I'm David Moore.I'm a restaurateur.I own restaurant Pierre d'Ateur here on Charlotte Street in the West End of London.Pierre d'Ateur is a, at heart, fine dining restaurant, showcasing the best of British produce with French techniques.
That's very interesting because the technique is solidly based in French cuisine, but we take modern twists at every opportunity.
We're open to all ideas, all nationalities of cuisine are also in the mix, but it is the French technique that we'd say that we're solidly standby.We're a family restaurant.It's owned by myself and my wife.We're here 33 years.
We haven't got there without being good at what we do.We are welcoming, inclusive, and very proud of having London's longest-standing Michelin-starred restaurant. We have had continuous recognition from Michelin with stars since 1993.
Plant forward menus with a view to inclusivity.So we also have a full omnivore menu and we market and advertise both on a level pegging. We're also a little bit odd in that we are super keen on taking care of people's allergies, food issues.
So we're quite happy if, you know, if you're a couple and one's omnivore and one's plant-based, you can have both menus on the same table.
That's a big selling point for us and it's really nice to welcome and to see the joy on people's faces when they know that we actually care enough to take care of the little things, which are making sure that there's no gluten, making sure there's no dairy produce.
Pied de terre. It's a family-owned restaurant.This is my wife and I's business.Hasn't always been like that.I started my career working for Raymond Blanc at Le Manoir aux Quatre Cisons.I was the guy in the dicky boat and I was taking care of you.
So I was very successful.I really enjoyed that focus.It was in the 80s.There weren't that many good restaurants around. And I had had a steer to get a job working for Raymond.And I always say it was like an apprenticeship.
I did six years, front of house, assistant head waiter, head waiter.And I was assistant restaurant manager by the time I was 23.And then I always said that the next two years were my exit strategy.I was looking for investors.
And I found all my investors at the Manoir, including Raymond, when I came clean about the idea that I wanted to open my own restaurant.He assisted. My first business partner and chef, Richard, was from the Manoir.
So Richard and I, we opened Pied-a-Terre in December 1991.We agreed on everything until we turned the key in the door.And then as soon as we turned the key in the door, I don't know, it was like all hell was let loose.
If I said that tablecloth was white, he said it was black. Anyway, you don't need to know those mini battles that we fought.But we were the new kids on the block.That's what we were coined in the press.There hadn't been new openings.
It wasn't the ubiquitous restaurant scene that we know now.I recollect maybe four or five Michelin-starred restaurants in London. back in 91, 92.So yes, we were a bit rock and roll.
Richard had previously been head chef to Marco Pierre White at his two-star Michelin Harvey's in Wandsworth.Richard's sous chef was a little-known Scottish chef called Gordon Ramsay.
And Gordon's junior sous-chef was a gentleman called Phil Howard, who went on to have the Square for 24 years.So the cooking technique that came to Pied-a-Terre was, it was more than rock and roll, I mean the food was really, really sexy.
We were an instant hit. But also, it was a struggling hit because there was no social media.There was no way of recruiting.Everything was a phone call, a word of mouth, write a letter.Life is so, so different.
But just by hard work and endeavour, both Richard and I put enough hard work into it.We worked super long hours, but we were doing it for ourselves.
In actual fact, I regard myself as a complete failure because I was to exit on year five and go off and do something else.But I got I don't know, I got hypnotized by the industry, I got, yeah, I was suckered into it.
There was no way out, but hospitality gives an amazing career.So we are, we're in 1996, and we've just gotten two stars in Michelin.
and we are the bee's knees really pleased with ourselves and Richard knocks on the door and I say knocks on the door because in this building we lived upstairs for the first few years and there had been some offices and we
We were so rock and roll, we took the furniture out, put the bed in, and that's how we managed.That's how we rolled.He knocked on the door one morning and he told me, he's leaving.
I'm like, you've just got your second star, you're not leaving, this is the start. And he said, no, it's all I wanted to do.I wanted to get a second star and I've got it.So then my job then was to replace him.
And I think he was slightly annoyed that I did it quite easily.So we brought back a sous-chef.So that's Tom Aikens.Tom had worked with us at Pied-a-Terre in 93, 94.He'd left us to go to Jama in Paris for Robuchon.He was in Les Cahiers in Reims.
A letter was written. and letters were returned and I visited him in Paris.A deal was done, he would return to London to be the going forward head chef of Pied-a-Terre.And Tom was with us through 96 to 99.
Then we had Shane Osborne, who was a sous chef.So we've always had this history where people say to me, David, you're so talented at finding these great cooks.How do you do that? And I go, well, they're usually in the kitchen.
