Marc Wilkinson, Chef patron, Restaurant Fraiche

The Staff Canteen

Chef Career Advice

Based on his extensive experience working within the Culinary world, Michelin Star Chef, Marc Wilkinson offers his advice to aspiring Chefs in an attempt to help them on their journey up the career ladder:

The best bit of advice probably given to me when I was young and it was really drilled into me in a kitchen environment and that is to work cleanly, it makes a huge difference, you do a job, you do preparation mois non plus, but then you clean and you clean properly before you start the next job.

If a CV arrives on my desk I think I'd look at the cover letter because CV's can be mass produced by somebody else, doesn't even have to be by the candidate, could even be by a job centre, or a job club, so I would look at the cover letter to see if they are actually interested or if I can pick up any passion in that cover letter.

Then also I would look at time spent anywhere. It's fine to do 2 months in a 3 star Michelin restaurant but you do question, why have you only done 2 months? in 2 months time, you probably haven't even cooked. Anybody that comes through the door at Fraise.

I guess the main focus is taste, we do use modern techniques alongside classical techniques but absolutely imperative is the taste and we work hard on creating flavours and textures so yeah I think the biggest learning curve for them would be the focus on taste.

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The Staff Canteen

The Staff Canteen

Editor 5th January 2017

Marc Wilkinson, Chef patron, Restaurant Fraiche