If you’ve ever considered a change of career from restaurant chef to development chef, Anthony Warner (AKA The Angry Chef) has all the intel you need. He’s one of the country’s leading food product developers, and he’s giving us all the insight into how he went from a yearning to step back from the hard physical hours and the late nights, to where he is now.

We asked all the questions YOU need to shine a light on following the same path yourself, and he’s given all the in-depth (and often hilarious) answers, taking a deep dive into the advice, the myths, the highs, the lows, and the time he had to serve pre-made Bolognese sauce to confused locals in a town square in Bologna.

How did you get into your current role?

I was a restaurant chef for about 12 years and as is the case for a lot of chefs, the hours and physical demands became a bit difficult to deal with, especially as I got older and had a family. I was still passionate about food, and wanted a job where I was cooking and developing recipes, so I applied for pretty much every development chef job going. It was pretty tough. After so long in restaurant kitchens I think I had forgotten how to behave in normal society and really struggled with formal interviews and presentations.

But when I was about to give up, I managed to get an interview at the UK’s largest food manufacturer, and the Head of Innovation there must have seen something in me. Even though she would become my mentor, I never really found out why she gave me a chance. I presume it was because I had an obvious passion for cooking, but also because I was quite unpretentious about food, and genuinely interested in making things for regular households.

What’s the best thing about your job?

And what’s the worst thing?

Seeing your products and recipes on supermarket shelves is always pretty cool, and it is even better hearing consumers tell you how much they enjoy them. I developed recipes for a popular pasta sauce brand, and once met a couple of people who had tattoos of the brand logo, which is a level of devotion my restaurant cooking never achieved. When you make someone’s dinner more interesting or delicious, that adds a bit of joy into their lives, and that really shouldn’t be underestimated.

But over the years, I think the more important thing is that when you develop products eaten in millions of homes, you can start to have a real influence on our food system. You can impact the amount of fat or salt that the UK eats, developing healthier versions of people’s favourite foods. And you can start to impact on the sustainability of our food system in a meaningful way, by making more sustainable options more delicious.

In restaurants, what I was doing often felt important, but at the end of the day I was cooking for a few dozen people on expense accounts. These days I am responsible for millions of meals, and that gives you a chance to make a real difference.

Big companies have processes and bureaucracy that can be pretty stifling. I am not a fan of meetings and end up having to sit in far too many of them. Most big companies spend far too much time jumping through internal hoops that mean nothing to their customers or consumers, and that can be incredibly frustrating. You also see a lot of people in the middle management of large organisations who contribute very little, and it can be very difficult not to call that out. Most chefs tend to speak their mind, and that is not always the best strategy if you want to succeed.

What surprised you most about the realities of the job?

I have worked a lot in product development for large consumer brands, which is unusual because you spend a lot of time speaking to different groups of consumers, either in focus groups or visiting them in their homes. This is essential for understanding what these consumers are interested in and what problems they need solving. The most surprising thing was how so many of our preconceptions about consumers are wrong.

A lot of the products I worked on were popular in lower socio-economic groups and there was a general assumption that people would be low skilled, wouldn’t know how to cook, wouldn’t know much about food, and wouldn’t really care about what they ate. Those assumptions proved to be almost completely inaccurate, especially when it came to working class families.

Everyone I spent time with cared hugely about food, had pretty good kitchen skills, and were often far more adaptable in the kitchen than better off consumers. There is a narrative played out in the media, reinforced by a lot of food writers and celebrity chefs, that people on low incomes are ignorant and if we just teach them about vegetables, they’ll suddenly become healthy. But that is hot garbage.

What does a typical day look like for you?

Like most jobs, it varies. I spend about 50% of my time in the development kitchen, developing recipes and ideas, because that is where I can add the most value (most companies don’t employ a chef to sit at a desk). There tends to be a lot of time spent presenting products and ideas, either internally, or for customers such as supermarkets.

I also spend quite a lot of time organising creative workshops, getting people together to work on a problem or challenge in the kitchen. As much as possible, I like to spend time engaging directly with consumers, trying to understand more about what they want from food products and brands.

What advice would you give to someone hoping to get into your profession?

Passion for food and ability to cook are your key skills, so don’t lose sight of that. You’ll probably have to learn to swear a bit less, but don’t try and blend in too much to the corporate culture – chefs are expected to be a bit different. Most of all, try and put yourself in the mind of the consumer who will be eating your products. Think about who they are, what their lives are like, when they will be eating, what they are looking for from a food product. If you can demonstrate that sort of thinking at interview, you will stand a good chance.

In the majority of development chef roles, there will be a certain amount of presentation and demonstration. You will have to be able to talk confidently about your recipes, often in front of an audience. That is difficult for a lot of chefs and was a nightmare for me – I’m extremely introverted and lacked confidence. But I found out that it is a skill you can learn. Practise as much as you can. Do a presentation course, join a public speaking club, offer to do a cookery demonstration at a school, record a cookery video. I promise that eventually it will click, and once you are confident speaking and demonstrating in public, it will open up a load of doors for you.

What’s the best piece of advice that YOU were given?

Tell us the weirdest thing you’re had to do in the course of your work

I was told by the Chief Executive of the UK’s biggest food company that he didn’t want me to show him things that were easy to make, because if they are easy, anyone can make them. He said that he wanted me to show him stuff that was delicious but really difficult to manufacture, because he had a building full of food scientists who needed challenging.

That will not be the case in every company, but it stuck with me. As a development chef, it is often your job to challenge the factory or the technologist to make things better, even when that is difficult. This does not always make you popular, and perhaps don’t do it too much in your first week, but it is what will drive the company towards making better food.

I once filmed a TV advert for a Bolognese sauce brand and the premise was that we went to Bologna with our sauce and cooked Spaghetti Bolognese for Italians to taste. The filming involved us actually setting up a stall in the middle of Bologna and serving our product to the locals.

The whole thing was bizarre, but anyone who knows anything about Italian food will know that it is virtually a hate crime to serve a meat ragu with Spaghetti. Even though people quite liked the sauce, everyone was very confused about who these strange English people cooking the wrong sort of pasta were We eventually got some good shots and managed to get out alive, but I’m not sure I’d be welcomed back.