There's no great skill, you know, just employ really good people, let them get on with the job.Tom came back to Pied, he had been in the Pied kitchen, he had been part of the alumni.Shane, he was the sous-chef.
to Tom and then Marcus Eaves and Andy McFadden and finally the exiting chef that is most recently left us, Asimakis Shaniotas, he was a sous-chef to Andy McFadden.Going forward we've got Phil Kearsey, now our new incumbent exec chef.
and he's really shaken up the menu, brought on some new great dishes.It's so exciting to see some of his new dishes.So those are the names of the chefs.We've held a star with all of them.
We've held two stars with Richard Neate, Tom Akins and Shane Osborne. The pandemic, well, we all know what that was.It was pretty horrific everywhere.Nobody had an easy time.
And during our closure, I was wanting to do something, just for my own sanity.So I wrote the story of Pulitzer, the book, 30 years at that stage.I was looking around, watching what other people were doing, lots of home deliveries.
So I thought, you know, that's something we can do.But I wanted to do it differently.I didn't see our food, Pied-a-Terre Constructs, going out in a box for people to do at home.Part of me thought, you know, I want to do something.
I need to engage with our clientele.I need to keep people aware that we're here, touch them as much as we can with newsletters.
We doubled our marketing budget as soon as we closed and my marketing people were very grateful for that vote of confidence. our public, our database really engaged with us.
And as soon as I came up with the idea of doing a home delivery that was plant-based, we got a massive reaction and it was hugely successful.It was so successful that after the pandemic and we reopened, we kept the home delivery going every week.
The only reason we stopped doing it was staff shortages.We couldn't recruit enough people to keep it going. It is a business idea that will resurrect.I will bring it back at some stage and it will be a standalone business alongside the restaurant.
So when we came back from the pandemic, we were not allowed the same number of cooks in the kitchen due to the various restrictions.So many people per square meter in the workspace, the health and safety.
So we constructed a new menu, a tasting menu of Omnivore alongside a tasting menu, plant-based.And the great thing about the plant-based is it covers so many other dietaries.
If you've got a customer who is dairy-free, egg intolerant, lactose intolerant, it covers all of that spectrum.
So it makes it a lot easier, a lot more focused for the kitchen to deliver really good quality food to people who have dietary requirements and issues.
I find myself at home not wanting to eat as much meat and I would never be caught buying one of those chickens in the supermarket.A chicken needs to have a life more than 30 days.
The animal practices that we find, the suppliers that we go to, where the animals have a good life, that's essential for their sustainability.Just general good animal husbandry is essential. We are not a solidly vegan restaurant.
We're very careful not to call ourselves vegan because we have, in the same fridges, in the same kitchen, at the same time, on leather chairs, with leather shoes.We're serving a plant-based menu.I think fine dining has become so ubiquitous.
There is always a new opening.There is such an appetite for it. What I have seen is a trend towards this open kitchen, which was never a thing when we first launched.The kitchen was always a little bit sort of like shamefully hidden away.
I would love to be able to embrace an open kitchen and have a site where we were able to do that scene where you see everything, warts and all.It's something that I'd love to embrace.In this building, I can't.I can't see how I could do it.
Customers have become so much more knowledgeable. you know, when we talk about our produce, where it comes from.Customers are inquisitive.I think many years ago, they would seldom dare to ask a question.
And I think people are now feeling a little bit more empowered.They want to understand how certain dishes are delivered.They want to get, it's under the hood.They want to know how the engine works.I think people are aware
of that food and wine combination now.I don't think there's a better combination than food and wine.
I've been to restaurants where I've had sake, where we've had teas, I've had all sorts of concoctions of cocktails, but I think a real grown-up dining experience, if you want to hit the real high notes, it is only wine that
elevates a dish in my mind.People are responding to that really well.That's all part now of a fine dining experience. But I think also that the fine dining is dripping down through all of the echelons of cuisine, even into the local brasserie.
You'll see them using espumas, which now have been brought to us by El Bulli.They'll see us using liquid nitrogen.All of those techniques are dripping down through.And as the chefs, as we have more and more chefs, if you go back to my day,
There was the Manoir, there was the Gavroche, there was Pierre Coffman, and there was maybe half a dozen chefs in each of those establishments.They have left, they've gone on to do their own things, they now have alumni.
I mean, if I were to count the alumni from Pierre d'Atere, the Michelin stars across the planet, it would be massive. And not all of them have gone on to do Michelin stars, but they've all gone on to do really good quality food.
