By Johanna Watson
Martain Irvine completed 5 weeks at Onich Hotel and will be travelling over to Nairn today to work at The Golf View Hotel.
Steven Speed is getting on great and enjoying his time at The Old Manor Hotel in Fife and will be staying for longer.
Edvinas Stankaitis is getting on well at The Torridon Inn along with William Sillars.
Phillip Blackburn worked a good stretch at Crianlarich Hotel and is booked for Auchrannie in the Eighteen69 restaurant along with new Head Chef Richard Agnew.
New man William Allan is still working away at Eden Court Theatre where Scott McKenzie and Garry Wilson will join him for 4 days next week.
Steven Chandler good reports back from Moness he will be joining Alan Kaye up at The Boat Inn in Aboyne.
David Ironside getting on well at Broxburn Care Home has enjoyed the Chippy salt and sauce Yes Please !!!
Mark Irons completed Fife Arms in Braemar and is now up at The Tongue Hotel working alongside new relief chef Shaun Lee.
Mikko Koskinen is enjoying the great outdoors up at Nevis Range and is booked again for a 2nd stint in July with a 4 week job down in Lockerbie at The Dryfesdale Hotel along with Antonio Demir.
Thanks again guys for doing great work.
Sun please come out it is June after all
Busy?
I will say.
Mark Operations Manager is off on a well deserved holiday for five or six days off to Knockengorroch music festival over by Carsphairn on the way up to Ayr.
Johanna Watson is managing the office this week, helped by Callum Graham our midsummer temporary helper who is on phone 1 this afternoon and will be kept busy.
Ian Paul comes in Monday and Tuesday evening to get invoices done. We call him “Invoices” and he plays a mean game of golf and in his mid-sixties, he has won our golf competition the last two years running.
Colin Fraser comes in on an ad hoc basic as he has a full time job and helps with “Special Projects” “Director of Special Projects we call him. New website, new database you get the gist. Give him a task to project manage and he will get it done, again a good golfer just down to six.
Ann Holt The Housekeeper comes in a couple of days a week, again just four hours part time but does a much needed job in keeping the office and downstairs tidy for interviews.
Bentley the Basset Hound lies about and eats what food he can and will bark when left alone.
We seem to have properties dotted all over Dumfries-shire now.
The Flat at Dundanion House which is connected via Chefs In Scotland and doesn’t need too much work.
The Shop on Well Street, Craizy Daisy Crafts, run by Ann Hornell, into her second year and doing very very well Ann has her own business at the Chefs In Scotland shop.
Nether Cottage by Crocketford over the other side. Holiday Cottages Crocketford a lovely 3 bedroom cottage which is tastefully down out and hand for relaxing and walking Bentley and cutting the back garden. But NO, the bookings are piling in and Angela Ferguson who decorated the property and looks after the house-keeping there more than does her bit.
We have over a hundred jobs on our website and Johanna has a pool of over 50 relief chefs working all over Scotland from Shetland to The Borders and into Cumbria also.
We are currently ok to recruit for perm head and sous and adverts for chef de partie and below positions.
We do take payment up front for adverts and us to look for head and sous.
Check out our website for pricing.
Busy, I will say.
3pm this afternoon I am off golfing with the Buddhists in the weekly medal at Moffat.
By Johanna Watson
Henry Samms has now finished his stint at Chester Hotel and is now working as Head Chef at Four Seasons Restaurant in Onich he is helping out this weekend at Loch Fyne Oysters in Cairndow.
Stuart MacColl has finished a good stint at The Old Manor Hotel where as usual he god on great he is working a few days at Balgeddie Toll Tavern and will be awaiting his next assignment starting Monday.
Alex Henry has now been put on week on week off at Glensander Quarry and will be able to help out the odd day here and there.
New man Scott Galloway is starting his first relief contract on the 20th of May at East Haugh House.
Paul Waters worked a few days at Fonab Castle and is now at Saplinbrae in Mintlaw working a relief Sous Chef.
