Chef Tanya Skeates

Start a restaurant, or go bankrupt trying:
A Soupçon of Success
by Lucy Rest
August 18th, 2005 - Ottawa Express

Although I've been enjoying her food at Elgin Street's Manx Pub for years, I only met Tanya Skeates for the first time the other night. I chatted with her in the kitchen of Soupçon, her new restaurant in Wakefield, while watching her expertly fold and fry some of her-absolutely addictive-veggie spring rolls.
"It was a whole process of letting go, but it was time to just take this chance," Skeates tells me when I ask if it was hard to leave the Manx after seven years (on and off) with a family of co-workers and friends. No stranger to trying new things, Skeates has cooked at posh private clubs (for the Queen, even!) in London and travelled through Europe and Thailand, learning new dishes all the way.

Her ability to let go of her fears is obviously a big part of why we're standing in her very own restaurant today-her latest adventure.

These days it seems everyone you talk to dreams of starting their own business, but what does it actually take to do it? A quick answer is, good planning, a hell of a lot of hard work, and knowing where to turn for help (financial and otherwise).

"I've had so much support, it makes me want to cry," says Skeates. Her mom helped out a little with the financing, and she got a government guaranteed loan for small businesses. "It was really hard ... because I'd never written a business plan or anything like thavt - I've been cooking for 14 years, I'm not used to writing." Friends helped her edit her applications, design a logo, paint the restaurant, and a website is in the works (to advertise cooking classes and catering gigs planned for fall and winter).

And customers? Skeates has been open only since June, but already Soupçon has a patio full of Wakefield locals who keep coming back for her home cooking and Asian-inspired cuisine. The laid-back atmosphere and wonderful service go a long way too.

When we were there, the simple, seasonal menu pleased our entire table. Plenty for vegetarians, everything is under $20, and the wine list is priced to encourage drinking by the bottle.

The spring rolls were a shoe-in, and the summer soup (tomato and brie today) was positively bursting with fresh flavour. Each forkful of my tilapia flaked perfectly and the veggies, jasmine rice, and pineapple red curry coconut sauce made for one harmonious bite after another. The coriander lemon-pepper chicken breast and the crab and mango salad in a yogurt and lime poppy seed dressing were also deliciously light, and even the heavier-sounding tamari-marinated beef tenderloin with potato rosti and pesto left the eater satisfied, but with room enough for dessert.

We order all three: maple crème brulée (perfect), Five-Spice chocolate brownie (yummy, but personally I'd like to taste more of the five-spice powder) and a caramelized lemon tart (to die for, with a tatin-like sugared crust over a divinely tart filling and flaky pastry).

A meal definitely worth the drive out to Wakefield, as is hearing Skeates' advice for becoming your own boss: "Just try it out. I talked about opening my own place for such a long time; I got tired of hearing myself. It's a really tough business and I'm either gonna do it or if this doesn't work then I can at least say I've tried and move on to something else.

"But if I hadn't done it, I would always be like, 'What if?' What's the worst that can happen? I'll go bankrupt, that's the very worst - it's not so bad really."