chef
Interesting: From a piece in today’s Guardian on ‘Bad Boy Chefs’
The truth about cheffy deportment is, of course, dull - and a real lesson in people management. Who is the nicest, happiest chef of all? Who has the most loyal, hard-working and happiest brigade of anyone in the country?
It’s someone who doesn’t seek the limelight much any more, a chef who, in fact, decided some years ago that the competitive sport of collecting Michelin stars is a mug’s game, and retired from running the then-most successful restaurant in the country and opened a private dining club, to which restaurant-guide inspectors are not invited or welcome. It’s the Swiss-British chef, Anton Mosimann who was the youngest-ever Maitre Chef des Cuisines at the Dorchester Hotel, presiding over the Michelin 2-star Terrace Room as well as the other restaurants and the hotel’s huge banqueting division.
Before he did anything else in the morning, Mosimann shook the hand of every single member of the brigade (around 90). If he detected anything amiss, this young man would enquire kindly of his employee whether everything was all right at home and at work. If he detected tiredness, the cook was relieved, for this shift, from the lunch or dinner service, and put on breakfasts or tea.
His staff saw this as commiseration, not condemnation, and worked the harder for it. This, more than any recipe, cooking technique, secret ingredient or swanky setting, is the secret of Mosimann’s continued success — and it’s not difficult to emulate.