Andreas Bagh

Chef Thomas Wal because he was my first teacher and his was the first restaurant in Denmark to earn a Michelin star. He gave me a great foundation and taught me to work hard and stay humble. I do not cook for ego, I cook for others.

I have childhood memories of my father making a Portuguese dish with salted cod and slow-cooked red pepper, which he prepared often. I realised at a young age that the pepper is an interesting ingredient to use in the kitchen because it has so many flavours and textures to work with.

Ernest Hemingway in Paris. He famously loved oysters and Krug, so I would prepare a seafood meal with a lot of oysters – maybe even our Oyster Bloody Mary, which is also pepperinspired with piment juice and Tabasco. We would most probably have one bottle too many as I listened to his stories and we talked about life.

One summer, my girlfriend and I were staying at a beautiful Danish inn. Before dinner, we sat on the beach under the night sky and shared a bottle of Krug 1998. It was different from anything I had tasted at the time and I will never forget it.