Opening acts

STUART Gillies is more than ready for his first head chef's position. In fact, he has been ready for a couple of years, but he was keen on increasing his knowledge and experience elsewhere first. As a result, he believes that the menu at the £1.5m Teatro restaurant, which opened last week on the fringe of London's Soho, will have an edge over other restaurants in the capital, offering a depth reflecting his background.

"Young chefs often jump into head chef positions before they are ready and very quickly run out of ideas for dishes," says 31-year-old Gillies, adding confidently: "That shouldn't happen here."

It certainly shouldn't, as Gillies is able to draw on a vast repertoire of dishes that he has gleaned throughout his varied international career.

After kick-starting his catering life at the Royal Garden Hotel in London, at the same time as completing a day-release course at Westminster College, Gillies was attracted abroad by a Swedish girlfriend and spent a year working at the Riche restaurant in Stockholm.

From there, he went to the two-Michelin-starred Lord Byron restaurant in Rome, where his eyes were opened by the quality of produce and the attitude to him as a chef. "People were impressed by what I did; while in England, at the time, cooking was still regarded as a second-class trade," says Gillies. "Food in Italy was all about passion, something which quickly rubbed off on me."

seasonal work

Gillies then took three years away from serious cooking, backpacking his way around South America and Sweden, doing the odd bit of seasonal work in ski resorts. But by the time he was 25, he was eager to leave the road, and returned to England to become chef de partie at Gravetye Manor at East Grinstead in West Sussex.

Eighteen months at one of the country's leading country house hotels was then balanced by two-and-a-half years as sous chef at Le Caprice in London.

It was about this time that Gillies began thinking about a move to head chef. His CV even then would probably have gained him a top position, but he felt there was something missing - somewhere special was needed to round off his experience. Having thought about France, he was encouraged to try New York by his friend Gordon Ramsay.

"I didn't just want to go there for the sake of New York, but for one particular restaurant - Daniel," he says. "Gordon told me that one of the best meals he had ever eaten was at Daniel."

Gillies himself ate at Daniel, owned by chef-patron Daniel Boulud, and professed himself completely blown away by the experience. "The execution of every dish was excellent and the flavours so clean," he says.

After writing on the off-chance to Boulud, Gillies landed himself a job as chef de partie. "Daniel was my finishing school," he asserts. "The man has enormous vision. His style, which is basically classic, having worked under Roger Vergé and Paul Bocuse, has been modernised in the USA. His quality of food is equivalent to three-Michelin-star standard, and yet he still serves an amazing 250 covers every day."

By the time Gillies left New York at the end of his one-year contract, he had been promoted to sous chef, and was more eager than ever to lead his own brigade.

The right opportunity was offered to him by Ramsay who, together with restaurateur Claudio Pulze, was a consultant and shareholder in Teatro, a new restaurant project being set up by actress Leslie Ash and her husband, former footballer Lee Chapman (see feature on celebrities running restaurants, page 66).

But the site was not yet ready. Gillies made use of the interim by helping in the opening of the capital's Bank for four months. For the past year, he has worked alongside Ramsay at Aubergine, providing the two with ample opportunity to develop a solid selection of dishes for Teatro's menu, all of which have been tried out as special lunch dishes at Aubergine or sister restaurant L'Oranger.

Ash and Chapman have left the food concept entirely to Ramsay and Gillies. It is described by Gillies as being lighter and more modern than the food at Aubergine and L'Oranger, but still with a classic base. "It is essentially a mix between French, Mediterranean and English ideas," he says, "and quite different from anything else in London at the moment. But it certainly is not fusion cooking."

The à la carte menu, available at lunch and dinner, offers a choice of 10 dishes at each course, at an average spend of about £40 per head, including wine. While one or two dishes are expected to be changed each month, a new menu will be introduced seasonally.

As it is situated in the heart of London's theatreland, on Shaftesbury Avenue, and with a theatrical connection through Ash, the pre- and post-theatre market at Teatro is expected to be significant. Gillies is offering a three-course pre-theatre menu until 7.30pm for £16. Providing a choice of two dishes at each level, this menu is also available at lunch.

Adjoining the restaurant is a private members' club, with a maximum capacity of 200. Here, members, drawn largely from the arts and media industries, can drink and eat from a scaled-down version of the restaurant menu.

While many of the dishes at the 110-seat Teatro have been put together by Gillies and Ramsay, others show the direct influence of Boulud. For example, a celeriac and apple soup with roasted walnuts has been adapted from a dish available in New York, where Boulud adds foie gras. Another dish, of caramelised veal sweetbreads with cumin and lemon with Swiss chard and potato gnocchi, offers similar flavours but a slightly different garnish to that at Daniel. Desserts include a steamed Italian meringue filled with strawberry chantilly, placed on a sablé biscuit and topped with a roasted peach. A variation of a classic baked apple dish comes in the form of baked apple tuile in which the apple is baked whole and then re-formed between layers of a millefeuille, garnished with sultanas and served with caramel ice-cream.

dream kitchen

Gillies is grateful to be working in what many chefs would regard as a dream kitchen. It has been designed by himself and Ramsay, cost £130,000, and is loosely based on the kitchen at Daniel. All appliances, including the central island range and fridges, are by Bonnet.

"I'm very fortunate in having exactly the kind of kitchen that I'd envisaged. The emphasis is very much on quality, with a lot of attention to detail. For example, the pastry section, which is part of the main kitchen, has its own cooling unit, with marble-topped fridges kept at a constant 3¼C."

Gillies' 16-strong brigade was brought together two weeks before Teatro opened, allowing one week of staff training and one week of trial runs, during which food was offered to family, friends and acquaintances at half price.

"Initially, we are keeping numbers down to 50 for lunch and 100 for dinner," says Gillies. "As the kitchen builds up in strength, we hope to gradually increase numbers to a total of 250 per day."

Gillies doesn't want to pile the pressure on his chefs too soon, as he is only too aware that the openings of major new restaurants often see the arrival and departure of staff within the first few weeks. "All the chefs have had trial working stints at either Aubergine or L'Oranger," he says, "and all are of the opinion that they want to develop with the success of Teatro." n