News & Info > Hospitality Pupils trip to Elystan Street and Durrants, London

Hospitality Pupils trip to Elystan Street and Durrants, London

This week our Middle Sixth Form Hospitality pupils enjoyed a wonderfully informative and enjoyable trip to London.

First stop was the award winning Elystan Street restaurant, opened in September by chef and Milton Abbey parent Phil Howard whose previous restaurant The Square won two Michelin stars.  Phil spoke about the restaurant business, advice on how he looks for new staff, in this case via social media, and about how pupils should consider the environment when choosing what food to cook or eat.  After a truly delicious three course lunch – a starter of octopus, a main course of guinea fowl followed by chocolate brownies - Charlotte the restaurant's deputy sommelier gave a talk about wine, very timely for those pupils wanting to do their WSET Level 1 Award in Wine next term.
 
After a walk across Hyde Park to work off  their lunch, the group headed to the beautiful Durrants hotel for the afternoon.  Durrants has been owned for the last 100 years by the Miller family – Ben and Jenny Miller are current Milton Abbey parents. There we were welcomed by Ian Macintosh, the General Manager, who spoke about the hotel, its’ history and clientele as well as giving invaluable insight into the current opportunities and challenges facing the hotel industry.  After a tour of the hotel the group were treated to a magnificent afternoon tea before meeting Mr Miller, the Chairman of the hotel and his various heads of department who chatted to the pupils and gave them very useful career advice.