Dimo Valev works as Marketing Manager at Media Cast in Dubai Media City. He is born in Bulgaria, in the early seventies, where he has completed the Academy of Art in Sofia. As many Bulgarian people, Dimo is fluent in few languages, in particular: English, French, Bulgarian and Russian. Apart from his job, he enjoys cooking, traveling, painting, playing chess and spending time with his family. As he is an interesting and inspirational resident of Dubai, Dubai Chronicle would like to reveal some details of his personal life.
Q. What is your personal style signifier?
We live in an extremely dynamic world where everything changes day by day. In this environment it is not easy and not right to be bound to only one style or philosophy, or form, or even culture! We have to be flexible, evolve, and always look for more so this is what I am. I will try all techniques in painting, all styles in poetry, all practises in cuisine, same is valid for my music preferences – completely cosmopolitan. I am a real citizen of Dubai, am I not?
Q. You are famous in your circles as the “next celebrity chef, would you like such status? Would you like to be famous for the very same thing that you love to do?
To be honest with you, at the moment this is one of my very few real pleasures; I like being chef because I can immediately see the result of my hard work! All you need is to see the smile on your guests’ face, the smile of their eyes can’t lie, you know! This is all I need. I never cook for myself. If I am alone, I will cut some cheese and salami, open a nice bottle of Italian wine, and that’s it.
Cooking is a shared pleasure, dedicated to all the nice people around me and my family, friends and friends of the friends – who really deserve this very special kind of attention.
I like this status, of course, it means I succeeded in my tasks. Be famous for it? Why not, it is one of my dreams! David Ogilvy started his career as chef before he became the World’s #1 Ad man, I could do things the other way around.
Q. What is last dish/food you have prepared? Did anyone help you? What were your guests’ comments?
It was one of the classics of the French cuisine as Asparagus sauce Hollandaise. It is the first time I cooked it myself, it was quite successful indeed. The comments? Empty plates, smiles, questions about the recipes – the usual stuff.
Q. What one can find always in your fridge?
Truffle butter, 3-4 types of French and Italian salamis and cheese, a bottle of red and a bottle of white wine. With this I can royally welcome any unexpected guest, at any time. For the expected guests I have to cook, no doubt.
Q. We know you are frequently attending cooking classes and seminars, how do you keep your self-informed about it? Where do you search for information, listings?
Well, being more or less a child of the Internet era, I always use Google as my first research spot. Internet is also a priceless (and free) resource for learning cooking techniques, and I use it all the time to enrich my knowledge and improve my skills.
I rely a lot on my friends and contacts around Dubai too, all the nice hotels and restaurants we have visited here, but also on the quirk of fate. And I am quite lucky: this is how I discovered the cooking classes of Chef Marco in Mezzaluna, Intercontinental at Festival City.
Q. What was the last thing that you have bought and you love it?
My 17-inch MacBook Pro. And I strongly recommend this experience to every single person on Earth. Life has different colour with this amazing all-in-one computer, and everything is much easier with it: I read with it, work with it, listen music and watch movies, edit videos, fix my photos… my 3 years old son started learning music with it, isn’t it amazing?
Q. Do you have in mind something that you would like to buy?
Yes, and it is at the moment completely out of reach: The Cuisine Diploma classes at Le Cordon Bleu, Paris.
To be continued in Part 2…
Exclusive interview by Gergana Mineva
