For Sean Wainer, country manager at CheckPoint South Africa, falling in love with food was inevitable. His father owned a delicatessen in Sandton, which meant there was always delicious, high-quality food in the Wainer household. It was an ideal playground for a budding chef's culinary skills to grow.

"All my cooking to date is self-taught. But, a few years ago, my wife booked me on a course for one-on-one lessons with a professional chef. I asked to learn basic, yet difficult skills, like de-boning a chicken. On my last lesson, I cooked in a professional kitchen for 12 of my friends. It was great fun." Wainer really enjoys preparing meals for friends and always takes some of his gear along when cooking at a friend's house. "Most people don't have a decent set of knives in their kitchen. And if they do, they're usually blunt. So I always take a set of knives and a sharpener with me." He does this, he says, despite his wife's protests - she thinks it horribly rude to walk into someone else's kitchen and start sharpening their knives.