasty, but it means it from an environmental health point of view.
00:39:59:00 - 00:40:14:12
Tom Kerridge
There's no, oh, you can't have pink burger. So we can do that. It Chiefs and obviously sits had the coach Nick one at mission star in the team. We've been able to maintain that ever since. And it's like proper stacked super high. And then you can get layers and layers of different flavors in it. So it changes seasonality.
00:40:14:12 - 00:40:15:08
Tom Kerridge
You can change your burger.
00:40:15:08 - 00:40:18:08
Dan Pope
Well I think I had like a big was it a like a pickle like.
00:40:18:11 - 00:40:37:10
Tom Kerridge
That big piece of cucumber pickle in it. Yeah yeah yeah. So we pickle them fresh every morning and then we'll do braised brisket with it. Some weeks we'll do smoked cheeses. We'll do whatever like and it grows and it changes. But it's always this great big kind of like tall burger with a stick in the top that like you have to pretty much eat with the knife and fork, but we serve it on a tiny plate, so it's a real nightmare.
00:40:37:15 - 00:40:41:09
Tom Kerridge
Like all of those. Like it's just supposed to be good fun. It is nice.
00:40:41:09 - 00:40:50:23
Dan Pope
Yeah, I'm real life. I've been having it with my mom, and then it's, eggs. I was going to say, is it meant to eat with the knife and fork is kind of like. It adds a massive, wonderful, like, whack of sort of theater to it.
00:40:51:00 - 00:41:08:09
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, yeah yeah yeah, yeah, exactly. It's about eating out. Should be about have fun. It should be about the noise and the buzz and the clink of cutlery and and people having a laugh and chatting. That's what going out should be. It shouldn't be about I'm not into. I am into temples of gastronomy. And I love them. But even a prime example.
00:41:08:11 - 00:41:26:06
Tom Kerridge
I was so lucky to be the liberal, earlier this week for my wedding anniversary. And you go there and it's a temple of gastronomy. It's three Michelin stars, but the front of house is so lovely and so, so bubbly and fun and like the energy and the atmosphere. And I was really everyone's having a nice time. There's a good you're not like, oh, God.
00:41:26:08 - 00:41:27:03
Dan Pope
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:41:27:07 - 00:41:36:23
Tom Kerridge
It's actually create energy, create fun. And it should be about noise and excitement and people having a good time and and that's why that Coach Burger hopefully brings in. Yeah.
00:41:36:23 - 00:41:39:15
Dan Pope
No more. Yeah. Which I'm to we're talking about it
00:41:41:00 - 00:41:59:11
Dan Pope
interviewed the dementia the other week. And his whole sort of philosophy is removing silent irritants. So silent irritants could be kind of you know, you walk in and it's busy and they give you a plastic, cup. Forget it. It's just ruins the experience. It could be the fork being slightly ajar, like, you know, there's there's little things.
00:41:59:11 - 00:42:06:17
Dan Pope
What would you say are sort of the silent irritants in restaurants? And how do you like to go around removing them?
00:42:06:19 - 00:42:27:03
Tom Kerridge
I the one thing that I always look at, are things I don't like. Pictures have to be straight. That's the first thing I notice. So many tiny things, the small detail. And I think, like, I should write that it's small and that's what makes great restaurants. So is that probably the things there's a guess. They never pick up on, but there's something that's not quite right, and you can't quite put your finger on what it is.
00:42:27:09 - 00:42:46:05
Tom Kerridge
And I think always good, great restaurateurs. If you look at the best, if you look at a Corbyn and King, for example, to the most phenomenal restaurateurs this country's ever seen in terms of restaurants setup, everything is all geared about the room in the space and how to create energy and what to do with it. Front of house is so key.
00:42:46:05 - 00:43:07:07
Tom Kerridge
I think that's probably one of the biggest things that I've learned moving forward, from being a chef to being an owner of spaces. Is that front of house genuinely make people's experiences? Yes, you could be about the best food in the kitchen, but if someone front of house doesn't make eye contact with you, or is surely at a table or say like it doesn't matter how good your food is, you've gone.
00:43:07:07 - 00:43:24:12
Tom Kerridge
Actually, this well, I've had a rubbish experience. If somebody connects front of house and it's fun and is exciting and is telling you you can have a great time and here's this and this is so and so, can I top that up? Or, you know, it talks you through a process. Front of house is massive to creating experiences.
00:43:24:12 - 00:43:30:16
Tom Kerridge
And then all of the little salient irritants. Yeah could could disappear. So much of is about personality and personality.
00:43:30:16 - 00:43:40:23
Dan Pope
So obviously when you walk in it was like you know when is now coming. When we're recording this, you walk into that, open that first room and that look like where the bar is at the hand and flowers and it's.
00:43:41:00 - 00:44:02:04
Tom Kerridge
I walk into here this morning, I can already see that there's a light off to this that I need to straighten, like out. So first thing, I like how, I think there's a thing that happens. I think as a restaurateur, you're always looking for the small things. You're always. You're always conscious of why there's one light bulb over there, or there's one thing that's happening there, and you're always aware of your environment and your space.
00:44:02:06 - 00:44:09:02
Tom Kerridge
And I think that's that's a good thing, that as an operator, you have to have you're always looking at what's.
00:44:09:02 - 00:44:12:17
Dan Pope
It's almost like an internal negative bias traits, external positive results.
00:44:12:17 - 00:44:28:01
Tom Kerridge
100%. Yeah, that's exactly the right way to look I'm always looking for what's the problem and what's the problem. What's the problem. And you solve it. I'm not looking for problems, but you're always looking for the little things that make the difference. You're always looking for it. And that bit chefs do that. You're always looking for things. And the best chefs are always looking for the things that are on the plate.
00:44:28:05 - 00:44:43:14
Tom Kerridge
Well how do I operate or what can I do? I want to put a new dish on, but that will be an issue because that that section won't be able to get that done with that someone. At the same time, it's that, well, we've only got one on a plant that can only fit that one. I do, I do that like you're always thinking and always problem solving, small ones or big ones.
00:44:43:14 - 00:45:00:24
Tom Kerridge
And I think that's. But if you can solve those problems quickly, those small little irritants that it creates a much better environment and then all of it can get masked and create good energy. If you've got brilliant front of house stuff, like.
00:45:00:24 - 00:45:03:21
Dan Pope
If you you get your personality into that part of the of the of the.
00:45:03:21 - 00:45:04:23
Tom Kerridge
Theater front of house stuff.
00:45:04:23 - 00:45:14:14
Dan Pope
Yeah, like we talked about how you put sort of time in the food, but how do you create the warmth and the because that's what I picked up was just warm like the tunes of onion as well. Like, yeah.
00:45:14:15 - 00:45:34:07
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, music's really important for energy, atmosphere. Music is really important. I think the team of people that you pick front of house, we're very lucky. At the hand we've got people that. So one of our biggest things, a Lord as his general manager, she's been with us for 18, nearly 19 years. Katie's restaurant manager, 116 years. We've got Colin Gavin front of house who both been with us for 14 years.
