.....over David Higgs
| David Higgs David Higgs has been a chef in South Africa for 18 years and travelled extensively as part of the South African national Culinary Team. From being voted “Chaine des Rotisseurs "Young Chef of the Year” to representing SA at the Culinary Olympics. David heads up the young team of chefs at Rust en Vrede to enable you as guest to enjoy the freshest ingredients and daily changing menu. Chef David Higgs has traveled extensively all over South Africa, learning the various secrets of South African cuisine. As a top chef, he offers modern take on classic dishes. Like every good chef, he has always insists on the freshest ingredients. He has perfected the art of squeezing out every last bit of flavor from any ingredient. Some people would probably criticize his cooking and dismiss it for an overpriced haute cuisine. He, however, would definitely disagree. He offers classic South African cuisines with a touch of European flavors – that’s a taste you won’t easily find elsewhere. Interview Annette Klinger recently caught up with Rust and Vrede’s chef David Higgs, just as he was about to embark on a well-deserved annual holiday. Could you give us a 30-second rundown of your history in the restaurant industry? I started out working with chef Bill Stafford and spent around eight years with him. Basically, everything I know today, I learnt from him. In 2000 I started my own school, The David Higgs School of Good Cooking and sold it in 2006. I then started a catering company, followed by a two-year stint in Leinster Hall. After this, I set up the restaurant at Meerendal, which I also sold. And that brings us up to where I am today, at Rust en Vrede. In October 2008 Rust en Vrede was named one of Eat Out’s Top 10 restaurants. How did this affect your restaurant in the ensuing months? Rust and Vrede has only been going for about year and six months, and when we got the award we were barely open for a year. It was a hell of a privilege for us to be awarded the Top 10 award, but I can’t say that it wasn’t our goal to be in it from the get go. We feel that we’re delivering on what we’ve been elected for. We’re really very proud of our product and hope that patrons who visit feel spoilt – enjoying a truly complete dining experience of excellent food, wine, service and atmosphere. Winters are generally slow in the restaurant industry. Coupled with the economic downturn, what are you doing to get seats filled? We certainly don’t run specials: what we offer is what we offer. If we could do it at a cheaper price we would, but we can’t. So, when people do come to the restaurant, we make sure that they are really lavished with attention. That said, we’ve had a very good run up until now. This winter is a bit slower, but we expected that. Rust and Vrede boasts quite an impressive wine list. Do you work very closely to Sommelier Neil Grant in the planning of your menu? Yes, we have in excess of 300 different wines on our wine list. Neil is an integral part of our restaurant. Without him, we couldn’t offer the complete food and wine experience to diners. You made a TV appearance a few years ago when you were still executive chef at Meerendal. What are the challenges of cooking in front of the cameras? Anything similar in the pipeline? One of the challenges is time, because it takes you away from your business, and the other is coming up with a concept that people are going to watch. There are so many cookery programmes nowadays that are all carbon copies of one another. I don’t think I’ll be doing anything like that again unless I feel that it’s something original. You’ve rubbed shoulders with famous international chefs and TV personalities alike. Any encounters that stand out? For me the biggest honour of 2009 was to cook for Feran Adria in Rust en Vrede when he was in the country for Design Indaba. He’s a truly unbelievable man – extremely humble and very complimentary on our country. The whole experience was very informative to me, and it was great to hear that he was amazed at the quality of all of the local restaurants. What country’s cuisine inspires you? I’m inspired by ingredients rather than any one cuisine. My style is classic, with roots lying very much in the French tradition. I like what Scandinavian countries are doing with food at the moment – simple, not too scientific, just really well presented. Your favourite ingredients to work with? It changes. At the moment I’m really enjoying vegetables. I think our local restaurants don’t utilise our vegetables enough – you always get the steamed, boiled or stir-fried kind of thing. Vegetables should be an essential accompaniment to the food. Being constantly innovative in the kitchen must be exhausting at times. How do you avoid creative burnout? It is exhausting and very difficult to keep coming up with new stuff. Luckily, I’m going on leave to Namibia and Sweden in a week and won’t have to come up with a new menu for a month. What has worked for me in the past, is that I don’t try and come up with a whole menu in one go, but rather change a dish a day. It helps to create a momentum where don’t have to push yourself constantly. What dishes are you currently experimenting with in the kitchen? A couple of interesting things. Various local fish species are becoming nicely available, so we are messing around with that a little bit. We’re really looking forward to spring and seeing what the season will give us. |
| Navigatie Terug naar Voorpret - Informatie - De beste Chefs van Zuid Afrika Bekijk de culinaire wijnreizen in Zuid Afrika van Exclusive Culitravel |
