The Wild Garlic, Beaminster: 
What a difference a year makes – Matt Follas has gone from winning a TV cooking competition to setting up this little beauty of a restaurant.
Photograph: David Partner

Adducing a corpse as a witness for anything is a cheap and distasteful gambit, so let me begin by suggesting that Keith Floyd, who died after lunching elsewhere in Dorset a few days after our visit, would have adored Mat Follas's first restaurant and might even have identified him as the fruit of his culinary loins. Although familiar to many of you as this year's MasterChef winner, Follas was a new face to me due to the Grossmanophobia that makes watching that show impossible even now, years after that stoic sufferer from irritable vowel syndrome departed. Follas's career is the mirror image of Floyd's, the latter becoming a telly character off the back of being a chef-proprietor and the former achieving the trick in reverse, but otherwise they are as one. The vibrant passion for food – the sourcing and foraging for it, as well as the cooking of it – with which Floyd laid the populist ground for programmes such as MasterChef shines through at the Wild Garlic in the pretty town of Beaminster.
There is so much else to admire that the traditional Hazgush warning must be issued. The twin traps of fierce lighting and lousy acoustics that often ruin otherwise impressive restaurants are nimbly avoided. The light green walls are unencumbered by hideous paintings, the furniture is farmhousy solid, and the room resounds with the appetite- stimulating buzz of relaxed people relishing their grub.

The short printed menu, meanwhile, bolstered by a wide range of blackboarded daily specials, is perfectly judged and resists the temptation to impress with technical wizardry that afflicts many gifted amateurs when they turn pro. Follas understands that encouraging first-rate ingredients to taste of themselves has the edge over poncery and ostentation. He also has unusual mastery of 
presentation, adorning the starters with an exquisite little salad dotted with edible flowers. Pan-fried garlic scallops (three plump beauties for £7; the pricing of both food and wine is without chutzpah) came alluringly browned, and with absurdly delicious miso-infused seaweed. My wife was lukewarm about her caramelised goat's cheese ("Nice enough, but a bit pointless"), but my smooth, subtle chicken liver pâté was great, while ceviche of brill was spectacularly fresh and zingy, and had a limey kick to keep a fleet of Tudor galleons scurvy-free for a year.

There then followed a moment that had me cooing at Follas's business sense. The inter-course hiatus was plugged by an amuse-bouche of a dozen clams garnished with capers and garlic mayonnaise, one of those cute touches that costs a restaurant thruppence but leaves punters purring at what seems a lavish freebie. Two of us then went for the lemon sole, a vast and blameless fish served whole and on the bone, and laden with more capers and garlic butter. My wife thought her ribeye steak of water buffalo well seasoned and cooked to the ideal medium rarity, but lacking the depth of flavour of beef, and for what the marital ledger reveals to be the ninth time in 18 years of holy wedlock, we were in full agreement there. However, she was wild about the "smoked mash" – a mound of fluffy, creamy potato suffused with a hickory, mesquitish twang – that also came with my five ruby-red slices of sensationally tender and flavoursome sika venison.

Fresh berry mess was magnificent, and chocolate brownies with cream, chocolate twizzle and berries was "absolutely the best I've had outside the Popeseye," said my wife of a beloved west London steak house.

All in all, this was one of the most pleasing meals I've eaten in years, served with warmth and expertise by a dramatically mustachioed manager and a droll waitress in pole position to do something about it, since her day job is running the old-fashioned barber's bang opposite. Follas is an exceedingly rare talent. Nothing the programme could ever accomplish could compensate for unleashing Loyd Grossman on this island, but MasterChef should be very proud of itself indeed.

It doesn't look like much, but ... Noma restaurant, Copenhagen. Photograph: PR

Before I was sent there for the MasterChef final, I didn't know that Noma, which Sybil Kapoor has written about beautifully in today's G2, existed. I was dreading going to a fussy Michelin-starred restaurant, because what I thought of as Michelin food was not the sort of food I want to cook. It was jaw-dropping for me to find out that at Noma, which has two Michelin stars, René Redzepi does food which is totally different from my preconceptions.