00:45:34:13 - 00:45:53:21
Tom Kerridge
We've got so many people that have been in that business, and then those people also then work and run the other spaces. They are the, you know, their oversee. And I think personality and energy in terms of interior design, you have to work with designers to understand you. You have to work with an infrastructure. You have to try and create a space or a place where you you want to be.
00:45:53:21 - 00:46:11:05
Tom Kerridge
That's it. You want to create space that you want to be. And that's why it's difficult when people talk to us about perhaps opening something overseas or doing other stuff, or doing never say never, but it's very hard to then create a a restaurant or a pub space without it feeling that you can visit, and it's your personality that's put into it that's really important.
00:46:11:07 - 00:46:27:09
Tom Kerridge
So I try to get into all the spaces every week, you know, even if it's only for five minutes, because that's all the time allows to come in and go, hey guys, how are we doing? You you're you're energy comes into space. You can see what's going on. You can ensure that actually this the room feels great. It's no problem.
00:46:27:11 - 00:46:27:24
Tom Kerridge
What?
00:46:28:01 - 00:46:31:06
Dan Pope
You know, there's two things I notice on the walls. Ones. The shoes.
00:46:31:08 - 00:46:32:17
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. And the hand here.
00:46:32:19 - 00:46:35:09
Dan Pope
It wasn't. Yeah, yeah. The hand. So what's the story behind that.
00:46:35:11 - 00:46:35:22
Tom Kerridge
So the shoes.
00:46:35:22 - 00:46:37:11
Dan Pope
That was like 40th birthday.
00:46:37:11 - 00:46:40:16
Tom Kerridge
So they were trainers I used to wear all the time.
00:46:40:18 - 00:46:43:06
Dan Pope
One of the trainers,
00:46:43:08 - 00:46:44:19
Tom Kerridge
At knees that was say yeah.
00:46:44:19 - 00:46:47:06
Dan Pope
So I couldn't really see. And I've had a few negronis. So yeah.
00:46:47:06 - 00:47:05:24
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, yeah. No there at me. So my wife's an artist. She works in bronze and marble and, they're actually the front of house, the kitchen team in the front of house team all, all kind of paid for them to be done as my 40th birthday present. So they stolen, like, so a pair of shoes got stolen. I don't even realize they've gone.
00:47:06:01 - 00:47:14:01
Tom Kerridge
And, my wife got cast, by a bronze cast. So. So that was a present from the team for my 40th birthday. Trainers like.
00:47:14:02 - 00:47:16:19
Dan Pope
That was almost like you. Just you just plodding away and grinding.
00:47:16:21 - 00:47:18:24
Tom Kerridge
Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that's.
00:47:19:01 - 00:47:22:02
Dan Pope
Interesting. And then the grenade was. Is it grenades? Yeah.
00:47:22:02 - 00:47:33:13
Tom Kerridge
That's an artist called Katie. So it's a grenade. That was, she did these amazing. Kind of like chocolate, hand grenades. And then she made. We were going to make some real ones with her.
00:47:33:15 - 00:47:38:07
Dan Pope
Like, so is it feels actually, like the size of a grenade or is it, is it like a thing on a.
00:47:38:07 - 00:47:52:23
Tom Kerridge
Now we were doing some small one. We were going to do some small chocolate grenades. And she did. It was a she's a yeah. Just an artist that we were very supportive of. So it was kind of like like, like a Cadbury's Creme Egg kind of thing that we built. We built the funding. We did the whole thing for it.
00:47:52:23 - 00:48:09:13
Tom Kerridge
So we did some. Yeah, some chocolate grenades with her, as a kind of a, like a kind of a joint kind of art installation piece. And I would both myself and my wife were very supportive of the British art scene. My wife is like her two sculptures are sitting there, you know, carriages. We have pieces of work.
00:48:09:13 - 00:48:15:00
Tom Kerridge
One, two, one, two, three, four, five, seven, seven of her pieces in there, though.
00:48:15:00 - 00:48:23:22
Dan Pope
That's what I wanted to ask you. Just so. So, Beth, she's a sculpture. We can take a picture of that on the show. Yeah, yeah. What she taught you about creativity. Because she's excels in her own right.
00:48:23:22 - 00:48:51:04
Tom Kerridge
Right? Yeah. She does. Yeah, we were very. We were both very, very different people in terms of we built a business together and both of our worlds run parallel together. But operate. We both drop in and out of each other's. Well, Beth's actually still very much involved in the business in terms of, cash flow infrastructure, the banking that she's still very much spends time on the on the computer, in the office, at home making sure that the business is working correctly.
00:48:51:04 - 00:49:19:23
Tom Kerridge
It's all over interior, interior design, vibe and feeling. But Beth operates in a world where it needs she needs calm and quiet, whereas I operate in a world where it needs to be chaotic and decision making, and together you end up working in this kind of, connected. I mean, it's a real privilege to have, over the last 20 years, to have been in partnership with your wife, to be able to make something, create something together, a business that works.
00:49:20:02 - 00:49:39:04
Tom Kerridge
But we both work in a very different way. And that's and that's really important because you listen to each other's viewpoints and you understand. And I think that's very important to be able to build a business that also I don't surround myself with yes people, but most of the time if I say this is what we go to, that's how it's going to be done is my business.
00:49:39:04 - 00:49:53:19
Tom Kerridge
That's what they'll do. They say they'll do it. Whereas if you say that and Beth has an opinion and I she's my wife. Yeah. He's not going to say, oh yeah, okay. Yeah I think I know that is wrong. And you go and you and you can stand back and look at it from. And that helps strength. It strengthens the business.
00:49:53:19 - 00:50:03:03
Tom Kerridge
It gives it it gives it two different constructive viewpoints. Even though we we both want exactly the same result, it's good to look at it from different angles.
00:50:03:05 - 00:50:04:17
Dan Pope
In the thing of exactly chaos.
00:50:04:17 - 00:50:05:19
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly.
00:50:06:00 - 00:50:21:13
Dan Pope
Right. Okay. That's wonderful. So let's just sort of sink into that a bit deeper, please. Is so is there an example of that where like the chaos and the and the calm collide almost with a business decision or, I think they used to be.
00:50:21:15 - 00:50:40:08
Tom Kerridge
A lot more when Beth was in the business, right. In the early days when she was in there, help him work front of house and was in the business, it's now got to the point where, you know, the businesses are successful. We've surrounded ourselves with incredible management and infrastructure and Beth, and also being able to go on to, I mean, you know, she won a global award for sculpture.
00:50:40:08 - 00:51:03:22
Tom Kerridge
She's got a huge piece at the front of the Dubai Opera House. She's got she's have one amazing show, the beginning of this year in Palm Beach. She's got another one, the run up to Christmas into Miami, into, Yeah. So so she's got a lot. She has a lot going on. So though that world of success where you've been able to grow, has been amazing.
00:51:03:24 - 00:51:29:03
Tom Kerridge
And that's all through development of conversation and talking together. I think there's always periods where people have people fall out and people have different opinions all the time. In any business now, whether that's Nicholas, who's restaurant manager, a restaurant director here, or Tom, who's head chef, they'll have different opinions of how to make things work, but it's how you then culminate and work it together as a team to be able to fulfill, because we're all aiming for the same thing.
