HOTELS & LEISURE
DISCOUNT CODE: SUMMER21
‘My heroes are the unsung ones’
We get the low-down from Luke Newton, the new Head Chef at The Mill.
About me: I’m a 32-year-old chef, who has a background predominantly in fine dining and worked most of my professional career in top hotels at 3 AA rosette level. Enthusiastic and ambitious are the two traits I find have made me relatively successful. I’m very familyorientated and would love to own a little charcuterie/wine bar one day. I’m a huge football fan and have a very close-knit family back home in the north-east. How I became a chef: I was studying A Levels and I got sick of having very little money. At a young age, having professional parents, I enjoyed cooking for myself as we all came home at different times, so we very seldom had family meals and I enjoyed using all of the ingredients in the house. Why I love my job: Every single day is different; the challenges of being a manager are tough and then with hard work you absolutely see the rewards. It’s a very challenging industry, but the buzz of service and making people happy with food is ultimately why I do my job.
Favourite style of cooking: Everything I enjoy is quick and simple, I love fresh dressings and simply cooked pieces of fish, light salads and all kinds of seasonal vegetables. The closer the food is to its original state is the best kind of food for me. Great ingredients need no work. Signature dish: Smoked pea and ham risotto, Parmesan espume, fresh truffle. Comfort dish: Minestrone soup, crunchy loaf of bread and butter. Secret hack: KFC chicken breast! A bit of flour and buttermilk, a lot of random spices – homemade KFC is incredibly easy and so, so good! Culinary heroes: Growing up, I had very influential head chefs and watching TV’s Rick Stein was the one I related to the most as he was passionate about fish and simplicity, and that struck home with me. But my heroes are the unsung ones; the chefs I am very much friends with now, that I learnt my trade with, and competed with on a daily basis. Those CDPs [Chef de Parties] who now their own kitchens and are successful head chefs in their own right are the ones who inspired me to be better than
them and, hopefully, I did the same to them. Healthy competition breeds a culture of winners and these chefs are my heroes and I owe a lot to them! Menu highlights: Lamb rump, Ratte potatoes, pickled Shimeji and pea, Little Gem lettuce. When I look around The Mill and see the grass and the landscape, this dish typifies our location and my style of food. There’s no ego here; it’s simply good ingredients married and paired with each other to give a light dish that’s very much packed with flavour and looks after the health conscious. Favourite menu dish: Cod loin mussels and Bombay potato – I love curry and I love fish, so again this is simple, fresh and packs a little heat. What else do you need? Summer recipe: Height of summer, it’s got to be an open mackerel sandwich – yes, it’s incredibly simple, but with a glass of white wine and the sun shining it’s perfect. Simple toasted homemade sourdough! A simple diced beetroot and potato salad, mixed with chives and light mayonnaise with a tiny hint of English mustard, buttermilk mackerel.
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