One minute you’re an unknown chef at an unassuming Essex (UK) pub, the next you’re an Instagram sensation, with a followers count (214k and counting) most Premier League footballers would be proud of. Go figure.
So how did things take off so rapidly for this mild-mannered Essex chef?
We caught up with Daniel to learn more about his “Insta-fame”, covering topics such as picking the perfect plate, the importance of lighting, and his love of bowls, along the way.
TabletopJournal: Firstly, tell us about your career?
Daniel Watkins: I’ve had a good grounding, done a lot of stages at really good places. But it’s been the last six years at Anchor (at Hullbridge) where things have really got going.
DW: Yeah pub/restaurant. It’s very informal; the kind of place you can get a burger but you can also have suckling pig.
TJ: So what led you to photographing your food?
DW: It’s my handovers. When I am off the next day, all the new dishes that are going on get photographed, tasted, the specs done for them, and it’s to hand over to my sous chef and the rest of my team. They were pretty cool pictures – you know, I’m forty one this year so I was quite late with the whole Facebooking and Instagram kind of thing – but I started posting them. But they still are my handover dishes!
TJ: Why put them on social media though, was that a business decision or just to show people what you’re doing?
DW: It’s just to showcase what we’re doing, really. I use Instagram heavily – I get inspired by everything, it could be a really simple dashi or it could be a really cool Sat Bains dish – I follow some really cool guys and I don’t just copy what they’re doing but I take elements. That’s the other main use for it, just to have a look at what’s going on; current trends. It moves very quickly.
The Anchor Riverside in Hullbridge, a Michelin Bib Gourmand award recipient, is where Chef Daniel Watkins calls home.
TJ: The funny thing is you now have more followers than most of the big guys you look to for inspiration!
DW: This time last year it must have been about 40k (followers) but now it has just gathered momentum. I use it regularly. The impressions you make, you’re going to get a good following if you’re posting nice things; it’s gone from there, really.
TJ: The pictures are of a great quality, what kind of set-up do you have?
DW: It’s just an iPhone 6. I’ve had a couple of different cameras and you know what – it is just quicker to use a phone. And I use the restaurant floor because it looks really good, or I’ll go outside in the garden. Natural light is always best. The summer is really difficult to take pictures so we do them first thing in the morning because you get that blue haze in the afternoon. Then in the winter I do them around mid-afternoon. But lighting is key: without good lighting it’s pretty terrible.
TJ: You have become known for the plates you use as much as anything… How do you pick the plates?
DW: That’s mainly working with Goodfellow’s now; their range of stuff is phenomenal. Working with them on their catalogue last year – that was amazing.
Sometimes I plate a dish up twice or three times and say, “you know what, I’ve thought about that too much”. I think sometimes that works really well. And getting the guys involved as well. It’s nice for them to have a play around as well. With a lot of the dishes we do… that’s not all come from me, someone has mentioned something and we just start working on things, or play around with things.
DW: I think it’s great now. You go back twenty years – everything was very plain and very formal. Now it’s a lot more relaxed; it’s a lot more informal. There’s a couple of desserts that I do that have just got mixed plates, where no two plates are the same. It just looks quite cool when you’ve got a table of four all with the same dessert but with different plates!
I don’t just willy-nilly pick plates. They are not just picked to do one thing, they can work for several dishes. That’s the business side of things, I don’t buy one thing of that and one of this; I’ve got to work with a couple of dishes. Some plates I’ve got have got great big cracks in them – they’re meant to be there but people in Essex don’t really get it!
TJ: What about broken plates? Are you a fan?
DW: Yeah I had one here – and then we broke that! I’ve seen that a couple of times. They do look pretty cool but they’re more for the high end. They wouldn’t get it where I am now. I tend to stick to round plates of different shapes and sizes. I don’t own any square, rectangle or triangle plates. I do like bowls as well – The Dairy in Clapham have got some great stuff.
TJ: What’s more important when it comes to picking a new plate – how it’s going to look or durability?
DW: I would say it’s a good mix. it depends what I’m looking for. I have to be practical – it would be no good for me going for a plate with no glaze, completely stoneware and a little bit fragile because that would last two minutes. It’s got to be able to held by a sixteen year old waitress from Essex!
TJ: If there was a chef reading this looking to replicate what you’ve done on Instagram what would be your tips for them?
DW: First and foremost, it’s good lighting. Look at where you’re putting the plate as well. If you’re going to take it on a stone table, the contrast between the plate and the backdrop really can make a big difference, I learnt that from the photoshoot at Goodfellow’s. They use these massive backboards – they’re just MDF with spray-painted plaster on them, but they looked absolutely amazing. And each plate was different on each one of them, and it really did make a big difference. Even though I use floorboards and concrete slabs, it does make a bit of a difference and looks very, sort of, rustic.
And when it comes to the food I think a lot of what we do is very natural looking, we don’t try and mess around. Even though some dishes are quite complex they still get plated quite simply. And I think that’s key: not to mess around too much. A lot of our dishes have a maximum of four or five ingredients on there, it’s not complicated things.
TJ: What about the future, could this develop into something else?
DW: The future? To carry on as we are. We are a very young team – we are about six years old now. With each year we’ve just gone from strength-to-strength it’s almost like the business and myself we’re working hand-in-hand and we’re probably only sixty percent there, and there’s a lot more to come from this place as well. It’s a big place, a huge place. To do what we do is pretty cool.
We got our Bib Gourmand last year and we’re really, really happy with that – that for me is good enough, that’s really cool.
By Isaac Parham
