No place like home for Chris

No place like home for Chris

Chris McGowan’s culinary CV reads like a who’s who of the London restaurant scene. These days, however, he’s more than happy to work on his own doorstep in County Armagh with his family close at hand…

Chris and Davina McGowan’s Wine & Brine restaurant was among a number of top eateries in Northern Ireland to be awarded a Bib Gourmand in the 2017 edition of the acclaimed Michelin Guide.

It’s a worthy reflection of the innovative, back-to-basics approach that Chris has taken with the new venue in Moira and it’s a testament to his own impeccable culinary credentials.

Forty-six-year-old Chris, who began his cheffing career at the former catering college in Portrush, opened Wine & Brine at the tail end of 2015, his first foray into the trade as a chef-proprietor. Prior to that, however, Chris had spent two decades living in London and working senior positons at some of the country’s most prestigious restaurants.

Chris did work for a short time in Northern Ireland following his graduation, when he donned his whites in the kitchens of George McAlpine’s former Ramore Restaurant. While he was still in his early 20s, however, he made to move to England with Davina and began working almost straight away at Bruno Loubet’s big new Regent Street restaurant, L’Odeon in the former British Airways building where he stayed for a year.

The next five years were spent working for Gary Rhodes, firstly at The Greenhouse in Mayfair and then at City Rhodes, a restaurant he opened in London for contract catering giant, Gardner Merchant (now Sodexho) in early 1997. During his time with Rhodes, Chris also helped launch Rhodes in the Square in Pimlico.

A two-year stint with Pierre Koffman at La Tante Claire in Chelsea followed before Chris was made head chef at Richard Corrigan’s iconic London eatery, Lindsay House. He went on to become chef director for the group, overseeing Bentley’s On Swallow Street in the city, the Oyster Bar at Harrod’s, Corrigan’s in Mayfair and the former Bentley’s Oyster Bar in Dublin.

“I’ve been very lucky, if I’m being brutally honest,” concedes Chris. “I’ve been very blessed. The places that I have worked have very definitely influenced everything that I’ve done. For anybody in any walk of life, they way that they are trained will be reflected in what they do, whether they are aware of it or not.”

Chris and Davina eventually returned to Northern Ireland in 2015:

“I saw the emerging food scene in Northern Ireland and just felt that I’d like to be part of it,” Chris tells LCN. “Also, we had a young family by that stage and we were keen to redress the work/life balance. I’d worked in London for 20 years and it was amazing, I had lived the dream and it was great for me, but it was also a big commitment and everything else in my life was second to that.”

Chris confides that he was desperate to spend more time with his family – the couple now have 11-year-old twin daughters – but he also admits that he now spends as much time in the kitchens at Wine & Brine as he did when he was at his busiest in London. The difference now is, that Davina and the kids, who live in Moira, are near at hand.

When Chris first returned to NI in 2015, he did some consulting work in order to familiarise himself with the local hospitality trade:

“Obviously, being away for 20 years, I had no diary of suppliers or anything like that,” he explains. “I didn’t know who was who or anything about the lay of the land in relation to the trade.”

The site in Moira came up in mid-2015 at auction and the couple knew straight away that it was exactly what they were looking for.

“I was really privileged to work in some great restaurants in London, but when I came back, I wanted to open a place that was stuffy or pretentious,” says Chris. “We believed that if we could get those basics right, then the rest of the stuff would look after itself and the restaurant would evolve as the customers dictated.”

Chris describes the food at his restaurant as “simple and flavour-driven”. Much of the meat and fish that he serves is ‘brined’ – hence the venue’s name. Brining the food in different spices will add to the flavour profile, while tenderising the meat and reducing shrinkage during cooking

As for the future, Chris says that for now, he has no aspirations to expand the business beyond Moira:

“I came into the industry more than 20 years ago and when I look back, I realise that when people come into our restaurant, they’ve made a choice,” he says. “It’s our job to reassure them that they’ve made the right choice. You have to make people feel that they are more than just a number and food is really only one element of that.”