FORMER Dell employee Ross Kelly, from Corbally, saw his redundancy package as an opportunity to pursue his dream to qualify as a chef.
Earlier this year, Ross invested his Dell redundancy package in a €13,000 exclusive course at the internationally known Ballymaloe, in east Cork.
After digesting what he described as a tough course, he told the Limerick Post he will never look back on his decision.
“All told, it cost about €13,000 to train down there… I have made it back already.
“It was a chance but I knew if I worked hard it would pay off.
“I don’t think I’d be where I am if I had finished a three year degree course. “There’s much negative stuff in the media about unemployment… there’s other options for people than doing State run courses”. He is now working full-time as second head chef at The Locke Bar and Oyster House.
“I started work in the restaurant just after completing the course in April.
“The owner Richard Costelloe, is a massive fan of Ballymaloe and he heard I had studied there, so I went in as a third chef”.
The move allowed Ross to have an input into the menu at the gastropub. “I brought some of the recipes and dishes that I learned down in Ballymaloe to the plate here.
“We’re now making nice home-made soups and home-made bread and sourcing some good ingredients.
“We have put together a winter a la carte menu and it to really local. We have a small amount of game on that we source from a gamekeeper at a local castle. I want to give people a bit of a Ballymaloe experience”.
He is now gaining additional experience in what he describes as a busy kitchen.
“It’s an open kitchen… patrons can see what we are doing.
“It’s a challenge to come up with a new special every day”.
Ross Kelly, now a chef at The Locke Bar and Oyster House, took a chance investing his Dell redundancy.
