Food & Drink Expert

Steven Kiernan

Steven is currently Head Chef at River Cottage HQ, where he manages the River Cottage restaurant, plans seasonal River Cottage specials for the menu and teaches cooking lessons in the River Cottage school.

Steven started his career as a Junior Sous Chef at Bank restaurant where he specialised in fish, before moving to Jamie Oliver's Fifteen Trattoria kitchen.

At Jamie's Steven trained the junior chefs in all areas of kitchen skills and he developed a love of making pasta from scratch, by hand and using his trusty (and much loved) pasta machine.

Steven later moved to Gordon Ramsay's Bread Street Kitchen as Senior Sous Chef where he managed the very busy kitchen and developed recipes, working alongside suppliers to make the best possible dishes from the freshest produce.

Steven's passion for fresh local ingredients led him to set up his own restaurant in Taunton, before moving to River Cottage HQ.

His love of pasta has grown over the years and he now loves passing on his pasta skills and recipes to River Cottage visitors and now River Cottage Diploma students.

Frequently asked questions

What’s the difference between PEER and EXPERT options?

At Peer and Expert level, you get access to the same core content and features:

  • Video lesson tutorials led by your expert tutor
  • Downloadable lesson notes
  • Option to practise what you learn with lesson assignments
  • Group learning within an online interactive classroom of up to 20 classmates
  • Lifetime access to videos, notes and classroom

If you choose Expert level, you get all of the above plus the following:

  • Personalised assignment feedback and coaching from your expert tutor
  • Opportunity to interact with your expert tutor through a private messaging system
  • Certificate of completion.
What is an online classroom?

Our online classroom has been developed to allow you to learn from our experts in a sociable environment alongside up to 20 other students. After each video tutorial led by your expert, you will be encouraged to practice what you have learned with optional assignments - these can be seen by the other students in your class, who are free to share their own thoughts and questions with you.

You will be encouraged to take part in an ongoing class discussion where you can discuss ideas, post images or work, and comment on each other’s assignments. It’s a great way to learn from other like-minded people who share your passion from all over the world.

This means not only do you benefit from people who are outstanding in their field, but also from a close-knit group of like-minded people whom you can learn alongside. Group learning has shown to greatly improve not just the experience of studying, but also how well you retain the knowledge, and we have built our classroom experience around this fact.

When can I start my course and how long will it take?

You can start your course any time within 12 months after receipt of your purchase confirmation email. Once you start, you’ll have lifetime access — meaning you can revisit the lesson videos and notes whenever you want.

Our courses are designed so that you can study at your own pace, some prefer to binge learn while others like to spread their studying over a longer period of time - it’s completely up to you. To give you a rough time frame, each lesson video is approximately 30-40 minutes long, and we recommend that you spend around an hour on each assignment.

How often can I speak with the Expert?

If you opt for the Expert version of your course, the time you have to interact with your tutor is limited to course length. You will have one week per lesson to chat to your tutor and to have your assignments marked, and during this period you can ask them as many questions as you would like.

To find out the length of each course, head to the product page and look at the Course outline to see how many lessons it contains. e.g. a four lesson course assumes that you will have completed the assignments within four weeks.

Your tutor interaction period will start as soon as you enter the classroom. If you find that you are struggling to complete the assignments in the allocated time or you wish to put this function on hold, just get in contact with one of the team via the support button and we will help you out.

Support and full FAQs

If you need any help with a course, be it one you’ve started already, or one you are looking to purchase, please don’t hesitate to reach out to our Support email address, or view the full FAQ’s here.

You can also use the orange speech bubble on your page to start a conversation with us.

For privacy or data questions, please contact us here.

Awards & accreditiations