There's a bond among a kitchen staff, I think. You spend more time with your chef in the kitchen than you do with your own family.
Few things are more beautiful to me than a bunch of thuggish, heavily tattooed line cooks moving around each other like ballerinas on a busy Saturday night. Seeing two guys who'd just as soon cut each other's throats in their off hours moving in unison with grace and ease can be as uplifting as any chemical stimulant or organized religion.
I feel like a lot of the pastry chefs and chefs I worked for and worked under were always really, really big on the philosophy of 'everyone's in it together in the food world.'
It's a very naive idea to think that the chef is cooking everything, and, on top of it, is irreplaceable. That would mean that basically he is the only genius, and there are idiots all around him, which doesn't make sense.
I liked the energy of cooking, the action, the camaraderie. I often compare the kitchen to sports and compare the chef to a coach. There are a lot of similarities to it.
I think that's what being a chef is all about: camaraderie and teamwork. I never feel that it should be so cutthroat that you can't help the other chefs.
As soon as I was old enough to peer over the worktops, I remember being fascinated by what went on in the kitchen. It just seemed such a cool place, everyone working together to make this lovely stuff and having a laugh doing it.
Gastronomy is my hobby. I'm simply the casting director. Once I've brought all the right people together, it is they who must work together to tell a story.
Molly was committing dinner by that time, aided and abetted by Sanya, who seemed to take some kind of grim Russian delight in watching train wrecks in progress.
In any restaurant of this caliber, the chefs are in the same position, building relationships.
We are about creating a new wave of talent. We are the Manchester United of kitchens now. Am I playing full-time in the kitchen? I am a player-coach.
