Award winning chef Hrvoje ‘Harvey’ Loncarevic has been appointed Executive Chef at Ashdown Park in July 2010. He moved to Ashdown Park from one of its sister hotels, the five-star Grand in Eastbourne, where he was promoted four times in five years to become deputy to the hotel’s Executive Chef.

During his career at the Grand Croatian-born Harvey won gold and bronze awards in the 2007 Wessex Salon Culinaire at the annual Hotel & Catering Show, the country’s largest regional hospitality trade show. He then won the 2008 Escoffier Challenge, run by the leading professional culinary organisation the Association Culinaire Francaise, after creating a meal from a surprise basket of five key ingredients. As a result of this win he was selected to represent the UK at a global culinary event held in Switzerland.

Harvey joined the Grand’s Mirabelle fine dining restaurant in 2002 after completing a three-year training course at the former Eastbourne College of Arts and Technology, now Sussex Downs College. He worked at the Mirabelle for three years before moved to an Eastbourne restaurant, which gained one AA Rosette within six months of opening. Harvey then moved back to the Grand as a demi chef de partie working in the Garden Restaurant.

Harvey, who is planning to enter the Knorr National Chef of the Year competition in 2011 said: “Working in the Grand’s main kitchen I was promoted four times to become Senior Sous Chef, which was a great achievement for me. To now gain the position of Executive Chef at Ashdown Park is the ultimate achievement. The hotel has an excellent name for quality and I am looking forward to building on that reputation and making my mark on the kitchen.”

With a team of 25 chefs Harvey is now responsible for Ashdown Park’s two AA Rosette Anderida Restaurant, the Fairways Lounge in the Country Club and the hotel’s banqueting, room service and public lounges.