Tom Phillips gets ready for the European Final of the Bocuse D'Or

The Restaurant Story chef is ready for the European Final of the Bocuse D’Or this week and is determined to prove that the UK deserves a long-awaited win. He talks to Jungmin Seo

 

You came 10th in the 2019 Bocuse D’Or World Final and coached Ian Musgrave in the 2023 World Final. How do you feel about returning?

 

I think a lot has happened in those six years and I feel a lot more – what’s the right word? Not necessarily confidence, but having more experience under my belt has helped. I’ve been running [Tom Sellers’ two-Michelin-starred] Restaurant Story as head chef and executive chef, which has given me a huge wealth of knowledge. I think the biggest difference is I feel like more of a rounded individual. I have a much stronger mindset, which is half the battle, so I feel a lot more set up for it than I did before.

 

What will you be cooking at the European Final at Trondheim in Norway on 19-20 March?

 

It’s split into two tasks: the plated dish and the platter. The plated dish is reindeer in three different cuts – topside, shank and tongue – and in all three we have to use Akvavit, a type of Scandinavian spirit.

 

There was a lot of trial and error with the dish because we can’t get reindeer in the UK – the UK doesn’t actually allow the importation of it. So three weeks ago, I flew out to Oslo and I managed to get hold of some reindeer at a friend’s hotel. I spent a few hours cooking it – I’d never cooked it before. We’d been working on a type of venison that’s from Scotland that’s meant to be like reindeer, but it’s actually nothing like it, so that was very useful to do.

 

The UK is yet to secure a place on the podium in the World Finals. Why is this?

 

Where we fell down before is experience and approach – it wasn’t quite structured enough. We’ve been improving every cycle (I came tenth, Ian came seventh) but it takes a tremendous amount of knowledge of the competition to do well.

 

There’s so many areas to focus on: producing an amazing plate of food, designing a platter that has a relationship with the food and that also tells a story about you as a candidate. We see teams that are on the podium over and over again and they have vast amounts of people behind them. They might have a core team of four and seven or eight assistants.

 

Why has there not been as much support or investment into the UK arm of the Bocuse D’Or?

 

It’s because Bocuse is still relatively unknown in this country, even among chefs. They might have heard of it, but they don’t know about the skill behind it, the importance of it or the actual work that goes into it. And when the industry isn’t behind it, it’s hard to have the general public behind it too, but in the past two years that’s starting to change.

 

It always blows my mind that so many people watch MasterChef and really get behind the chefs, and I want that with the Bocuse D’Or, where the chefs represent the whole country in the most cutting-edge culinary space. I want to spend this year getting people to go to the competition in Lyon, because when you go, you get the bug for it.

 

Clare Smyth was named UK president of Bocuse D’Or and she’s been vocal about the need for greater investment in the competition. How have you been collaborating with her?

 

I go to Clare to guide us on what we are doing and she’s been a massive part of our growth, especially the fundraising part. There’s some European teams that have budgets of a million euros. We do not, but it’s still more than previous years. We’re taking 1.178 tonnes of equipment with us. We spent the last year re-kitting the whole kitchen out to resemble the one we will use on the day of the finals. We’re taking bespoke table tops, heat lamps and bespoke drawer cabinets with flush-closing doors – there’s three of those, weighing 200kg – with us.

 

What convinced you to take on the Bocuse D’Or again?

 

I have a real love for this competition and for [its founder] Paul Bocuse. This competition has been entwined into my career from the very beginning. We still get mocked by the commentators. Even when Ian won the Best Plated Dish in Europe, when he went up to get the award, they said the UK wins for their “fish and chips”. So how amazing would it be to change that perception.

 

I truly think that winning the Bocuse, or at least me getting on that podium, will change things for British gastronomy. We have a large number of Michelin-starred restaurants and yet they still don’t view us as a serious contender. We tried to get government funding but they’ve never wanted to support us, because a chef is considered a low-skilled job. [If we do well] surely that proves something and I’m excited about what can come off the back of that.