In the build up to The Staff Canteen Live 2015 at the Hospitality Show, NEC Birmingham on January 19 – 21, we are taking a closer look at the chefs who will be joining us on stage, first up Daniel Clifford from two Michelin-starred Midsummer House. Daniel is a judge on Great British Menu and he was awarded the prestigious Chefs' Chef in the AA Restaurant Guide 2015.

We dig a little deeper to find out what they are hiding under those chef whites!

Daniel Clifford is chef patron of Midsummer House in Cambridge. The 41-year-old from Canterbury took over in 1998 and earned the restaurant’s first Michelin star in 2002 with a second following in 2005. He will be joining us for The Staff Canteen Live at the Hospitality Show 2015 in Birmingham.

At The Staff Canteen we want to see what makes chefs tick. We asked Daniel a few questions about what he gets up to when he’s not in the kitchen:

What made you want to be a part of The Staff Canteen Live?

Well Mark Morris (Managing Director of The Staff Canteen) phoned and asked me to do it so I thought yeah, why not? It’s good to get your name out there and it’s good for young chefs to see what’s going on really. The nice thing about England is we’re all cooking very differently and there’s no bitterness between any of us anymore. It’s nice to meet up with your mates and have a laugh as well.

Daniel, tell us a little bit about Midsummer House.

Well, I think Midsummer started as a forty cover restaurant in the middle of Cambridge. To be honest, when I first took it over it was in dire straits. Me and my partner, we came to look at it and we both had a vision; we both understood that we had to make money to get where we wanted to go. I have been very, very lucky that my partner has been very supportive.

And that is a business partner that you have?

Yes, a business partner that has become, to be honest, more of a father figure than anything. He's very passionate about it. He has given me a lot of support and a lot of guidance and he is one of the main reasons that we are where we are today because you can't do this on your own. It's not a single minded, one person vision - it takes a team of people to get where we are today. For me, it's about building for the future. It's not about standing still; I still want to be here in 10 or 15 years. I love the place: I have built it with my own bare hands so it has been a challenge.

What do you do in your spare time?

Well I’ve got five kids so that takes up 95% of my time outside of work. Other than that I go carp fishing a lot. Once a month or so, I’ll leave work at around 11:30pm, meet a friend at the lake to set up at midnight, fish until 7am and then go back to work. It’s something I do to relax and take my mind off Midsummer really. I’ve got five kids and run a busy restaurant so you could say my schedule is pretty full. (laughs).

>>> Read more about Daniel here

What’s one thing you could tell us that nobody else will know?

Well, the day I opened Midsummer was the day I found out my first child was coming so the pressure was ridiculous. I had Michael Winner in for dinner on the same night so it was the worst night

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I love what you do, let me contribute right now

of my life.

What was the last album you bought?

It was an album by one of my best friend’s bands actually, called Bloom. They’re not massive but they’ve done two albums and I really like his stuff. He played at my 40th birthday and he’s a really good mate. I’m seeing him on New Year’s Eve. I’d like to go a bit more often but it’s just finding the time. The more PR you do, the more people expect you to be here. I’ve built the restaurant around me being here and I like to be here. Midsummer’s my sixth child, it pays the bills but it’s a dream I had as a boy and I don’t see the point in changing that.

Chocolate or cheese?

That’s a silly question because I love them both.

Marco Pierre White or Gordon Ramsay?

I’ve worked for Marco. Marco’s a legend, an absolute legend for what he did for this country. He made cooking sexy. Having said that, I take my hat off to Gordon Ramsay, as a businessman I think he’s phenomenal. So a bit of both really.

>>> Read more in the Behind the Chef series here

What’s the worst injury or cut you’ve had in the kitchen?

That was with Marco! He told me to turn something over in a pan, I was on the larder and I had a 12 inch carving knife in my hand. I turned round, smacked the fridge and the knife went around the length of my finger. I’ve still got a massive scar on my finger from it. I wrapped it up in a cloth and Marco told me to finish service before going to hospital and said, ‘if you’re not back tonight, you might as well f*** off!’ “That was a sort of wake-up call on what the industry was all about but back in the day you just had to take it.

If you weren’t a chef what do you think you’d be?

Well, Dad said I’d be a bin-man.

Wow, that must make you proud of what you’ve achieved?

To be honest with you, I’m the luckiest person in the world. I started work experience at Canterbury University. I was 15, I was a complete tearaway. If it wasn’t for cooking I’d be in prison. “I drive home every night asking myself if we are good enough. You win all these awards but self-doubt is a killer. You stand there and you say to yourself every day: as long as I can do better tomorrow, I’m a happy man. You’ve got to enjoy it. The day you don’t enjoy it is the day it’s not worth doing.

That’s very true Daniel, is there anything else you’d like to add?

I just feel that, at this present moment in time, this is the best industry to be in. We’ve been through a recession and the strong restaurants have survived. It’s taught everybody out there that the customer is king and if you adopt that kind of attitude, your business is going to do well. Young chefs need to realise that you can learn from everyone. I learn from my kitchen porter every day.

Daniel will be a key part of The Staff Canteen Live, performing at 12:30 on Tuesday, January 20. We are delighted to welcome such a well-respected and highly decorated chef.

By Tom Evans

The Hospitality Show takes place at the NEC Birmingham from January 19-21, 2015. Registration for the show is open now at: http://www.hospitalityshow.co.uk/sc/

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