00:51:29:03 - 00:51:44:05
Tom Kerridge
We all want guests to leave happy. That's it. That's the end result is guess if happy. Yeah. How do we get to that point? How do you negotiate it and how do you work it through. And so you have to have an understanding and I am I am it's like it's like a marriage. You have to understand. You have to listen.
00:51:44:07 - 00:52:02:00
Tom Kerridge
But you also have to be able to express. And when you can find that balance between the two things and it works really, really well. But it doesn't mean it's always in synergy for front of house or, or, but we find it a lot easier now that our home life isn't is very separate from our work life. Like it's a lot easier to.
00:52:02:03 - 00:52:03:09
Dan Pope
When you create that space.
00:52:03:14 - 00:52:18:24
Tom Kerridge
Over time. Yeah, it's really hard. Like it's really hard. Anybody who goes into business. Yeah, you know, I would be open minded if I was I was 31 years old. And if you live above the space work will work with your wife and you're in it. She's your restaurant manager and and you were the head chef. It's a really difficult starting point.
00:52:19:01 - 00:52:35:22
Tom Kerridge
But you can grow from that and you build from that and you end up becoming new. So. But that isn't going to come instantly. You just have to work and you have to understand that, you know, when people say something or I'm saying so it's not personal, it's reactionary to pieces. But then you have to understand the point where you where you separate it and don't.
00:52:35:22 - 00:52:41:20
Tom Kerridge
Actually, this isn't about so it's about moving, but that can only come with time and experience. And it's like anything like it.
00:52:41:22 - 00:52:42:20
Dan Pope
Yeah, yeah, yeah I love.
00:52:42:20 - 00:52:48:23
Tom Kerridge
I'd love to say to somebody yeah, it's really easy. It's a lot easier now 20 years down the line. But it doesn't mean to say that it was at the beginning.
00:52:49:00 - 00:52:57:22
Dan Pope
So you you're captain of this, this wonderful ship delivering happiness, making people happy. Everyone's looking at you. What are the things you silently struggle with?
00:52:58:10 - 00:53:22:15
Tom Kerridge
About balance in terms of I operate on a I always need to be doing something. I'm always late for something else. I'm always I fill my time with. So I take. So if you have ADHD, and then you deal with issues like addiction issues, like paying for a whole drinking alcohol situation, and you go through a world of,
00:53:22:15 - 00:53:24:12
Tom Kerridge
coping mechanisms.
00:53:24:12 - 00:53:52:10
Tom Kerridge
And how do you how do you build on that? How do you how do you continue in your daily life whilst dealing with all of those different things? I love? It's weird because I love structure with no structure, like it's I love chaos and I love mayhem, but I have no structure in my life. I was explaining to you my life like today where I what what I did yesterday to them, what I'm doing today and then tomorrow and then.
00:53:52:14 - 00:54:13:23
Tom Kerridge
And I love the absolute chaos of the timings are all over the place and it's where you find solace and structure. It's why I struggle with some form of escape structure from the chaos world. And sometimes it becomes overall thing like it becomes quite a huge and a how do I, how do I unravel it or unwind it.
00:54:13:23 - 00:54:33:17
Tom Kerridge
So I, I try to live I try to to block Sunday's, I try to I live my life vicariously through my son who's made into motorsport and rugby. So great. Yeah, let's escape into that world. And I love that. I try to get to the gym every day. Sometimes I won't, I won't yesterday, and I won't today.
00:54:33:20 - 00:54:48:04
Tom Kerridge
So that I mean, that Friday I've got to do something because I also will sit in my head now. Yeah, I've got to get, I've got to get like I've got to get. Yeah. So he's trying to find those escape spaces. I struggle, I struggle with that. I really want structure in my life. And then I hate the idea of it.
00:54:48:06 - 00:54:50:18
Tom Kerridge
So I. I struggle with those things. I struggle with.
00:54:50:18 - 00:55:04:06
Dan Pope
That. Yeah. It wouldn't because I've had my battles with addiction. Like, I used to fucking love partying. And I sort of got 28. I would like just hit rock bottom as I need to sort this stuff. Yeah. And I've basically just threw it all into this. Yeah. It was kind of a good escape mechanism.
00:55:04:06 - 00:55:12:02
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. So you'll, you'll, you'll be the same. So you're completely thrown into this and it doesn't matter if you've got to do it for 24 hours. And a thing of like, because you're in it, this is what I'm doing and this is what I.
00:55:12:02 - 00:55:13:18
Dan Pope
Do and it's focus. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:55:13:18 - 00:55:44:01
Tom Kerridge
So it went from tiny flowers. One business with an alcohol problem to remove alcohol from my life tonight. Five businesses, six businesses I like, I fill it with the other. The chaos that I bring in, the alcohol was had with. I brought into business an infrastructure and something that keeps the mind just absolutely flying and buzzing and hating and loving and like, yeah, I got rid of that and bought in that.
00:55:44:01 - 00:55:47:19
Tom Kerridge
So the saying you got rid of the party stuff and now you bring in, you bring in a.
00:55:47:21 - 00:56:08:11
Dan Pope
Another reason we don't have a studio is because I like we like today rocked up breakfast. Yeah. It's it's I was like this going to be interesting right. Yeah yeah yeah. Look but every space we go into it's like a new challenge. But I need that, like, fuck me. Where are we going to set up the cameras? And it just keeps my brain going, which I feel like if I go to one space, I just get like, I did it for like a couple of months.
00:56:08:11 - 00:56:10:16
Dan Pope
I just got bored, like, oh, new idea.
00:56:10:17 - 00:56:13:00
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, yeah. Routine. It's the same infrastructure.
00:56:13:00 - 00:56:33:22
Dan Pope
So it's so in terms of the boozing stuff, because I've heard the stories about that. Like how important do you think that was to, creativity that I've, I think and I've spoken to a guy called John Hegarty like marketing genius. He's did BHP design like, Levi's guy basically got Levi's going. He's quite a bit older now.
00:56:33:24 - 00:56:54:16
Dan Pope
And he said, there's something about alcohol and creativity within, you know, within limits. Right. But he says he he sort of believes that the creative, the advertising industry now is kind of diminished the creative output because he kind of lost the long lunch and we've lost that ability. He says. Creativity is a, a generous and convivial act, which I really liked the way of, you know, saying it.
00:56:54:22 - 00:56:58:10
Dan Pope
How would you how important was the boozing in that in that period for you?
00:56:58:12 - 00:57:29:14
Tom Kerridge
Hugely, massively if it were, if I don't regret it for a single minute, I sometimes I think, oh, I'd love a couple of cold beer just watching a football. But the reality that's not in my world. I can't be part of my world. Yeah, but not for a single minute to I regret that person in that space or that, because without it was a release from a relentless drive, a relentless of being in the kitchen at 630 in the morning, pushing all the way through till midnight every day, driving, driving.
