About Us

who we are

The Bertinet Kitchen opened in September 2005 in the centre of beautiful and historic Bath. Owned and run by French chef and baker, Richard Bertinet, the school offers a range of relaxed and fun courses for food lovers of all abilities and specialist baking and bread-making courses for amateurs and professionals alike.  The school won the South West Tourism Award for Best Tourism Experience in 2009 and has been featured in the US television series on PBS: Gourmet's Adventures with Ruth - a tour of cookery schools around the world.  

“a range of relaxed and fun courses for food lovers of all abilities...”View Current Programmes »

richard bertinet

Originally from Brittany in North West France, Richard trained as a baker from the age of 14.  Having moved to the UK in the late 1980's, he started cooking and his catering background included stints at the Chewton Glen Hotel, as head chef at both the Rhinefield House Hotel in the New Forest and the Silver Plough at Pitton in Salisbury where in 1990 he was awarded Egon Ronay, Pub of the Year and American Express Magazine, UK Pub of the Year.  In 1996, a position as Operations Director with the Novelli Group of restaurants brought him to London where in 1998 he started advising small food related businesses. The business flourished causing Richard to set up the Dough Co, his consultancy business, in 2000 and to split his time between consultancy work advising on the development of new products for several of the supermarket chains, teaching and writing.

In 2004, with a young family, Richard and his wife Jo decided that it was time to leave London and head West to be closer to Jo's family. The plans for The Bertinet Kitchen began to take shape and they found the premises at 12 St Andrew's Terrace, Bath at the tail end of that year.

The cookery school opened in September 2005 in the same month that Richard's first baking book, DOUGH was published by Kyle Cathie to critical aclaim and a host of awards (IACP Cookery book of the year 2006, James Beard Award for Best Book (Baking & Deserts) and the Julia Child Award for Best First Book). Richard published his second book CRUST in 2007 (World Gourmand Award for Best UK Book (Baking) and his third COOK - In a class of your own in April 2010.  He is currently working on a book on Pastry.  

Richard was named as the BBC Food Champion of the Year 2010 at the BBC Food & Farming Awards on 24 November 2010.

the office team...

jo harrod bertinet

Jo is the boss!  Formerly a commercial lawyer in London, Jo heads up the comapny and all things Bertinet.

carrie bell

Carrie is the glue that holds the team together.  Carrie has a background in TV production and not only is she in charge of money and media but she is also the lovely person who deals with the team.

sarah geraghty

Sarah is our longest serving member of the team having been at the school since shortly after it opened. She has previously been a barrister and a brand manager for a global food business and is primarily responsible for the development of the Bertinet brand and the roll out of Bertinet Bread.

ildiko abraham

Ildi is in charge of our mail order business and handles all of our orders and stock.  When not working with us she is training to be a yoga teacher.

adam rush

Adam joined the Bertinet team during a placement as part of his business degree at Bath University.  He was so good we just had to keep him so he is working part time for us while he finishes his degree.

kathleen panel

Kathleen is our bookeeper.  She comes in and sorts the contents of our shoe boxes into nice neat organised colums while remaining smiley all the time.

the kitchen team...

jess courtis

Jess is the longest standing member of our kitchen team and looks after our guest chefs and welcomming you to the kitchen.  

hannah cameron

Hannah joined us a year ago after a stint cooking in Australia.  She has worked for a variety of food companies in the UK and loves baking.

suzie phudephatt

Susie is the most recent member of the team.

fionn young

Fionn is our Saturday girl.   Still to complete her studies at school she is looking forward to pursuing a career in food when she leaves. 

our house chefs...

jenny chandler

Jenny Chandler studied Spanish and Catalan at Bristol and Barcelona Universities. After training at Leith's School of Food and Wine she worked as a chef on a luxury yacht based in the Mediterranean and in Barcelona. She is our longest standing and most experienced house guest chef has worked closely with Richard since the school opened in 2005.  She runs her own classes in Bristol and has written two cookery books on Spanish Food. 'The Food of Northern Spain' was shortlisted for the prestigious Andre Simon award.

monisha bharadwaj

Monisha grew up in Mumbai with her grandmother, many aunts and her mother who were all keen cooks.  After leaving school she qualified as a chef before moving to England when she was 22. She tried out countless recipes in order to replicate what she had eaten in India while paring down the fuss and bother of traditional Indian cooking.

 She has worked as a food consultant to the Times of India group of newspapers where she cooked for national and international celebrities and more recently has written a number of books on Indian cooking.  She teaches in London and with us in Bath.

sara stanley

Sara is a baker and confectioner who has worked extensively in product development working on cakes and pastries for food manufacturers.  She also works as a food stylist and teaches cake making classes and cupcake classes for us.

charlie digney

Charlie Digney is the owner of the King William pub and dining rooms and the Garricks Head Pub in Bath well recognised and respected for their fantastic organic seasonal cooking.
"...a gastropub to bring a tear to your eye, a pub so good that it is truly worth the hour and a half train journey from London just for lunch." Giles Coren, The Times

valentina harris

Valentina is a much loved and noted authority on Italian Food and has written over 20 books on Italian cookery including the award winning Perfect Pasta. She appears regularly on television and has had her own series on BBC called Italian Regional Cookery.

ghalid assyb

Ghalid was the founder chef of Ottolenghi the fantastic London bakery. He works as a chef and patissiere and teaches in London and at The Bertinet Kitchen.

nick sandler

Nick Sandler is a development chef whose books include the wonderful Preserved, Mushroom, Soup, the classic Duchy Originals Cookbook and Branded - recipes for the world's most famous food brands. Nick builds smokehouses in his spare time and uses his shed to cure and age hams.

claudine boulstridge

Claudine’s Anglo-French background and international upbringing, has provided her with a broad spectrum of culinary interests. Her professional training, at ‘Leiths School of Food and Wine’, enabled her to marry her passion for cooking with her love of teaching. When not teaching Claudine writes and tests recipes and is working on her first cookery book.