Opemifolua Tejuoso, a lawyer, is the Creative Director of Opindos Bakery, who recently established a Chef School having being in the kitchen industry for about two decades. In a chat with Senior Reporter, ANTHONIA SOYINGBE, she spoke on her passion for cooking, how are grandmother influenced her culinary skills, her Muse method of cooking, among other issues.
Tejuoso
At what point did you decide to establish a cookery school and what influenced your decision in this regard?
I have run a catering business, called Opinions Limited, for about 17 years now. We do both catering and cakes. Some of my clients over the years brought some young ladies to me who had challenges in their marriages because they could not cook. So, I had to do some form of training for them. These are people between the ages of 22 and 25 then. It was like a referral. What I had was my catering and baking business. So, it was either they come to my house where I teach them one-on-one, or they would join us in the bakery, which was not always convenient. Some times, when they came to my house, their classes used to clash with my personal life. Also, when they came to the bakery, their programme used to clash with our orders and time of delivery. So, I thought of setting up a separate place where that would be the focus. Where you come in and register, we teach you with a syllabus. The people that came earlier wanted to go into the kitchen industry. After a while, because it was interfering with our work, I stopped taking them. But the phone calls did not stop. When I refused, people thought that I was hoarding my knowledge. But, it was not so. It was due to the inconvenience of combining their training preogramme with meeting our clients’ deadlines. It just did not work. So, every year, I got so many phone calls from people asking me to train them. If such people are young ones or brides, who had no plans to go into business we did it informally. For those going into business, since I had to teach them with the best of my ability and since my structure at that time was not geared towards that, I could not accept to handle their training programmes. I would not take your money and at the end of the day, I would cheat you by not giving you value for your money. So, I did not admit people, except those who needed help, whose husbands were about to kick out due to lack of cooking skills. Such people always come to my house, spend the whole of Sunday afternoon with me, during which time I teach them the basics. So it was until I decided to establish a school formally for the training programme.
Was that why you decided not to practice law?
I had a law degree first. But, I did not go to Law School then because it was moved to Abuja and I could not move to Abuja at that time. I just had a baby and I did not want to be travelling up and down with a little child. So, I decided to put on hold the Law School programme. I was then thinking of what to do. I always had small cook jobs while in school. I saw an advert in a cookery school in London, the world’s famous Leith’s School of Food and Wine, and that was an option for me because I could take my child along with me and my husband was on holiday. When he agreed to baby-sit, I thought that would be easier than going to Law School then, but it wasn’t. It actually turned out to be one of the toughest time of my life and toughest examinations I had in any catering school I attended. That was how the catering thing came up and I started my business soon after. In the course of starting my business, I also worked at Eko Hotel, Victoria Island, Lagos, for about a year, to gain practical experience. I later faced my business proper. After a while, when the Law School returned to Lagos, I also returned to the school and got my LLB.
My law programme was just for two years and it was in the course of my catering career. So, I still had my business on one hand and I was going to work on the other. While I was doing the law programe, it was challenging handling both work and catering business. So, I did not take any students at that time. But, prior to that, I did. After that, I also did. But they were different grades. Before the law thing, it was people who wanted to start catering business and after the law thing, it was bride and children, who wanted to learn how to cook.
Can you share with us how you acquired your culinary skills?
I got my entrepreneurial and culinary skills as a cook from grandmother. I started cooking at the age of six and the bulk of what I know about cooking, I learnt form my grandmother. As a little girl, my grandmother would sit in her room and give instructions on how to cook. Gradually, I started cooking on myself. The beauty of it was that weather I did it well or not, she would always eat my food. After eating, then she would say, ‘You should have done this or that’. I could remember my amala classes then. She showed me how to do it and I think I tried it the first time and the lumps were something else. I just did not get it right. So, I decided to play a trick on her. The house behind us then belonged to my uncle and he had a house help, Rafi, who always helped me to prepare amala whenever I was told to do so. I had done that for months until a day my grandmother wanted to eat amala and Rafi had taken her off duty. There was no Rafi to help make amala. That day, was determined to do it myself. At the end, she told me that I had really improved. In her commendation, she said, “This is the best meal you have ever made”. So, I thought that I was even better than Rafi. Since then, my amala has no comparism.
What is unique about the Muse method of cooking?
Over the years, being a cook and a caterer, I have been looking for the quickest method available. Being a cook and a woman, my husband calls suddenly every now and then and says he is coming home for dinner and that he is coming with 10 people. You know, his office is not too far from the house. Yes you can cook Jollof rice; but, how can you cook it faster? So, we have devised methods over the years that are quick without compromising on quality of food. The Muse method is focused on the quality of the food and hygiene.
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