Fine dining chef
Fine dining chef
There was a time not so many years ago when there was an acute shortage of fine dining chefs and other experienced catering staff in South Africa’s finer hotels, game lodges and restaurants. As a result of meetings with catering industry leaders, two Johannesburg business men got together and started up what was then known as the Prue Leith College of Food and Wine, one of the purposes of which was to train students in culinary art and to produce fine dining chefs for the industry. That was back in 1997. The college has recently changed its name to the Prue Leith Chefs’ Academy. Prue Leith is a household name in many parts of Europe, and especially in the United Kingdom, where she was awarded Order of the British Empire for her services to the catering industry. Prue is patron to the college and sits on the advisory board with several other industry leaders.
Prue Leith Chef’s Academy has been producing fine dining chefs for ten years now, and many of them have become world-class chefs in their own right, working in some of the more famous kitchens of Europe. Many have ended up in some of South Africa’s finest five star restaurants, hotels and game lodges. Part of the Chefs’ Academy Diploma Course involves being placed in selected catering establishments two months at a time in order to gain on-the-job experience in diverse working surroundings. The net outcome of this is that the academy produces fine dining chefs when they graduate, and many of them end up working permanently at the establishment where they were sent to gain working experience. Such venues include the Sabi Sabi Game Reserve, the Dubai Sheraton, and the Haute Cabrière in Franschhoek.
The Diploma course at this fine dining chefs’ academy lasts for eighteen months, commencing in either January or July, and is split up into three semesters. To qualify for entering the academy students must have completed their Matric exams and have obtained at least a standard grade pass. They must be eighteen years of age when applying and have to pass an interview board at the college. The college curriculum is extremely comprehensive. The accent is on traditional French cuisine with modules that embrace Thai, Japanese, Chinese and pan-African cooking. The end result of the course is a number of fine dining chefs ready to go out into the world to jobs in some of the top catering establishments of South Africa, Europe and the Middle East.
The Prue Leith Chefs’ Academy along with its other group member, Prue Leith Catering, enjoys state-of-the-art kitchens and equipment. There is a temperature controlled chocolate room with granite tops where students work with spun sugars and pastries, and the academy includes its own fine dining restaurant where the future chefs are put to work and gain valuable experience. The college boma is the venue for pan-African cuisine demonstrations and bush cooking. A fully equipped demonstration kitchen is backed up by a large teaching kitchen and a separate lecture room. All students who graduate from the Prue Leith Chefs’ Academy are guaranteed to be placed in good employment when they come to leave the college.
