A light-hearted remark over a pint in a pub turned out to be lifechanging for Tom Lowe, a former sous chef at The Blacksmiths Arms in Barrow.
Tom was chatting about his passion for cooking to his Dad, Ashley, who said, “Why don’t you enter MasterChef: The Professionals?” They laughed it off, but the idea took root. Tom, 23, decided to give it a bash and enter the BBC2 television show. This involved phone interviews, face-to-face sessions with judges and a visit to The Blacksmiths from the MasterChef team. Tom made it into the last 48.
Then the heat was on, as three weeks of intensive filming began in London. This included the daunting skills test, when Tom had to prepare pan-fried calves liver in a Bordelaise sauce. “Here I was being judged by chefs I had idolised,” he said. “I was shaking – but I passed the test.”
The judges were Michelin-starred chef Marcus Wareing, Monica Galetti and Gregg Wallace. In another round, Tom’s signature cabbage dish (cod wrapped in cabbage, with a smoked bacon sauce and mussels) drew praise from all three and he earned the name “Cabbage Connoisseur” on Twitter for his celebration of this humble vegetable. After surviving more challenges, he made it to the semi-finals, before being knocked out by his dish of hake with sauce vierge, olive and prawns.
“I knew I had messed up so it wasn’t a surprise that I didn’t make the finals, but of course I was disappointed.”
As Tom progressed through higher levels of the competition, interest in him grew and job offers rolled in. “Being on the show has been life-changing,” says Tom, who was living in Burton on the Wolds at the time. “Three weeks of filming, being judged by top chefs and doing so well in the competition taught me a lot and boosted my confidence.”
Today he is a far cry from the Rugby schoolboy who struggled academically and dropped out of school before writing his GCSEs. Then, he had no clue what to do but took a punt on catering and registered with a college. He discovered he liked cooking, watched celebrity chefs on television to broaden his knowledge and completed a three-year course, NVQ Level 3.
He headed off to London to work in the Michelin-starred Gordon Ramsay restaurant Petrus where he learned a lot, before landing his first sous chef job at the Belmont Hotel in Leicester at the age of 19. But it was a move to Mountsorrel’s John’s House, a Michelin-starred restaurant with three AA Rosettes that, he says, changed how he saw food.
“Working with John Duffin opened my eyes,” he says. “I learned so much from him, seeing how to use ingredients well, learning to grow vegetables and herbs and cook with them.”
He joined The Blacksmiths Arms in 2018 as sous chef, where vegetables and herbs are grown and used in fine dining dishes. The BBC shot scenes there for their introduction on Tom and The Blacksmiths gave him their full support during the filming of the show.
Sadly for Barrow, Tom has moved on. He was appointed head chef at The Plough in Ivy Hatch, Kent, and he, and girlfriend Abbie, moved there last month. It was the perfect choice for him as it fitted with his philosophy of growing and cooking food. He and the owners hope to achieve Michelin star status in the near future. Tom’s dream is to one day open his own fine dining restaurant.
After leaving The Blacksmiths in December, prior to moving to Kent, it was a whirlwind of guest appearances and pop ups – here Tom created menus and hosted the evenings.
“It felt strange to see my name being used to promote events. Six months ago, people would have said, “Who’s he?” Not anymore. We’ll be seeing a lot more of Tom and his culinary talents. And, in Warwickshire, there is a very proud Dad, who remembers the day it all started.
Lindsay Ord