Member Info
Originally trained with the amazing Joyce Molyneux at the original Carved Angel in Dartmouth. Worked in numerous restaurants in Devon, mainly Salcombe (Dusters, The Galley for example). At the time The Galley was the best fish and lobster restaurant in the area. Then followed a finance professional career as a partner at a major global accounting and consulting firm, but worked in various restaurants as commis or assistant chef off and on for my own pleasure and experience. Finance usually pays a great deal more than the restaurant industry, but professional cooking has always been my passion. Stages in various restaurants in Netherlands when we lived there, mainly Halvermaan (translates as Half Moon or Crescent Moon) near Amsterdam / Amstelveen, fine dining restaurant in modern European style. Now sadly closed.
Invested discreetly in a London restaurant as a financier / property investor and sold that interest in 2005 when I moved to New York. Took a sabbatical and spent a year in Japan in 2015 and worked in 6 Japanese restaurants in Tokyo, Kyoto and Hiroshima and did extensive courses on sashimi, fish butchery, Kobe butchery and artisanal Japanese knife making.
Retired from the finance profession having been a director of various plc’s and in 2022 built a restaurant in Kent called Silk House Dining adjacent to The Silk House where I now work as Chef Patron with my front of house business partner since July 2023. I am also licensed to sell alcohol.
We have a large and busy kitchen garden and orchards that provides significant supply to the restaurant and the restaurant itself is set within a large and renowned Japanese garden that is open to the public for charity several days every year and we also cater for these events. We cook only high quality freshly prepared food, usually as a four-course menu plus home bakery, or a tasting menu.
Our food is influenced by French and Italian cooking (despite my background in Japan). High welfare, organic meat, game and poultry, and fish mostly sourced fresh from Rye Bay. Very sustainable (due to the kitchen garden) and minimal waste. Wines are focussed on France and Germany mainly though we cover many styles with an extensive list.
We open Thursday to Sunday with a Chef’s Table offering (licensed) for usually 14 guests lunch and dinner, and open other days by prior arrangement and for events.
