Meet the England National Culinary Team

The BCF is delighted to introduce the line up for the 2021 England National Team, to find out more about each member, simply click on the pictures below.

Without the valued support of our sponsors we could not make this happen and we would like to say a huge thank you for their generosity. You can find more about our sponsors or become a sponsor yourself here.

TEAM COACH OF ENGLAND’S NATIONAL CULINARY TEAM

Director of food at Fuller's, Paul Dickinson is a classically trained chef whose success in delivering winning solutions in complex catering environments has propelled him to executive roles across multiple organisations, implementing strategic leadership and change management. Paul will be England’s Team Coach for the Culinary World Cup, Luxembourg in 2022.

You can read more about Paul here.

ENGLAND’S NATIONAL CULINARY TEAM MEMBERS

Team Captian Adam Thomason

After years of working within Michelin environments and achieving a Master of Culinary Arts, it quickly became clear that Adam’s passion lay within creating food that was both exciting and stimulating to the palate, whilst creating memories and unique experiences that aim to never be forgotten. The challenge of guaranteeing the precise technical execution of each dish is one that continues to inspire him. Understanding and respecting the ingredients and using this knowledge to stir an excitement in the brigade, ensuring that any team he leads will work together to create an ever-evolving kitchen that will exceed expectation.
He found the world of chef competitions a true challenge and a great way to constantly develop new skills and build relationships with other like minds. Besides competing with the National Team, Adam has competed in many competitions, including National Chef of the Year, Bocuse d’Or UK final 2017, Le Taittinger Prix Culinaire International, Roux Scholarship and Compass Chef of the Year, which he won in 2014.

VICE-CAPTAIN - DAVID JOHN DAVEY-SMITH

Sgt Chef in the RAF, David has worked as a Chef Instructor, teaching culinary skills to the future force and has also catered for royalty.
He has competed with the military for 11 years, achieving multiple international and national Gold medals, with the highlight of achieving double Gold and 4th at the Culinary Word Cup, Expogast, Luxembourg for regional teams. He has also been a finalist in the National Chef of the Year.

PASTRY CHEF – TOMAS KRASNAN

A new member, very passionate and no newcomer to competitions. His biggest achievement to date is winning the Association of Pastry Chefs’ Dessert of the Year for three consecutive years, 2018/2019/2020. His love of cooking is rooted way back into his childhood, from his father who was a hotelier and ran his own restaurant, to foraging herbs and mushrooms with his grandfather and pressing fruits from the vine in the basement and enjoying his mother’s and grandmother’s home cooking. Tomas absolutely loves being a Pastry Chef and creating all those little moments of indulgence and enjoyment.
He has worked at the London Carriage Works in Liverpool with Paul Askew, was part of the opening team at The Hilton in the Panoramic 34 restaurant. Also worked with Mark Fletcher and his team at The Mere, Knutsford, recently taking on a new challenge leading the Pastry Team at Restaurant 20 Stories in Manchester.

PASTRY CHEF – IAN MARK (AKA BEAR)

Bear is a seasoned Sgt Chef in the military. He is currently employed as SNCO I/C JRM at RAF Coningsby and has previously served in various environments ranging from Chef Instructor to providing Catering services in all types of messes, feeding VIPs and deployed personnel in field conditions. He has served in various military operations and exercises worldwide.
Bear has over 14 years competition experience and has been part of the RAF Buffet team, Combined Services Culinary Arts Team and England’s National Culinary Team. Some of his highlights include winning “Bake Off, Crème de la Crème”, representing the UK in the World Chocolate Masters, winning double Gold medals in the Culinary World Cup and the Culinary Olympics. He has won numerous Gold medals with the Combined Services team in Salon Culinaire at Hotelympia and Hospitality Show, including a highly prized Best in Class award for La Parade des Chefs.

SHOWPIECE SPECIALIST - CHRISTOPHER ZAMMIT

Chris started his career training at an academic institute in Malta where he studied under some of the best pastry instructors at the time. His passion for anything pastry saw him work at some of the best hotels on the island. He honed his skills in pastillage, butter sculpting, chocolate and gelato, running away with the top awards most of the time. Twelve years ago, he moved to the UK to widen his horizons where he opened his own ice cream production business. In October 2015, he won the Best Chocolate Showpiece and Best Chocolate Tasting entremets at the UK Pastry Open, earning him a place on Team GB for the Coupe de Monde de la Patisserie 2017. His chocolate showpiece and carved chocolate block finished 5th out of the final 22 countries competing. Since then, he is now a Choco-Commando for the renowned chocolate company, Callebaut focussing on Choco-Gelato and is also involved in teaching Chocolate and Gelato work all over the world.

CORE TEAM - EDWARD MARSH

Ed has been cooking in the industry for eleven years, starting his training at University College Birmingham where he graduated and moved to the south west to work under prestigious chef, Hywel Jones at Lucknam Park, progressing to the role of Junior Sous Chef. After leaving Lucknam Park, Ed took up his current position as Sous Chef at the Michelin-starred Manor House under Executive Chef Robert Potter. Ed is no stranger to competitions, holding a spread of titles including South West Chef of the Year 2019/2020 and The Caterer Acorn award. He has represented England in both the Junior and Senior National Culinary Teams and individually in international competitions for the last eight years against chefs from around the world.

CORE TEAM - STACEY HARRIS

A new member of the team, Stacey attended the University of West London and commenced his career at the 2 Michelin-starred Petrus where he spent 2 years, followed by the Michelin-starred Chapter One, Orpington for five years. For the last seven years, he has been working as Head Chef for Restaurant Associates, Compass Group in a Fine Dining environment for a large contract in Canary Wharf, London. He has won a Silver medal in La Parade des Chefs and received an Annual Award of Excellence from the Royal Academy of Culinary Arts in 2015.

CORE TEAM – JAMIE LEWIS GIBBS

Jamie currently works in the private aviation sector for the leading culinary inflight provider, Absolute Taste Inflight. From a competition perspective Jamie has been competing for the last 15 years, winning medals at regional, national and international levels. His biggest individual success was achieving a 7th place world ranking Gold medal at the Culinary World Cup 2014. He has been with England’s National Team for 3 years and in that time has had many successes, the best of which was a Gold medal at the Culinary Olympics 2016.

CORE TEAM – STEFAN SEWELL

New member, Sgt Stefan Sewell joined the Royal Air Force in 2009. He is currently the Head of Chef Training for Royal Air Force Cadets, working at the Defence School of Catering. He has represented the Combined Services Culinary Arts Team (CSCAT) as Team Captain at the recent World Culinary Olympics. During his time with CSCAT he has achieved an Olympic double Gold medal and reached the final of the National Chef of the Year 2018, and most recently won the Kikkoman Masters 2019.