Marcus Wilcox returns to kitchens at Outbuildings Dorset

More than a decade has passed since fledgling chef Marcus Wilcox was running a Michelin-starred restaurant or being watched by millions on TV.

After a spell out of the limelight and out of the kitchen altogether, he has now returned to the stoves.

In 2013, Yeovil-born Marcus, who grew up on the Dorset and Somerset border, reached the semi-finals of MasterChef: The Professionals, whilst working at The Rose and Crown in Trent, near Sherborne.

Two years later, aged just 26, he took over from Russell Brown at Sienna in Dorchester, which held a Michelin star – the only restaurant in the county to do so at the time.

Marcus, who previously worked at The Ledbury, was unable to retain the star, with Sienna deleted from the 2016 guide, before COVID ultimately spelled the end for the restaurant a few years down the line.

After returning to The Rose and Crown, Marcus then left kitchens behind, before being tempted back in earlier this year, taking on the role of head chef at Outbuildings Dorset.

The Bridport hotel is run by Dom Sanchez and Ed Whitehead, who have turned to Marcus in a bid to elevate its food offering.

Marcus Wilcox in 2015 at Sienna and in 2026 at Outbuildings Dorset — Then and now: Marcus Wilcox in 2015 at Sienna and now in 2026, back in Dorset at Outbuildings

Why did Marcus Wilcox step away from kitchens?

Marcus told The Staff Canteen: “I came out of it for a little bit and did a bit of landscaping with my brother, for about a year and a half.

“I just wanted to get a bit of a break after working every day for three years. It was time to take a little bit of a step away.

“I felt my break was over, so I wanted to get back into it and put a stamp on something.”

Asked if he was able to completely take his mind off of cooking during his time away, Marcus said: “You just keep always thinking, but I tried to switch off as much as possible from it, just to really focus on having a break, getting out of it.

“But it's been seamless coming back in.

“I've always had ideas of doing dishes in the back of my mind, and now we can start putting them into production and start putting them on the menu.

“We do tastings and trials, but it's been nice to get some of the food that I thought about doing over the last year and a half when I've been out, to actually see them on the menu and roll them out to the customers.”

The Cart Shed at Outbuildings Dorset open to non-residents

Outbuildings’ main restaurant, The Cart Shed, recently opened up to locals, as well as residents, as it looks to widen its customer base, making it the perfect spot for Marcus to make his mark again.

“It’s a really exciting thing that we’re starting here,” Marcus explained.

“The hotel is well known throughout the country, so now they want to take the food offering up to a similar level as the hotel.”

He added: “A lot of our residents are London-based, and they understand the level of food that we're trying to do. But it's been interesting trying to bring the locals in as well and offering them something that I personally feel they can't get round here.

“It's nice to welcome them in and get their opinions, and so far it seems to be being well received.

“It's quite a nice time, really. It's an interesting time and a productive time for us to keep pushing forward.”

Ed Whitehead, Dom Sanchez and their family at Outbuildings

Who owns Outbuildings Dorset?

Married couple Ed and Dom took over the ownership of Outbuildings during the coronavirus pandemic, with Ed’s parents about to turn 60 and thinking of selling up.

It was a far cry from their previous life, often spending much of their time apart, in their careers as performers.

“Ed grew up on the farm,” Dom explained.

“His family bought the farm around 27 years ago. There were a lot of derelict buildings and they started converting them and refurbishing them.

“Ed is definitely the pioneer of Outbuildings. He is the creative director, the designer, the everything. His brother, George, does our carpentry on site.

“We all worked really hard to create design-led escapes, in the world of COVID staycations. We really rode that wave.”

Dom continued: “Ed and I were previously performers. Ed was a dancer, I was a professional singer, and we travelled a lot in our careers.

“We started to create places influenced by our travels and the places we visited and things that we found really amazing elsewhere. We were like, ‘how can we bring this to Outbuildings?’

“This is still our family home, so we want people to feel that when they’re guests here as well.

“Our tagline is to ‘feel wildly at home’, and that is exactly what we want.

“Ed and I are an interracial gay couple. We want people to feel comfortable. For us, we don't really care, they can come as they are.

