The Recipe Superb

From Instagram to Netflix, there’s no shortage of content celebrating the creative side of the culinary world.Yet there’s precious little coverage of the dark side of the hospitality industry and, in particular, the mental health issues that many restaurant workers face.In fact, from burnout to suicide, substance abuse to toxic masculinity, the restaurant industry may well have more problems than most.Today, though, more and more people are trying to make a difference.From tackling tabo...

Our guest this month has been described as “hospitality personified”.Sam Ward is the managing director of the Umbel Restaurant Group, a collection of restaurants launched by chef Simon Rogan, who’s considered one of the pioneers of the ‘farm-to-fork’ movement in the UK.The group’s holdings include one restaurant in London, three in Hong Kong, and three in the Lake District village of Cartmel — including the group’s flagship restaurant L’Enclume, which turned 20 earlier this year.Named the UK’...

Could you run a restaurant without a bin?That was the question that an environmental activist asked chef Douglas McMaster back in 2011 — and he's been trying to answer it ever since.Today, he's the chef-patron at restaurant Silo — the world's first zero-waste restaurant.Located in London, Silo was born out of a desire to create a sustainable restaurant that serves food made from scratch, using produce sourced from ethical growers — without generating any waste.Silo is now a big source of insp...

The MAD Academy is a new type of school for food professionals.Conceived by Noma’s René Redzepi and based in Copenhagen, it wants to transform not only the hospitality industry but the entire food system.Indeed, the academy is born out of the belief that everyone who works in hospitality can and should dare to make a difference in the world.But who is the academy for and what exactly do its students learn?Who does the teaching, and what are their methods?How can the academy tell it’s having a...

Today, Garrey Dylan Dawson is the general manager at Henne Kirkeby Kro — a Michelin-starred restaurant on the west coast of Denmark. But that scarcely scratches the surface of the former chef's long and illustrious career in the industry.His highlights reel includes a decade as the head chef at The Fat Duck — alongside Heston Blumenthal — when it won its three Michelin stars; a long-running stint on one of the UK’s best-loved food programmes, Ready, Steady Cook; and a move to Denmark, where h...

Restaurant names are critical.A good one could be the difference between a diner taking a look at the menu — or moving on.So, in episode 5, we explore why names matter and how restaurants can choose the right one.First, we take a lighthearted look at how some top restaurants got their name — from the Latin American eatery that shares its name with a Kanye West album, to the pizzeria that found its name in the English-Esperanto dictionary.Then we talk to Amy Dennis, of the Nice Branding Agency...