Raymond Blanc: Chef on food trucks, Instagram, diets and Brasserie Blanc

Master-chef talks to ‘The Independent’ about what we can all do to become better cooks

Raymond Blanc (Mat Quake)

There are three things that grind Raymond Blanc’s gears when it comes to food.

Firstly, diets. “I feel very angry about all these trends of diets,” he raged to The Independent. “These diets which say: ‘It’s a miraculous diet and you will learn how to eat well and cook well.’ What does it mean?” he exclaims. “So many people who are totally unqualified, completely unqualified, to come out with all these extraordinary, miraculous diets which will let you down in very little time down the line.”

Secondly, pre-prepared ready meals. While the 67-year-old chef understands the busy lives of the modern man and woman, he just wishes everyone would cook. He is certain delicious food can be made quickly and reels off the best technique to cook meat or fish in a frying pan: just a bit of butter, olive oil and water.

“We are eating too much pre-prepared food,” he says.“If you buy yourself a frying pan, believe me, I can teach you 100 dishes to make in the frying pan."

And, lastly, it is food trends. Blanc is speaking to The Independent to mark the 21st anniversary of Brasserie Blanc – the chain of bistro restaurants that bear his name up and down the high streets of the UK.​ So what is the secret to success of a high-street restaurant for more than two decades?

While things must adapt, and he recognises the importance of certain trends hence his sprucing up of the aesthetic of Brasserie Blanc to become more modern and move away from the “conservative, old-fashioned French brasserie” feel of the way the bars used to be, he does not follow food trends when deciding the menu.

“Food trends can harm your long term… one day it is the year of the bean etc. As trends come and go, they disappear. What we try to do is create wonderful food that people will love and come back again and again,” he says.

Believe it or not, this is where his food frustrations end. Surely a chef with Blanc’s reputation for being outspoken, and at times controversial, would have more to say about all the fads that engulf the industry, but when speaking to him you quickly learn almost everything food-related is “wonderful” and “beautiful” and he is actually very receptive to the more modern ways of cooking.

For instance, take street food. “I think street food is wonderful,” he exclaimed. “It is effectively food from the street and creating something inexpensive and to have it available.” He says the only downside is that in the UK the street food from places like Thailand and Malaysia are better suited in their reliable warm weather than the unpredictable British weather.

So what about Instagram? Amateur food bloggers trying to filter a steak tartare must surely grind his gears. No, Blanc says the relationship between social media and food is a great thing.

“The more we talk about food, the more we get familiar about where it comes from, what’s in it, from which farm that comes from, our farmers and fisherman. “The modern guest is getting more knowledgeable, responsible and aware.”

It is clear the Michelin-starred chef is especially proud of Brasserie Blanc, despite all the other achievements in his field, because when he first started the project he wanted it to be a place which would actively welcome people who could not afford his other restaurants – like his parents.

“I wanted it to welcome people like my parents, working class parents, as well as families… we did not want people to come just once a year or once in their lifetime but a place where people will come regularly,” he said.

While there is a focus on affordability, and Blanc points to them being one of the first restaurants to incorporate a set menu deal with their £12 menu with a glass of wine eight to ten years ago, the quality is important to him because his name is attached to it. He points to the fresh and free range produce they use saying that while they might be slightly more expensive than their high street competitors this is reflected in the value.

“It’s very hard to compete in that market but we want to give the best quality because obviously my name is associated to the product and I am extremely involved with creating the dishes and so on,” he says.

Raised in eastern France, Blanc self-taught himself cookery before moving to the UK in 1972 to work as a waiter. He opened his Michelin-star restaurant Le Manoir in Oxfordshire in 1984.

“Cooking is easy when you know, of course. All through my life, I have known about cooking because of my fantastic Grandmother and Mum. They cooked and gave me all these values, not just with cooking but also with sourcing, seasonality and so on. There have been all these values which have been given to me.”

Blanc also has a vast history of mentoring having started the Raymond Blanc Cookery School and trained chefs including Marco Pierre White and Michael Caines. The head chef at Brasserie Blanc is Clive Fretwell, who before his 21-year stint at the brasserie was Blanc’s head chef at Le Manoir after Blanc initially sent him to France for two years to brush up on his culinary skills when he first approached him.

So, aside from ditching the ready meals, his other piece of advice for people who want to improve their cooking skills in their home kitchens revolves around confidence, which he says is often the biggest hindrance to home cooking.

“I wish you could all be my students,” he says. “I wish.”