For the final, the other guys were both at five star hotels and had the whole treatment; dinner at chef's tables, all the frills. We stayed at the Scandinavian equivalent of a Travelodge in the red light district and had a few drinks at a Vietnamese, but there's no way I would have swapped. I was delighted to be there. It was very much a life-changing couple of days, offering inspiration as well as the chance to pick up practical tips for my restaurant.

We spent one-and-a-half days at Noma, but even just getting an hour with them, getting to understand what they do, would have been invaluable. René is an 

incredibly busy man, but took the time to show me how, for example, his foraged produce comes in. I now have my own foragers and I can give them the same containers I saw at Noma - nothing fancy, just lined with tissue paper - and I know from going there that fresh foraged bits and pieces will happily last a good few days.

There's certainly inspiration from Noma that I've used all the way through putting our restaurant together, from the induction hobs in the kitchen to a skate dish which I've done with British ingredients, sea kale and sea kale berries, but which is very much inspired by Noma. Without having gone there it would have been so much more difficult. I don't want to copy him, but when I'm thinking, "how the hell do I do this?" it's my touchstone.

We'd cooked turbot during the day of the final, and when it came to attempting to replicate René's signature dish he said, "you're too good at cooking fish, I'm going to give you something else to do." That was good and bad. He gave me a version of the musk ox tartar, which is a very difficult one to do for service. I had to do a swipe of tarragon paste across the plate, exactly the right width, on the right angle. It wasn't something I'd done before, but it was the biggest compliment to hear that he was pleased with it. 

Going back to my management training, I'd call René an authoritative leader. He leads by example. He knows that he can do pretty much any job in the kitchen, and like any good kitchen there isn't any shouting. He was very clear when he wasn't happy with something and he sent a lot of food back, including some of mine; even his experienced sous chef was getting plates returned, perhaps one in four. But there was no belittling involved in it, and I really felt a sense of achievement when I'd done it to the right standard.

Rene is hard to describe, but I think the whole crew, males included, all fell slightly in love with him. The girls went ga-ga; it was kind of a standing joke. What I want to cook is what Noma does. That's as aspirational as it gets for me.

Mat Follas at the opening of his restaurant, The Wild Garlic.
Photograph: Chris Ould

I'm exhausted, relieved and ecstatic ... our restaurant, The Wild Garlic is up and running. We trialled first on the crowd from the local pub, then friends and family, finally, on Saturday we had our real opening, with 350 people, canapes and wine. The staff were all nervous and jittery, almost panicky, on the practice run, but the opening went well, apart from a sudden realisation that a lot of people in the restaurant increases the temperature: blessed as we were with good weather, most people drifted outside.

Thanks so much to the Word of Mouth crowd for all the feedback on the various stages of opening. I have taken lots of it to heart and made some changes as a result. The menu has changed, basic things like the toilets have had more attention than I would have initially given them. I have dropped the service charge from the bill and the tips the last few days have been fair, around 10%, so those suggestions were spot on.

Rabbit, too, is on the menu directly as a result of your comments (I guess we won't be seeing the person who said they wouldn't ever come to the restaurant if I serve bunny!). Oh, and, controversially, I haven't changed my view on chips - we have none on at the moment. I'm risking the wrath of the chunky chip haters, I know, but the chips will be chunky, when the right potatoes are in season.

I won't please all of you, but I'd hate for my restaurant to be something too comfortable; it should gently challenge some people's preconceptions and for others be a place where they know they'll get something great to eat and enjoy the ambience. I'm really proud of the design of the restaurant and the opening menu, which I've posted on my blog.

There are still details I'm mulling over - we're decorating the tables with fresh wild flowers picked from the hedgerows after Amanda went for a walk and came back with a bunch of tall, frothy cow parsley and plopped it in a vase. It looked magical; uncontrived, fresh and interesting. She says the next bunch will be foxgloves and ferns.

So now it's all about the cooking, it's not earth-changing or likely to make me rich but I'm loving the hard work, running a great team, and most importantly, finally having a job where I can let my imagination run wild.

