DELUXE Mallorca Magazine winter 2016/17 1.12.2016 | Page 46

DELUXE PEOPLE Can you tell me a bit about where you’re from and how you started as a chef? I basically became a Chef by accident. As a young boy I just wanted to be in a rock band or play football professionally. At 15 years old I got a weekend job washing dishes in a restaurant and I instantly loved the buzz of the kitchen, the teamwork and the camaraderie. I knew then that I would become a Chef. “Km 0 is pretty hot right now” With two new restaurants on the cards this year and having won a third star for his flagship Palma restaurant at the Convent de la Missió Hotel at the 2016 Michelin Guide awards, the celebrated British chef Marc Fosh is once more the talk of the town. One of the most colourful chefs on the Island, he is also often cited by culinary experts as one of Mallorca’s most experimental, for his contribution to avant-garde-turned-freshMediterranean cuisine. However, with his healthy appetite for new horizons, this resident from Great Britain is also a brilliant businessman, and in 2016 Marc Fosh presented three new venues with surprising concepts. As well as a catering and consultation branch, a cooking school, two new restaurants and a shop for kitchen accessories and culinary treats, not forgetting his ongoing involvement in the Marc Fosh restaurant at the Palma hotel Convent 46 DELUXE de la Missio (formerly known as Simply Fosh), Fosh currently operates three restaurants in the old town – one earning him a total of three Michelin stars – and he isn’t showing any sign of stopping there, either. This year he opened Fosh Kitchen, a chic brasserie in a former chocolaterie, and Fosh Lab, a restaurant for show cooking (covered by a flat screen TV) where he wants to “test experimental concepts for future venues”. One of Britain’s most prolific chefs, Deluxe talked to him about his career abroad and how creativity and good old-fashioned hard work are the secret of his success. You are now at the helm of your own company – how did the new projects evolve? Over the last year I’ve restructured the company and been very lucky to find new partners to help take the business forward. The new projects were planned for a while but in the end came almost together and we are very excited about both our new restaurants. Fosh Lab is a very intimate and exclusive space where we can really push our creative energies and it’s a very cool, new gastronomic experience for Palma. Fosh Kitchen is a lively Mediterranean bistro where the emphasis is on the best ingredients, simply cooked in a healthy way. I guess it’s a restaurant where you could eat everyday. With your numerous establishments do you still have time to cook? What do you say to critics when they ask about your time spent in the kitchen, about becoming a brand? As a Chef and owner of restaurants my main focus is always about the food. Cooking every day in a high-end restaurant is very physically demanding, its also incredibly stressful and as you move forward with your career you learn to become a good teacher and you also have to learn how to delegate. It’s clear that I can’t be in every kitchen all the time and that is why we have such wonderful teams in all our restaurants. For me it’s about making sure that they follow our philosophy of warm hospitality and clean, healthy Mediterranean food with pure flavours. A Fosh restaurant has to carry those ideals. I don’t know about becoming a brand. As a Chef, I suppose if you have been around long enough and been successful at what you do, people will then put their trust in your name when they go out to eat. It’s a big responsibility and I’m very grateful that we have such a loyal clientele who continually support us and help us to improve everyday. How do you explain your consistent success? Like anybody you have up’s and down’s but I am a naturally positive person and I never like