Alan Murchison

Executive chef of the 10in8 group, whose seven restaurants include L’ortolan, TerraVina and La Bécasse, the Scot has appeared on Great British Menu three times. He talks to Alicia Miller

I would go back to Vietnam just to eat.

I travelled the full length of the country, north to south, and the diversity was amazing – elegant, light food in the north, Cantonese-style dishes in the south. In Hanoi at the Metropole Hotel (sofitel.com) we had the most stunning French-Vietnamese meal, but my favourite was going to tiny restaurants with plastic plates and chairs, where everything is super fresh because the market is on your doorstep. There are no double standards there with food – they eat everything. I even tried cobra wine.

Asian food is fascinating for a British chef

– we don’t normally learn to cook it, and it’s nice to eat something you can’t replicate yourself. I remember initially eating at London’s Zaika (zaika-restaurant.co.uk), the first Michelin-starred Indian restaurant – I wouldn’t have thought a truffle belonged anywhere near a naan bread, but it was sublime. I’d like to visit Tokyo; there are more starred restaurants there than anywhere, and I do wonder what you need to do to raw fish to get three stars! But if I did a food tour, it would be in New York, starting at Per Se (perseny.com).

I hope to compete in the world duathlon

in Ottawa this summer. Until I was 22 I was a competitive runner for Scotland, but only started it up again three or four years ago – it’s part of my mid-life crisis. When you hit your late thirties you’ve got to make an effort if you’re going to be the fit and healthy chef.

Local recommendations are always the best.

When I was in Chicago, I asked chefs where to eat. I tried Alinea (alinearestaurant.com) which had just opened – no one had heard of it then – and it blew my mind. I had a dish which played on different textures and temperatures of potato: I haven’t look at spuds the same way since. The Alinea chefs suggested I try Moto (motorestaurant.com). It was in the (then) dodgy meat-packing district, which tourists would normally avoid, but it was great.

The best restaurant in Britain

is the Hand & Flowers (thehandandflowers.co.uk). Tom Kerridge looks like a cave man but he cooks like a ballet dancer – after myself, he’s my favourite chef. We were on Great British Menu together; the night before finals day, the fridge holding all of Tom’s duck broke, and he had to source it all again the morning of the competition. He still won.

The next chef to hit it big with pub dining

is James Durrant at The Plough Inn (theploughinn.info) in Hampshire. He worked with Ramsay for ten years, so he’s a bloody good cook. There’s no jazzy website; he’s just in a little village, putting all his energy and effort into the food, and makes a good product.

In London, I have four favourites

– Hix (hixsoho.co.uk) for the cracking food; Bar Boulud (barboulud.com) for the service and buzzing atmosphere; Hakkasan (hakkasan.com) because it’s just cool; and William Curley’s (williamcurley.com) shop in Fitzrovia – I’d happily sit there all day, drinking his hot chocolate, slowly dying of cocoa poisoning.