Aktar Islam, chef owner, Opheem: Having two Michelin stars ‘important’ for Birmingham

For Aktar Islam, achieving two Michelin stars at Opheem was far more than a personal achievement. It was recognition and a success for the whole of Birmingham.

Aktar, born in Aston to Bangladeshi parents, is a proud Brummie and has always strived to push himself to reach new heights.

Leaving school at 13, Aktar quickly found himself in a kitchen setting, releasing cookbooks and DVDs, before having televised success in Gordon Ramsay’s The F Word and then Great British Menu in 2010 and 2011 respectively.

Aktar, who previously also ran Italian restaurant Legna and Argentine-inspired steakhouse Pulperia, has seen his 2018 venture Opheem go from strength to strength.

Achieving its first Michelin star in 2019, Opheem this year won its second star, making it one of only two Indian restaurants in the UK to hold such an accolade.

PROUD OF HIS ROOTS

Aktar says the design throughout Opheem is representative of Birmingham and the Jewellery Quarter, the area of the city in which the restaurant is based.

In terms of the food itself, much of the menu features cooking over coals, to emulate the style of cuisine Opheem is aiming to represent.

“Opheem is a culmination of my life experiences and my relationship with food,” explains Aktar.

“It’s a representation of my personality, when it comes to putting a plate of food together that represents and respects the seasons and producers here. What comes out of our land and our seas and our farms.

“At the same time, paying homage to my culinary heritage, which comes from my parents. It’s something I feel very proud of.

“My career started off in mainstream curry restaurants. There was nothing wrong with it, it is what it is, but I felt I had more to give. That’s what we do at Opheem.

“It is basically taking the best of British produce, giving it as much love as we can and, at the same time, taking influences from India and the entire subcontinent and cultures that have sprouted from that. And we also look back in time and take historical references in order to create food and menus that are totally unique to us.”

He added: “When Opheem was announced as Birmingham’s first ever and only two Michelin-starred restaurant and one of two Indian restaurants in the country to ever achieve this accolade and recognition, it was absolutely incredible. Every single member of the team was in tears.

“We then started to realise this achievement is not just for us, but how important it was for the city. And everyone in the city realised how important it was for our city collectively. It was lovely to see the support and congratulations come from members of the general public, whether they were diners here or not. People were just coming in to say thank you and well done, which was so heartwarming and really touching.

“What having two stars has done is it has spread the news far and wide. As a restaurant we’ve always been very popular, but now we’re very popular internationally. We are seeing guests who normally wouldn’t come and visit our beautiful city.

“They come here and dine with us, but they’ve also booked a hotel, are going to have lunch with someone else before they go, whilst they’re here they’ll have a drink somewhere, have coffee somewhere and do a bit of shopping. It has a massive effect on the ecosystem that surrounds us. It’s not just Opheem that sees benefit from it and me and my team, it’s the city far and wide.

“Our hospitality scene is absolutely amazing and anything we can do to shine light on that, it’s something that’s really important for me.

“I thank Michelin for supporting our city, not just me. It’s had a massive positive effect.”

Reflecting on his early beginnings in hospitality, Aktar said: “My career started when I was 13 years old. I got kicked out of school, which I wasn’t too unhappy about, to be honest. I decided the world of academia wasn’t for me.

“I got myself into a kitchen, I found myself in a very happy place. It was hard work and hard work became my best friend. I looked forward to it and I still look forward to it.

“It’s a story that resonates with many from immigrant backgrounds. My parents came over from Bangladesh when they were about nine, so still had that immigrant mentality as they were growing up - hard work was basically your route and avenue out of poverty.

“That’s something I grew up with. I saw my father and mother work incredibly hard. It was important I continued in that vein.”

INDUSTRY STRUGGLES

While things are going well at Opheem, Aktar outlined the struggles he and others in the industry have recently faced.

“One of the positive things that came out of lockdown was it actually gave the general public a true insight into what life in hospitality is about – the financial side of things,” he explained.

“People see fine dining tasting menus, look at the price and think ‘these guys must be making millions’. But you’ve got margins as little as 3-7% on average from hospitality and the reality that 40-45% of it goes on various forms of taxation. So people started to realise, actually, that’s not the case.

“Sadly, that hasn’t translated its way into the mind of the government. They look at hospitality as an easy cash cow to continue squeezing. That’s why we see ourselves in a situation where hospitality as an industry is seeing so many casualties. Some household names disappearing because it’s no longer viable to keep that dream alive. That’s down to all the mitigating factors – taxation, cost of ingredients, cost of energy.

“Even myself, I had a conversation with my accountant for my last financial year. He said you’d have been better off giving everyone a tenner and having them walk on, because on our food we were actually losing £15 per cover.  I’m in the fortunate position where I could take that hit, but not everyone is in that position.

“Hospitality 20 years ago was quite a lucrative business to be in. Sadly, today it’s not. Anyone still operating today, especially on the independent scene, they’re there purely out of love for what they do and what they want to share with everyone. It’s not because they’re going to retire on it. It's such a shame.”

Looking to the future, Aktar said: “The past six years have been absolutely mental. There were massive hurdles we had to navigate our way around. I feel that’s made us stronger and more resilient.

“My mantra is very simple. You wake up every morning and you make a promise to yourself ‘you’re going to be the best you can be’. The entire team all have the understanding. But we also finish off with ‘tomorrow we’re going to wake up and we’re going to be better’.

“The journey for Opheem, it’s always about looking forward, continuing to develop.”