Fairlie in the frame

Despite its standing as one of Britain's leading properties, Gleneagles has never held a Michelin star. Joanna Wood meets the man who hopes to change all that.

Hands clasped around his knee, with his feet lightly resting on each other, Andrew Fairlie leans back against the copious cushions of his restaurant's lounge-bar sofa, relaxed and confident. It's a little more than three months since he opened his new restaurant at Gleneagles hotel, but there is no obvious sign of the stress that opening a restaurant is supposed to cause. The image he presents to the world is one of calmness.

In conversation, the impression is of a man who is instinctively open, yet there is a guarded quality to his words. In fact, he is a mass of contradictions. He admits to getting bored easily - yet he remained at Glasgow's One Devonshire Gardens for seven years. He says he hasn't been unnerved by the three visits he's already received at his new location from Michelin - yet he lets slip that he used to get anxious about similar calls when he was in Glasgow. And he is confident enough to display two oil portraits of himself on the walls of his restaurant - yet he winces at working the tables.

Are the paintings egotistical? Perhaps. But they are more likely to be a reinforcement of a marketable commodity - Fairlie, himself. Or rather, as he insists, it was simply a design decision by the artist, Archie Forrest, whose skilful artwork adorns the walls of the whole restaurant.

For seven years as head chef at One Devonshire Gardens he was the city's sole holder of a Michelin star. He is arguably the best native chef cooking in Scotland today and, with the move to Gleneagles (at the end of May) to set up under his own banner, who's to say that he won't become the first home-grown chef to win the two-star accolade? He has the facilities and the time - now, with the restaurant opening in the evenings only - to take his cooking to another level.

"I was never going to get a better opportunity to set up on my own than here," says the 37-year-old chef. "I know I'm very fortunate - I have a safety net of more than 200 bedrooms in the hotel, providing a high-spend captive market and a rent-free three-year deal. It's the least risky solo venture that I could ever have been presented with, and I'd have been mad not to take it."

Instrumental in luring Fairlie to Gleneagles was the hotel's food and beverage director, Alan Hill. But it took him a year - and two rebuffs - before Fairlie was persuaded to move out of Glasgow. "I never actually planned on leaving One Devonshire," says Fairlie. "Yeah, I knew I'd do my own thing at some point, but how or when that was going to happen, I really had no idea. I thought I'd stay in Glasgow."

For his part, Hill was unswerving in his determination to bring Fairlie to the Auchterarder property. The Gleneagles hotel, Hill argues, had reached a point in its development when it needed the prestige of a serious Michelin contender. Moreover, Fairlie had the added newsworthy spin of being a local Perth boy made good. Fairlie, says Hill in conversation, was "right" for Gleneagles: he married with the hotel's other upmarket associations, such as Capt Mark Phillips's equestrian centre and Sir Jackie Stewart's shooting school. Bringing Fairlie in would offer clients a new experience and provide Gleneagles with a benchmark.

Persistence paid off. By the end of 2000, Fairlie had decided to move on from One Devonshire Gardens, and he phoned Hill; five months later, he was operating an eponymous restaurant. And being able to call the shots - completely - is, he concedes, very satisfying. "It's a hell of a lot easier getting out of my bed in the morning and coming to my own restaurant," he says with a slow smile. "Even with an hour's driving up the road from Glasgow, it doesn't seem like a job any more." It might even make his Achilles' heel - the post-service table rounds - bearable. But only just.

"Doing the tables is a drag," he laughs. "It's good to get feedback from customers, but there are some people I just can't face. Anybody pompous, I avoid. How do I know who to talk to? It's mainly an instinctive thing. The other night we had a couple in - very into each other's company - but they just didn't seem relaxed with themselves. I just thought, ‘God, I'm not going anywhere near them!' They looked up as if to say, ‘Aren't you going to come and have a chat?' and I thought to myself, ‘No, forget it!' I was really self-conscious of the fact that I couldn't go over."

Empathy with customers is not an absolute pre-requisite for a chef-restaurateur, of course. But empathy with staff is, and it's a testament to Fairlie's managerial skills that the key members of his front and back of house brigades at One Devonshire Gardens followed him to Perthshire - sous chef Darin Campbell, junior sous Stevie McLaughlin, sommelier Johnnie Walker and restaurant manager Dale Dewsbury, to name but four.

