A London-based chef has apologised for what his peers branded a “rude” response towards criticism, after he faced backlash online for revealing the line-up of his kitchen team at his Notting Hill restaurant. Thomas Straker, who opened his namesake restaurant Straker’s in 2022, recently shared a photograph of his “chef team” comprising eight people, including himself. All eight members of the team pictured were white and male, prompting complaints from social media users who believed it did not reflect the diversity of London. Some comments claimed Straker’s team showed how the food industry was a “white boy’s club”, while others urged the restaurateur to provide chefs from minority groups a “safe place to grow as chefs”. Straker, who found fame by sharing his recipes and cooking videos on TikTok, responded to the negative backlash by commenting: “Honestly, people need to calm down. Firstly, there is a shortage of chefs/hospitality workers. Secondly, if you feel so passionately, please go and gather CVs of any chefs you think we’re missing in the team. Solutions not problems. Thank you.” However, his response has also been criticised as “rude”, with a number of chefs and other figures in the food industry weighing in on the online storm. He has since shared an apology via his Instagram Story. “On Friday night, I put up a post of my chef team and many rightly pointed out the lack of diversity in it. I am very sorry for my initial response, where some queried whether I take this issue seriously,” he said. “I am absolutely committed to ensuring diversity in my restaurants, unfortunately we aren’t achieving this in my kitchens currently and this is an area I know I need to improve on, making sure it is seen as a welcoming and approachable environment for all. Tom x.” Becky Paskin, a drinks expert who appears regularly on ITV’S Love Your Weekend, wrote on Straker’s original post: “Too often we say, ‘We only recruit on the basis of the best people for the job’ without any consideration the role bias plays in the selection process. “It’s been proven time and again that diverse teams are more creative, productive and successful. If every member looks the same and has the same background, you’ll find they’ll all think the same as well. Forming diverse teams is not only the right thing to do, it makes business sense too.” US chef Kenji Lopez-Alt, who is known for his book The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science, added: “Get off the social media for a week or so. Do some reflection. Talk to people who care about you and who you trust. Be better.” However, some people have defended Straker’s choice to hire who he wants in his team, and pointed out the staff shortage affecting the entire restaurant industry. Henry Tilley, restaurant manager at Native in London, wrote: “The industry is on its knees right now. There [aren’t] enough chefs or even [front-of-house staff] to go around as it is. We would love some applications for chef positions in our restaurants from female or non-binary individuals. The reality of the matter is we never get the applications so can’t be as representative as we’d like.” But Ben Mulock, executive chef of Balans in Soho, says the onus is on senior chefs to “solve the problem” of lack of diversity, instead of “asking others to solve it for us”. He told The Independent: “I am a white male executive chef, so it is my responsibility to push for an inclusive workforce, be that sex, age or ethnicity. They are not mutually exclusive – they are all important. “No, it’s not easy and at the moment, it almost seems impossible to recruit, but if we don’t try, we don’t move it forward. We always need to do better for this industry, and if we can’t do it in London, where can we?” While Straker’s post was not intended to stir controversy, the lack of diversity in his team has “shone a light on the broader challenges we face in kitchens these days”, Hannah Norris of Nourish PR said. “This is a classic case of an ill thought-out post,” she told The Independent. “Thomas Straker has issued what he believed was a photo of a group of confident, strong-looking chefs ready for service but didn’t think about the optics of the image and what it represented. “Whilst it was well-meaning I believe, a picture doesn’t lie. For whatever reason, he currently has no women or people of colour in his kitchen, so it all looks a bit ‘pale, male and stale’. Perhaps the reaction to this image will make Thomas think again a bit more carefully about who he wants to employ in the future.” The Independent has contacted Straker for comment. 