“We don’t care about the wellies you wear or the car you drive. We just want it to be a very community-based place.”

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How Outbuildings Dorset found head chef Marcus Wilcox

Dom and Ed have grown the space since taking over, including opening The Cart Shed in 2023. This year, they are taking it to a new level.

“The restaurant has been on a journey,” Ed began.

Dom added: “We knew that guests were coming here to stay and there was a demand for food. Every hotel has food, but also in this area, most of the demographic of our guests are coming from London, Surrey, Kent, Bristol, Bournemouth. So they're used to a seven-day food operation.

“We wanted to make sure we got it right with the guests first, before we just opened the doors, because locals are the hardest people to please.

“It came with trials and tribulations from chefs. To us, we thought we were offering the opportunity of a lifetime, because we have established a brand, have an amazing social media following and have put all this work in. Edward's designed everything. We were just ready to hand this over to a young budding chef and say, ‘this is yours, go for gold’.

“But no-one seemingly wanted to do that. So it was really, really tough.

“We had been jaded so many times by the chef process, essentially getting ourselves to a point and then, boom, starting from scratch. We just wanted some stability.

“Marcus applied like a normal person, and was genuinely kind of nonchalant when we first met him. And we were like, okay, how is this going to work?

“But the proof is in the pudding. Our head chefs always do a demo trial for us, and his ‘nonchalantness’ was definitely not there when it came to his cooking. It was very chalant!

“The food was so exquisite and so intelligent and so creative and so smart. And it was story-driven, local-driven, and we were like, my goodness.”

Ed said: “Marcus has been doing it since he was so young, he's just got such an innate ability with food and flavour.

“He's not arrogant, he doesn't really have an ego, it’s more like ‘yeah, I can cook’.”

Dom said: “The head chef position for us is more than just a head chef.

“They're helping us move this along. We have such big ambition for the business and where it can be in five to ten years' time.

“We need a chef that not only can deliver great cooking, still wants to be in the kitchen, wants to develop menus, but also sees a future in our journey.

“We understand that we are technically asking a lot, in the way that we want someone to be ambitious, which is apparently hard to find. But we feel like we really found it with him.

“He respects the business and the brand, and his food is just exquisite.

“Outbuildings has always been an experience-based place. We're not a place to lay your head down or just come for a quick bite.

“We want it to create an atmospheric, great vibe with good music and food that match that, and we feel like we really found the match in Marcus, for sure.

“He's so good with his team and teaching them and getting them to the level that he wants to provide. He also has so much pride in what he delivers that if he needs to work more to make sure that his team is well trained and fostered, he'll put that in.”

Food at The Cart Shed

What is on the menu at The Cart Shed?

The menu itself in the past few months has included dishes such as duck ragu with squid, sharing steak, apple parfait and other ingredients from the garden.

Discussing his approach to cooking and how much his past influences his present, Marcus said: “I look back with a lot of pride and what I did at a young age, but now, even though it’s ten years on, I haven’t changed.

“I’m just trying to push on from where I was ten years ago.

“Food’s evolved a little bit. It’s less complicated and focus on more local sourced. People want the provenance now a lot more than ever.

“I’m still the same chef and still the same person.”

He added: “It's a really relaxed style of dining at The Cart Shed.

“We’ve got local lamb, local fish, Creedy Carver duck from down the road and apples from the orchard.”

Dom said: “Come into The Cart Shed, enjoy incredible food that's championed by the local area, from things that we grow, from the farmers we know.

“Now we have Marcus and we are in a very, very good place.”

Outbuildings hot tub and food

What are the future plans for Outbuildings Dorset?

Ed added: “There's so much we can do with Outbuildings.

“I've got multiple different plans, literally made in 3D, of what we can do. It's all well and good having future plans. But in today's economy, we just have to take it a step at a time and not get too hung up on one thing.

“We have no real interest in being billionaires. I think there's enough of those trying to destroy the world at the moment as there is. So for us, it's about building a life that we're happy with.

“This is such a lovely business to run.”

(Photos: Outbuildings/Catherine Frawley)