00:57:29:14 - 00:57:52:21
Tom Kerridge
And it was an escape and a release, and it was the massive crash come down of an in hugely intense day. And it was like every day was escape and it was this without without being able to be that intense in the kitchen. I could not that intense escape route. So without that intense, if everything was just like six out of ten, you would we wouldn't be sick.
00:57:52:22 - 00:58:07:20
Tom Kerridge
We wouldn't be in the business. We wouldn't we wouldn't be there. The business wouldn't be there. Like, I don't like if you if you want just calm seas. You're never going to achieve anything if you want to, if you want to be the best. No matter what you do, if you want to achieve stuff, no matter what industry, whatever, whatever it is, you do it.
00:58:07:20 - 00:58:30:05
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, you have to be 100% in it and to be 100% in it, you have to also then become 100%. I be at some point you need to release just a pressure valve that gets taken away. Mine was alcohol and I mean it's now, it's now in the gym or it's now some other form of chaos that I bring in, but it's without a single minute, do I not?
00:58:30:06 - 00:58:51:07
Tom Kerridge
I don't regret that person that that space, that place that I was in. Yeah, it was it. It's absolutely no good for me health wise. It was absolutely ridiculous. You know, if I was still, we wouldn't be here now if I was still in the same space. There's absolutely no doubt about that. But without that drive and relentless push without escape.
00:58:51:10 - 00:59:08:03
Tom Kerridge
So no, I don't regret for a single minute. It's funny, I did the, you know, the high performance podcast. Yes, I did that. And then always talk about percentage points and whatever. You know, how hyper focus and all these sort of things. And, and you go, yeah, yeah. But it, it kind of like but my reaction to it kind of blows out the wall.
00:59:08:03 - 00:59:13:14
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. No do everything get all of that and then go and get absolutely fine like it. You I mean it's just.
00:59:13:14 - 00:59:27:16
Dan Pope
Like that's what we're going to do after this. Basically because it's like it's sort of the intense I love this. Like my dopamine goes through the roof and I do these things like the, you know, the setting up. But then after that I have to just fucking get on it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It helps me just it does help me relax.
00:59:27:16 - 00:59:47:06
Dan Pope
And I think, yeah, I think especially in the last couple of years and I, I do agree like net it's well I, I don't know that I agree with it but the whole alcohol free movement is, is good. But I think it's, I think we sort of get into a place where we demonize people who booze. And it's actually like I always say, like where you put your restaurant boozing.
00:59:47:10 - 01:00:03:13
Dan Pope
Churchill drunk too much. Yeah. To be an alcoholic. That's the quote. There's one quick run that I don't even have two. Right. So I think it's I think there is a release in it and it's and it's super interesting. What would you say is, so you I remember I think it was, it was, is it when you 40s when you were like, right.
01:00:03:13 - 01:00:06:18
Dan Pope
I mean sort this. Yeah. And you used to you almost like took stock on life.
01:00:06:18 - 01:00:08:10
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. It's an age point I think.
01:00:08:12 - 01:00:08:16
Dan Pope
Yeah.
01:00:08:16 - 01:00:11:06
Tom Kerridge
That was I think when you approach 40,
01:00:11:06 - 01:00:16:07
Tom Kerridge
I think as a point of reflection, you go, what have I chief. What am I what where am I at.
01:00:16:11 - 01:00:28:08
Dan Pope
What were you right. Like maybe writing or thinking like what if you have some principles like this, this what I need to do to live a good life. This is what I need to avoid to live a bad life. Obviously, other than the booze, like, what would you say some of those reflections were at that point?
01:00:28:13 - 01:00:45:04
Tom Kerridge
None of that. That whole point them was like, I need to stop drinking. I say, that was a that was the biggest thing. It was the biggest thing. Yeah. If I remove that from my life, something else can. So I, I, I stopped drinking, I started swimming, I swam every day. I got to the point where I'd swim a mile every day, not drink.
01:00:45:06 - 01:01:03:04
Tom Kerridge
And it was just a reactionary it again. It then then became the hyperfocus. It became the thing and it became my, swim in. How fast can I swim? I quit, can I do a mile? Right. How many? And you started seeing the numbers, and the numbers start coming down and you start recognizing you're getting better at this, and you do so.
01:01:03:06 - 01:01:13:22
Tom Kerridge
So that became the focus of. Right? What? How am I doing this? What more do you know? I had to do that every day. I had to be I have to do that every day. I had to do that every day. And then that's moved to like the gym or it's moved to sort.
01:01:13:22 - 01:01:14:20
Dan Pope
Of stuff to do in the gym.
01:01:14:20 - 01:01:27:16
Tom Kerridge
Like a lift. Try lifting, like dead lifting. And yeah, deadlifting is I try I spend five days a week trying to build all everything else to a one day a week deadlift, and you just go, right, that's where we go. You go, yeah, I'll try it.
01:01:27:18 - 01:01:32:24
Dan Pope
Okay. Yeah. So, so it's just seeing your the chaos into focus. Yeah a beautiful dance. Yeah. Yeah.
01:01:32:24 - 01:01:37:11
Tom Kerridge
So you go these are all the other exercises that I do and they're all part and parcel of you because.
01:01:37:11 - 01:01:41:10
Dan Pope
You said stuff would you do to get a good deadlift. So I like to go to the gym but like, not.
01:01:41:12 - 01:01:57:24
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. I thought well we you obviously you do. You do the lactate then you do shoulders. You chest and you do whatever because the deadlift is all it's a full body movement. Yes. They go right. So I'm trying to train all of the other bits. And then and then I've got a stick in a couple of bits of cardio obviously, because you've just got to keep moving which is a bit that I.
01:01:58:02 - 01:02:13:13
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. You go. So you go say that a couple of days of cardio workout, like maybe one day of a hit routine. You just get it done in half an hour and just hate every minute of it. Yeah. And then and then. So yeah, I'll just go through a process. I work with a trainer and then on deadlift I don't I don't have the trainer.
01:02:13:13 - 01:02:15:03
Tom Kerridge
I just do it on my own and.
01:02:15:05 - 01:02:15:24
Dan Pope
Build up to.
01:02:15:24 - 01:02:30:16
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. And then try and then try and then try and get the dates and then some weeks are really good. Some weeks a paw, some weeks you, you do, you know, you try and hit your head a high weight. And then of the week you go on up because as you get older like 52 you go on. My back feels a bit sore.
01:02:30:16 - 01:02:46:00
Tom Kerridge
I've also learned to not push. I've also learned actually that doesn't feel right. I could push it. Yeah, but then my back's fucked and I might be done for three days and I just go actually, let's go. I'm good for today. I can walk away from it going. I got to remind myself, it's not a sprint. It's a marathon like that.
01:02:46:06 - 01:02:52:16
Dan Pope
That mind. Yeah. Which is. Which is just grind out, grind out, push, push, push. That's one more. So you know, we're saying.
01:02:52:16 - 01:03:01:00
Tom Kerridge
That it comes with age. That comes with experience. It comes with experience. Interesting. I'm just going to tell you now but just back off now. It doesn't matter. Revisit again next week is cool.