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Erik ten Hag was left bemoaning several decisions he felt went against his Manchester United side as they sank to a dramatic late defeat at Arsenal. Stoppage-time strikes from Declan Rice and Gabriel Jesus secured a 3-1 win for the hosts, who had equalised through Martin Odegaard just 110 seconds after Marcus Rashford had opened the scoring for United. The late double would have been even more galling for the away side as substitute Alejandro Garnacho thought he had won it with his own strike, only to see it ruled out by a close offside VAR call. That was just one of the close decisions ten Hag believes fell in Arsenal’s favour as the Red Devils slipped to a second defeat of the season in north London. The Dutchman also felt Kai Havertz should have been booked for diving after seeing a penalty award overturned by VAR and that Rice’s goal came about only because Jonny Evans had been fouled – while he called for debutant Rasmus Hojlund to have been given a spot-kick of his own. “The performance was right but the result was not on our side and definitely many decisions were against us,” he said. “Let’s start at the penalty given but rejected. Everyone can see it’s a simulation but he did not get booked for it. “Then the foul on Hojlund in the penalty area and I don’t think it was even noticed by the VAR. Then the disallowed goal from Garnacho. The performance was right but the result was not on our side and definitely many decisions were against us Erik ten Hag “I think they looked from the wrong angle and it’s onside. Then the final goal. How can they allow that? It’s a clear and obvious foul on Jonny Evans otherwise he would have blocked the shot from Declan Rice. So it’s a lot.” Despite the defeat ten Hag felt his team – without a number of injured first-team players and having also lost centre-back pairing Lisandro Martinez and Victor Lindelof to injury and illness, respectively, during the game – put in a strong showing. “I also have a good feeling because our performance was very good,” he added. “I won’t say it was perfect because there is definitely room for improvement. But if we see our compactness, pressing, moving with the ball and making the counters, very calm, we never gave Arsenal an opportunity to press us. There were a lot of positives in this game but there is still a lot to do Erik ten Hag “The next stage is we could have done that better and the movement we could have done in the right moments. There were a lot of positives in this game but there is still a lot to do.” Arsenal have now won three of their opening four games as Rice once again shone following his £105million summer move from West Ham. He topped off a fine display with the important second goal as manager Mikel Arteta hailed the influence of the England midfielder. “I think, a tremendous performance,” he said. “When you look at how a holding midfielder needs to dominate his area, how he needs to break up play, how he glided the team together when they were stretched a bit. “Then he produced a magic moment to win us the game, so, (I’m) really happy with him. “He’s a great kid. I think he’s got a good mixture between being extremely demanding with everybody and himself, having a bit of banter and being around the staff and the boys in a really humble way. So I think he’s fitting in brilliantly.” Read More Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live They really outplayed us – Jos Buttler credits New Zealand after England mauling Rugby codes unite with tributes for David Watkins Wolves claim player subjected to discriminatory abuse during Crystal Palace loss

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We could shoot lasers at the lunar soil to help us live on the Moon, scientists have proposed. By melting the lunar soil into a more solid, layered substance, we might be able to build paved roads and landing pads on the Moon’s surface, a new study suggests. Many space agencies including Nasa have plans to establish semi-permanent bases on the Moon, which would both allow us to better study it but also serve as a stop off on the way to Mars and elsewhere in the solar system. The Moon’s surface is a tough place t land and live, however. The dust of the soil tends to get kicked up by landers – and the low gravity means that it floats around after it is disturbed, potentially finding its way into equipment. As such, future Moon colonies may require robust roads and landing pads to allow for us to travel both to and around the Moon. But it is unlikely we would be able to transport materials to build them, given the cost of doing so, leading scientists to look at what is available there already. In the new study, scientists examined whether lunar soil could be turned into something more substantial by using lasers. And they had some success, finding that lunar dust can be melted down into a solid substance. They used a variety of different sized and types of lasers to see what they would produce. The best used a 45 millimetre diameter laser beam to make hollow triangular shapes that were about 250 millimetres in size. Those pieces could be locked together to create solid surfaces that could be placed across the Moon’s surface, they suggest, and then used as roads and landing pads. On the Moon, the same approach would require a lens of around 2.37 metres squared, which would have to be transported from Earth. That could then be used to concentrate sunlight, rather than using a laser, and so allow the material to be created with relatively small equipment. The plan is reported in a new journal article, ‘Laser melting manufacturing of large elements of lunar regolith simulant for paving on the Moon’, published in Scientific Reports. Read More Nasa opens up pieces of a distant asteroid transported back to Earth Earth hit by a huge solar storm that would devastate civilisation, trees show Incels using TikTok to spread ‘hateful beliefs’, research suggests