YNCOTY Ruth Hansom to join graduate chef series at Royal Garden Hotel

Munkley is vice-president of the Craft Guild of Chefs and founder of the Graduate Awards.

He regularly seeks to offer young and up-and-coming chefs the chance to showcase and develop their skills.

The chef series will feature four previous winners of the Graduate Awards, and will welcome Hansom, current demi chef de partie at The Ritz hotel, on Thursday 22 June.

Each chef will cook an original four-course menu at the hotel’s Park Terrace restaurant.

Hansom’s menu will include veal sweetbreads with walnut and black pudding crumb and caramelized endive, carrot, nectarine and almond.

Also joining the line-up will be Andre Rhone, current sous chef at the Royal Garden Hotel, who will take over the kitchen on Thursday 8 June. His menu will include influences from the Caribbean and Mediterranean, and include ackee and saltfish.  

Connor Godfrey, the hotel’s junior sous chef, will take part on Tuesday 13 June. Having previously worked at The Ritz, and Wiltons restaurant, Godfrey brings fine-dining influences with a menu of langoustine, jersey royals and sea herbs, and guinea fowl breast with fruits of the forest.

Victoria Scupham, chef in the Royal Household, will finish the series on Wednesday 28 June. Her menu will include pork, apricot and pistachio terrine, followed by pan-fried fillet of John Dory with a courgette and heritage tomato timbale, and a Strawberry Charlotte served with compressed strawberries and Champagne jelly.

The series will also take place as part of the London Evening Standard’s Food Month festival.

The news just days after the names of the 36 semi-finalists in this year’s Graduate Awards in Kitchen and Pastry were announced, ahead of the semi-finals next month. The final exam for this year will take place at the Royal Garden Hotel on 11 September.

The 394-bedroom, five-star Kensington hotel also features the Chinese restaurant Min Jiang.