Chef Emmanuel Stroobant branches out to creating healthy meals for patients in Alexandra Hospital

At 40, chef Emmanuel Stroobant received a sobering wake-up call. His cholesterol was “very high” — a result of drinking, smoking and working long, rigorous hours as the chef-owner of two-Michelin-starred contemporary French restaurant, Saint Pierre. It also didn’t help that his family had a history of succumbing to cardiovascular diseases.

Taking matters into his own hands, the Belgium-born chef decided to turn vegetarian and has not looked back since. Cutting a fit and toned figure at 57, the avid yoga practitioner reflects: “It is always good to get an alarm call and react before getting hit.” The incident sparked a perennial interest in health and wellness. Over the years, Stroobant has given talks to various organisations, branched out to creating healthier meals in schools, and more recently, developed meals for hospital patients. 

Stroobant, who also runs the two-starred Edomae sushiya, Shoukouwa, was recently announced as the culinary advisor at Alexandra Hospital, where he designs meals for patients in the 326-bed public hospital. The “Featured Chef Menu”, which is part of the hospital’s regular dining programme, was rolled out on July 1. It comprises 12 wholesome dishes that span three cuisines: Asian, Chinese, and Western. 

Western dishes include chicken provencal, a braised chicken dish with olive oil, tomatoes and basil, layered ratatouille, and honey lavender blanc-manger, a milk-based pudding. Chinese dishes include tilapia with ginger and mandarin, and steamed pear with rock sugar and goji berries. Patients can look forward to Asian dishes like grilled lemongrass chicken and steamed egg custard with goji berry. 

Alexandra Hospital’s Featured Chef Menu is available for dinner once a week at no added cost to patients and is served to those on a regular texture diet without therapeutic restrictions. 

Restaurant-style cooking techniques

The collaboration serves as a way for Alexandra Hospital to enhance its dining experience for patients. Its food services team also wanted to tap on Stroobant’s over 25 years of experience of running restaurants and combining healthier cooking techniques with therapeutic nutrition. He showed how cooking techniques and processes in restaurants, where the texture, temperature and flavour of food are thoughtfully considered, can be scaled up in a hospital setting. 

The Featured Chef Menu incorporates healthier cooking methods such as steaming and roasting and uses less salt and more herbs. Stroobant believes that through wholesome and flavourful food, the recovery journey of patients can be improved.

Stroobant, who is a long-time vegetarian for health reasons, says: “I’ve always had an interest in nutrition and how it impacts the body. The general perception of hospital food is not very good, but mealtime is one of the few things that patients can look forward to during their stays and the dining experience can be enhanced.”

The Belgium-born chef, who has lived in Singapore for over 20 years, also runs Mycelium Catering, which manages canteens in several international schools, was first in touch with Alexandra Hospital to discuss a potential shop space for his catering business. Talks later morphed into developing a hospital menu.

Over the past seven months, Stroobant has been working with the hospital’s dieticians and nutritionists to finetune his recipes that adhere to nutritional guidelines. His brief? To come up with dishes have to be Halal and low in salt and fat, among other nutritional requirements. He also trains the hospital’s team of over 20 chefs to execute the recipes.

Chef Kenneth Francisco, assistant director of group hospitality and head of food services at Alexandra Hospital says: “Through this collaboration, the culinary team at Alexandra Hospital aims to raise the standard of hospital cuisine by focusing on local ingredients, refined modern and classic cooking methods, enhancing natural flavours and maximising nutritional value.” 

Enlivening dishes with natural ingredients

One of the key areas Stroobant has introduced to the hospital’s food services team is looking at ways of enlivening the flavours of dishes with natural ingredients. 

For example, the tilapia with ginger and mandarin orange is served without soy sauce. To inject a dash of umami, he adopted kombujime, a Japanese technique of enhancing the taste of sashimi through aging it in between sheets of kelp.

He explains: “By rubbing the fish with kombu, glutamate is transferred to the fish that adds umami without relying on salt.” The use of citrus zest is also a good replacement for salt, he adds. Similarly, lemon zest is added to chicken provencal, which he says that the slight lift of acidity has the same taste effect as a light sprinkling of salt. 

He also uses dehydrated mushrooms, seaweed and slow-cooked vegetable broths to build depth of flavour in dishes while reducing sodium content.

Francisco adds that working with Stroobant has enlightened his team with inventive ways of meal preparation. An example is using the ‘heated marination’ technique, where proteins such as chicken and fish are first seared with fresh tomatoes, olives and garlic in olive oil, till the flavours are released. Then, the cooked meat and fish are swiftly vacuum-packed while they are still hot, before being baked in an oven.

He says: “This additional step ensures that the flavours of the fresh seasonings are infused into the meat and the subsequent oven-baking releases the natural juices, such that no additional heavy sauces are needed to dress the protein – patients get to taste the ingredients in its most natural form.”

Empowering hospital chefs

Besides developing a hospital menu, Stroobant has conducted training sessions for Alexandra Hospital’s chefs to equip them with professional culinary skills. The sessions cover precision cooking techniques through the use of sous-vide machines and combi-ovens, reducing waste through nose-to-tail butchery and making last-minute food substitutions, such as swapping dairy with almond milk for lactose-intolerant patients. 

Stroobant, who has spoken at culinary and health-related conferences, has also conducted workshops for Alexandra Hospital staff on incorporating healthier cooking methods at home. 

 Saint Pierre turns 25

One of the earliest French fine dining restaurants in Singapore, Saint Pierre, will mark its silver jubilee on December 8. The stalwart fine dining restaurant opened in Central Mall in 2000, before the arrival of celebrity chefs at integrated resorts and the Michelin Guide. Its chef-owner, Emmanuel Stroobant, says: “We started with classic dishes like duck confit, foie gras and miso cod, but the dining scene has evolved so much that these would be considered basic brasserie dishes today.” 

Having been immersed in Asian culture, his dishes now carry Asian ingredients and accents, and use little cream and milk. Recent dishes in Saint Pierre’s “Grand Opulence” menu include Shizuoka king crab with green curry and borlotti beans, and challan duck with braised winter melon, water chestnut and goji berries. 

Saint Pierre will celebrate the milestone with a series of dining events in the lead-up to December 8. Stroobant plans to bring back some of his erstwhile signature dishes in a 25th anniversary menu, such as pan-fried foie gras with caramelised apples and a flourless chocolate cake, which is very close to his heart. He says: “It was my grandmother’s recipe. She didn’t want to give me the recipe when I had my restaurant in Belgium, so that she would bring the cakes there every day. She finally shared the recipe when I moved overseas.”