To everything, there is a season...

Back in 2001, Chef Eric (Tucker, from Millennium in San Francisco) and I went to a big food event in the Civic Center plaza; for an hour or so, we wandered around various booths in our chef coats, trying to look important enough to get free stuff. One of our stops was a booth for Ten Speed Press, the publishers of The Millennium Cookbook, Eric’s first book (and later, The Artful Vegan); the folks were friendly and loaded Eric down with cookbooks, ‘Here, you take this one, this guy is good’ he said, handing me a copy of Gordon Ramsay’s A Chef for all Seasons. I devour cookbooks, and was pleased to have this hardcover and artfully designed one to add to my collection. Later, I was also pleased to discover that the format followed a unique pattern, arranging recipes by season instead of by courses. The photography was stunning, the recipes engaging, straightforward, and fairly modern, but, as I recall, it was his near political advocacy for ‘in season’ and local food selection that was the most enticing feature.



Later I heard a story about the character of this chef that took some of the shine off of the jewel, the now famous account of him physically removing food critic A. A. Gill from one of his London restaurants. As a chef, and someone who has lived in fear and awe of critics (the civilian oversight of our profession) for the better part of my career, the symbolism of such an act was powerful. It certainly didn’t mesh with the clean lines and austere presentations that were shown in his book. More stories followed. The temper, the larger than life ego, the passion; the very public character we have all come to know. Ramsay apparently started out as a professional football (or soccer, as we call it here...) player. It would seem that he brought that rough and tumble competitive spirit with him to his new profession; his breakout television series (which I haven’t seen) chronicles his quest to achieve the world cup of fine dining awards, three Michelin stars. Later series have put him in the role of the bully coach, tightening the screws on the underperforming players in an attempt to get a winning game out of them. And finally, in one of his most recent roles, the unfettered hooligan, the armchair quarterback, given control of the entire game. He is, what we in the profession call, ‘a screamer.’



Kitchens are very high stress environments, sometimes, (such as in the case of severe food allergies or in the poor stewardship of chemicals or the potentially poisonous effects of mishandled meats or rotten foods) we are actually holding life and death in our hands. Now, to be fair, we are not doctors, firemen or paramedics, or as one critic put it recently, we are not saving the world (not all of us, anyway). We are not required to earn diplomas to serve our wares, yet the facts remain: if we fail to be careful, sanitary stewards of our duties, we may do harm, even severe harm. That thought terrifies me every time I see a brigade of untrained high school children manning the line at any chain restaurant, even a doughnut shop. When I hear the tales of dangerous and deadly mistakes that occur as a result of our blind acceptance of such a system, I am only surprised that it is only as infrequent a story as it is.



I worked for a screamer once. I’m sure we’ve all had awful bosses at one time or another, if pop culture and the movies are to be believed; a tough boss or drill sergeant (or coach) is not only acceptable, it is of vital and critical importance in our process of becoming good people. But every once in a while, that line is crossed from being tough to being abusive. Kitchens, as I stated, can be very high stress environments, and the farther you move up the food chain, the higher the stress. The screamer I worked for ran a very high end restaurant kitchen. Her tirades were famous within our four walls and unknown outside them. Her ability to berate was legendary—and the terror she invoked in every person within earshot was unmatched. But the fact is, she wasn’t that good. She demanded and commanded respect though her bellicosity, but even the dishwashers knew she was overcompensating. She was good enough; she rigidly maintained the status quo in the kitchen while the executive chef who trained her (and trained her to scream) poked his head in once a week before touring the dining room and taking credit for her (and our) work. But the screaming was a device. In her mind, she was keeping us all on the straight and narrow; she probably even saw herself as a friend and mentor, but she was often guilty of the failings for which she attacked us. To be fair, most of us were ambitious, egotistical shits who had taken the job at this exclusive, well reviewed restaurant to pad our resumes and (hopefully) get a leg up to a better job. We all had nothing to gain from serving anything but the best product we could assemble and it showed. Basic food-handling philosophy, such as the ‘first in, first out’ rule were the ‘first out’ the window as we scrambled over the tired old product to tear into today’s delivery in order to get an edge over our competitor...oops, I mean our co-worker’s presentation. Expensive, rich, and heart-clogging ingredients were crammed onto every plate as a substitute for creative, thoughtful or even skillfully devised ones. In fact, technique was very low on the roster of priorities in that space, edged out by the greater good of guaranteed results. Creativity was suspect, forward thinking was discouraged, and waste was a price paid for elegance. She brought nothing of value to that kitchen other than a semblance of order; she knew this, we knew this, and her terror of anyone else finding out required her to keep the world at arms length. So she screamed.



