Top UK chef Antony Worrall Thompson may be the surprise ingredient at this year?s Bermuda Culinary Festival.

Bermuda Tourism?s UK agency, Hills Balfour, is hoping the restauranteur and celebrity chef will be headlining at the event in November.

And, if the deal comes off, they are anticipating his backing for the festival, both in Bermuda and in the UK, will drive up bookings from British visitors towards the end of the year.

Hills Balfour PR director Jonathan Sloan said they had put together a shortlist of celebrity chefs and one of the likely candidates was Worrall Thompson.

?We would be looking at holding a number of consumer evenings here in the UK with Anthony as the celebrity guest; to tell potential visitors more about Bermuda and the Culinary Festival, with a view to them visiting Bermuda,? he said.

?Antony would then attend the Culinary Festival in November as the UK representative for the event.?

Worrall Thompson, who has won the coveted Mouton Rothschild Menu competition and the Meilleur Ouvrier de Grande Bretagne (MOGB) ? the chef?s Oscar, opened his first restaurant in London in 1981. It was famous for only serving starters and desserts.

More recently he opened the Notting Grill in London?s Holland Park and is a regular on British TV cookery shows. He can also claim to have swum the English Channel at 16.

The use of celebrities is an integral part of the Hills Balfour marketing strategy, and they are also hoping British fashion designer Sadie Frost and socialite Jemima French will ?take? a Bermuda vacation this summer to generate coverage in UK glossy magazines.

In addition, they are also hoping top British DJ Trevor Nelson will make an appearance at the Bermuda Music Festival in October.

Nelson, who was the DJ at the Bermuda tourism UK launch in February, is known as the ?unchallenged impresario of British R&B?.

His Radio 1 show now goes out twice a week across the UK and over the net. He also hosts a show on MTV and was one of the original DJs on the popular Kiss FM station.

Meanwhile, Hills Balfour has reported a 400 percent increase in calls to their call centres and a big rise in referrals from the Bermuda Tourism website.

Mr. Sloan said much of the interest had come following a number of events in Britain, building on the ?buzz? created by the launch party in February.

In May, Bermuda was mixing with royalty when they hosted a party at the prestigious Kuoni World Class Polo Cup which had Prince Charles in one of the teams.

They also collaborated with Universal Pictures, running a competition to win a Bermuda vacation hooked on the launch of the DVD of the film Love Actually.

Hills Balfour?s use of celebrities is part of a drive to gain ?1 million of ?free? PR coverage in UK quality newspapers and magazines.

In addition, they have added several new tour operators to promote the Island, including Virgin Holidays, Caribbean Collection, Titan Travel and Sunset Faraway Holidays. Another operator, Elite Vacations, has just launched a dedicated Bermuda brochure.