Michael Deane's restaurant in Belfast holds the only Michelin star awarded in Northern Ireland, and after a complete refurbishment, it's packing in the diners once again, writes Dan Keenan
Michael Deane certainly isn't afraid of change. He closed Deanes, his well-established restaurant on the corner of central Belfast's Howard Street, for a total revamp a year ago, sweeping away the somewhat cluttered period feel in favour of a modern minimalist makeover.
It was a gamble, but it has paid off. He is now in possession not only of Northern Ireland's only Michelin star, but also the titles of Food & Wine Magazine's Best Restaurant in Ireland and Georgina Campbell's Restaurant of the Year.
"Things had got stuffy and too personal," admits Deane. "We had started to slip. Modern food needs a modern restaurant, and now we have clean lines, smart furniture - and an interior that looks twice the size of its predecessor."
Deane is now considering adding some artwork - possibly local stuff - just in case the uncluttered look of the muted walls strike some customers as rather too bare. But the minimalist approach is also in keeping with his ideas about food.
"Flavour is the thing," he insists over our starters of Lough Neagh eel. "Intense flavour with no nonsense, just fine cooking and nothing on the plate that shouldn't be there." What is on his plate is an enticing array of colours, shapes and textures. "Look at that," he says with some pride. Indeed, it seems a shame to put a fork in it, but the taste is a conversation-stopper.
Deane's style is French, but the ingredients, from the seafood to red meat, are local. Chicken, however, is imported from France. "I just can't seem to get the quality here," he says.
Deane's accent is unapologetically classic Belfast. There's no suggestion of pretending to be anything he isn't. Reared in Dunmurry, somewhere in the territory where Belfast merges with Lisburn, he is the son of a TV rental company worker.
When he was younger, he had vague ideas of wanting "to do something half creative". In his teenage years he got a job in a kitchen in Donaghadee, the north Down harbour village that is easily within the day-trippers' radius of Belfast.
"Fish came flat and covered in breadcrumbs," he says with a laugh. "Dessert meant boxes of bought-in Black Forest gateau. That's what I thought food meant."
He denies ever harbouring notions of chef superstardom, yet as a teenager something drove him to London in 1982 to wash pots in Claridges. From there he went to the Dorchester to work under Anton Mosimann, arguably the world's first celebrity chef, after lobbying the Swiss chef in the men's room at the Shelbourne Hotel in Dublin. By the age of 21, he was fourth commis chef at the Dorchester and gaining fluency in kitchen French. By 1989, he had returned to do his own thing in strife-torn and post-hunger strike Belfast, the place for which he had suffered daily homesickness.
His first venture was at Belfast Castle, under the shadow of the Cave Hill, and this led to his first restaurant in north Down's affluent Helen's Bay, where he soon tired of the predictability, quiet Tuesdays and some residents "who had money, but didn't want to part with it".
"The Belfast attitude is different," he says. "Power lunches are back again, but people want healthier, more nutritious food - the 'lifestyle kick'. But the punter's money isn't everything and the customer is not always right. Eating too quickly, drinking too much and wanting too much salt are just some of the common flaws."
Deane admits to using what he calls the "Dublin model" to reference his restaurant, and expresses admiration for the capital's eateries. "I love Guilbaud's," he says. "Dylan McGrath at Mint is fabulous; so, too, is Kevin Thornton at the Fitzwilliam, and L'Ecrivain on Baggot Street."
But he won't be leaving Belfast. The Deane empire now includes a brasserie - Deanes at Queens - in the university quarter, Deanes Deli, also in the city centre, and Simply Deanes at the Outlet retail park at Banbridge, Co Down, off the main Dublin-Belfast dual-carriageway.
Deane exhibits no apparent envy of celebrity TV chefs, and no sense that he is in any way affected by the Jamie Olivers or Paul Rankins of this world. Marriage to former UTV journalist Kate Smith, and his own success, means his picture does appear in the glossies from time to time - but that's it. "My focus remains on the restaurant, the food and the fight to maintain standards," he stresses. "The Michelin star is international currency, it brings people in - that's why there are 12 chefs, three partie chefs and 10 waiters working here.
"We don't cook just for the guide books," he says, though it is clear he does rate the Michelin judges. The next stars are awarded in a few months' time. "Even if they take ours away - they're still the fairest."