The cook

Дата добавления: 2014-10-22; просмотров: 1341

Giles Mildmay, 24, has been a professional cook for three years. His father, George, owns a two-hundred-acre farm in Devon. The family have farmed in Devon for over three hundred years. Giles’ younger brother Tobias is studying farm management at Exeter University. Giles and his brother talk about his choice of career.

Giles

I think I’ve always been interested in food. My grandparents (on my mother’s side) lived in a huge old manor house in Lincolnshire and they had a wonderful cook. She made fantastic standard English food; her roast beef and Yorkshire pudding was out of this world. I used to love going down to the kitchen and watching her work, and I picked up a lot of cooking tips from her. I realized that I wanted to be a cook when I was 12. I went to a boarding school and when other boys chose to do sport, I chose cookery. By the time I was 15, I had taken over the cooking at home for my parents’ dinner parties, and I had started to make up my own recipes. I knew my parents would not approve of cooking as a career, so I decided to introduce them slowly to the idea. I told them that I wanted to do a cookery course for fun, and I went for a month to a hotel

in Torquay. I enjoyed it so much, I knew I couldn’t put off telling my parents any longer, so I brought the subject up one night over dinner. At first there was silence, and then my father asked me why. I explained that cooking was like painting a picture or writing a book. Every meal was an act of creation. I could see that my father was not convinced, but he didn’t get

angry, he just patted my on the shoulder and smiled. My mother kissed me. And now that I have opened my own restaurant, I think they are very proud of me. However, my grandfather (on my father’s side) is not so kind, he thinks I’m mad to have given up farming.