Success Stories

Ashley Smith – April 4, 1989

Well basically I started out in small hotels like Waterton Park and St. pierre hotel in Wakefield. Between them two I worked in France for a month with college on placement.
I did a bit of work at Harewood House and worked at Harvey Nicholes in Leeds.

But on April the 28th 2008 during my NVQ3 at leeds City College I finished my course early to start working at Gordon Ramsay, Claridges following a trial where by Mark Sergant the executive head chef gave me the job.
I worked there for a year going from head of section on pastry to garnish and larder, I then got promoted to chef de parti and ran hot starters the first solo section then moved onto fish .

After a year, I left Claridges and moved back to Yorkshire to work at the Star Inn at Harome, a beautiful pub restaurant with a Michelin star. I was put on pastry section learning a lot but also putting in my own knowledge to the menu. I moved to larder, veg and hot starters section for a month and sauce and fish for a further month but then moved back to pastry due to the other pastry chef leaving.

We did a lot of outside catering jobs going up to Newcastle , Harrogate and London .Also we had to make pastries, bread, desserts, stews, lasagnes ect for the shops to sell so we were always very busy due to the high demand for food not just from the village but other parts of Yorkshire.

I am now in the process of travelling to Australia.