Photograph: Amanda Follas

We always have 'fish of the day'; it's very exciting for me to wait and see what seafood comes in that day and then devise a dish from it. It gives a real freshness and spontaneity to the overall menu and it's often the dish I'm most proud of. We have favourite plants, like sea kale, that we are desperate to use more of. In March, it has young leaves which can be 'forced' like rhubarb, in May it has flower spikes like broccoli and then in June it has seed-pods, the size of a large pea but tasting of cabbage. It seems wrong to forage for it because it's not a common plant so we're trying to grow it. We visited Jekka McVicar's herb farm in the spring and brought a few specimens home to see how they do in the garden.

Another favourite of ours is edible flowers. On MasterChef I made a lavender mousse, the smell and flavour are reminiscent of a country cottage garden, and we're continuing to serve that. This year we've also been experimenting with lemon verbena but have yet to extract the flavour with any great success, but we will persevere because the deja vu you get when you smell it is an absolute delight.

Another flower we love is pineapple sage; it has two great things going for it; firstly it is bright red and looks amazing, and secondly it tastes very sweet, like pineapple or honey. I can't think why everyone doesn't use it!

As you drive around Dorset in April and May, you can smell the wild garlic as it blooms; this month it's been replaced by pungent elderflowers. We want to use these wonderful smells and flavours - they mark the passing of the seasons and we love the anticipation caused by knowing that we won't see them again for a whole year.

We want to harvest some wild garlic seeds and pickle them to make our own 'capers', a technique I noticed they used when I visited Noma in Denmark during the filming for MasterChef. We've been a little busy, so this may be something that will have to wait until next year.

We like to employ traditional techniques to enhance the flavour of food, for instance, we smoke a lot of food in the kitchen. I don't mind at all if the aroma of alder smoke wafts through to the customers in the restaurant because it never fails to make people salivate and we can produce extraordinary things with it, like smoked mash.

I realise that I've been incredibly lucky in attracting a lot of interest and coverage in the build up to launch, thanks to the MasterChef win. For our opening we had 350 people drop in and we're benefiting from an enormous amount of goodwill from our customers, who seem genuinely excited by the restaurant. We're trying our hardest to produce food and service that mirror their expectation, while staying true to how we'd like to do things.

The MasterChef factor is interesting, I think. We didn't try to make the opening a 'celebrity' occasion, we wanted it to be a local affair all about a new restaurant in west Dorset because, let's face it, if the locals don't come, we're sunk.

Opening night at The Wild Garlic
Photograph: Chris Ould

Amanda and I are terrible introverts, so the prospect of a whole evening of schmoozing was pretty stressful, but we are becoming quite practised at it with the various goings-on over the last few months. I spent opening evening air-kissing and meeting interesting people - I'd normally be more interested in loitering around near the ocean bed with a diving buddy, but I actually enjoyed it enormously. The evening was declared a success by all and we're delighted that so many people came to share the launch with us.

The whole celeb business holds little appeal for me in terms of being recognised and, let's face it, MasterChef hardly makes me A list. That said, it's a chance for some interesting stuff, such as an endorsement deal with an great NZ wine I drink anyway. I'm getting more offers as time goes on and I have to admit, making appearances and the likes might not come naturally to me, but it all means I won't have to panic too much about funds this year and it makes business sense to keep the profile up for the sake of the restaurant.

We did rush the opening, in part because of a slightly difficult situation with my former employer that I won't bore you with. Suffice to say, I was faced with a choice of playing safe in an unhappy situation or taking a risk. I decided to get on with it, because you only get one chance like this. I think I've made the right choice.

It's been great fun blogging over here on Word of Mouth and I've loved having so much feedback. I wanted to do it because the readers here are known for being an opinionated bunch and we all know constructive criticism is a valuable thing for anyone entering the service industry. I have to say, though, I didn't expect the hundreds of comments we got, or the informative and generous nature of them, so I'm both chuffed and grateful.

I'll be continuing to listen over at my blog to anyone who's interested in staying in touch, and anyone who wants to pop in to the place down in Beaminster - there will always be a special place in my new restaurant for Word of Mouth readers (most likely the toilet, as that's where you had the most influence!). You know where to find me.

The interior of The Wild Garlic.
Photograph: Mat Follas

Firstly, thanks to all who responded about the menu on the last blogpost, and I've also had numerous emails overwhelmingly in favour of putting rabbit on the menu, which I'm delighted and surprised at. Bunny will be on my menu from the start.

