Caines scrutiny
In the second part of our look at the Birmingham College of Food, Tourism and Creative Studies, Catey winner Michael Caines finds out if its teaching methods are meeting industry needs. Joanna Wood reports.
One subject crops up year after year at Caterer's annual Chef Conference: the acute skills shortage in kitchens across the industry.
In the course of debate, the UK's catering colleges often come in for a bit of stick, being accused of not delivering students with basic skills to the country's restaurants and hotels. The other principal culprit is identified as the NVQ (National Vocational Qualification) system, which, according to most chefs, fails to match the standards of the old City & Guilds system in the skills level it requires from graduating students.
The problem with this continuing debate is that representatives from the two sides - the industry and the colleges - rarely meet to discuss the issue; and, without dialogue, the situation is unlikely to improve. With this in mind, Caterer invited Michael Caines - head chef and co-director of Devon's two-Michelin-starred Gidleigh Park, proprietor of Exeter's three-AA-rosette Michael Caines at the Royal Clarence, and a mentor of the Francis Coulson Scholarship - to spend a day at Birmingham College of Food, Tourism and Creative Studies to assess for himself its training methods.
Caines, who trained at his local college in Exeter, has recently been enlisted by Plymouth College to advise on its culinary courses and, prior to the visit, was eager to see how a big-city institution such as Birmingham would compare to a provincial West Country college. He approached the outing with no real preconceptions of how Birmingham's culinary departments would function, but was aware that Birmingham is considered to be one of the country's leading hospitality educational establishments.
Before his tour he commented: "Birmingham has a large catchment area of students. If you take somewhere like Plymouth, it doesn't have the same population from which to draw potential students, and so struggles to get people on courses."
Overall responsibility
Co-ordinating chef training at the college is Bill Farnsworth, director of catering and bakery studies, himself an ex-chef who has worked in leading hotels such as the Savoy and the Dorchester in London. He has overall responsibility for running Birmingham's NVQ courses in Basic Food Preparation and Cooking (levels 1 and 2), which runs over one year, and its Advanced Food Preparation course (level 3), which stretches over a further 12 months. Students are continually assessed and put on work placements at the end of each completed year. Level 2 students are placed within the Birmingham area for four weeks, while level 3 students go further afield for a period of three weeks, often to leading restaurants and hotels in London.
Currently, the theory:practical percentage on the courses evens out to a 34:66 split.
In addition to the placements, the college schedules all students to work at least five days a week in one of its realistic working environments (RWEs). These include three profit-making catering outlets open to the public - a traditional pub, the Cap and Gown; the 60-seat Brasserie; and a fine-dining restaurant, the 40-seat Atrium - as well as a subsidised student café.
"We have a very in-depth induction period for new students, and put them into skills classes for about four weeks before they go into an RWE," explains Farnsworth. "It would be great if we could afford to put students on industry work placements for six weeks. When they go through the interview process, we tell them the hours and commitment that the industry expects, but it doesn't really hit them until they step outside."
NVQs set out skills modules for colleges to teach (subjects such as basic fruit and veg prep and hygiene practice for level 1; meat, poultry and fish preparation and cookery for level 2; pastry skills at level 3), but it is up to individual colleges to extend their students' craft abilities. Birmingham is lucky enough to have about 1,442sq m of kitchen training area with state-of-the-art equipment, which allows training beyond the NVQ requirements. "We look at what the industry requires and build a programme around that, then look to see how the NVQs fit in," reveals Farnsworth.
The college also tries to accommodate the wishes of students. "We talk to them about what skills they'd like to achieve and then tailor their timetables to incorporate what they want," explains Farnsworth.
Caines's day at Birmingham comprised tours of all the college's kitchens, both training areas and RWE kitchens - its butchery, larder, bakery, smokery and demo kitchen sections included - where he was able to observe students being taught how to butcher chicken, shell cock crabs, bake bread, cook dishes to order for the brasserie and smoke fresh salmon.
Throughout the tour, he was able to chat with the college's chef-lecturers, all of whom, like their students, go on regular industrial placements to leading restaurants in order to keep them in touch with industry demands. A recent lecturer stage was at Rick Stein's Seafood Restaurant in Padstow.
Caines's reaction
"From a chef's perspective, I thought the college was fantastic. I felt like a kid in a toy shop. That huge Bonnet range in the demo kitchen - I wish I could afford one of those. Absolutely amazing.
"Quite clearly, the college is rooting itself in a very practical curriculum. It's delivering on all skill levels. In fact, it's way above the average. They're clearly breaking ground.
"It's good that it's running food outlets on a commercial basis. That means they're taking the industry seriously. And I was impressed by the fact that the lecturers do regular stages in industry. But it seems that it's up to the individual college to set a high curriculum standard. It means that standards are not consistent across all colleges. That's the problem for us in the industry. We all know that an NVQ can be a minimum requirement.
"I think it's very difficult for small colleges to deliver the key skills that the industry needs. Here at Birmingham, it's structured to run like a big hotel - you've got a number of different food outlets and huge kitchens. We need a national curriculum that guarantees across the country the same type of facility that the college has here.
"If I had to be very critical, I would say that the actual way that the kitchen works is a bit old-hat. There's not enough plating. I know that has to do with teaching gu‚ridon work, but there's often not the space to do it in modern restaurants. The waiting skills should be taught but, having been taught, then the kitchen operation should reflect modern kitchen environments as much as possible.
"I think the trade could be brought back in to the college even more. The industry has got to take more of a lead, get more involved. We've got to make it possible for students to eat in our restaurants - do some special deal. We should do more guest lectures, take on more placements than we do. We need to give students as much insight into the industry as possible.
"In the first year that I was at college, I didn't know much about anything, but in the second year I started hearing about Michelin stars. And I didn't get the feeling from chatting to the students that they were up on that. I think it should be part of the curriculum. Students should be educated in the fact that there's a Michelin guide and an AA guide; that there's a restaurant called the Ivy in London; that there are critics called AA Gill and Matthew Fort; and, yes, that there are celebrity chefs. But they should know, too, that Rick Stein, for example, ran a restaurant for 20 years before he appeared on TV.
"I was a bit disappointed that my opinion wasn't sought at all during the day. When the college has got someone like me on-site, the lecturers should seek feedback. Birmingham shouldn't just be comfortable with what it's doing, it needs to keep thinking of new ways forward. It can't rest on its laurels. Colleges are there to serve the industry, and they should never forget that."
