A Friday Chat With Searcys’ Brand Development Chef Daniel Broughton

Daniel Broughton has been part of Searcys for over a decade and has seen the company grow from strength to strength. He’s worked his way up from sous-chef to his current role as brand development chef across all of Searcys’ venues, restaurant and events spaces.

Daniel, tell us a bit about your journey with Searcys

I’ve been with Searcys a total of 11 years now in total! I started off working with Searcys at the Royal Opera House for a couple of years. Then I left and came back to the company a few years later to join the opening team of 30 Euston square at the Royal College of General Practitioners. Searcys has been a big part of my career. I started as a sous-chef, then went on to be executive head chef, and so becoming part of the development team felt like a natural progression. Winning many awards, such as the best catering venue in London have been among my proudest moments at Searcys, and for me, it’s really important to help make sure we maintain the highest standards across the brand.

Your lockdown tips

During lockdown, enjoying family time is essential, and it’s been a real highlight to take out of all this. Being in this industry, you tend to miss getting that quality time, so it’s been nice to be around my family, and I’ve also been doing lots of virtual catch-ups to stay in the loop. Also, of course, I’ve enjoyed cooking a lot. Pastry is my Achilles’ heel, so I have been practising that, and my wife and kids have been happy recipients of my doughnuts.

What are you working on at the moment?

Right now, I’m working on a savoury afternoon tea selection which is really exciting. We’re trying things like chive madeleines, smoked salmon and caviar. Our touch-free menu development is still ongoing, which we hope will be especially cutting-edge for us for events, with individual bento boxes prepared for each guest. There will be dishes such as classic breakfast bento boxes and a delicious fish offering all sourced from the River Wye, with sandwiches with poached trout and pickled fennel and Wye crayfish and truffle.

We’ve spent the last few months meticulously re-designing our menus and re-training our staff to make sure the catering experience guests receive at events is COVID-safe, which will be crucial in re-starting events. Everything else is top secret!

What is your favourite spring dish?

I don’t have one favourite dish per se, but springtime does evoke happiness as you suddenly have an abundance of vegetables to play with after winter, and dishes can be lighter, such as charred black cod, peas, mussels and British Shellfish. There are picnic-inspired boxes on the new bento box menu like a green bean, shallot, asparagus and goats cheese salad which is just perfect in spring.