Chef Tommy Banks on the Black Swan, Great British Menu and more

We talk to Tommy Banks, Michelin-starred chef and owner of the Black Swan in Oldstead, about how he got started, his time on the Great British Menu and an emotional Douglas Fir dessert.

Tommy Banks is a Michelin-starred chef from Yorkshire, who recently went all the way to the banquet stage on the BBC’s Great British Menu.

loveFOOD spoke to him about his time on GBM, his inspirations and what’s up next for him and his flourishing pub, the Black Swan in Oldstead.  

LF: How did you become a chef?

TB: Kind of by accident. My parents decided to buy the local pub which was 10 years ago so I was 17, and my brother who does front of house was 19 – we had no experience of doing anything like that. We didn’t have any chefs one day and I ended up in the kitchen and it went from there.

You didn’t have any formal training, did you?

I didn’t go to college like lots of people do, but we just found our own way of doing things.

Could you imagine doing what you do any other way? Because the Black Swan is a real family-run pub.

I’m far too stubborn to work for anyone else. Everything is very unique, we grow everything, forage everything, things like that and that means the techniques we use are a bit alternative and I think my style of food is so rooted in what we do in a different way, I don’t think I’d be able to do anything else.

You’ve described your cooking as ‘old school.’ Are there struggles with this style?

There are a lot of challenges, a lot of frustrations, it’s not just a bed of roses. Things go wrong all the time, loads of crops fail and we have to adapt and do different things. It forces us to come up with new ideas and dishes; that’s what gives us our uniqueness.

Do you have a particular favourite dish you enjoy making?

We grow these crapaudine beetroots, which we harvest in autumn, and store in a straw stack, and they keep through the winter and into the new year, that’s a really big crop for us. We cut them into a steak, and cook them slowly in beef fat for about four hours and make ‘meatroot’ and it’s this meaty, smoky, sweet-flavoured beetroot which has a leathery texture on the outside. I’m really fond of that dish.

Tommy was 24 when he received his Michelin Star, which made him the youngest chef in Britain to achieve the accolade.

Did it just happen, or was it a long process of hard work?

When the recession started in 2008 we’d only been around a couple of years and no one was coming. And the idea was to go for the top of the market and make something that people would really want and travel for. We employed a chef and me and him worked together, and tried to make it better and better, and we got a Michelin Star in 2011. He left a year or so afterwards, I took over and won the star back in 2013.

How did you find the Great British Menu experience?

A lot of fun, I mean so stressful. I was so nervous as it’s your whole livelihood at stake isn’t it? It’s cooking on the biggest platform; if you make a fool of yourself it could ruin your career but it could kickstart things if it goes well. That’s probably why I did quite well because I’d gone to a lot of effort.

Finals week I really enjoyed. Not only were they fantastic chefs but really good lads as well. That experience was great with less pressure on you, because there’s one dish, and there’s all the other guys.

But the sheer amount of work! So many people asked me: “How many chefs did you have to help you with the banquet?” and you’re like ‘Well, none’.

I wish I’d let it soak in a bit more, because it was all quite overwhelming. It was a beautiful place [the House of Commons Members' Dining Room at the Palace of Westminster – where the final banquet was served]; you felt like you were doing something historic but you also had an awful lot of work to do so you really had to crack on and stop being so romantic.

                                                 Image: Instagram/@tommybanks

“I never expected to get that dish to the banquet.”

I’d never plated that dish [Preserving the Future, which was a mackerel dish, accompanied by sheep's yoghurt, woodruff vinegar gel, mackerel tartare, smoked mackerel belly and mussels] before. I was so busy, and then my dad and brother were making props until 4 in the morning the night before. I also had a reaction to oysters, so I’d been lying down all day, then came up and cooked it and it won.

I thought the Douglas Fir dessert you created, inspired by your Grandad was so lovely. 

Tommy's dish, entitled 'My Great Briton', was a Douglas Fir parfait with lemon verbena gel, white chocolate tuile and a ewe's milk yoghurt sorbet – accompanied by a Douglas Fir sour cocktail and a bonzai tree prop featuring the voice of his late grandfather.

Image: BBC

Thank you! I think if you’re going to make something as a tribute to somebody, it needs to be original, it needs to be something that no one has ever done before.

It was really special to me. He died when I was 18 and I think I struggled to deal with it at the time and I never really dealt with it. It was a bit of closure for me, it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, because he felt so real. I’ve had so many lovely letters from people, saying it touched them, and it’s inspired a few people which is awesome.

Although everyone is different, we all have the same emotions at the end of the day.

And he even made the fishman cry

On the Saturday [after the episode aired], the fish delivery man arrived, this bloke from Hartlepool, and he went: "Oi, I want a word with you" so I was like "Oh no, what have I done, have I run him off the road?" And he walked over and gave me this big embrace and said: “You made me cry, you’re the only man who’s ever made me cry".

Would you say there’s a chef who inspires you?

I’ve always struck a chord with Fäviken in Sweden. Fäviken make me feel that we’re not that remote because we’re just off the A19, but they’re really in the middle of nowhere. But ultimately, the guys who inspire me the most are probably the guys I work with every day as they’re always working incredibly hard. What gets me out of bed every morning isn’t some chef who I’ve seen on TV, there’s already six or seven other guys pushing on in the kitchen and I need to get in there and help out, it’s those guys and also, my family. They’re more inspirational than anything.   

There’s nothing more honest than working hard is there?

When someone else is working hard for you, you have a real appreciation for them, I love it. I think it’s brilliant.

Do you have a favourite restaurant?

I really like the Clove Club in London, I think it’s fantastic. If I had to go for a meal – if I had to? – if I was going to go for a meal in the UK tomorrow, I would go to the Clove Club.

Do you have any advice for aspiring chefs?

Work hard, but most of all, be a nice person – don’t have an ego. I think, when you’re eating at someone’s restaurant and it’s more about them than it is about the food and the customers, you can taste that.

We have a rule where no one is bigger than the Black Swan, so you chuck the egos out and think about the food, the ingredients and the customers and try to make the best food we can for the customers.  

What’s next for you and the Black Swan?

The Black Swan is the one for me, it’s got to keep getting better. Television is something I’m interested in if the right thing comes along, but everything I want to do needs to feel right and have meaning to it.

I’m starting to write a book as well, but certainly no more restaurants until this one is absolutely perfect. Which will probably take about 45 years.

It’s been amazing the opportunities that we have been afforded from doing the Great British Menu. We’re really pushing the Black Swan forward and it’s amazing after 10 years of average business it’s really kicked off.

Liked that? Try these:

Great British Bake Off: where are they now?

The world's most expensive restaurants and what they cost

The UK's 'secret' cheap restaurants featuring the stars of the future