My vegetarian options came in for quite some criticism, which is great - what was really good was the constructive criticisms with specific suggestions such as books and restaurants to look at. I'm doing that now and will post my new menu before we open.

Still lots of feedback on the loos, paper towels and hand-dryers going in ... I'd like a Dyson too, but it's not practical because of the noise they make and the building we're in.

So what else have I been thinking about in between visiting suppliers, painting, cleaning, etc etc etc? Staff and front of house.

I'm an experienced people manager from my corporate life, but I can't treat my restaurant staff in the same way. We're not talking high salaries or even full-time positions for a lot of them, so the commitment or expectations aren't as clearly defined. We do now finally have a full complement - a team of great individuals - and now need to think about the day-to-day running of the business.

This is how the outside looks now
Photograph: Mat Follas

What sort of service do we want? Front of house, we want a confident but relatively informal approach. People secure in their own knowledge, who are not afraid to make a few mistakes and have enough about them to handle a diverse clientele. They should make the customer feel at ease, be attentive but not grovel or hang over the table like a vulture. We don't want them to be 'friends' with the customer, but we don't want them to be high-handed or aloof either. It's a difficult balance. What we want is how we like to be treated when we got out.

I have to say, the best example I can give of what I regard as exemplary service was at John Torode's restaurant, Smiths of Smithfield, the day after MasterChef finished airing on the telly. My wife Amanda and I were halfway through a day of press interviews and live TV, and we eventually rolled up at 3pm dazed, tired and very hungry.

The first of our two waiters was Irish, he had a calm manner, an endearing charm and knew everything about the menu; he recommended dishes for us and we simply took his advice. We felt very safe, relaxed and as if nothing would be too much trouble.

Our second waited arrived at pudding time. He wandered over to see whether we were ready to look at puddings and coffees. My wife gazed at the menu for a couple of seconds and then looked up at him. "I just need some chocolate, could I have something with chocolate in it," she said wearily. He picked out the 

dessert with the most chocolate and suggested she might enjoy that. Then the coffee - I said I'd like a 'flat white' and he said "of course". What!? No "what's that then?". He'd spent time in Australia and understood the antipodean (or is it just Kiwi?) obsession with coffee. Amanda all but emptied her purse onto the table as we reluctantly left.

I'm sure all WoM readers can tell of bad dining experiences and I could give you no end of horror stories myself, but this was great, confident, informal service; you really get to understand why John is such a successful restaurateur when you witness a standard of service that in my experience is pretty much unique.

Uniforms - clean black and white to give an air of formality without stuffiness. We've gone for black trousers, white cotton shirt, and a black bib apron with logo; simple, clean and not trying to be overly trendy or cool ... I think. We're yet to order the aprons and will be really interested to get any constructive views on uniforms.

What do you want in front of house staff? What else should I be doing to train them or achieve the right balance?

Mat in the kitchen

We had coffee training on Tuesday from the Origin Coffee guys for all the staff so they know how, and just as importantly, why, to make a great espresso and other coffees. There was more training yesterday on wine service from James Handford, then we had a practice run at actually running a restaurant involving some willing volunteers from the local pub, The Red Lion.

It was great fun, there were a few mishaps in the kitchen as we got used to working together but it ended up as a successful, and fun, night - I'll tell you more about it next week. Tonight it's staff families, a bunch of friends from another local pub and the volunteers who've helped us over the last few weeks.

Our kitchen porter wants to learn to cook, so we're going to sponsor her through an apprenticeship, locally if possible. She's extremely artistic as well as being a talented amateur cook, so we set her the challenge of making great cupcakes for the coffee trade during the day. She started off well, but wow, she's really got it now. I think she's bought every cake book ever published, has studied them all as her new religion and is now producing beautiful cupcakes - and they taste as good as they look.

Cupcakes!
Photograph: Mat Follas

So that's mostly it. As you read this I'll be prepping for the 300 or so guests coming for the actual opening on Saturday night. We're serving fizz and canapes and really putting my tiny kitchen through its paces (there is no plan B if it rains so please wish for good weather over Dorset!).

The reservations book is busy for next week and we've a huge local event next weekend as Beaminster parties in the town square (where the restaurant is) for our annual festival. We've got a full house and will also be serving drinks from a table out the front ... and MasterChef have chosen that day to put cameras in the kitchen to help things along too!

