Gary Goldie to open Oban restaurant

Former Scottish Chef of the Year Gary Goldie is to open a new restaurant at the Queens hotel in Oban.

Goldie will be in charge of all food and beverage operations at the four-star Best Western hotel, which currently has a single AA rosette, and will also open a restaurant called Gary Goldie, based on foraged food.

The chef previously headed up the kitchen at Ardanaiseig on the shores of Loch Awe where he built up a strong reputation for his use of wild food, and won three AA rosettes. He left Ardanaiseig after 15 years in May 2013 and undertook several stages in Europe, including a stint at Michelin-starred In De Wulf in Belgium.

Goldie told Caterer and Hotelkeeper: "I worked at the Queens hotel in November-December and started doing some interesting, slightly off-the-wall food, mostly wild with pickles and smoke etc, with the chefs taking the food out.

"I do need to run the busy bar also but have a very strong head chef, Will Hay, coming to help and also can enjoy doing good food there too.

"There won't be anyone in Scotland doing food like it, and I doubt anywhere in the rest of Britain will be focusing on wild food as we will be," he said.

The restaurant will seat 25-30 people, doing eight services a week. It will be decorated with paintings of wild food, produced by an artist friend of Goldie's (see image below). It opens on 12 February.

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