01:03:01:02 - 01:03:12:10
Dan Pope
Yeah. So you're so your son is your son's name AC yeah. Yeah, yeah. Well, out of all the challenges you've been through, what are the ones that you'd actually want him to go through?
01:03:12:12 - 01:03:32:07
Tom Kerridge
Oh, geez. That's quite on. Like, it's quite because he's grown up in a very different world to mine. Like, I grew up with a single parent family on the estate in Gloucester. He's grown up in a big house in Marlow, like day two. I mean, like I say, yeah, he's world is completely different. He's he's got so many wonderful opportunities in front of him.
01:03:32:09 - 01:03:53:15
Tom Kerridge
But we a he goes to state school. We don't send him the private school we go to. Like it's quite important to me that he understands it. He's very lucky. He's very privileged for what the opportunities he's got in front of him. We try to make sure that, you know, we take into he goes to art galleries, early experiences, nice food and different ingredients.
01:03:53:15 - 01:04:16:23
Tom Kerridge
He'll be a part. He's got so many experiences in his life. He goes on nice holidays. He hangs out with, you know, other chefs and other chefs kids. And but he also it's really important. His world is, also recognized. He got to go to instill into him that, it's a pirate ship and it takes all sorts of different people.
01:04:16:23 - 01:04:37:05
Tom Kerridge
And the his world is very, very privileged and very different. So an appreciation, of where of what he's got in front of him. It's also really hard to present to a child. Yeah, but he's also read it. He's coming up to ten. Okay. Wow. So, so it's really hard to present to a child of like, we're lucky to have this, you know, go.
01:04:37:05 - 01:04:57:20
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, yeah, yeah, but he doesn't know anything else. You know, he doesn't know any, but actually. So one of his closest friends at school, actually, lives in a lives in a mobile home. So he spends a lot of time around there, like, understanding, like trying to understand that it's a very different world. He plays a lot of rugby.
01:04:57:20 - 01:05:10:22
Tom Kerridge
Rugby's really important. So he hangs out with a lot of kids that the rugby he plays for him. Right. Right. Right. Yeah. He's a, he's a, he's a monster. He's an absolute unit. He's like he's nearly he's he's nearly ten. He's got size 8.5ft. He's like he's.
01:05:10:24 - 01:05:11:23
Dan Pope
Seven. Yeah.
01:05:12:00 - 01:05:30:00
Tom Kerridge
Yes I get he's a he's a monster. He's in. It comes to that. We got we got a little gym at home. He comes into Jimmy is deadlifting and he's squatting big weight like he's he's deadlifting 85 kilos. Like he's a there's a ten year and nine year old like he's a monster. He's a monster. Like he's like, it's like he's a he he absolutely loves.
01:05:30:00 - 01:05:50:02
Tom Kerridge
He loves it. So. But that rugby, that rugby space is a really it's a really good place to be because he's not great at things like he's not he's not Fast Runner and he's not mega at football. But rugby's like he's mega. So he understands like rugby is a great sport because there's a position for everybody and there's a space for everybody.
01:05:50:02 - 01:06:07:20
Tom Kerridge
And different, different kids have different strengths in that team. Building and it's magic for that and being a part of that rugby he did three times a week. He's a rugby. So he's, you know three training sessions or a game every week and he's like he's he's being a part of that community. Rugby I think rugby I played a lot as a kid.
01:06:07:20 - 01:06:20:21
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, yeah. And it's such a special sport for teaching everybody that everybody can have a role, a bit like a kitchen, you know? Everybody's got a role. Football is essentially a pretty much the same. You I mean like, I just.
01:06:21:01 - 01:06:31:15
Dan Pope
I hadn't thought of it. It's actually really ironically because it's usually played by it's kind of an elitist sport, but also a very democratic sport in the sense everyone. I hadn't thought of like that.
01:06:31:17 - 01:06:59:03
Tom Kerridge
I think it used to be hugely elitist. Right? Yeah. This would be the best school now. It's like if you think of the best. I mean, he's made into playing for Harlequins in England. If you think of it, if you think of the England or British and Irish Lions front row, where you have Joe Marler, who comes from a different background, you've got Ellis from Bristol, like, you know, and these are players that have come from, you know, different like working class backgrounds that then made it to the top of an elite sport.
01:06:59:05 - 01:06:59:16
Tom Kerridge
Like it.
01:06:59:19 - 01:07:00:19
Dan Pope
It's changing. Yeah.
01:07:00:19 - 01:07:02:07
Tom Kerridge
It's definitely change in this space is.
01:07:02:07 - 01:07:20:03
Dan Pope
Really one of my good mates who's actually good friends with Joe Marlow's Ollie Cohen, who does. Yeah. Quins back was on the big Quins family season ticket. So yeah, the games I think it's just the Stoops just. Yeah. Great. Great great doubt. But, one of the things he was sort of saying to me is like, what?
01:07:20:04 - 01:07:30:12
Dan Pope
What were the things like scoring whenever they came on the podcast was like the lessons from or leadership lessons from rugby. I know you played a little bit. Is there anything you took from, from, from that into the kitchen?
01:07:30:14 - 01:07:52:04
Tom Kerridge
I mean, I think that an understanding possibly in retrospect, I mean, I stopped playing when I was 17, 18 because I ended up going into a kitchen. Yeah. So you go you end up, you haven't got time, you know, there's no time on training in midweek or in the weekend that you're like, it's just yeah, yeah, you're in a kid, but you end up learning, I think in retrospect, you look back at it and you recognize that everybody has a role to play.
01:07:52:04 - 01:08:12:22
Tom Kerridge
Everybody has a, you know, Joe Marler is there for pushing, you know, that's it, that you have a quick kids to that for running fast. You know, like there's different roles for everybody. And you know somebody is a more relaxed calm pastry chef section. Somebody is all about cooking the meat and fish. Somebody else is about the time taking create intervenes on the larder section.
01:08:13:03 - 01:08:30:08
Tom Kerridge
You know, there's all those and you have to learn and piece all those pieces together. And then the head chef is like the captain that's building it all and running it. I think that you very much learn that a kitchen can you. It's like a rugby team. It's, it's it's a lot of individuals that need individual team building and caring.
01:08:30:14 - 01:08:39:22
Tom Kerridge
But the recognition of the importance of each person's role is, is, is recognized very much. Me, I suppose kitchens and a rugby pitch.
01:08:39:23 - 01:08:45:16
Dan Pope
The you've got a I think you're in a WhatsApp group with like Paul Ainsworth sat Bains it's like also was at the National mic adventures.
01:08:45:18 - 01:08:46:22
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, yeah.
01:08:46:24 - 01:08:48:04
Dan Pope
Who else in it. It's
01:08:48:08 - 01:08:54:24
Tom Kerridge
Paul, Claude, Daniel and Claire. Claude. Claude. Paul. Daniel. Claire. Me? Yeah.
