Edinburgh chef Tony Singh is back in action this festival.
While it would never come as a surprise to hear that he was doing his own Fringe show, he is actually cooking up his Road Trip pop-up concept at Metro Brasserie in the Apex International Hotel on the Grassmarket.
Open from noon to midnight during August, the pop-up will draw on Tony’s globe-trotting adventures to produce a menu of colourful street food ranging from chicken tikka pie to sea bass ceviche and Thai prawn omelette.
Over the last couple of years, the larger-than-life chef has been carving a TV career as the presenter of TV shows such as The Incredible Spice Men and Tony Singh’s India.
While his upbeat, enthusiastic personality make him perfectly at home in front of a camera, he is never happier than when he is bustin’ moves in the kitchen.
Signature dishes
As well as daily specials, the menu features signature Tony dishes such as his haggis pakora and his Coogate burger. There is also the option of having a single fish – the chippie lingo for a piece of battered haddock.
The collaboration is a canny move for both parties. Tony gets to use all the facilities of the kitchens and restaurant at the centrally located Apex International Hotel during the busiest month of the year.
For their part, the hotel gets some Tony telly stardust and an eye-catching menu which will help them stand out in the intensely competitive, festival eating out market.
The 5pm Dining blog spoke to Tony about his travels, the changing restaurant market and, er, porno charades – it’s not what you think.
You can follow the pop-up, Tony and Apex International Hotel on the following: Facebook @ApexInternationalHotel, Twitter @Apex_Inter, @McTSingh #scran #SinghsRoadTrip
We also filmed Tony making some of his hot sauce. We’ll link to the video once we have it edited.
What was the inspiration for the Road Trip pop-up?
TS: All of the dishes have some memory for me, some link to a place where I have been.
Also, I want to work on projects which are collaborations. I’m a good chef. Working with Apex Hotels allows me to concentrate on the things which I’m good at.
It gives me the support and framework to be more playful with the pop-up. We can change things as we go along and make things a bit more edgy. You don’t have to nail your colours to the mast from the very beginning. You can change things and be a bit of a pirate.
We want customers to experiment. With Road Trip, we want to offer lots of smaller plates so that people can share and try out different dishes. We want to bring in as many flavours and as much colour as we can from the different places that I have travelled to.
Is there a favourite dish of your on the menu?
TS: The Punjabi BBQ sweet corn is dead simple but delicious. Sweet corn is right in season now and we serve it with lime juice, a little bit of chilli and black salt which makes all these flavours explode in your mouth. That is a dish that transports me to the Punjab every time I taste it.
I’ve just come back from Vietnam and the pho broths I had there are still very fresh in my mind. We went to what was supposed to be the best place for pho in Saigon but it was a disappointment. I think it was aimed mainly at tourists.
The best we found was from this young girl who sold it around the corner from our hotel. We had it for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Again, it’s very simple. You need the best stock and then keep all the other flavours really fresh. The flavours just wake you up. It’s like a slap to the face.
Are people bored with the conventional sit down, three course restaurant format?
TS: There is a market for that and there always will be. People want to make an occasion of a meal out and that won’t go away any time soon.
But, even with conventional restaurants, more and more of them have tasting menus so that customers can have a lot of variety and the chef can show the full range of what he or she can do.
The casual dining market is certainly changing quickly. It’s becoming about the experience and each one has something unique; be it the music or the decor or some piece of patter which they have.
On top of that, everyone is travelling a lot more or they’re watching TV shows showing food from around the globe and they want to try it. The way forward for restaurants is to offer something that looks good and has flavours which are as authentic as they can be.
The projects which I’m working on now and will be working on in the future will be more relaxed. They will be about having fun. I want to do more pop-ups, more collaborations like this one with Apex. I like to keep things fresh and changing.
Sweet Venues are performing at Apex International Hotel over August and there are thousands of other shows across the city. Have you got your eye on any of them?
TS: I’m going to see Fred MacAulay at The Assembly Rooms and there are a few late night comedy shows which I’m going to try and get to. The Imaginary Porno Charades are playing in the hotel – it’s not as rude as you think.