A table laid with several plated courses, bread, cheese and wine, photographed from above

Private chef, Gran Canaria

European technique, Asian flavour, Canarian ingredients.

Cooked in your kitchen, served at your table, and cleared away before I leave. Three menus, written out in full below, from 78 euro a head.

Check a date Read the menus

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The island’s private chefs are almost all Italian and Mediterranean. I am not.

Where it starts
A farm childhood. I learned what a tomato tastes like picked at the right hour, and how an animal should be raised, long before I learned to cook one properly.
Where it was trained
Over a decade in Cambridge’s best kitchens, then an island that grows papas antiguas, cherne, baifo and palm honey.

Priced separately

The lobster

Bogavante, erizo de mar, bisque. Lobster poached slowly in butter enriched with sea urchin, with its own bisque reduced to a single dark spoonful.

Available as either a first course or a main on any of the three menus, at market price, because it moves week to week. Every restaurant you have eaten in does the same thing.

The chef

I grew up on a farm. That is still the part that matters most.

I learned what a tomato tastes like when it is picked at the right hour, and how an animal should be raised, long before I learned to cook one properly.

The technique came later, over a decade in Cambridge’s best kitchens: the University Arms, Autograph Collection by Marriott; DoubleTree by Hilton; Quy Mill. What I cook now sits between the farm and that training. French and English method, Asian flavour, and whatever the island gave up that morning. Cherne with green chilli and coriander mojo. Canarian goat, slow cooked with star anise and orange. Local prawns, XO butter, gofio.

I write every menu for the table that booked it. Vegetarian guests get their own three courses, not the side dishes. Tell me you hate coriander and you will never see it.

I arrive two hours before service with everything, including my knives. I only need your oven and two burners. I cook in your kitchen, serve each course at your table, and leave it cleaner than I found it. You do not shop, plate, pour or wash up.

Trained under
Lee Clarke, whose restaurants Clarkes and Prévost earned Michelin Guide recognition and three AA rosettes, and who learned his craft from Marco Pierre White at the Mirabelle and Albert Roux at Roux Fine Dining.
Languages
Fluent English, native Romanian, and Spanish improving every week. Menus available in German on request.
Credentials
Spanish food handling certificate and full public liability insurance. The fourteen EU allergens are declared on the back of every menu card.
A large rib of beef resting on a tray in a working kitchen
A decade of kitchens before the island.

How an evening works

You do not shop, plate, pour or wash up

  1. I shop that morning

    The market first, then the fish counter. The menu is finished after I have seen what is actually there.

  2. I arrive two hours early

    With everything, including my knives. I only need your oven and two burners, and a photograph of the kitchen beforehand.

  3. Served at your table

    Each course plated and brought out in its own time. No buffet, no chafing dishes, no queue at a counter.

  4. The kitchen goes back cleaner

    Everything washed, put away and wiped down. You are left at the table for the sobremesa.

The work

Plates from the last year

Photographs of dishes I have actually cooked and served. Nothing here is a stock image.

A strawberry and meringue dessert plated on speckled ceramic, with further plates behind
Four bowls of fish plated together during service
A board of cheeses with grapes, pomegranate and herbs
A crisp fried starter over dressed leaves and edible flowers on a white plate
A tray of individual desserts plated for a large party
Individual chocolate desserts finished with edible flowers
A plated brunch dish with cured salmon and a poached egg

Practical

What it costs, and what changes it

The menu price is per person and covers everything: menu design, shopping, ingredients, cooking, service at your table and the cleaning up. Nothing is added afterwards.

Menu prices, per person
MenuCoursesMinimum tablePer person
HuertaFour4 guests78 euro
TravesíaFour4 guests95 euro
SobremesaFour6 guests130 euro
Job minimum
340 euro. A table of two is the same shopping, the same drive and the same service as a table of six.
Groups of nine or more
10 euro per person off the menu price. Real economies exist at that size and you should see some of them.
Travel beyond 30 km
35 euro. Mogán and the north cost two hours of daylight.
Booking inside 72 hours
15 percent. Late villa bookings mean dropping whatever else the week held.
Weekly meal prep, residents
260 euro a week for five dinners for two, with ingredients reimbursed separately.
Where I cook
Maspalomas, Meloneras, Mogán, Puerto Rico, Las Palmas and the villas between them. Yachts and long stays by arrangement.

Enquire

Tell me the date and who is at the table

I answer every enquiry the same day. Send a photograph of the kitchen too if you have one, it prevents surprises on both sides.

Vegetarian guests get their own three courses, not the side dishes. Tell me you hate coriander and you will never see it.

Prefer WhatsApp? [Send the same details there]

Or reach me directly

Email
alexpetruchelaru@outlook.com
Phone and WhatsApp
+34 641 275 731

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