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“I have itchy feet,”
says the 40 something executive chef, Michael
Beechey, a New Zealander who will take over at the GRAND
INTER-CONTINENTAL in Mumbai,
to open in November.
Till it happens, Beechy is putting the kitchens of
the Delhi branch of the hotels in shape. “After being in
business for 21 years a lot of what to do isn’t cooking. I
also work towards motivating a kitchen team, look into menus.
Concepts & purchases,” he explains. Beechy feels the
traditional role of chef has changed: “You can’t stay in
the kitchen and expect to please the guests. A chef has to get
involved with the people.”
Coming back to his inability to stay in one place for
long, he remembers his first foreign assignment , for an
American chain of hotels, the Sonesta Beach Resort, at Sharm
el Sheikh in Egypt.
“ I went
there with my girlfriend who is now my wife,” he remembers.
And though, the city was beautiful, the couple “ got sick of
the sand, and one day just decided to take off to Switzerland
and get married.”
After the quick wedding the couple dropped anchor at
the Grenada, a resort island in the Caribbean for two years.
“Believe me, lying under the sun can get very boring. We
started suffering from island fever,” he says.
So he took off again, this time for Asia. “I got an
offer from the Grand Taiwan Formosa Hotels in Tai-Chung,
Taiwan. Since I had never seen that part of the world we
packed our bags and I ended up working there for a year.”
While in Taiwan , he decided to go on solo and went on to open
his own restaurant called Salt & Pepper which served
“Californian cuisine with an Asian touch”. Talking about
cuisine, his favorite food is obviously Australian. “Whoever
says Australia doesn’t have a cuisine of its own should come
and talk to me.
I think it is the
food capital of the world. The whole island is cosmopolitan
and you get everything You’d ever want to eat,” he
says.
And in case you were wondering, this chef showed
penchant for cooking when he was barely 11.
“I cooked
dinner for a party for six and I got hooked,” he says. But
Beechey’s child hood cooking experiences lasted till his
parents got divorced. My mom got a boyfriend and my dad got a
girlfriend and they both banned me from the kitchen,” he
laughs.
His advice to wannabe chefs: “The best way to learn
is on the job.” He adds that one should “always inculcate
local flavors in the food one cooks.” So, don’t be too
surprised if you see a tandori chicken Caesar salad or a roti
club sandwich on his new hotel menu soon!
But, before that happens, you might also see the
Inter-Continental chefs out of their mandatory black and white
uniforms and dressed in “bright tropical prints.” Because
all this is a part of Beechey ‘s new
policy of giving then a more human, approachable look.
“As a part of the hotels renovations we want to have
more open kitchens, and since the chefs will be seen, they
should look more good,” Beechey concludes.
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