Chef
forward to the judging of the Menu of the
Year Catey sponsored by Quorn
All Menuwatches go
Suckling pig
Benedicts R
ichard Bainbridge has been working towards his own restaurant for a long time. “This has been in the pipeline ever since I walked into my very first kitchen aged 13,” he says. “I don’t want to be that chef who looks back aged 55 or 60 and has regrets.” After making his name as head chef at
Morston Hall, in Holt, Norfolk, under Galton and Tracy Blackiston, Bainbridge finally got the keys to his own property in Norwich in May, and come June he had opened it as the 35-cover Benedicts. “It’s been a labour of love. We haven’t got a massive budget, there are no investors – just my wife and I – but the busi- ness plan was to create somewhere that we wish Norwich had for our days off. Fine din- ing food in a place that I’d feel relaxed bringing my daughter to at lunch.” Viewers of the Great British Menu, in which he competed for three years between 2010 and 2013, will be familiar with Bainbridge’s mod- ern, locally focused food, and much of what he learnt at Morston has made the trip across Norfolk. “What I learned at Morston was mas- sive. It taught me how to be a manager and run
50 | The Caterer | 31 July 2015
“No one is more
passionate about the food than the chefs who have just cooked it”
Richard Bainbridge
After a career closely associated with Norfolk’s Morston Hall, Richard Bainbridge has gone it alone with his own restaurant in Norwich. Tom Vaughan reports
a kitchen and to create my own style of food. And a lot of the relationships I built with sup- pliers have also come with me.” Whereas Morston Hall remains destination
dining, Bainbridge wants Benedicts to have more of a bistro feel – albeit with his fine-din- ing twist, with à la carte priced at a very reason- able £36 for three courses and a tasting menu at £50. “I want people to come and feel relaxed and informal – I wanted a bistro feel so felt like I had to have steak and chips on, for example. But it is my take on steak and chips.” Bainbridge and his two chefs strip down a rib of beef from nearby Blickling Hall Estate. “We use different muscles on the rib, strip it down and smoke it on a Big Green Egg with a few juniper berries thrown in so it gets this lovely smokey, berry flavour,” he explains. It is then served with diced potatoes – “blanched and frozen and deep fried so they are lovely and crispy” – girolles courtesy of a “strange guy who turned up on our doorstep last week wearing a mac” and a truffle mousse made from last year’s truffles found in nearby Dereham. Not only is it a lovely, accessible
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