Steve: Yeah, a hundred per cent and it’s
really difficult, I always say like blinkers.
That’s another thing because we’re so
used to the way we’re working but that
comes from my recruitment policy as
well. Although I’ve got a stable team of
chefs that I surround myself with, we’re
just taking on this chef called Josh who
used to work with Gordon Ramsay, we’re
bringing in the new blood and it’s a bit of
a risk to bring someone in at a senior level
to come and help but it’s also refreshing
what we do; I want someone to come in
and question the way we’re doing it. And
almost have arguments, I don’t really like
it in the kitchen when I go in and I say
what we’re doing, I want the chefs to be
like why are we doing that? Why don’t
we do this? Why don’t we do that?, I can
say why don’t we spin it on its head and
say for this week we wanted to do a new
component, we do this dish, lemon and
oranges, it’s where we would normally pick
a dish this week in the year, and we haven’t
got a lot of fruits available to us in England
so it’s always the citrus that come in from
another field, and lemon and oranges, it’s
a really nice dish, but I just think let’s do
something different, and we came up with
like a lemon and biscuits and then I had the
idea, it works really nice with biscuits, it’s
really nice, it goes well with the lemon but
we did it with biscuits and ice-cream and it
just didn’t work, so we’ve had to drop that.
That’s almost how we do the menu, the
menus are written for the year, I’ve done
that over the last three years, if I know what
I’m supposed to put on in that week I just
clarify it with the suppliers to make sure
that there’s no heavy snow coming this
week that’s gonna ruin the asparagus that
I’ve got on the menu at the moment, but
I always want to improve it, I never want
to be set in my ways and I always think
how can we make it different but I think
the hardest thing for people to get their
heads around is when I try and change the
menu 52 times a year. They think it’s like 52
of each 8 course and I’m not going to lie
that it’s probably a collection of a hundred
dishes that I’ve got but I know which ones
are my weak ones and which ones are
my strongest, it’s all about moving those
weaker ones up the level of the strong, but
even with the dishes that’s pretty much
what most chefs have got.
Jason: You change the menu quarterly,
there are 25 dishes on the menu, you
know if you said an al a carte would be 8
starters, 8 mains, 8 desserts, that’s already
24 dishes, and then you’ve got to change it
4 times a year. Is there anything that stays
on the menu, is always going to stay on the
menu? You don’t take it off?
Steve: Yeah, the marmite bread I do with
butter because it’s what I love, and this
is where I want to go with all my dishes.
It’s got a real identity to it, it hasn’t been
copied by anyone, it’s me that created it
and the way it’s served is unique as well.
When I come up with a new dish those
are the three things that I’m looking for,
the way it’s served, that it is unique, and
then does it have a story, does it tie in
with Sussex. I know Marmite’s not from
Sussex but the seaweed is and the South
Downs butter so it’s probably those, but
what I like about Marmite is the institution,
I like things like Marmite ketchup, I even
like gentleman’s relish, those sorts of
things that are in our DNA. Like I said with
Raymond Blanc and Michel Roux coming
over to the country with French food,
another thing of mine is almost like crikey,
we’ve got some great food and great
menus that we’ve had throughout the last
100 years or 300 years and that we don’t
really promote it. Not fish and chips and
shepherd’s pie, which is British food but not
what I want people to see as British food.
You know like done nicely, taken care of the
ingredients. I think that’s also to do with the
empire that we built, because we’ve taken
a little bit of everyone. Almost like a culture
slightly mixed and it only leaves us then
with a few dishes like the toad in the hole,
that are really British. You know it’s hard to
create a new dish that, that’s why I want
to go down the road with the produce and
the relishes and ketchups and pickles, they
definitely are an English thing.
Jason: So I don’t think we have asked
you yet but where did the name “etch”
come from?
Steve: I wanted to put Sussex food on
the map, I love the use of Sussex produce
but I didn’t want it to be anything to do
with Sussex. I think it just dishonours
what you’re trying to do if you’ve got like
Sussex produce or a Sussex restaurant,
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