My Life in Hospitality – Nick Vadis

On a rainy day in Liverpool, while out shopping with his mother, a 14-year-old Nick Vadis saw a poster that changed his life. "It had a silhouette of a sailor in bell-bottom trousers next to a scantily clad woman and a palm tree, with the words ‘Join the navy, see the world' along the bottom," he says. Two years later he did just that.

 

An initial burst of rebellion against his Greek chef father saw Vadis sign up as a helicopter mechanic, but three months in he realised resistance was futile and asked to become a chef.

 

Vadis quickly discovered that training in the military is much more intensive than at college. In eight weeks, working 10 hours a day with regular tests, he received a qualification equivalent to a City & Guilds. Further on-the-job training consolidated what Vadis had already learned and nine months later he went to sea.

 

Having previously never been abroad, Vadis went round the world for the first time at the age of 20. "The world is an amazing shopping basket of experiences, food and flavours," he remembers fondly. "It was phenomenal to see all those different cultures."

 

Vadis rose through the ranks, ultimately following in his teacher mother's footsteps by completing a BA degree in education and heading up the Royal Naval Cookery School where he himself had trained 20 years before.

 

"I was always interested in training and I wanted to give something back," he says. "To be part of it, teaching the new recruits, gave me great satisfaction."

 

When Vadis felt he'd gone as far as he could in the Navy, he left to join Cambridge University and open a conference centre in Wyboston Lakes with his old boss, who left at around the same time. He stayed for two years before joining Compass Group as the executive chef at British Airways and in 2007 Vadis was appointed into his current position of UK executive chef for the UK and Ireland.

 

He quickly discovered it wasn't just his cooking skills that were transferrable from the Navy.

 

"When you're in the military you don't think they're teaching you anything, but leadership is bred into you from an early age, so it was easy to adapt to Civvy Street," he recalls. "‘Give respect to get respect' is a motto that has resonated through my career."

 

HIGHS… Throughout his career Vadis has maintained close links with the rest of the hospitality industry through culinary competitions. In the early 1990s he formed a team on the HMS Illustrious that went on to win over a dozen awards at Hotelympia.

 

"They'd never done anything like it before," he says. "The camaraderie was inspirational. Warships aren't generally known for culinary cuisine, but what it did for food on the ship was amazing."

 

Success at Hotelympia continued with Compass. This year Vadis took a team of 60 chefs from across all sectors of the business and together they walked away with 111 awards.

 

Ultimate recognition of Vadis's contribution to training and the industry came last month, when he was awarded an honorary professorship from Thames Valley University, which he describes as very humbling.

 

"I was really pleased and totally honoured to get that award. It was the icing on the cake and recognition for a job well done. It's not what you take out of the industry, it's what you put back."

 

LOWS… Vadis experienced terrible loss during the Falklands War of the early 1980s. HMS Sheffield and HMS Glamorgan both suffered missile hits to their galleys and many chefs lost their lives.

 

"They were personal friends of mine who were doing a great job, with great passion," he says.

 

"Sadly in a war scenario you're going to have casualties. They chose to do it because they believed in it."

 

NICK VADIS

 

Family Married, with three children

 

Age 50

 

Favourite holiday Spain or the Caribbean

 

Drives Audi A4 estate and an Audi TT

 

Motto I don't expect anyone to do anything I wouldn't do myself

 

Recession-busting tip Use fresh, seasonal produce. It's cheaper and in abundance