Hotel Cateys 2024: Hotel Chef of the Year (fewer than 250 covers) – Paul Leonard, Forest Side

Paul Leonard’s job as head chef at the Michelin-starred Forest Side goes far beyond turning out exemplary plates of food. As a director of the business as well as head chef, Leonard has a business brief to accompany his culinary responsibilities.

He is in charge of kitchen staff hiring, as well as helping to implement and maintain personal and mental health programmes to make sure his staff are looked after and supported both inside and out the kitchen.

Leonard runs a tight ship, while also ensuring that his team are engaged and supported to perform to the best of their ability. His gross profit is consistently 70%, while business costs and kitchen waste have declined year-on-year.

He keeps quality high with healthy margins by sourcing ingredients as seasonally and locally as possible, as well as growing a huge amount of food on-site. The Forest Side gardens and kitchen garden provide about 85% of the fresh seasonal fruit and vegetables required, as well as an array of flowering plants and herbs.

With a small team, Leonard’s mission is to teach the basic pillars of cheffing and to impart the key skills and techniques required to build and sustain a successful kitchen. He focuses on nurturing chefs, sharing his own knowledge until they’ve gained the confidence to start a new challenge and succeed in their own right. He also works with Hull College, of which he is an alumnus, to increase the visibility of cheffing as a reputable career path.

Leonard also works hard to support his team’s mental health. Both he and general manager Alasdair Elwick are mental health first-aiders and the pair have organised life coaching, group therapy sessions and even yoga classes. All of this focus on training and support has led to a 90% staff retention rate, but those who do leave have gone on to some success, with Forest Side alumni now running their own kitchens at Winteringham Fields, the French, House of Tides and Cail Bruich.

It has been an outstanding year for Forest Side. It won the AA’s Hotel of the Year in September 2023, was included in Square Meal’s Top 10 Restaurants in the UK and it placed number 60 in National Restaurant Awards Top 100. Meanwhile, Leonard was awarded Cumbrian Chef of the Year 2023 and he retained the hotel restaurant’s Michelin star for the third year running. He can now add Hotel Cateys Chef of the Year to his considerable list of achievements.

What the judges said

“Paul’s passionate commitment to the Cumbrian ecosystem and the community around Forest Side is total; from championing suppliers to nourishing his team’s careers and reducing the footprint of his operation.”

Chris King

“An incredible chef with a stellar, proven pedigree who has made Forest Side what it is and who has come into his own in the last year.”

Will Holland