We caught up with our Food Development Manager, Nick Burns, to hear all about his career in catering and the last 10 years he’s spent at Robinsons and his life before emails – Who knew he’d been around so long!

So you’ve had a career in catering. How did it all start?

I’m going to show my age here. So, I started with four years at Catering college, two years in Salford and two years in Blackpool, which is a great place to go to college when you’re 18. Then when I came out of college, I got my first pub, the Yarrow Bridge in Chorley with a brewery called Greenall’s. I was there a couple of years as a manager and then there was a job advertised internally for a food development role – which I got at 22, which was amazing.

That was in Stockton Heath near Warrington, looking after over 86 pubs all on the Miller’s Kitchen menu, and little old 22-year-old me was doing it, which was a bit weird. In the 2000s, Scottish and Newcastle bought out Greenall’s, which included Dave Harrison [Director of Retail Operations] and Susan Forbes [Head of People Development and Compliance], at that time I took redundancy and didn’t know them at the time, but here we are years later working together at Robinsons.

From there, I was an Area Manager for 15 years with three different companies, in education and contract catering, in universities and colleges. Then I was working for MAKRO looking after their coffee shops but that was all the way up to Aberdeen and down to Exeter and the travel just got too much. I was happiest in food development, so I started to look back at food development jobs. I found this one for Robbies just before Christmas and started in the January the same week the Airport opened. So, I’ve grown with the Managed Houses.

When I first started in 2015, I was initially taken on to look after our Pub Partner estate as a bit of a consultant for our Pub Partners. But, as time went on and our Managed Houses grew, I ended up getting more and more involved.

I guess over the 10 years things have changed quite drastically…

Legally it’s changed a lot, things like calories and allergens on menus. The food safety side of things are all so much tighter. It was 1992 when I was first doing this, showing my age, but the legislation was a lot slacker then. A lot of the other stuff is similar to be honest, things like writing spec sheets and doing the costings.

I imagine that things changed in terms of systems and things becoming more digitalised too?

With things such as software, yes, there has been a big change. I was doing it before Microsoft even existed and we were doing it all on floppy disks. Trying to print spec sheets out you needed to get that paper with holes down the side and you’d have to fit it all in perfectly. I even remember receiving my first email, it was a guy called Dave Russell, my Ops Director. He sent me an email and he came running down the stairs. We opened and it together and it was like witchcraft – it was just mind-blowing at the time. It sounds daft doesn’t it. I remember getting my first mobile phone too. Before that, I’d be sending a letter to the supplier – I’d have to write the letter, then I’d pass it to someone to type up and then it’d go in the post with a stamp on. I’d wait a week to get a reply.

Now, you send an email, and you get a reply within 10 seconds. It’s a hundred miles an hour, whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing, I’m not sure. I quite enjoyed the slow pace [laughs]. And that was only in the 90s.

In the past if I was going away to see a supplier, nobody could get hold of me for two days, it was great. I wasn’t at my desk, so I was uncontactable. That’s so different nowadays. Your to-do list is always there, because it’s always moving.

So, what does your role entail – talk us through it?

I’m responsible for anything to do with food in our Managed Houses. So that’s working with Chris [Food Development Executive] on the menus to make sure we get dishes that all our pubs can cope with, particularly in busy periods, making sure its legal and compliant. We also need to make sure we get things costed properly to ensure we’re making a profit and hitting our financial budgets.

We’ve of course got to offer and source great quality food, so there is a lot of dealing with suppliers and resourcing. Anything to do with food from top to bottom. That includes things like kitchen designs too and the refurbishments for kitchens.

Obviously, it’s well known that there has been a shortage of chefs coming out of the back of the pandemic, things haven’t quite been the same. So, what’s special about the industry to you?

It’s the buzz. I’ve worked in kitchens for years and years, it becomes addictive. The industry gets under your skin. I do miss working in a kitchen, there is nothing better than doing 300 covers and coming out of the other side and knowing you’ve nailed it and everyone’s happy. When you’re in the kitchen you might have 30 checks on, and your concentration is so intense, and you’re getting the food out and everyone’s happy. And then suddenly you get down to about six checks, and you almost feel the seas calm.

And then you hear that “chh chh chh chh” [the noise of the ticket printer]

[laughs] – Yes, and then it starts again. But it’s that moment, that feeling where you think, ‘we’ve done it’. We’ve only got another 18 meals to get out and then we’re done for the night. It’s a real achievement; your adrenaline is racing. I’ve really met some incredible people over the years.

It is, it’s one of those industries that gets in your blood…

It really does. I started washing up when I was 14, you can’t do that nowadays. But, before I was 16, I already had a knife in my hand and was cooking, and since then I’ve never left the industry. When I left that restaurant, I was one of three head chefs at 18 – then I moved to Blackpool to go to college. That was carnage too.

So, what’s kept you at Robinsons?

It sounds corny, but Robinsons is easily the best place I’ve ever worked. I’ve had a really great boss in Dave for the last 10 years too. It’s just a nice place to work, there’s no pressure, no management by fear, your trusted to get on with your job. There is faith that you’ll get on and deliver what your meant to in your role.

Are there any funny tales you can tell from the last 10 years here?

Ooh that’s a good one; it’s got to be something to do with Ellis [pauses]. I think it might have to be his spontaneous stand up show he did when we were away on a business trip in Amsterdam.

Oh, it was absolutely hilarious, I couldn’t breathe, probably one of the funniest hours of my life. The man needs to be on stage.

It sounds like this is a story we’ll need to hear from Ellis… a part two might be coming here… Finally, if you were to give three pieces of advice to someone looking at cheffing as a career?

Embrace the opportunity – there is a potential solid career in front of you. The best advice I ever got given by one of my old head chefs, who was terrifying was – keep them open [eyes], them open [ears] and that shut [mouth]. And that’s so true. It’s stuck with me for years. It hasn’t done me any harm. Laughs. Just enjoy the kitchen camaraderie you’ll get too, you’ll meet and work with people you’ll never forget. Just enjoy the food, the passion and let the passion take over. Embrace the opportunity you’ve been given. It’s just a fabulous industry.

Thanks so much for chatting to us and for letting us film you eat that rather awful selection of sandwiches as nominated by the teams. Well done for stomaching it all.