Whether it is the fact of our duty to handle food safely, or even just to keep a handle on our jobs (or our Zagat ratings, or our Michelin stars...), kitchens can be very stressful places; but even the most jaded restaurant lifer would agree that in few other professions would such bad behaviour as is seen in this one ever be tolerated. Now, in that ever present interest of full disclosure, I have, on (hopefully rare) occasion, fallen prey to the beast within and screamed my way out of a situation I couldn’t earn my way out of. I feel no pride in this. In fact, that dark side is my profession’s (and my own) most disgusting feature. When I scream, I remember that other chef, her tirades, her iron grip, but ultimately, I remember that she was screaming to compensate for her own shortcomings. I repeat, I take no pride in my temper, and no joy; but I do take some comfort in the fact that in my worst moments, I am always careful to not be personal...no such claim could be made about the onscreen antics of chef Ramsay. And when my head cools after such a rough night or shift, my first priority is to seek out anyone who may have gotten in the path of my invective and to clear the air, to breathe deeply, apologize and remove the weight of all that stress. My screaming boss never took these steps, and if Ramsay does, it is certainly excluded from the final cut of his shows, to all of our detriment. And in a perfect world, we never would have been cornered into such a response in the first place.



You see, I have also had the distinct honour of working for seven years with a guy who in all of those high stress, top of the profession, intense moments, never (to my memory) lost his temper or personally berated a member of his staff. Eric Tucker was a hell of a chef and I try my best to pass on the lessons of his even keeled temperament to every crew I’ve worked with since, admittedly, some days more successfully than others...but such is the nature of the beast.



Gordon Ramsay has had a wonderful season. His books top the charts, his numerous restaurants rate quite well, his television series have had a good run. He is even taking over a cooking school. A few years ago there was another successful television star who was raking in the rave reviews, a guy named Dave Chappelle. At the top of his game, his brand of race-based stereotype skewering humour had propelled him to the sort of ‘do no wrong’ kind of popularity that is not unlike Ramsay’s current run at the goal. Then one day he stopped. He is quoted as saying he felt that some of his sketches were ‘socially irresponsible’ that he felt like a prostitute, that people were laughing at him, not with him. As a chef who takes no joy in the dark side of our profession, and as someone who sees and appreciates the deep spirit Ramsay’s written work has evoked; a love for the season, of local foods, and most recently, of a return to the ritual of family dining and togetherness...I can only hope that someday soon, he too will have his own ‘Dave Chappelle moment’ and realize that for all of his good intentions, he is glorifying the worst of who we, the brother/sisterhood of chefs, can hope to be...



Mario Batali, a fine chef who seems quite capable of keeping a cool head has recently banned Ramsay from all his restaurants in response to personal attacks made by Ramsay regarding him in the press, in response, he said, to criticism Mario made about his food. Ironically, when chef Ramsay evicted that critic in the famous story that introduced me to his less than thoughtful nature all those years ago it was, as he said, because criticism of his food was one thing but personal attacks were not acceptable. Batali has turned the mirror to Ramsay, and given him the treatment he has offered others, nothing more and nothing less. It’s time for the rest of us to do the same.