Michel Roux's Service: 'I don't smell grapes or oak or nuffink. I just smell alcohol.'

I always thought waiting was bloody hard work. I've had a few waiting jobs in my time and I'm not fond of it. Here are just some of the things I dislike about it: I can't hold the plates correctly, I have clumsily dropped trays full of drinks, I am rubbish at wines, restaurant customers can be so rude and mainly, I just don't care. Herein lies the difference between myself and the students in Michel Roux's Service. A group of 8 young folks have been selected to take part in a training programme which will allow two of them to win a scholarship to the Academy of Food and Wine. 'Eh, what was that Suzanne? There's an academy that teaches you to waiter?' Well, according to Michel there is. 'A school for putting plates down and writing 'lasagna' on a note pad?' Apparently so. I mean, I've done the serving bit and the eating in restaurants bit and let me tell you, for all my failings, I got pretty decent tips. And it was all because I was pleasant to the customers, they like that you know. And that's all I'm bothered about when I go to a restaurant, after all everyone makes mistakes and as long as they apologise and sort it out in a nice manner then I'm no fussed.

The saving grace of this programme seems to be Michel Roux's ability to build the students self-confidence by, yes, you guessed it, BEING NICE. Take note Ramsey. Here is a decent, successful guy that these kids aren't intimidated by. When he catches them all messing about when they're supposed to be learning their menus for service, he talks to them reasonably and they get on with it. No one needs to be upset, you'd never get anything done if you go about upsetting people. A life lesson for us all - don't be a dick.

Roux's students do have something going for them, personality. They're not the Michelin star cookie-cutter waiting staff who place plates in front of diners and slip away like 'ghosts'. Nikkita, for instance, blows apart the pretence of wine-snobbery when smelling the wines, 'I don't smell grapes or oak or nuffink. I just smell alcohol.' I like this girl. The students might not be able to pronounce 'prosecco' or open a bottle of wine correctly but they have a laugh about it and don't take it so seriously; after all, it's only dinner.