So I think we're talking about the impact of fine dining is that it has raised the standard across the spectrum of dining. A chef who is bright, intelligent, doesn't necessarily have to have a Michelin star.He's just engaged with his produce.
He's the same as a painter.He's maybe not a Picasso, but he has to understand his canvas, he has to understand how his paints work on canvas, how they react with light.
A chef has to understand his produce, how it reacts with the customer, how the customer comes with an excitement for dining.The chef is coming with probably an equal excitement for the produce.Sometimes it's just a case of not messing it up.
I've recently heard this phrase, chefs are agents for change. That is so true because chefs, they have the voice.Often they're on TV, often they're on radio shows talking about it, but they're actually able to tell you about the sustainable veg.
Who knows?Who recollects what the seasonality is of fish? But we all think we love a piece of cod, we all love halibut and turbot.But these fish actually have seasons.There are times when we should eat them and when we shouldn't eat them.
And that is something that needs to be preached a little bit more by our agents for change, our chefs.You will find that they know these things and it's educating the kids coming through, rising up through the hierarchy of the kitchen.
It's about distilling that information to the wider audience.That audience is our customer.
And making sure that when we're talking about something on the menu, we always want to name the grower, we want to name the place, and anchor that dish in Tierroir, like a Givery Chambartin, like a Chablis, like a Champagne.
I think the chefs need to articulate, they need to shout about their produce.
They need to remind their chefs and the team and the audience that they're cooking for that the chicken has had a good life and we're celebrating it by cooking it beautifully.
At Pied-a-Terre, every plate that comes out of the kitchen is a mini little masterpiece with lots of thought.I don't always know that the customer, the general public, know quite how much thought might have gone into something.
What gets me up every day is a passion for my restaurant.What keeps me going every day is just wanting to deliver to our customers great produce, finding the next big thing.Pied-à-terre, I've always said, is a restaurant that doesn't do trends.
We didn't touch the small plates, we haven't gone in for cooking on open wood. but we are a restaurant that does set a trend.And you can see a lot of people talking about plant-forward cooking, plant-based food, plant-based menus.
And I'd like to think that we were at the forefront of creating that awareness that it can be done.Talking to our suppliers and engaging with them, making sure that they know that there is an appetite, audience, a customer, for that product.
When you grow it, we will buy it.And it's really tricky because in the UK, I think the UK agricultural scene is more mass than sexy.
Like it maybe more is in France, where you get Jean-Pierre who has two fields of tomatoes and he ships them up to Ranges every week and his five boxes of tomatoes have 15 customers veying for them. In this country, we are talking to our suppliers.
You know, we want to have that perfect cauliflower.And when is it that we should have that?So it's about letting the grower know, you grow something sensational.We came across a strawsberry. Only last week, the first time in my life.
I'm 60 this year and I've never seen a strawsberry.It's a cross between a strawberry and a raspberry.It has the most alluring flavor.We've been serving it with a little mint sorbet.Oh, delicious.
So, you know, getting up in the morning and finding that new ingredient, that went wow.And every day is like a school day.I could go into a Forrest Gump Every day is like a box of chocolates when you have a strawsberry.
Now we've got the strawsberry, and now we've got the lion's mane.Who knew?And a product that is just so good for you is, I mean, it's not tricky to grow, but it is, it just needs care and attention.
It's a vegetable which has just so many textures that you can work with. And in Phil's dish where he's smoking, barbecue, roasting, temporing, all in the same dish, it does really, it is so versatile.
I had, and it's funny how I'd never seen it before.Only a couple of weeks ago, Phil brought in the lion's mane and I was like, what on earth is that?And he started telling me about it.
I went to my local farmer's market on Sunday and I found a supplier who had lion's mane and it's kind of, how did I miss that? I bought two boxes of lion's mane in my local market and took him home and started messing around with them myself.
So that's really exciting when I see something and I think maybe The change agent is the chef, he is here at Pilatero, it's Phil, but it's not just him, it's his supplier saying, try this.
So maybe the bigger agent for change and for information is actually, it is that discussion, it's that talking, that conversation that we have between
Other chefs, probably, we did a demonstration at an event on Sunday, maybe 150 people in the audience now know about Lion's Mane.And they might be walking along that same farmer's market or another one and see it and go, wow, I need to buy that.
And then that will rollercoaster because once they start selling out of it, they're going to be growing more.And it was, you don't know what you don't know.
And until you are open and have conversations and start to try to discover new things, you have to be really, I think, I suppose you have to be really humble because we want to be experts in what we do, but we also need to be open to the conversation.
What don't we know?I don't know.
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