][1]For the last three years, the Institut français d’Ecosse and Fred Berkmiller of Edinburgh’s Escargot restaurants have organised exchange trips between groups of young French and Scottish chefs.
Called Budding Chefs, the programme has seen students from the Lycée Hotelier de Dinard, a Breton catering college, come to Scotland while Scottish chefs have headed to Brittany.
Initiated by the Institut français d’Ecosse and Fred, Budding Chefs aims to develop the gastronomic connections between young Scottish and French chefs as well as showcasing the best of both countries’ larders.
With suppport from Innis and Gunn, Campbells Prime Meat and Fresh Direct, the most recent exchange happened in October when a brigade of seven, young, Scottish chefs packed their passports and crossed The Channel.
Accompanied by the Institute’s Director, Vincent Guérin, Fred and Chef Mark Greenaway led a team which included promising young talent from The Pompadour and Galvin Brasserie de Luxe at The Caledonian Hotel, Centotre, Martin Wishart’s restaurants, The Kitchin and L’Escargot Bleu.
Among other destinations, the Scottish contingent visited an oyster farm, a butter producer and an artisan pork producer. The visit culminated with the Scottish chefs and the Lycée students cooking a Breton banquet for a hundred guests.
You can follow the trip, picture by picture, on this brilliant Storify timeline.
The 5pm Dining blog had a chat with a couple of the Edinburgh chefs who went on the trip. Alexander Stewart is a Chef de Partie at The Pompadour in Edinburgh’s Caledonian Hotel. Aaron Jones is a Demi-Chef de Partie in the hotel’s Galvin Brasserie de Luxe.
While on the subject of The Caley, there is still time to enter 5pm’s fantastic competition with the hotel.
][17]What was your main impression from the trip?
Aaron Jones: It was good to meet lots of new people within the industry. That includes the other chefs from Scotland as well as the people we met in France. Everyone was very passionate about what they do and that’s always encouraging.
We met Olivier Roellinger. He is a chef with three Michelin stars and he was giving us some seriously passionate chat about his food.
Alexander Stewart: The people we met in France had amazing knowledge about the food from their local area. We would be driving from one place to the next and the French lecturer or chef who was with us could tell us what they were growing on the farm we’d just passed or that farmer’s particular method of making cheese.
What surprised you the most?
AS: To be honest, it’s hard to pick out one thing – it was all exciting. We visited an oyster farm and I just couldn’t get over how large it was. Seeing how they got all the oysters ready from the water to being sent out to restaurants and so on was amazing. The numbers involved are staggering. The French eat a lot of oysters at Christmas so they were beginning to gear up for that when we were there.
AJ: We went to the big food market in Rennes and that was special. It took us about four hours to get around the entire thing. The produce they had was spectacular but it also had the effect of making you grateful for the produce you get here. I imagine that the French students coming here are probably taken aback a bit by the quality of our beef.
You worked with the French students. Did you notice any difference in, say, technique or approach between you and them?
AJ: A lot of the French chefs spend a lot of time at catering college whereas a lot of people in Scotland just go straight into the trade and learn on the job. The French students get to see everything from how to carry a plate to cooking the food.
AS: They can spend up to seven years in catering college. They start at the very bottom and cover everything from front of house to wines via pastry. In the later years, they specialise in whatever part of hospitality it is they want to work in.
Did you see anything that you would love to see replicated in Scotland?
AJ: The markets. We get good stuff here but the range and quality of the food in the Rennes market was amazing.
][19]It’s a cliché but were the French wary of British cooking skills?
AJ: Not really. We cooked a big gala meal with the students at the Lycée Hotel Dinard. We would take turns showing each other how to cook dishes. We would show them how we made a Cullen skink and they would show us how to make a soupe de poisson.
AS: The language barrier could be a struggle. Or rather it was for us. They were pretty good at it but we just showed each other the techniques we used.
Did the trip change your plans or ambitions?
AJ: Before going, I would never have considered going to France and doing a stage or trying to get a job there. Now, it’s something that I would think about.
AS: We got a fascinating glimpse of one area of France but it is a massive country and, of course, it’s just one part of Europe. After the trip, you could see how working in other countries could be a big benefit to a chef.
Did you eat anything new while there?
AJ: I’d only tried oysters a couple of time before going but while there we would be sitting down to big plates of them.
AS: We had donkey sausage in buckwheat crepes or galettes in the market. I hadn’t tried them before. We had them first thing in the morning after a late night. If I remember right, I think we had cider shortly afterwards.
][20]There seemed to be a lot of good looking lunches?
AS: They looked after us really well. We ate at the school three times a day. Lunch and dinner would be three courses with wine. I came back bursting.
Have you kept in touch with your French peers?
AS: A lot of us have kept in touch on Facebook and so on. The people we were working with at the Lycée are the students who are coming over here next March. I think we’ll be doing something with them when they come to Scotland. It will be good to see them.