OK, so the plants are gone and the window frames have turned green, but what's happening inside?
Photograph: Mat Follas

First of all, thanks everyone for great comments in my first bloodspot, helping me with the decisions I'm making in the opening of my new restaurant, The Wild Garlic (I know not everyone likes the name, but I do and we're sticking with it!).

Just to update you on some of the design decisions we've made - we're going with Marnie Moyle's tables because we love them (and in the interests of time) but, as so many of you recommended, we are re-designing them so most will be square tables that can seat two or four people, can be pushed them together for larger parties etc.

About the, ahem, Keeler chairs - we haven't seen anything else that we can get in time for opening. I quite the idea of some one-offs as several of you suggested, so that may be a development for the future. But we've been sitting on the Arne chairs for a week now and they really are very comfortable (the main issue, as everyone pointed out), in fact my wife has now pinched one for her office.

We've left a small bar (I found the original oak bar top hiding in a back room and have recycled it), the seating in front will be fairly casual but can also be used as an overflow dinner table, so wine and coffee during the day, then maybe 'non-booked' seating in the evening.

About the loos - the raft of comments last week about how important this area is have made me take a serious look (I got the message loud and clear, thank you) and I'm now replacing the carpets that I previously thought I could live with. We're replacing the carpets, lights, hand dryers and toilet seats with new ones, as well as applying a fresh coat of paint. Key question, we've got a brand new hand dryer, do we need paper towels as well? Or do people prefer them to be made out of cloth?

So on to the most crucial aspect of any restaurant, and the one I've agonised over: the menu. The killer question I want answered is: what's your preference between organic and well managed locally produced food? Personally I look for well managed locally produced food first but I wonder if organic still has the hold over consumers?

We're not campaigning particularly with our food. It should be in season. We want the primary ingredient of a dish to be British, local if possible - if it's not available, then my feeling is that we should change the menu. But are we ready to go to an all British menu? I don't think we are, and I'm not planning to trial it with my restaurant launch. I think if the star of the dish is local, other ingredients can be imported. However. I know this type of thinking is being mooted by foodies and a couple of weeks ago I read this compelling article by Jay Rayner. It's an interesting idea and maybe something we could do in a year or two.

We have tried to price the menu at the right level to make a living but also to provide fair value for money, rather than thinking what we might be able to charge for short term gain trading on the MasterChef factor. I'm very conscious this won't last long - besides, is it just me or is the list of 'celeb' chefs going bust getting longer by the day? I intend to be in the kitchen for the summer, doing the cooking, and greeting customers when I can, but it's going to be the food not the novelty that I hope will impress the local people who I expect to be my core business and who I want to price for.

The draft menu for Mat Follas's Wild Garlic restaurant

So we've designed the draft menu you see here to provide a good three course meal for about £30, with the ability to stretch to four courses and a £50 spend for those who want it, and I really want your thoughts on this. With regards to drinks - wine is not an area of my expertise, and I'm not too proud to admit it, so I'm happy - and lucky - to be working with master of wine (and occasional diving buddy), James Handford who is writing a fantastic bespoke wine list, short and with a few key vineyards and wine starting at under £13 a bottle.

And of course, I need to put some of my MasterChef dishes on the menu, but which ones? We thought the 'smoked scallops', the 'crab thermidor' and the 'lavender mousse' should feature, as they're the dishes everyone talks to me about. People seem very interested in the trio of rabbit dish too, but they usually add "but I never eat rabbit", so I'm pondering this interesting fact. The trio can be a very wasteful dish if you don't use the leftover meat. I've been using it to make a smoked rabbit pate recently and I wonder if I should incorporate that into the dish, or stick with the MasterChef-winning rabbit starter. So my final question is simple. How many of you would eat my trio of rabbit?

Mat Follas's new restaurant premises in Beaminster, near Bridport, Dorset.
This is the place before Mat did any work to improve it.
Photograph: Mat Follas

When the people at Word of Mouth asked me if I wanted to blog the progress of my start up restaurant, The Wild Garlic - my first thought was: when? Since winning MasterChef, there's been no time to breathe and the amount of work to be done has just increased by about 70% (if I'd won The Apprentice it would be at least 110% ... am I the only one who hates those overstatements?).