01:08:55:05 - 01:09:09:22
Dan Pope
If you could sort of sum up each person their genius. Because I love the idea of, like, just networks and making the ship rising with the tides. Essentially the ship, the boats rising, the tides. If you could sum up their individual genius in, like, a sentence or so, which what would it be? Maybe start with Paul like.
01:09:09:23 - 01:09:28:06
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. Well, I think the the six of us, we do a kind of a gastro trip every year where we drive car free France and eat in beautiful restaurants for 4 or 5 days and like, and it's it's mega, it's mega. We absolutely love it. We we get blocked off kind of a year in advance. If this is where we're going to do, then we spend a lot of time planning a route and the restaurants are going to eat.
01:09:28:08 - 01:09:54:23
Tom Kerridge
We all enjoy driving, we all enjoy being in that space. And you and you. And then you look at, I mean, Claire, like, is a three star human, not just a chef. You know, she's constantly represented. She'll come down in the morning immaculately dressed. She's just so sharp, so represented. She represents herself, represents her business, represents Michelin, represents everything that she she she exudes class.
01:09:55:00 - 01:09:58:18
Tom Kerridge
She's an exceptional human, wonderful person.
01:09:58:20 - 01:09:59:12
Dan Pope
Human. That's.
01:09:59:14 - 01:10:23:07
Tom Kerridge
She's a three star human. She's romantic. Is she? Yeah. She's amazing. She's a proper and she's brilliant. She's great to spend time with. Her experiences where she's learning, where she's cooked, what she's done is phenomenal. So is probably, I don't know, the closest to, like, an, like, an Aston Senna figure, like he's, he's kind of. Yeah. Like he like creative spirit and exciting.
01:10:23:13 - 01:10:43:01
Tom Kerridge
And you never quite know what's going to come out of his mouth next. You never know where it's going to go. Like like he's you know, he has I mean, we've all known each other for such a long time. And he's got an amazing energy and brilliance. And there's always a sense of nervousness that you're not entirely sure where it's going to go.
01:10:43:02 - 01:11:07:07
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, yeah. Claude. Phenomenal. Beautiful, brilliant Frenchman who is big and robust, like he's cooking and he's, but he's also incredibly tactile and wonderful. Once you scratch beneath the surface, he's one of the most warm and gentle humans that you'll ever meet. The persona that you get when the front is this big French and he is all of those things.
01:11:07:07 - 01:11:36:19
Tom Kerridge
But he's also like, he's got parents to my son, and he's such a magical, warm, kind, gentle human. But also like, quite hardcore, like can't quite a hardcore hardcore, just as in like reactionary and robust and big and relentless and is always looking for the next thing. And it's always we both we both own a race car together.
01:11:36:19 - 01:11:49:12
Tom Kerridge
We race. Yeah, right. So we we both we do. Yeah, yeah. Do track teams together and we race and we have our. So we do endurance races where we swap in and I like we're actually racing next weekend. So yeah we bought what.
01:11:49:14 - 01:11:51:18
Dan Pope
So basically this one car gone. What was it like.
01:11:51:18 - 01:12:01:12
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. So mandatory no mandatory pit stops on track. So so I like a SuperSport series where it's Silverstone. Donington. Like it's Brands Hatch.
01:12:01:15 - 01:12:02:07
Dan Pope
So you're.
01:12:02:07 - 01:12:13:20
Tom Kerridge
Going. Yeah you have to. Yeah, exactly. You do it in two hours. You have to have two mandatory pit stops so that you swap. You change driver so you get. Yes ice Mega. We love it. Yeah yeah yeah. Track days and stuff like that. We mega.
01:12:13:22 - 01:12:15:15
Dan Pope
What's another way to get your chaos fix?
01:12:15:15 - 01:12:31:14
Tom Kerridge
Exactly. It's 100%. It's 100% that. And it means you have to be in that moment and in that area. You can't. You're not, you're not you can't be thinking about anything else because, I mean, you're going 120 miles an hour, so you have to be thinking about that moment there and then know. Yeah. So that's it.
01:12:31:14 - 01:12:59:00
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. So so cool. So that pole is incredibly, vibrant, controlled, brilliant businessman, amazing, interaction, everything that you see, Paul Ainsworth and I've known Paul since he was 18 years old. We worked together for, Gary Rhodes. So we've been best mates for such a long time. And he's kind heart. The one thing that connects all of us, I think, is a hard work ethic.
01:12:59:00 - 01:13:16:00
Tom Kerridge
Everyone works just relentless, relentless, relentless to to being a part of it. And then Daniel's, Daniel is just one of the most intense and magical humans that you could come across, like, ever. He's like, you know, smoked fags, talks loud.
01:13:16:00 - 01:13:22:04
Tom Kerridge
Boys into the UK be the first one. We're in a we went to Michelle Bra and one of our drives.
01:13:22:04 - 01:13:40:15
Tom Kerridge
One of our years and he's the first one with the phone and the pictures and it's like so excited and excitable like teenage kid about the industry and where we're at. You know, it's a 50 year old man. We shared our 40th birthday together. We do 50th birthday together. We've known each other for a long time where our birthdays are a week apart.
01:13:40:17 - 01:13:47:04
Tom Kerridge
So we we spend a lot of time together. And Daniel is the most excitable teenager, particularly about the industry. It's amazing.
01:13:47:04 - 01:13:50:23
Dan Pope
So like so when you say he's excitable, like about.
01:13:50:24 - 01:14:09:10
Tom Kerridge
So passionate about the food and the places and the history and like particularly in French cuisine, like a trip through France with Daniel is like a like he's like food porn and chef porn. For him, it's just like absolutely full on amazing, like pictures, selfies with the chefs in the kitchen. He wants to see everything be a part of.
01:14:09:10 - 01:14:19:02
Tom Kerridge
He's so into it, so into it. I mean, to be fair, everybody, everyone on that group is a fairly intense human, like everyone is.
01:14:19:07 - 01:14:22:07
Dan Pope
So that's why I just want to get to is that what's that coming? So the golden thread.
01:14:22:07 - 01:14:29:02
Tom Kerridge
Common theme is everyone's really fucking intense. Like everyone's quiet. Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah it is mega. Everyone is quiet.
01:14:29:02 - 01:14:33:03
Dan Pope
And what do you do? You share business lessons or like what's what some of the learnings you get from the.
01:14:33:03 - 01:14:37:16
Tom Kerridge
Yeah massively. We all we all talk about it. We all talk about it. Can we all get as busy as Claire.
01:14:37:18 - 01:14:41:07
Speaker 1
That's basically. Yeah. Yeah. So so Claire.
01:14:41:07 - 01:14:44:23
Tom Kerridge
How do we make our voice champion. And it turns out you guys get three stars. Are you actually.
01:14:45:00 - 01:14:53:15
Dan Pope
Three star human? Like, what's what? Like, why is she such a genius? You just thinking that we're going to wrap this up shortly.
01:14:53:19 - 01:15:13:17
Tom Kerridge
She she's incredibly controlled. She she's very she has huge infrastructure. Yeah, she knows exactly where she wants to go. There's no she doesn't. There is a I'm sure there is some form of chaos or something in her life. She's operated within it like a world, a restaurant, business world is incredibly busy. Her. Well, she's global, you know.
