Elizabeth Haigh

Elizabeth Haigh
Born Elizabeth Allen
Singapore
Education

Central St Martins

Westminster Kingsway College
Culinary career

Elizabeth Haigh (nee Allen) is a Singaporean-born chef who competed on MasterChef in 2011, and went on to win a Michelin star at the Hackney based restaurant Pidgin. Since she left she has formed her own company, Kaizen House, with the intention of opening her first restaurant, Shibui, in 2018.

Career

Born in Singapore and raised in Maidenhead,[1] Elizabeth Haigh (nee Allen) is Singaporean on her mother's side and English on her father's. She never thought about a career in cooking as a child, and instead trained as an architect at Central St Martin's, London. While here, she realised that she preferred to cook, and was dared to apply to appear on the BBC television series MasterChef. The 2011 series was her first experience of cooking outside of her home, or for her friends. She was eliminated early on in the series, after producing a smoked duck dish when asked to make a roast dinner: although the resident judges liked the dish, the guest judge said that the smoke flavour was overpowering.[2][3]

Haigh decided to continue to pursue a career in cooking, and started to work at a gastropub called The Green Oak in Windsor. After learning the basics here, she moved to the Royal Oak, Paley Street, where she came under the influence of head chef, Dominic Chapman. While she was working here, she attended culinary classes at Westminster Kingsway College on her day off each week for three years.[2] She went on to work at a variety of restaurants, but learnt most at Neil Rankin's Smokehouse restaurant, where she became joint head chef.[2] She complained to Neil: ‘I’m fed up with being put on pastry because I’m a girl’." So, he taught her how to butcher and barbecue meat, which she is now evangelical about. .[1] In 2015, she was invited by James Ramsden and Sam Herlihy to be head chef at Pidgin, which she co-founded with them, their Hackney based restaurant following on from their supper club, the Secret Larder.[4][5] Shortly before Pidgin was awarded a star in the 2017 Michelin Guide, Haigh left.[6] She set up a company called Kaizen House, under which she plans to launch her own restaurant Shibui in 2018. The restaurant will feature wood fired cooking with elements from different cuisines.[6]

References

  1. 1 2 Butter, Susannah (8 February 2017). "Chef Elizabeth Allen on going it alone: 'Cooking is the easy bit'". Evening Standard. Retrieved 28 November 2017.
  2. 1 2 3 Allen, Elizabeth (10 June 2016). "My Smoky Duck Was Too Smoky for Masterchef". Munchies. Retrieved 28 November 2017.
  3. ↑ Allen, Elizabeth (22 September 2011). "The Modern Chef, a blog by Elizabeth Allen". The Staff Canteen. Retrieved 28 November 2017.
  4. ↑ Gander, Kashmira (22 September 2017). "Chef Elizabeth Haigh on Clean Eating and How to Cook the Perfect Scrambled Eggs". The Independent. Retrieved 28 November 2017.
  5. ↑ Jenkins, Tom (2015-11-12). "What It's Like to Quit Your Indie Band and Become a Restaurateur". Munchies. Retrieved 2018-01-07.
  6. 1 2 "Chef Elizabeth Haigh to open Shibui in London". The Caterer. 15 June 2017. Retrieved 28 November 2017.
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