Douglas ‘Denzil’ Gillies has completed another long stint on Shetland (September 2013 – May 2014) he is now booked to start work on Monday the 19th with Brian Crawford at Cross Keys Hotel in Kelso.
Damian Bolton is helping out at Inch Hotel in fort Augustus for 2 stints then heading the The Caledonian Hotel in Oban for 4 days.
Michael Njoroge is working with Paul Waters at Saplinbrae.
Phillipe Alamichel has been to Kildrummy Castle then went on a wee holiday to France and jumped right back in the work at The Green Hotel in Kinross working with new head chef Gordon Wood placed by Michael.
Thanks for all your continued support.
PLEASE NOTE when you are on a relief job we do not want you to mention your hourly rate of pay to other members of staff as we have never and will not start poaching chefs from their full time positions.
Tuesday 6th May
I am saddened to have taken the call this morning from Tam Dennett’s daughter Marion. Tam sadly passed away on Saturday. He had been having chemotherapy treatment for cancer.
Pleasingly, Tam had been out watching Brora Rangers play football and had been having a couple of pints. He was in no pain.
A good man was Tam and my thoughts and condolences are with his family, children and grand-children.
Your Grade 1 is for ever intact now Tam and I guess you left my name with your daughter as you liked to read a couple of musings on the Chefs In Scotland website, and latterly on Facebook. You told me as such and you knew one would be up about you.
Tam had started out back in the late 60’s working in Drymen at the Buchanan Arms before a spell in Southport for three years. He worked in Glasgow at the Central and The Pond Hotel before making his way up to Shetland where he had stints at Brae Hotel and The Lerwick Hotel, both of which we have dealt with in the last week.
Sometimes, the cast changes a little Tam.
I first spoke to Tam in about 2000 and over the years, Tam became a fixture on the circuit in between long placements like The Portland Arms in 2006 to 2009, placed just before The Swallow Group went into administration on September the 14th 2006. I remember the date well Tam, we were never paid for your placement, but you did many other jobs successfully and you were one of the good names to watch out for on relief, always secure the placement would be completed and usually for longer than the original stint.
Burghfield, up north of Inverness, Hootenanny’s in Inverness, The Caberfeidh in Stornoway in the Western Isles, Polachar. After 3 jobs the comment says
“100% reliable so far”
And that was the way it continued. Your last job last year was at The Cairngorm Hotel in Aviemore where you were booked for a couple of weeks and stayed working for many months.
The good chefs are always asked to stay on longer. You were a good chef Tam, a good man, a good father, grandfather and husband. Lastly, you were a very good friend to this business over the years and I hope that we managed to help you back a bit in return.
I only met Tam the once, up in Portree in about 2003. You were up for an interview at my old stomping ground, Harbourview, with Kenny Mackinnon the owner at the time. We met up next door in the new Merchant bar in the Bosville Hotel just next to the Harbourview, overlooking the Square. We stood at the bar and had a few pints and a blether, about hotels, about chefs, just chewed the fat.
We were lucky to have you as one of us, a good, reliable, hard working & honest man. All the best Tam on your onward journey.
Michael
CIS Recruitment Policy 6th May 2014
Head chef advert or fee of interest.
£100 or £100 up front plus VAT and further £500 once you employ a chef that we suggest.
Sous Chef advert or fee of interest.
£75 for advert or £75 fee of interest and further £325 if you employ a chef that we suggest or both.
Relief chefs.
Changes by the day.
Chef de partie, commis and pastry jobs.
Advert only and if we manage to look we can do but will not go on our list as too many jobs and just not enough chefs.
NB please note that there are chefs out there and coming through. But more jobs than chefs at all junior levels.
Well paying head chef jobs on our site are getting applicants. Should you want us to look for head and sous, we are happy to give direction based on our market experience over the last 16 years.
We would advise paying for a five days 45 to 48 hour week with overtime for extra days worked and for hours worked over 45. For CDP jobs and below, we would advise hourly rate. Commis £6.50 to £7.00 and chef de partie £7 to £10 per hour.
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