What I have, I share

What I have, I share. If not now, when? This page starts from that question.

What I know was given to me, by mentors I honour privately and by twelve years with the luxury houses that shaped how I think about a brand. It is not mine to keep. For me, teaching is a way of conserving things: indigenous gastronomy, the craft of building a brand, and the cultural heritage that runs through both.

It is also a way of recognising people. Some cooks have more real experience than the certificate route would ever give them, and never had the chance to be certified. They deserve a place in the classroom, and recognition for what they already know.

The trade rarely teaches its people how to build and market an identity of their own, and I can. I have spent my working life between East and West, between old techniques and new ones. Teaching is how I hand that crossing on.

Where I teach

I teach at Taylor’s Culinary Institute, part of Taylor’s University. I began there in 2021, and since June 2026 I have been Adjunct Professor for the 2026 to 2028 term. Most of the teaching happens at Truffles Restaurant on campus. The work covers lectures in kitchen theory and practice on the undergraduate programmes, a hand in curriculum design and in how students are assessed, short courses and public seminars, and the links between the school and the industry. The Taylor’s page sets out the role, the three ways I teach and the dinner the students cooked for royal and diplomatic guests in December 2023.

What drew me to TCI is that the institution believes in the same continuing professional pathway I do. There is a programme for practitioners whose industry experience deserves formal recognition, regardless of whether the certified pathway was open to them in their early years. That conviction, that experience earned in the kitchen counts as scholarship, is the partnership’s foundation, and mine.

Knowledge before technique

At its best, a classroom is where a student starts to see why a technique is right, as well as how to do it.

One student kept failing. He had taken in the curriculum as a list of techniques, with no sense of why they were the right ones. Kitchens train by watching and copying. That is necessary, and it is only a start. A dish with no knowledge behind it is forgotten as soon as the plate is cleared. So I talked to him about the difference between a cook who understands the reason behind every gesture and a hand that has only watched. The cook who understands can put that understanding on the plate, and the diner feels it. That is when a dish is remembered.

Tenacity got him through. It has got me through too, and it is one of the few things I inherited that I trust.

What I will not teach

I don’t teach shortcuts, to recipes or to techniques, and I have no patience for laziness. I do encourage failure, the kind that comes from trying hard. I encourage students to discover things for themselves, and to let the hand find what a book cannot teach it.

Practice is the mother of all skills, as long as it is done wisely and with attention, and with the knowledge kept alongside the hand. That is what I ask of a student. It is also what teaching asks of me.

Mentees as friends

My mentees become friends. They talk to me about more than the kitchen: hard seasons, uncertain decisions, the doubts that come to anyone serious about a craft. I tell them mine. At its deepest, teaching is less about a syllabus than about keeping each other company when the load is heavy.

Master Jeff Chew once reminded me to be resolute, and to be ready to change course when things turn unpredictable. That is what I try to pass on: steady for the day’s work, and willing to bend when the day asks for it.

Questions answered

Is there a route for experienced cooks without formal qualifications?

Yes. Taylor’s Culinary Institute runs a continuing professional programme for practitioners whose industry experience deserves formal recognition, whether or not the certified pathway was open to them in their early years.

How can a school, programme or kitchen work with James Won on teaching?

Write to connect@chefjameswon.com and tell me about the people you train.