A chef and a restaurateur are different jobs: One is about pleasing people with what's on the plate; the other is about understanding the market. I'm a chef, but I think I'm a savvy businessperson, too.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
While some people may think being a chef only entails making enticing dishes and pushing the culinary boundaries, being a part of the food industry involves much more.
I think, as a chef and restaurateur, that you have to take care of your business. Otherwise, you're only as good as your last meal. You have to watch if your food costs are too high, or you could be out of business in no time.
I don't have any interest in being a chef without being on the business side of things, or vice versa, because if you don't make money at the end of the month, you're going out of business.
When you look at a kitchen, you tend to see that the people who are doing really well are those who have worked with the same chef or stayed in one restaurant for a significant amount of time.
I call all chefs 'cooks.' They're all cooks. That's what we do, we cook. You're a chef when you're running a kitchen.
Very good cooks who are employed as 'chefs' rarely refer to themselves as 'chefs.' They refer to themselves as 'cooks.'
'Chef' doesn't mean that you're the best cook, it simply means 'boss.'
In any restaurant of this caliber, the chefs are in the same position, building relationships.
A lot of people call me a celebrity chef, but I don't think that I'm a celebrity. So I want to stay keeping just a chef. That's more comfortable.
I like cooking, but I don't think I could be a chef. Everyone from the ground up does terrible hours, whether you've just walked in off the street and you've got no experience, to whether you're the head chef. You can work 14 or 15-hour days. It's really, really intense.
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