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Nic van Wyk
Nic van Wyk is one of South Africa’s foremost chefs. He started his culinary journey at the Institute of the Culinary Arts (ICA) and his first job was at La Colombe under Franck Dangereux. He opened Terroir in 2004 with chef Michael Brighton, worked at Kleine Zalze, opened Diemersdal farm eatery in 2012, as well as Bistro 13 in 2014 and Haute Cabrière in 2017. He is well known for his TV appearances as culinary judge on various cooking shows. Nowadays he is a hospitality consultant and helps with various restaurant projects. We had the privilege of chatting to him on WhatsApp.
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Nic van Wyk is one of South Africa’s foremost chefs. He started his culinary journey at the Institute of the Culinary Arts (ICA) and his first job was at La Colombe under Franck Dangereux. He opened Terroir in 2004 with chef Michael Brighton, worked at Kleine Zalze, opened Diemersdal farm eatery in 2012, as well as Bistro 13 in 2014 and Haute Cabrière in 2017. He is well known for his TV appearances as culinary judge on various cooking shows. Nowadays he is a hospitality consultant and helps with various restaurant projects. We had the privilege of chatting to him on WhatsApp.
Hi Nic, how are you doing? Hannes from sincebread.com here. Are you keen to chat to us for our Chef Interviews section?
Hi Hannes, yes sure. Let’s chat.
How did you end up in the food industry in the first place?
I was lucky to know exactly what I wanted to do from a very young age and that is cooking. My mom had a catering business and I grew up in kitchens. My parents were very supportive of my decision to become a chef from a very young age.
How do you see the operations in a professional kitchen? Is it normal to yell and throw pots? How do you prefer running your kitchens?
I am sure there are many kitchens where staff yell and throw pots. However, the kitchens I was trained in, was more peaceful. I am a firm believer in respecting each other. You must respect your staff. Professional kitchens are high pressure environments, so yes, you get tense moments in the kitchen. But you’ll get more from a person if there’s mutual respect in a calmer and organised environment. Your staff should enjoy what they are doing and respect their work and fellow colleagues.
What are you working on at the moment? Any interesting projects we need to know of?
Apart from my two main culinary consultation jobs at Kleine Zalze and Warwick wine estates (both located in Stellenbosch, South Africa), I also help with projects at the Erinvale Golf Club and Montagu Country Hotel. I just concluded writing a book and that was a very cool experience. Hopefully I’ll be able to tell more within a month or two. And hopefully there’s an interesting TV show on the horizon as well…
How did the Covid-19 pandemic change your career?
The pandemic caused a lot of loss in various sectors, but it hit the hospitality industry very hard. I was lucky to survive the challenges. It did however change the course of my career: I am now busy with consultation work on a full-time basis and don’t focus on only one restaurant anymore. After the pandemic, a lot of places needed expertise to shine again and I am happy to share my knowledge and expertise with various places.
What advice do you have for people in the culinary industry to overcome the challenges Covid-19 has caused?
You must be able to diversify and run more than one offering from your restaurant or catering business. It’s also very important to be very aware of what people want after the pandemic and how their habits have changed, and you also need to adapt. You don’t necessarily have to work harder, you just need to work smarter and more strategically. Check your resources and use it wisely and try to get the most from it. Don’t be afraid to ask for help. We all need to help each other to make the industry flourish again.
What advice do you have for young prospective chefs?
Before you spend a lot of money to study at a prestigious chef school, consider identifying the best chef in your area and ask if you can go work there for a month without compensation. There’s a big difference between thinking what you want to do and physically doing it. After a month of working a 14 hour shift for 6 days a week in a high pressure kitchen, you’ll quickly realise whether it is something you would like to do or not.
A lot of people think chefs only eat perfectly styled and exotic dishes every day. Do you eat like that? Tell us what you eat on a regular busy working day.
It’s definitely a myth that chefs eat fine dining meals every day. During my career there were so many nights I only ate an egg on bread or instant noodles after a long day of cooking. The last thing you want to do is cook for yourself after a tiring day of cooking for other people. But times change. Currently I spend more time behind my computer and dealing with people and admin. So now I cook more interesting things at home. But we eat simple. I also have no problem with the occasional KFC or McDonald’s burger. A lot of chefs operate like this. We don’t really have time to eat fancy food all the time.
What’s always in your fridge?
Butter, even at the current price. Any hard cheese goes a long way like parmesan. Eggs, cream or sour cream. Some form of cottage cheese as well. Garlic and onion. And lemons! It’s a very sad day if there’s not a lemon in the fridge.
One never stops learning. What do you learn at the moment?
That is a very true statement. It’s one of the reasons I am cooking. I know I still won’t know everything about cooking the day I die. My knowledge about food is actually very limited if you think about it carefully. My expertise is mostly western cooking and in my case that only includes French, Italian and Spanish cuisine at the moment. I have so much more to learn and explore. A month ago I had snail caviar for the very first time. You learn something new about food every day. You’ll never know everything. And with the little we know, we can still improve on every day.
Who in the culinary world inspires you?
