An afternoon with Inge Anda - the celebrity chef from Stavanger!

As I sat down on a comfortable chair overlooking the small hidden garden in the backyard, Inge brewed some fresh coffee for me in the kitchen. I had just walked in feeling cold after walking through light Stavanger rains, but I already felt at home here. As Inge brewed coffee, I looked around and tried to soak in the atmosphere of the house. This visit to an old house of Gamle Stavanger was special and I wanted to make the most of it. But there is a short story behind how I was sitting inside a few hundred years old house and waiting for coffee brewed by none other than Stavanger's very own celebrity chef - Inge Anda.

Hello Inge Anda :)

Old houses draw me like nothing else, especially when they are still being used as living spaces. There is some magic about them that's impossible to express in words and can only be experienced in person. With these thoughts in my mind I walked one cold early morning in Gamle Stavanger, hoping to not just explore the houses but also stories connected with them. I had conveniently forgotten that I wasn't in India and knocking on someone's door uninvited was highly inappropriate, so I walked for a long, accosted by a cat, took many pictures, but felt the visit was incomplete. What's a visit to old town if you can't even meet and talk to the people who lived there? In my opinion nothing much...

I came back and immediately pinged my saviour in such cases, TI, and asked him for help. Somehow I assumed that being a local he would certainly know someone living in those few old houses - someone who would also be willing to invite me over and have a chat with me too! Well as it turned out, TI set the wheels of my karma in motion and soon enough found someone who would actually be happy to have me over. And this was none other than Inge Anda. I called him up immediately and made an appointment for an early evening chat at his place later in the week.

And that's how I ended up sipping hot coffee and binging on chef's own handmade chocolates.

The lovely large mirror on the wall...

Just like most other meetings, I had absolutely no agenda and was just looking forward to knowing a true Stavanger local well and maybe sharing his story with the world. Inge is a rather famous chef but food was something we barely talked about, except of course his love for baking.

He grew up in a small farm outside Stavanger and very early in the life he knew that he wanted to be a chef. While is brothers helped their father do the farm work, he preferred spending time in the kitchen with his mother and cooking food. He never thought of anything else but becoming a chef and this wasn't at all a challenge for him. He studied at Norse Hotellhøgskole and very quickly went up the ladder of success.

The hidden little garden :)

Inge didn't just live the house, he knew quite a bit about the history of the house as well. The house had two different parts which were constructed in the year 1839 and then in 1854. Later these were combined in 1990 into the present day house. Owning a house in Old Stavanger is not like living anywhere else and when you buy a house you get a plan of regulation - there is regulation on colour of the house, colour of the door and what all modifications you can do in the house.

As Inge showed me pictures of his house in other books, he also told me about how he came out to his family as a gay man. It surprised me a little but even he was a bit afraid and apprehensive to tell his parents about his life. He tackled this very smartly though. Being a famous chef he was interviewed for a book on Stavanger and he talked about his sexuality there. So he decided to simply ship a copy of this book to his parents over Christmas :) Of course, the family accepted him as he was and even welcomed his partner home.

An old article in the magazine...

His house over the years...

Now Inge specializes in wedding menus and wedding supplies and has cooked for more than a hundred weddings over the past three years. He also organises cooking classes for executives in organisations - cooking food together can be a truly wonderful team-buildings exercise. With his good nature and humour, I can totally imagine him doing a great job - in fact, someday I too would love to attend such a class under him :)

We talked about many more things, especially his passion for travel. His travel experiences put mine to shame, but also inspired me more. He travels for leisure as well as for work. A while back he spent days exploring the chocolate shops of NYC as he wanted to open a chocolate shop here in Stavanger too. The economic downturn put a stop to his immediate plans to have his own shop, but he makes his own signature chocolates which can bought at other shops. I do hope he gets to start his own exclusive stores soon though...

Inge Anda relaxing by the window

Here are some of the more interesting questions I asked him...

So tell me a bit more about Stavanger of today?
"Well, Stavanger was quite a successful city in Norway primarily because the oil industry is located here. However, last two years have been tough with the oil prices collapsing and many people losing their jobs even here. The city had so many expats, but most of them have returned back home.

The oil industry changed many things in the city, especially the influence of USA. When I was young, eating Pizaa and watching movies was a luxury, but it all came to the city with the boom in oil industry. Back then there were only two restaurants in Stavanger...things have changed so much today."

What inspires you?
"My brain works really fast and new ideas keep coming to my head all the time. So I always have a small notebook that I keep with me to capture these ideas. These ideas come as a flash out of nowhere and can simply disappear unless I capture them somehow.

Travel is another big inspiration. When I travel outside I see new things and they always inspire me. I travel to about six countries every year and they all always inspire me."

What is your dream Inge?
"Dreams depend on where in life you are. The higher you go, the more ambitious you become. Right now I am 47 and I am in good health. I dream that I could live the last ten years of my life once again and I would live them a bit differently.

When I was younger, I should not have moved to Stavanger but to a bigger city, taken more chances and made it big."

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Inge hasn't been to India and I tried my best to convince him to make a trip here. He is such an open-minded person and I feel he would love the country. From travel we moved to politics and then back again to food, and I was always impressed by his knowledge of the world affairs.

It was still raining outside and I was tempted to stay back and hear more stories, but it was time to go. Meeting Anda Inge had opened up another facet of Stavanger, and in fact Norway, which I had never quite explored before - life of its people. I am sure my next visit to the city will allow me to explore its people much more.

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Oh by the way, this is a part of my mini-series, #StavangerDiaries - tiny stories of daily life from the Oil capital of Norway, Stavanger. And what am I doing here? Well, mostly working, but also collecting these snippets of life.