01:15:13:17 - 01:15:32:01
Tom Kerridge
Claire is global. Yeah, yeah, yeah, she's a monster superstar in terms of that. But I think she's she she's probably the most calculated okay of all of us. She's probably the most. Okay. That's that's what I'm going to do. That's why I'm going to go. That's how I'm going to control this. And this is so she she's completely in control.
01:15:32:01 - 01:15:41:06
Tom Kerridge
Completely in control. But they're all where I think the rest of us pulls, pulls actually quite similar to that. I think the rest of us are just a bit like, fuck you, let's see what happens. I mean.
01:15:41:09 - 01:15:52:08
Dan Pope
Yeah, foot to the floor. Well, talk to me about the the media, amazing media, which you've built. Like how did you navigate that like. Well, interesting. Well, challenging.
01:15:52:08 - 01:16:11:24
Tom Kerridge
I've always been quite comfortable with people. I've always been quite comfortable with and always been quite confident in my own skin. So then in terms of like when I compete on Great Bridge, when you came from great British menu, so competing, great British menu and winning it, I backed myself to do all right on it. When I got asked to do it, and I was quite fortunate.
01:16:11:24 - 01:16:28:11
Tom Kerridge
I won at the first year, and then I backed myself again to go back the second year and won it the second year. And then after that, that was the point where I think, it's the right place at the right time. The BBC looking for, I don't know, someone to do a cookery show. I'm probably the last TV chef to come through.
01:16:28:11 - 01:16:52:03
Tom Kerridge
Since then there hasn't really been any other that, like Nadia, and then after that there hasn't really been anybody else. If you think maybe it was 10 or 15 years ago that the media, the media science scene has changed. So there isn't nobody's really commissioning a new chef on television, if you can. It's always the safety of whereas Rick Stein doing go in what's Jamie a Jamie Oliver doing.
01:16:52:03 - 01:17:11:13
Tom Kerridge
Where's James Martin, what am I doing. Who's doing like this. No I think there's a safety point because television is fairly static. It tries to move forward. But actually people that watch it, people watch it. Streaming services. Now, you know Gordon, that is new TV show on Netflix. It released last week. We before like I've not managed to see it.
01:17:11:13 - 01:17:27:09
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. But you know that that's where that's where new age or new things are going on in people that, Jesse from top drawer. I'm doing a thing with him later at lunchtime today. You know, he's the next, but he's not on the TV screen. So, I mean, it's like a big all of these things are big. So I said I was very lucky.
01:17:27:09 - 01:17:40:16
Tom Kerridge
I think it was the right place at the right time. I think the opportunity came along. I think the fact that maybe a regional accent of representation, always being yourself is quite important. Not becoming a caricature.
01:17:40:16 - 01:17:40:20
Dan Pope
Yeah.
01:17:40:24 - 01:17:46:22
Tom Kerridge
Like again, you can if you are a big character, it's quite easy to become a caricature like.
01:17:46:23 - 01:17:48:13
Dan Pope
What you mean by that. As in like.
01:17:48:15 - 01:18:05:15
Tom Kerridge
It's quite easy to just like I am like a cartoon. Essentially, I'm a six foot three fat, bald bloke that's like. Like you are like a kid with a regional accent. And I'm a chef, okay? You know, you could become. Yeah, you can buy into people know. Oh, he's the pub guy, you know, it's quite and it's a quite an easy thing.
01:18:05:16 - 01:18:28:11
Tom Kerridge
So it's a, it was the time and a place but also it's a profession now people think that I put as much effort into media and getting that right as I would in a kitchen, like you turn up into somebody. I don't know how cameras work, right, I don't know, I've signed works, I don't know. So there's a whole world of people tech wise and behind the scenes and editorial storytelling, all those things.
01:18:28:11 - 01:18:45:00
Tom Kerridge
Like Sunday, I fly out to Italy. I had a meeting just briefly with is of the production crew for we're filming a series in Italy. I've done Tom Kerridge, Cooks Britain, Tom Kerridge, cook Spain, Tom Kerridge cooks Italy, and you go in as 16, 18 people there and they've all got individual jobs. You just have to trust in what they do.
01:18:45:02 - 01:19:01:18
Tom Kerridge
So and then they trust in me and my job that I will turn up and I will present and I will get energy and I will talk to a farmer, I talk to an Italian producer, I talk to a thing and get the information. So I know, I know my role to go right. That's my job. How do I do that as best as I can?
01:19:01:18 - 01:19:08:00
Dan Pope
What did you have to work on to get better at media like? Because obviously you're now present in Greece. Yeah. Mean you like it? Yeah. Huge.
01:19:08:00 - 01:19:29:11
Tom Kerridge
Like, I think you said the clarity of, pinpoint where to probably talk way too much on this, but try not to say too much. Get to the point quite quickly. Make it try and be succinct, particularly when it comes to a TV show that might get edited down into 24 minutes. For ITV, you go. You've got to be quite succinct.
01:19:29:11 - 01:19:44:07
Tom Kerridge
You don't get to the point quite quickly. You got to you got to manage it because everything comes into an edited point. So it doesn't matter how many words you say, if you say one sentence, that's fucking great. That's a bit they use. So work out. Work out what everybody else wants. What do they want? What are they looking for from you.
01:19:44:09 - 01:19:51:08
Tom Kerridge
Get that out. Or if it was a presenter point of view, a lot of the work from television, from a point of view, I do before the cameras run.
01:19:51:09 - 01:19:52:01
Dan Pope
That's what I mean. Yeah.
01:19:52:01 - 01:20:11:21
Tom Kerridge
You try. So you meet the guests because most, most times that you're interviewing people, farmers and producers, they're not on TV, they're not used to TV. They're it can be quite an intimidating thing. Cameras and all these people point things at you suddenly because. So your role is then spent an hour and a half beforehand chatting to them, making them feel comfy, having a look, and then when they turn the cameras on, they're already in a zone.
01:20:12:00 - 01:20:19:03
Tom Kerridge
So a lot of the work is done behind the scenes to make sure that you can get what the imagery and what you need whilst you're there.
01:20:19:07 - 01:20:25:02
Dan Pope
There's a coordinated set it, there's a quote which is like what you practice in private, you'll praise for in public, which I love.
01:20:25:02 - 01:20:27:09
Tom Kerridge
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So much of the work is done behind the scenes.
01:20:27:09 - 01:20:42:03
Dan Pope
Behind the scenes, coupled with things. So what? So you run great British, menu back to back. What were the small things you. Because I interviewed Tommy Banks and I was like, how did you win it? Yeah. Mad story. I don't know if it was a cricket. Yeah. And was in bed like his farts, basically. And he was.
01:20:42:03 - 01:20:52:12
Dan Pope
I need to I need to win this to get the restaurant going. And he was. I like the 1% things I did is I brought my own pillow. Like, he was like, those are the things he was doing. What were you doing to make sure you won that show? Was it just like, well.
