UCB opens new restaurants to train the next generation of chefs

University College Birmingham is opening a 60-cover restaurant on Harborne High Street, as part of a £15 million programme of investment that will give its students real-world experience in professional kitchens.

The restaurant, called Brocks, will open later this year in the former Harborne Kitchen site. Students from UCB's College of Food will work across the kitchen, bar and front of house.

A £15m programme

The programme began in July with the acquisition of the former Cube Hotel and Marco Pierre White restaurant, and is expected to create more than 150 jobs across its venues. It also includes:

• Beyond, an 80-cover café, restaurant and bar opening at the Summer Row campus late this autumn;
• the refurbished Restaurant at College of Food, which reopens on Monday 12 October;
• the Cube hotel and restaurant.

Named after a teacher

Brocks is named after Richard Brocklesby, a chef lecturer at UCB from 1982 until he retired in 2024, who taught chefs including Brad Carter, Liam Dillon and the TV chef Poppy O'Toole. His speciality in butchery suits the building, which was once Walter Smiths Fine Foods butchers.

Mr Brocklesby said he was "shocked but incredibly honoured and humbled" to have the restaurant named after him.

An alumnus in charge

The head chef will be UCB graduate Matt Nicholls, who won the British Culinary Federation's Young Chef of the Year in 2018 and its Competition Chef of the Year in 2022, and has worked at Simpsons in Edgbaston and as head chef at Cheal's in Knowle. Liam Roe will be general manager.

The restaurant will have an open kitchen and bar, booths and high-top seating, and a private dining room upstairs for feasting menus. The seasonal menu will offer small plates, mains and sharing dishes. It will open for dinner on Wednesdays, lunch and dinner from Thursday to Saturday, and lunch only on Sundays.

David Cumberlidge, UCB's commercial director, said: "We're immensely proud to have our alumni, such as Matt Nicholls, return to University College Birmingham armed with the expertise they've developed since graduation to inspire the next generation of chefs."

Learning by doing

Training restaurants are a long tradition in catering education. Working real services for paying customers teaches students the speed, teamwork and standards expected in professional kitchens in a way classroom lessons cannot, and many go on to jobs with the employers they meet. Hospitality businesses across the country have struggled to recruit skilled chefs in recent years, so colleges that can supply trained staff are valued by the industry.

A food city

Birmingham's restaurant scene has grown rapidly, with several Michelin-starred restaurants and a large number of independent kitchens. UCB's College of Food has trained many of the chefs working in them, including Brad Carter and Liam Dillon, both taught by Mr Brocklesby.