In the beginning of my career Nico Ladenis and Thomas Keller inspired me most. They still do. Then there’s Charlie Trotter, the Roux brothers and Marco Pierre White. One of my favourite cookbook authors is Nigel Slater, as well as Donna Hay. Jamie Oliver also inspires me. I know people say he is not a real chef and what not, but Jamie really inspires the average Joe to cook and that also deserves recognition. Then there’s Neil Perry, Fergus Henderson (specialising in offal), David Chang and Michael Pollan. You go through phases and different people inspire you at different times of your life.
Nic van Wyk is one of South Africa’s foremost chefs. He started his culinary journey at the Institute of the Culinary Arts (ICA) and his first job was at La Colombe under Franck Dangereux. He opened Terroir in 2004 with chef Michael Brighton, worked at Kleine Zalze, opened Diemersdal farm eatery in 2012, as well as Bistro 13 in 2014 and Haute Cabrière in 2017. He is well known for his TV appearances as culinary judge on various cooking shows. Nowadays he is a hospitality consultant and helps with various restaurant projects. We had the privilege of chatting to him on WhatsApp.
Hi Nic, how are you doing? Hannes from sincebread.com here. Are you keen to chat to us for our Chef Interviews section?
Hi Hannes, yes sure. Let’s chat.
How did you end up in the food industry in the first place?
I was lucky to know exactly what I wanted to do from a very young age and that is cooking. My mom had a catering business and I grew up in kitchens. My parents were very supportive of my decision to become a chef from a very young age.
How do you see the operations in a professional kitchen? Is it normal to yell and throw pots? How do you prefer running your kitchens?
I am sure there are many kitchens where staff yell and throw pots. However, the kitchens I was trained in, was more peaceful. I am a firm believer in respecting each other. You must respect your staff. Professional kitchens are high pressure environments, so yes, you get tense moments in the kitchen. But you’ll get more from a person if there’s mutual respect in a calmer and organised environment. Your staff should enjoy what they are doing and respect their work and fellow colleagues.
What are you working on at the moment? Any interesting projects we need to know of?
Apart from my two main culinary consultation jobs at Kleine Zalze and Warwick wine estates (both located in Stellenbosch, South Africa), I also help with projects at the Erinvale Golf Club and Montagu Country Hotel. I just concluded writing a book and that was a very cool experience. Hopefully I’ll be able to tell more within a month or two. And hopefully there’s an interesting TV show on the horizon as well…
How did the Covid-19 pandemic change your career?
The pandemic caused a lot of loss in various sectors, but it hit the hospitality industry very hard. I was lucky to survive the challenges. It did however change the course of my career: I am now busy with consultation work on a full-time basis and don’t focus on only one restaurant anymore. After the pandemic, a lot of places needed expertise to shine again and I am happy to share my knowledge and expertise with various places.
What advice do you have for people in the culinary industry to overcome the challenges Covid-19 has caused?
You must be able to diversify and run more than one offering from your restaurant or catering business. It’s also very important to be very aware of what people want after the pandemic and how their habits have changed, and you also need to adapt. You don’t necessarily have to work harder, you just need to work smarter and more strategically. Check your resources and use it wisely and try to get the most from it. Don’t be afraid to ask for help. We all need to help each other to make the industry flourish again.
What advice do you have for young prospective chefs?
Before you spend a lot of money to study at a prestigious chef school, consider identifying the best chef in your area and ask if you can go work there for a month without compensation. There’s a big difference between thinking what you want to do and physically doing it. After a month of working a 14 hour shift for 6 days a week in a high pressure kitchen, you’ll quickly realise whether it is something you would like to do or not.
A lot of people think chefs only eat perfectly styled and exotic dishes every day. Do you eat like that? Tell us what you eat on a regular busy working day.
It’s definitely a myth that chefs eat fine dining meals every day. During my career there were so many nights I only ate an egg on bread or instant noodles after a long day of cooking. The last thing you want to do is cook for yourself after a tiring day of cooking for other people. But times change. Currently I spend more time behind my computer and dealing with people and admin. So now I cook more interesting things at home. But we eat simple. I also have no problem with the occasional KFC or McDonald’s burger. A lot of chefs operate like this. We don’t really have time to eat fancy food all the time.
What’s always in your fridge?
Butter, even at the current price. Any hard cheese goes a long way like parmesan. Eggs, cream or sour cream. Some form of cottage cheese as well. Garlic and onion. And lemons! It’s a very sad day if there’s not a lemon in the fridge.
One never stops learning. What do you learn at the moment?
That is a very true statement. It’s one of the reasons I am cooking. I know I still won’t know everything about cooking the day I die. My knowledge about food is actually very limited if you think about it carefully. My expertise is mostly western cooking and in my case that only includes French, Italian and Spanish cuisine at the moment. I have so much more to learn and explore. A month ago I had snail caviar for the very first time. You learn something new about food every day. You’ll never know everything. And with the little we know, we can still improve on every day.
Who in the culinary world inspires you?
In the beginning of my career Nico Ladenis and Thomas Keller inspired me most. They still do. Then there’s Charlie Trotter, the Roux brothers and Marco Pierre White. One of my favourite cookbook authors is Nigel Slater, as well as Donna Hay. Jamie Oliver also inspires me. I know people say he is not a real chef and what not, but Jamie really inspires the average Joe to cook and that also deserves recognition. Then there’s Neil Perry, Fergus Henderson (specialising in offal), David Chang and Michael Pollan. You go through phases and different people inspire you at different times of your life.
