The Dog in a Doublet

[prev]… chef is about. There’s no social life, it’s work work work, it’s monotonous – then you’ve got this hectic two or three hours every now and again where you’ve got a full restaurant and you’ve got to get the food out. If that reality dawns on you, and you still want to do it, then you’re a chef! That’s what makes Dog in a Doublet work – we all love that buzz of managing to get great food out to a busy restaurant and customers coming up and telling us they loved it. We have an open plan kitchen so dinners can see this buzz… like a theatre… drama… even comedy… we don’t hide anything here.

‘I quite liked Gregg Wallace, but I didn’t really get on with John Torode’

WHAT WAS IT LIKE BEHIND THE SCENES ON THE SHOW?
I quite liked Gregg Wallace, but I didn’t really get on with John Torode – he slated me for undercooking my lamb, and we started having a bit of a barney! It was never shown on TV, that bit. The funniest bit for viewers – and they used this clip a lot – was in this Michelin-starred restaurant. I was on the fish station, and with the swordfish was one accompaniment that needed to go on the grill – a head of asparagus, basted in olive oil. And I put it on then said to this French chef next to me ‘Oh bugger, I forgot to put the olive oil on…’ And he said: ‘Don’t worry, I’ll sort it out,’ and went over and squeezed olive oil straight onto the grill. Flames went everywhere, and the chef’s gone doolally, I can’t be a kid about it, so I’m not about to point and say ‘It was him…’ I’m just having to stand there and take it! They played Firestarter when they showed it.

HOW DID MASTERCHEF CHANGE THINGS FOR YOU?
It was good fun, it was a feather in my cap, and I used it. It was a few months before it got shown, so I worked in a couple of restaurants in London just to get the gist of things and then came back home here to a restaurant and said: ‘I’m going to be on MasterChef, so if you let me cook here you can use that in the publicity for your restaurant’. And they did that, and I was then known as a chef and got head-hunted by the Petrus brothers. And I’ve not looked back, really. I used to have quite a big social life. That’s all gone and I don’t mind! Anyone with a restaurant will tell you that’s their life, their family.

DO YOU HAVE A FAVOURITE DISH ON THE MENU AT THE MOMENT?
Every dish has been a labour of love. But I’ll tell you one I’m really proud of at the minute. I’ve got beef short rib on, which is a really old-fashioned cut. It took me months to source it, and in the end I’ve used these cattle from the other side of King’s Lynn – beer-fed Dexters – and in fact we’re using their steaks too, now. They’re 32-day aged – absolutely out of this world.

‘The cattle are fed nine pints of ale every lunchtime just to chill them out’

The cattle are fed nine pints of ale every lunchtime just to chill them out, stop them using their muscles too much. The rib is cooked for three days at a really low temperature but still comes out medium-rare, and we marinate it in horseradish from our own fields, rosemary from the garden and some top-notch maple syrup, and we serve it with celeriac purée, roast parsnips, saffron fondant potato and an oxtail jus. OK, those accompaniments you might see on any menu, but the beef short rib is our own. I don’t know of anyone in the Peterborough area doing what we are doing here in the way we are doing it…

The Dog in a Doublet
N. Side Thorney
Peterborough PE6 0RW
01733 202256

www.doginad.co.uk