crucially important.
What's been your biggest challenge then, I mean you talk about sleepless nights, I love the phrase mayor of happy town it's brilliant and I'm going to use that in the future, what's been your biggest challenge then coming out of that kitchen? What made you think oh my God"¦
What have I done?
Yeah I mean if you could just"¦one single biggest challenge what do you think that's been? Is it getting acceptance from front of house because you are the don in the kitchen aren't you? Head chef is the don.
Yeah I think the biggest challenge is not to think like that, in the kitchen, "I'm the boss," the chef's the boss, the chef shouts, the chef does this, chef does that, so don't come out of the kitchen like that and the question is you can take the chef out of the kitchen but can you take the kitchen out of the chef? And that's a big, big stumbling block because the behaviour and approaches and motivational skill set you adopt in the kitchen"¦
Why do we not see more chefs doing this then, you know we spoke earlier, there's yourself, Alan Hill Gleneagles, David Nicholls, John Williams The Ritz London has done it before, there are others but we certainly, from a website point of view we couldn't do a feature every month because there aren't enough people doing your role, so why is that? Is it the security of being the chef is very comfortable and people don't want to do the next stage or is it just too big a step for people or aren't there perhaps the operations for"
It's possible in any food operation it doesn't matter the size, forget the size, I believe what chefs have is passion, we've got a lot of emotion and it's there all the time and they need that emotion, that creativity and that should be harnessed to sell the property that's what I certainly found, I could sell this property, three, four times over. So I think it's a natural progression. I don't think it's about size.
But isn't that why as chefs if you take people like Jamie Oliver, if you want to call them celebrity chefs, whatever, they generally get knocked by chefs because they're not a cook in an operation.
I think Jamie Oliver's great and I would never have a bad word said about him.
I think he's done phenomenal for the industry.
But he never professes to be a professional cook. He says, "I'm a great cook, I've done this and that"¦" he never professes to be that, he professes to be an entertainer, an informer, a communicator on television and he does that exceptionally well and for somebody who was, I don't know how old he was, 17, 18, when he first got removed from the River Café so really how much time has he had in the kitchen so he would never say that he was a professional cook although he's been in the professional kitchen. He's a great cook, great communicator and what this guy has done to make awareness of school dinners, the organic movement, he's gone over to America to do the how best to eat, you know the junk food, and he has done an amazing amount. So he shouldn't be criticised.
So you've mentioned you still cook, you're in your chef's jacket today, you can take the chef from the kitchen how do you take the kitchen from the chef? No, no you've hit the nail do you think your passion will be extinguished, your love of food, your creativity?
So it's just harnessing that creativity in a different way isn't it?
Yeah creativity is still there and the creativity on the plate is still there but how I'd set that is through regular menu meetings and that's every week. I probably cook intensely every two weeks for a couple of days back to back and that's what today, essentially tomorrow will be, just a bit of a shake up on the product from the Shire menu. That's the line, that's the line, don't go across the lines and then it allows the chefs just to trade within that even if I'll just sign off the dish they're getting the dish towards that. So the creativity's still there. So if I've got 100% creativity, 50% is now in the food, 50% is outside. It's still there.
Okay. Last but by no means least then where's John Campbell going to be in five years time?
Good question. I'm happy with the journey at the moment. It's very exciting.
I mean you've made a massive transition so are you, you know, my guestimation of you is you're ambitious, you're forward thinking, you've talked about reading psychology and things like that so is there this continual development of yourself to say, "I now want to be house manager, then general manager?" or are you now at a plateau where you're comfortable in terms of your career development?
Very good question. My ambition is to leave a legacy of my industry. That's my ambition and my son is also in his chosen field is to also leave a legacy, change, absolutely change the way the industry thinks about things. So my future's more of the same, more consultancies, perhaps more TV, more branding, more PR, it's exciting. It's an exciting industry and I think if you do allow yourself to make that transition it's just massive, massive thing you can do, what you can do for your brand, for yourself, what you do for the kitchen, it's huge. So whatever's out there is quite exciting for me.
Well listen thank you very much. I'm so glad we got together today when I created this article you were one of the first names I wrote down because I think you set a real good example of what this feature is about and it's exciting to see what you did at the Vineyard and what's happening here and I think it can be used as an inspiration for chefs.
Yeah I hope so. I hope so and I think it's important that chefs do recognise that there is a life outside the kitchen and with the food and gastronomy changing all of the time there's no need to be worried that you'll be left behind and you won't have that creativity. That creativity is always there you just need to make sure that you just keep touching it every now and again. The products, are you aware of the product changes, you keep your ear to the ground in the industry, you know what's happening, you know what the innovations are but if you're more closer to the client because you've allowed yourself to come out of the kitchen you're more placed to decide what they're looking for so you can move the brand towards what the client needs are. And if you look at the client base now, they're more aware, they're more travelled, they're seeing food television, food, food, food all the time, so they're more informed and customer is king again.
Yeah absolutely.
And for me front of house need to be equal stars with the cook
Absolutely I mean you can't do great food and have bad service, or bad service and great food it just doesn't work.
It doesn't work. As an example of that you're in the restaurant, brought your partner in, "Good to see you again," sit down, "Glass of champagne?" chatting away and suddenly we've recognised you, you've got some champagne, we've got some cushions, you're sitting with a little party, there's six of you, chatting away and maybe it's sunny outside, you've got"¦ "Do you want to sit outside on the terrace?" so we're trying to anticipate all your needs and then you're into the restaurant we're really looking after you. We notice you're looking at your watch, "What time do you want coffee?" we're always on you. And that's the important part but if we've made you feel special, made you feel recognised, if you've ordered, for example, a medium rare steak and it's medium you're going to complain, you know, you'll feel mayor of happy town already. And it's that recognition and this helps bridge that gap.
Yeah. Well listen John thank you very much. Thank you so much. Want to run a restaurant like John? Then head on over to our jobs board.
restaurant.
There's got to be a reason for something and we're gastronomic chemists, as chefs. We have a set of ingredients or a set of chemicals that we need to mix together and pushing those together changes things, it does something, it does something for the mouth feel, the palette, the holistic nature of the food, or just a chemical reaction of the food groups themselves. So that was really the start of it all. Lords was really performing well and as with every kitchen we want great food, we want great accolades, we want this, we want that, we want everything, but you can't have the staff or you can't have the equipment, because I was so bloody minded with a skill set through accounting, motivation, organisational skills or critical path writing, I thought, "˜Okay I'll show you,' and we just did it. It was at Lords that I really understood the importance of the team. That I was not just the custodian of ingredients and making sure that they are properly looked after but I'm also a custodian of my team and that was the important part and it was a big moment for me just to say, "if I want to succeed I can't do this on my own," it's the team that do it not me, I'm just orchestrating how they perform and work and guide.
How did you manage that transition? I mean chefs by nature are creative people, they're passionate people, they're hands on people and as you identified there you have a love of food and to a degree you've got to give that up. I don't mean entirely but you've got to stop cooking every day from literally going out of the kitchen one night and never going back into it on a daily basis?
