How did a pot-washer turn chef end up running the pass at one of London's most exclusive hotels? Richard McComb talks to Adam Smith about his culinary adventure.
Until now, it has been as quiet as a church.
Actually, make that a cathedral because in restaurant terms this place is decidedly upscale.
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I am in the subterranean kitchens of The Ritz shadowing the hotel’s unfeasibility unflappable Adam Smith as he commands the pass with a maturity that belies his age.
Smith was promoted as executive sous chef just three days ago, a fact he discloses almost reluctantly. The Ritz’s executive chef John Williams, who is effectively god below stairs, is the only guy ahead of him.
Smith then is God’s right-hand man among the salamanders. He is only 25. It is his role to ensure the kitchen of the arguably the world’s most famous hotel meets and exceeds the expectations of customers on a daily basis. Off days are not tolerated at No 150 Piccadilly. Smith was born and bred on the sprawling Castle Vale housing estate of east Birmingham, and left school at 16. Today, the former pub pot-washer is in charge of a brigade of 60 and cooks for some of the most famous and impossibly rich guests in the world.
Has Smith cooked for the Queen? After all, she only lives down the road at Buckingham Palace and her mum was a fan of The Ritz.
Smith is humorous and relaxed, but he is not getting into that.
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When I first descend into the kitchens it is midday, half an hour before the start of lunch service.
You can’t exactly hear a pin drop. The bubbling of stock pots, the occasional clank of a metal utensil and the tinkle of bone china means there is gentle background music. But there is no idle chit-chat and definitely no shouting. I do not hear a raised voice during the whole service, the only face-off being between Smith and a waiter. The waiter, wisely, defers.
An air of expectant concentration pervades the sections – the pastry, the meat and fish, the larder, the sauce, the tiny station where the canapés and petit fours are assembled. The Ritz chefs are in the game zone.
In a side kitchen, scores of finger sandwiches are being sliced for the hotel’s legendary afternoon tea service, which, rather astonishingly, kicked off half an hour ago, around the time I was digesting breakfast.
Such is the demand for tables that the first of five daily sittings starts at 11.30am, the final customers of the day sitting down to £45-a-head cucumber sandwiches, scones and fine pastries at 7.30pm, just as guests are heading to the grand Ritz Restaurant for dinner. Afternoon tea here is slightly eccentric, very English, and very Ritz, so sports shoes are not permitted in the Palm Court.
It is just after 12.30pm that the first restaurant orders arrive in the kitchen via a hand-held printer positioned next to Smith. It is a leisurely, deceptive start to proceedings. By 1pm, the checks are flying in. It is a giddying experience and I quickly give up trying to keep track.
There is constant communication, Smith doesn’t stand still. Here is a typical 30 seconds in the life of the kitchen:
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“Eight covers! Six scallop, two mackerel,” says Smith.
He continues: “Cottage pie. How long? (‘Two minutes, chef.’) You ready, Charlie? Three lamb, one
John Dory... (‘When?’) Now. Six scallop. How long?... Mackerel. No dairy. Is that avocado?
(‘Yes.’)...
This goes on for several hours.
When it is time for the six scallop starters to be plated, with smoked eel and pickled apple and foam, four chefs including Smith descend on the section, each pair of hands attending to a different component. Fennel pollen provides the final flourish.
By now, the heat from the stoves and the burners - not to mention the body heat of the chefs - means it is sweltering. What a contrast to a few hours ago when I sat down to wait for Smith in one of the hotel’s grand private meeting rooms. Coffee and chilled water is delivered on a silver tray as I take in the spring view over Green Park. The hotel’s communications executive says he has just seen Chef Smith butchering a suckling pig. He is on his way.
I first met Smith in January in Lyon at the Bocuse D’Or, the world’s biggest chefs’ competition. He was there to cheer on 海角视频 representative Adam Bennett, the head chef at Simpsons in Birmingham, who finished fourth, the best ever for a Brit.
