Pastry chefs are often the unsung heroes of the kitchen. They work just as hard (if not more) than the headline-winning head chefs, consistently producing things of incredible beauty and flavour, employing techniques unique to their craft. For Andrew Gravett, the executive pastry chef at The Langham in London, however, it didn’t take long for him to realise that the pastry section was where he was meant to be.

‘My mother’s French and cooks very good food, which probably played a part in wanting to be a chef, but there was never a particular moment or ‘spark’,’ he explains. ‘I was the only boy to do home economics for GCSE, so there must have been some determination to become one from an early age.’

With GCSEs over, Andrew went off to France to complete a four-year apprenticeship in Normandy, working in various restaurants and pastry shops. ‘I was only getting about 700 francs a month, which was about £70, for working six days a week, but I loved it,’ he says. ‘I had a pretty old-school boss who would throw plates and pans around, but he taught me how to work hard and I grew up massively. After another two years working in a pastry shop in Normandy I came back to England to work at Thackeray’s in Kent, which was owned and run by a chef called Bruce Wass. He really understood flavour; back in France things were done because that’s how they’d been done for years, but Bruce was always evolving and trying new things.’

A year-and-a-half later, Andrew decided to up sticks and head to London, landing a job at The Capital Hotel, around the same time Eric Chavot became head chef. Originally planning to just work in pastry for three months before moving onto another section, he eventually became head pastry chef after a year. A few years later, the restaurant received a second Michelin star. ‘Chef Eric is a good friend, but he drove me mad,’ Andrew laughs. ‘We had a team of eight pastry chefs for a restaurant with forty covers, and we were making absolutely everything in-house. At one point we had this tray of fifteen chocolate bonbons to be passed around at every dinner, and we had to make nearly 2,000 of them a week to keep on top of it.’

By this point, Andrew knew it was pastry he wanted to focus on above everything else. ‘I didn’t see any difference in cooking meat, fish or vegetables, but with pastry, you have bread, breakfast, jams, chocolate, desserts, ice creams – it’s endless. There’s always something new to learn with pastry; cooking meat, fish and vegetables wasn't for me.’

Working with Eric was the most influential part of Andrew’s career, and he stayed at The Capital for eight years. ‘I learned about caramelisation, how to get the maximum flavour out of ingredients, to reduce sweetness – his cooking is the best I’ve had. He would send me off to France to learn how to make jam, chocolates and ice creams, and his high profile led to my next job with Valrhona.’