![]() ![]() I learned a lot about food and how a kitchen was run, and different culinary styles. I moved around quite a lot at the beginning of my career – I’d do one year in one place and then move on somewhere else. You’ve worked with some of the best-known chefs in the industry like Joël Robuchon - what are the key lessons you’ve learned from them? When we finished, I went to London to work in a Michelin starred restaurant. My parents were just getting to the point when they were really starting to stress about what I’d do, and I said, ‘Don’t worry, I’ll be a chef!’ My brother went to catering college too, and we were the two best students there. When I was 16, I looked at what I might do with my qualifications and saw that catering college was an option – you could get in with an interview, and that was it. I got pretty atrocious results at school, and my parents were worried about what I’d be able to do afterwards. I knew I wanted to do something with food from a young age – probably 10 or 11. We’d also do things like spending the day with him while he met a supermarket supplier, so I was exposed from that side of things, quite young, too – it wasn’t just food and cooking. He got lots of wines from France, and my twin brother and I would sometimes go to France with him. My father had an import/export wine business. My mother also took care of everything foodwise, and I spent a lot of time cooking with her in the kitchen and preparing family dinners. I grew up in Norfolk, and my mother grew all our vegetables in the garden for the family, so I understood seasonality from a very young age. *** Where does your passion for the culinary arts stem from? He talks to Enness about his roots in Norfolk, his experiences working with Pierre Koffmann and Joël Robuchon and his new London restaurant, Muse. The opening price point on the wine list is as high as a Belgravian elephant's eye, but quality is of course very fine, and the tasting selections are worth the extra – after all, this is one of the district's more characterful dining spots.Earning two Michelin stars by the age of 26 (the youngest British chef to do so), Tom Aikens is one of Britain’s most acclaimed chefs. Our pre-Christmas visit was sparkled up by a pre-dessert of white chocolate variations, including a pure white bombe filled with mincemeat – a more enjoyable assemblage than the following torched apple-meringue tart and matching millefeuille with a caramel ice-cream sandwich. For the main course, a dual serving of beef (a braised nugget of short rib and a roast piece of Denver steak) is robustly accompanied by bone marrow, buttered salsify, puréed turnip, chargrilled onion and chunks of braised tongue. The Indian spice repertoire is mined for a dish of skate with a spinach pakora, a cumin-spiked purple carrot and some pickled fennel. ![]() Presentation tends towards the surreal: a langoustine appears perched on a twig mounted on a porcelain plinth trowelled with lardo and burnt apple purée. An appetiser of sliced scallop comes with cauliflower and grapes at various stages along the spectrum (from dried to partly hydrated), all lubricated by a horseradish-fired ajo blanco of cashews. While the narrative structure may weary those who just want to get on with eating something, one can hardly fault the insistence on distinctiveness – especially when the food is distinguished by such ingenuity. ![]() The concept, for such it is, draws its energy from various biographical details of the Aikens story – from youthful tree-climbing to some long-remembered maternal reproof. Step into the tiny entrance lobby, and be enveloped by the refined domesticity of the place, a refreshing alternative to urban grandiosity. Muse is a Georgian townhouse in a secluded Belgravia mews, the latest chapter in the development of inspirational chef Tom Aikens. The name is the first of many plays on words.
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