What I know now: Clare Smyth
Her London restaurant, Core, was awarded two Michelin stars (in its first year), she was named Best Female Chef of 2018 and, ahem, catered the royal wedding. Ishay Govender-Ypma met an icon in the making
I grew up on a farm in Northern Ireland.
I loved the animals, used to ride horses and was generally quite a tomboy. My mum cooked for the farmworkers – simple, very wholesome food, fresh from the farm. And we ate every part of the animal. It would cook slowly in the pot and only be ready the next day.
I was always in a hurry. I started working in restaurants at the age of 12 during the school holidays and on weekends. I finished college when I was only 17, so I wasn’t even old enough to get a job.
One of my signature dishes is
a potato-and-roe dish, which is about my roots and about humble ingredients. I ate potatoes every day growing up.
British food is a mix of influences
from everywhere. For me, it’s really about the produce and we have some of the best – game and fish, shellfish. While my cooking is French-influenced, I try to make it as British as possible with some nods to our own culture and familiar classics that people identify with because of a sense of nostalgia – like carrot cake, which eliminated the need for sugar – a scarce ingredient during the war.
I’m a very happy workaholic. I feel I do have a balanced life because I love what I do and there’s nowhere else I’d rather be than at the restaurant. Eating out and socialising are also important to me.
I get inspiration from nature,
from art, my environment, people, smells, the weather and what I feel like eating right now. Our coleslaw dish, for example, was inspired by the incredibly hot summer.
The biggest thing awards give you
is confidence. It’s nice to be recognised for the work that we’re doing. But with every award comes more pressure.
The biggest award is always Michelin and the more stars you have, the higher your diners’ expectations.
Respect and professionalism are
essential in my kitchen. Respect is about respect for the produce, each other, the profession and respect for our guests. Everyone has their own personality but how you talk to each other is important.
Learning to accept criticism comes
with experience and maturity. You have to listen to the percentage. And if there is a higher percentage of people saying: “I don’t like that”, you have to listen to that, but you can’t please everyone.
I’m against bullying in any form;
I hate it. I won’t tolerate it. I always encourage people in my kitchen to step up and call it out, so that we can deal with it. I train my staff not just to work for me, but to get an education. We invest a lot of time in both training and cross-training the team, so that it sets them up for the future.
When setting up Core I did every
single thing myself, from arranging the bank loans, the investments, to designing the space. I didn’t take on another member of staff until four months before we opened.
I love the hospitality industry.
You don’t hear the government talking about the industry, but I think we should champion it more. It’s an industry that needs people; you can’t do it on a computer.