It also struck me that in the midst of all of the panic and work involved in getting the restaurant under way, writing a few posts would force me to pause - give me a chance to step back, stop and calmly think about what we're doing. Most importantly, I'm hoping to get some good honest feedback from Word of Mouthers – you're known for being an opinionated lot when it comes to eating out, and I think this is a brilliant opportunity to get some real help with some of the decisions I need to take from people who know what they like – and don't like – about the places they eat out in.

So I'd like to say don't hold back, I'm keen to hear your thoughts. But in all honesty, there's just one bit of feedback I really don't need – yep, it's the worst time, economically speaking, in the last 20 years, that I could have picked to do this, and yes, I'm clearly mad to consider opening a restaurant in the current climate. But there's not much I can do about that now!

A few weeks ago, I finally resigned from a corporate IT job. After 11 years and one week (not sure how many hours but I was close to counting), I sat for half an hour wavering over pressing the 'send' button ... wondering how we were going to pay the bills ... all that job security gone ... that wage coming in automatically every month. The decision itself wasn't hard but actually doing it, pressing that button, was another thing entirely. But ... bye bye IBM.

I didn't look back for long – I'd already signed the lease on a great little place in my local town that I'd had my eye on for a few years. It had been a locals' pub in a town of three pubs and no restaurants, struggled to find its place for years then been transformed into a nice bistro run by a young couple who made a real success of it before selling it at the height of the property boom.

The buyer was a good cook, young and with a clear idea of what he wanted to serve, but unfortunately it wasn't what the locals wanted to eat. After realising too late that he had to change, the business ran out of funds about the same time as I was finishing MasterChef.

After extended negotiations and lots of looking at other sites we eventually took a lease on the building. It's taken three months to the day, from agreeing to purchase the lease, to actually signing it. It's incredible - the stress; the rows. People keep asking how it feels to be fulfilling my dream. Well, at the moment, it feels like I've got a big lump of cold sick stuck in my stomach.

But no matter, it's in my name now. I got up with great determination the day after signing, had breakfast and charged over to the restaurant. Finally I could walk through the door and take a sledgehammer to the oversized bar and start to make it look like the image in my head. At last I can begin getting ready to open. And this is where the first lot of decisions come in – the all important look of the place.

Currently it's all beech veneer tables, white fabric chairs and leather placemats, which are not my style at all. But is my own taste going to be right for the restaurant? I'm wondering if I should go country kitchen - all wood - or something a bit more modern, like the clean lines and stainless steel Kevin McCloud is so fond of.

For furniture, we've made contact with Marnie Moyle, an amazing outdoor table designer who I'm very excited about (and flattered that she likes what we're doing) … but her beautiful tables are designed for outdoors and I'm not sure the the chairs she has with them work inside.

Can I fit her furniture with something else, I'm thinking, or do her tables have to be properly matched with equally high end chairs? I personally think that £20 indoor chairs around those tables will work - it's eclectic and very much us, but I'm suspending judgement for a time, surfing the web, looking at country cottage styles until I see some Arne Jacobsen chairs (is that just my teenage memories of Christine Keeler getting the better of me?). If you've got any good links you reckon I should see (for the furniture that is, not Christine Keeler!), please share them below.

There's also the question of the huge bar in the restaurant that dominated the place before I knocked it down (yep, that's right, please don't say the one thing you'd want is a huge, oversized bar). But what should I replace it with? It would be a great daytime seating area for drinking coffee or wine, a comfy area to wait in or even act as a casual overflow dining area for a few walk-ins. Or we could squeeze a couple of small tables in. The thing is, I want customers to enjoy the space, stay for the evening, maybe have an extra glass or two of wine. If they're comfortable enough to stay for three courses, I think that's worth more than the extra revenue of trying to turn a table.

The more I write the more questions come … I need to get on with making the kitchen workable (and easier to clean), so no doubt there will be more questions to come, from menu to front of house staffing issues. But in the meantime, I'd love to hear your thoughts on style. What brings you into a restaurant and, more importantly, what brings you back? What are your "must haves" and "don't do's" for a restaurant in terms of space and design?