01:20:52:15 - 01:21:10:13
Tom Kerridge
It's a great British menu? Yeah. I mean, I mean, I was still a full on drinking at that point. So I was when we were competing, I was cooking as hard and as good as I could. But then when we were finished, when we weren't filming, like when we finished for wrap for the day, I I'll get I'll be on it.
01:21:10:18 - 01:21:27:05
Tom Kerridge
I'll be fucking getting battered and then get back in that kitchen. I was, I was cooking in that great British menu kitchen, all those cooking around the fires. I was a full on energy, alcohol fueled, fueled chaos. And I said that. So that's so I went I went with the attitude is like I was cooking at the hand.
01:21:27:05 - 01:21:36:07
Tom Kerridge
So that's that's I mean, Tommy took his own pillow. I took 24 cans of cellar in my car. So it's kind of like I mean, it's two different variants. We both want it, like, be funny.
01:21:36:09 - 01:21:43:21
Dan Pope
How you get that. What are some of your favorite, like, got garage, like gastropubs. But I want probably the best food in the country. Do you think maybe,
01:21:43:23 - 01:21:59:00
Tom Kerridge
And, I mean, there's quite a few out there that are all magic, but there's two and two gentlemen that I've known for a long, long time. I've been doing it for a long, long time. And without them. Yeah. The British gastro pub food team would be around. One is Andrew Perrin at the Star at Harriman. So Andrew's food.
01:21:59:02 - 01:22:29:17
Tom Kerridge
Sorry, star at hair. I'm up in Yorkshire, so I'm preparing the Michelin star. I make one of the first British pubs to win a michelin star. Represents Yorkshire. Yorkshire food. Absolutely amazing, solid, robust cooking, a beautiful human, a wonderful guy in hospitality. An a brilliant, brilliant business. And and he's absolutely phenomenal. And Steven Harris at the sportsman, dining Kent, which is, in C Saltaire, near Whitstable, which has had a michelin star for however long.
01:22:29:17 - 01:22:51:17
Tom Kerridge
And he just cooks the most magical, wonderful food. From the area. Simplicity like he does a dish. Slip sole with CV butter and that's it on the plate. And it's just magic. And he's one of the most a lovely guy who's so into food. A beautiful pub. So both of them a magic, magic chef's that.
01:22:51:17 - 01:22:58:02
Tom Kerridge
Yeah. Without without them. You know, the British food scene would nowhere near as strong. They're phenomenal cooks.
01:22:58:02 - 01:23:00:16
Dan Pope
And then what are some of your favorite restaurants in London?
01:23:00:18 - 01:23:01:04
Tom Kerridge
I got this.
01:23:01:10 - 01:23:03:14
Dan Pope
I take my hat on many. There we go.
01:23:03:16 - 01:23:27:18
Tom Kerridge
There's so many. There's so many magical spices. I mean, genuinely so fortunate to eat in the library the other day. And I haven't been for a while, for a long time, and it was just so Tom's fancy. He's doing the food that night, and I he's just outstanding individual, unique, quirky. Beautiful. Like, so, so special.
01:23:27:18 - 01:23:47:22
Tom Kerridge
Exciting. Vibrant energy. Like it? Magic. Magic food. Claude, I always think he's just a phenomenal cook. Josephine. Restaurants. I think of magic. You know, they're just, you know, they're just beautiful. Representation of great French cuisine. Part of that gastro trip we always call in it Claude's parents, and they cook us lunch. So we all sit there saying a includes back garden.
01:23:48:03 - 01:23:52:08
Tom Kerridge
And his mum, would have done an amazing lunch, whether it was.
01:23:52:11 - 01:23:52:22
Dan Pope
Actually.
01:23:53:03 - 01:24:15:06
Tom Kerridge
A braise or is that makes a paté. They've always got charcuterie, a pie that that makes his mum do something very simple this year with roast chicken and a salad and a beautiful kind of like flan, like tart. And. And it's just magic. And that sense of kind of like, slightly bourgeois French cuisine cooked beautifully, representing the area.
01:24:15:06 - 01:24:42:13
Tom Kerridge
Claude does so, so well. The Josephine restaurants, I think, in magic. Nieves is a wonderful cook. Sable, I think is beautiful. Like out of the new space in Shoreditch is amazing. Like wonderful Spanish cuisine. Claire. I mean, core is just it's just brilliant. So we're very, very lucky that there's some amazing and brilliant restaurants in London you can eat any types of, whether it's from French cuisine to Spanish to, you know, the library core.
01:24:42:13 - 01:24:44:11
Tom Kerridge
You know, we're so, so lucky. Yeah.
01:24:44:13 - 01:24:50:24
Dan Pope
Final question mate. What's one truth you believe that most chefs would disagree with you?
01:24:51:01 - 01:25:01:06
Tom Kerridge
Oh my God. One truth that I believe that most chefs would disagree with me on.
01:25:01:08 - 01:25:09:16
Tom Kerridge
Core, I don't know, I thought I would say that most chefs and I think we all work with the same ethic. I mean, I don't it's interesting.
01:25:09:16 - 01:25:33:24
Dan Pope
So like, so Robyn Gill said, you kind of to your point, you said chefs are not artists, right? Yeah. They're like they're like like you said trade. Trade. Yeah. Michel Roux said that it's the food isn't actually that important. It's. Yeah. Service. And I think you've kind of like a lot of the people think it's the, the food, but actually it's the service and the setting that add up to it.
01:25:33:24 - 01:25:49:17
Tom Kerridge
I would, I would bow for those points. I massively grand I think you recognize that as you get I think a chef it's very easy for chefs to believe that it's all about them. And don't get me wrong, you go out for something to eat as a guest. You go out for something to eat. The heartbeat of a restaurant is the kitchen that that is the space that makes it happen.
01:25:49:19 - 01:26:10:20
Tom Kerridge
But actually the all round, complete experience that the guest goes away. I haven't had an amazing time. I want to come back as is only 50% the kitchen. The kitchen may think it's fucking all about us. It's not. It's about everything else. Getting it right from the booking process to somebody saying hello when you walk through the door to get in the drinks quickly enough on time and the right one.
01:26:10:20 - 01:26:44:08
Tom Kerridge
And all of those aspects are so, so important. So yeah, maybe, maybe from a chef's point of view, you're not as important as you think you are. You're incredibly important and you're the you are the beating heartbeat. But it is it is a complete team game. And sometimes chefs get sewn, sewn up in their sense of self-importance. And I think you begin to recognize as you get older that that isn't it isn't it isn't just all about you and your creativity and your amazing ideas.
01:26:44:10 - 01:26:47:01
Tom Kerridge
And everyone bow down to how brilliant I am.
01:26:47:03 - 01:26:50:07
Dan Pope
I loved that chef Tom. Absolute pleasure mate. Thank you.
01:26:50:07 - 01:26:51:06
Tom Kerridge
So thank you so much.
01:26:51:06 - 01:26:56:08
Dan Pope
Thank you. That's right. That was awesome coach. Love that man. Thank you.
01:26:56:10 - 01:26:58:00
Speaker 1
Sorry I
01:26:58:00 - 01:27:32:18