Smith himself is a dab hand at competition cooking, having won gold at the World Skills in Calgary, Canada, in 2009. Could he be a future 海角视频 candidate for the Bocuse D’Or should Bennett decline to compete in 2015? I wouldn’t bet against it, but Smith is staying tight-lipped.
The “taking things as they come” attitude, allied to a quiet determination, was nurtured by a modest upbringing in Castle Vale. The family lived in a two-bedroom terrace house until Smith, one of three children, was eight, and the Smiths moved to Witherley, Leicestershire, near Atherstone.
The young Smith was still at school when he got a job in a village pub at the age of 12. He told the boss of Sheepy Parva’s Kingfisher he was 15. “I blagged my way into the kitchen, washing up in the summer holidays,” he recalls.
Smith did well at school, getting 11 GCSEs, including a couple of A-stars, and fancied a career in law but his stint at the pub “corrupted me into the catering industry.”
He says: “There was a quick turn over of chefs. I turned up one Saturday and they said, ‘You will be doing puddings tonight.’ It was a case of glazing the creme brûlées and scooping ice cream. I loved it. I knew it was what I wanted to do.”
Smith went to the then Birmingham College of Food, now University College Birmingham, when he was 16. He loved the course and the facilities but only stayed a year, such was his enthusiasm and desire to work in a real-life kitchen. Smith recalls a lecturer advising him that if he was going to leave, he had better aim for the top. Had he thought about The Ritz?
Smith joined a group of final-year college students for a trial at the hotel in June 2004. John Williams had just moved to The Ritz from Claridge’s, spotted Smith’s precocious talent and the young chef was offered a place. Still only 16, he moved into a chefs’ hostel in Hampstead.
“I had always been quite independent,” he recalls. “To be honest, I think having already worked for three years I had a rough idea what was involved. But it was a case of starting all over again at The Ritz. For my career, it was the best choice I ever made.”
Smith started as a second commis chef in the sandwich section, picking out the salad leaves for afternoon teas. He still cherishes the buzz he got when he headed up his own section, working on burgers, chips and sandwiches for the bar and room service.
He says: “I really worked hard at it to make a point and that was spotted by the chef. That came from my desire.”
Smith’s training evolved with extended periods on fish, vegetables, the main larder and, his favourite section, sauce, where he worked solid for two-and-a-half years.
He was a chef de partie at 18; his peers were 25 or 26. Before he left for the World Skills competition, Williams told Smith he would promote him to sous chef if he won. The chef with the Midas touch did not disappoint and became a senior sous chef in 2010. He ran his first service, in total command of the kitchen, in January 2011.
He says: “It was daunting and the trick is to learn quickly. I have matured a lot and grown up in the business.
“I do get a lot of high-profile guests but the real meaning of things is to produce quickly and sustain it. We are always evolving to make things better - the quality of ingredients, the quality of service, the quality of the experience. It does not matter who you are. All our customers get the same experience.”
So what are the immediate challenges for Smith? One of them involves the small matter of a Michelin star. The Ritz, surprisingly, has never had a star. There is a sense in which a grand luxury hotel, with impeccable breeding, is above things as prosaic as restaurant guides; and yet the stars bestowed by the little red book matter dearly to chefs, far more than many would admit. Smith has no such
reticence.
He says: “We have been trying to achieve a Michelin star for a couple of years. It is something The Ritz has never had. We think it is something we thoroughly deserve. It is a goal as a team from the Chef to the managing director. It is something we are pushing for, but the bottom line is that we have a full restaurant and we are constantly getting better.”
And they are. I last dined at The Ritz three years ago and the food has moved up a gear, no doubt.
Later that night, I have dinner in The Ritz’s opulent Louis XVI-style dining room. Smith personally prepares the menu, the highlight of which is a speciality from the restaurant’s new Les Arts de la Table menu. Williams has been working with Smith to re-create some of the grand dishes associated with classic French cooking.
A sea bass en croute, Sauce Mireille, is served at the table – a huge fish in peak condition filled with lobster mousse, truffles and a quail’s egg. It is a glorious, rich £40-a-head show stopper. The boy from Birmingham is definitely putting on The Ritz.