On The Line a chefs path Part 1 My Story into the unknown.

Chefs are indeed a very rare breed. I joined the ranks of the kitchen 15 years ago and still have a raging passion for my job even though I have moved across so many sections, areas, lines, kitchens, operations and countries. So why and how do us chefs do what we do? We Put our bodies through long hard shifts in hot heated and fast services. You may very well ask that and move straight to the normal stereotype of all chefs being alcoholics, junkies, hooligans and bad tempered. I though ask you to think again because to be quit honest with you the kitchen rocks and it definitely is a rewarding place to be.

I am in this industry for my love of the technical side, the well planned logistical element of commanding a kitchen that is pumping 900 covers a day in a very tricky environment over 30 floors up from ground level. When you are getting it right table after table its the nicest feeling in the world. The things that never change will and will always be the long lasting rivalry between floor and kitchen always being able to get one over the floor in a nice political way is awesome. In my kitchen we do not shout or insult each other, we do not throw things in an angry manor at each other or burn each other with scalding hot pans. All I ask for in a kitchen is pure concentration, communication and PASSION. Passion is the most important ingredient to being a chef but this is in my opinion also the same in other careers, you need to choose what you want, then embrace this passion and devote yourself to achieving the success in what you have chosen. This of course by all means is not easy, I have had to bite my tongue, reign in my ego, remove all of the chips from my shoulders and have had to learn skill of leaving any private life baggage at the door.

I stumbled into the kitchen in march 2001 and was a KP (kitchen porter) in a pub that would do up to 150 covers on a Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Monday to Thursday would be fairly quiet, Tuesdays, Saturdays and Sundays were the ones I hated the most. You may think that if there are a few days of a working week that were horrible why do it? Well back then I did not see it in the same way and I am now writing this in hindsight so please stick with me. Tuesdays, they were horrible, it was weekly pension day and special OAP offers, they flooded in check after check of fish n chips, pie and chips, rissoles and the head chef, what a dick he was. He was your typical bully somebody who would show off, put you down and would set you up as the clown for his amusement. I worked there for 6 months roughly and one Tuesday I came to work and had been changing the fryer oil. When you open an oil drum they have a plastic pull ring under the cap and sometimes they break and that happened to me on that tuesday. I asked the chef how to open it up he of course made a tit of me by saying how stupid am I and ranted on as usual. He then asked me in front of the sous chef, junior sous chef, chef de partie and a couple of restaurant staff what I aspired to be later in life. I answered that working in the savoy would be amazing, or in a michelin restaurant and that I dreamt of learning how to cook amazing food. He pursued to inform me in front of the to for mentioned people present that I would aspire to nothing, I was useless and would never be able to achieve any of my dreams. I was laughed at deeply though I did not say anything. My only reaction was to turn around clean my knives, pack my knives and roll them up. I proceeded to remove my apron. I turned around and said “watch me” I proceeded out of the door into the unkown. Would I ever cook or step foot in a kitchen again?

The morning after my head was hurting, my mouth was dry and vague memories of the night before appeared. I had to drag myself out of bed to find a new job in a kitchen to prove my haters so I got dressed and whilst I was brushing my teeth I had an Idea. There was a pub near by just a stones throw away from the old place where I had been working so I jumped on the bike and pedalled the five miles to the place. As it turned out they weren’t a pub at all but a restaurant which had four little rooms of say 40 pax, a bar with space for another 30 pax and 2 ensuite bedrooms with a semi detached apartment. The interior was modern in the bar, the restaurant rooms were cozy with 2 being like a hunters lodge and the other one of them was a conservatory. There was also a small terrace for summer which had an additional 10 covers. The head chef was great, I explained to him the story of what had happened and asked if there was a possibility of a job. We had an interview and a nice chat about food, cooking, his journey and my journey. The chat was concluded by him asking me if I had a passion for food. At first was not sure, is this a trick question or a joke, so I nervously answered yes of course and was then told to come back tomorrow for a trial. I was chuffed, I had a job interview the day after walking out from another to somewhere where I hoped I could learn from a chef who had been working in 5* hotels as an executive chef.

I woke up the next day, packed my whites, my knives and my birkies jumped on my bike and powered my way off to my new place. I arrived 10 minutes early so had got changed and was in the kitchen bang on 9 with crisp whites and knives good enough to shave with. I was shown around. The kitchen was very small with a small 2x4 m island in the middle. On one wall was a 6 burner range, a salamander, under counter oven and small fryer. Opposite to that on the other side of the island was a cold section fitted also with a small fryer and small oven for some hot starters. I was kind of crazy the flow, the waitress would come in read the cheque, stick it to the wall and leave. The chefs would make it ring a bell and that was it. No talking, no shouting, they just did it. My first jobs were to prep some dover sole, it was a magnificent fish fresh of of the Milford Haven trawler, rigour mortis was still fairly present an I could swear some of it was still twitching. The lobsters they had there were huge, I swear that i could probably have ridden rodeo on one of them it was that big. This is it thought, this is what its about. I was for the first time in my life enjoying the kitchen, I was loving it. After lunch service I had a chat with the chef, he said I was doing well, he could see that I had a passion for food and that my skills were also pretty ok and then offered me the job. I of course accepted. Now I felt as if I was read to learn how to be a chef.

To be continued!

Join me soon for Part 2 of On the line a chefs path.