"I couldn't have opened in two months at a high level with strangers," confesses Fairlie, who runs a democratic operation, even though the buck clearly stops with him. "I still find it difficult to make decisions without running things past people - that's why it's great to have the guys here with me." To reward their loyalty, he was anxious to create a civilised working environment, and drew up a hit list of what was wrong with the industry ("you know, not enough meal breaks, overlong hours, crap conditions, bad equipment"). The results of this are that the team is on a higher pay structure than was previously the case, he claims, and the kitchen has one extra member of staff (now eight), so that if somebody is ill or wants a day off then the brigade is not put under pressure. Everybody gets a share of any gratuities, regardless of their job. Everyone eats together - and talks.

And then there's the no-lunch-service factor.

Ironically, the decision to let lunch fall by the wayside was made on economic grounds rather than philanthropic ones ("there's no market - all the guests are out playing golf!") but, nevertheless, it has visibly lifted the atmosphere in the kitchen. "Not doing lunch just takes a hell of a lot of pressure off," explains Fairlie. "Normally, the worst part of the day is having to come in early in the morning and get ready for lunch service when you're really, really tired. I can see the change in the guys - they're a lot more relaxed now."

The benefits of having more time in which to craft and cook dishes are incalculable. Essentially, Fairlie is putting out similar menus to those he ran in Glasgow, but presentation has become more precise, more sophisticated, and the food more complex in its composi-tional elements.

Dishes on Fairlie's menu (priced at £55 for three courses) include ravioli of summer truffles, woodland mushrooms and white bean sauce; seared salmon with langoustine beignets, crushed confit potato, herb sabayon; roast Anjou squab with truffle gnocchi, braised cabbage, confit garlic; an assiette of porc Gascony with jus rôti; a zingy, brûlée-like glazed passion fruit tart and coconut sorbet; hot cherry soufflé; and one which has become something of a signature dish, home-smoked lobster with warm herb and lime butter sauce which now comes with cress salad.

The dish has its roots in Fairlie's stage at Michel Guerard's restaurant in Eug‚nie les Bains 17 years ago, part of his prize as the winner of the first Roux Scholarship. He credits the stage as being the most influential period in his professional education, and still thinks the French are leading the culinary world. Press him to name a top-ranking British chef whom he respects and he demurs, preferring not to make unguarded statements about his peers on record. But ask about French chefs and he will name Robouchon and Guerard instantly.

Understandably, given the decisive role that the Roux Scholarship played in his career, Michel Roux is one of the few people he praises, unprompted. "I have the most amazing respect for him," he says. "The energy and drive needed for being at the top for so long are immense."

For Roux's part, he too holds Fairlie in high regard. "He was my first scholar and he's still the one I look on as an exemplary and rewarding scholar," Roux says. "He's a good leader and highly skilled. What else do you want? In the kitchen he's decisive, without being rude or pushy. [As a person] he's reserved - and I like his almost-shyness.

"There's something soothing about him, you know. He seems to enjoy what he's doing. That is true professionalism. He has embraced his profession for life, not to score and get out."

If Fairlie lasts the course as long as Roux, he would probably be a contented man. His immediate future is, of course, mapped out. Three years, at least, based at Gleneagles actually cooking; then he hopes to gradually step back from the stove.

"I would expect realistically to obtain a star in January 2002. The next goal is to achieve a second Michelin star. Then to expand my business. And then to watch guys like Darin and Stevie grow within that. That will give me another sense of achievement."

Wines

Fairlie's sommelier, Johnnie Walker, has chosen wine pairings to go with the dishes featured in Chef.

Consommé
Bonnezeau "La Montagne". Domaine du Petit Val 1990. Loire, France - "marmalade and honeyed tones, but keeping clean lines with wonderful balancing acidity".

Andrew Fairlie at Gleneagles

The restaurant is located in the central part of the hotel, with no access to natural light.

Fairlie says: "I thought, ‘Christ, what the hell am I going to do with it?' - but the problem was solved by opting for a dramatic design of black walls, softened by swathes of cream drapes and clever lighting.

"I wanted comfy and theatrical, masculine but romantic," says Fairlie, whose ideas were translated into design by Gregor Mathieson and Amanda Rosa.

Refurbishment cost £100,000, with £11,000 alone going on the Bernaudaud crockery.

Spend per head: £101
Seating: 38 (maximum)
Kitchen brigade: eight
Front of house: eight
Current GP: 65%

Wines

Scallops
Pouilly Fumé "En Chailloux" 1998. Didier Dagueneau, Loire - "a clean line, mix of pure fruit, minerals and acid grip".

Lamb Chateau Puech Haut "Tête de Cuvée" 1998. Coteaux de Languedoc, France - "leather, soft fruit and spice, giving a sweetly balanced elegance to complement the sweetness of the lamb and pungent kidney".