Eating as a chef.
When you spend any time on social media, you will eventually find yourself watching an engagingly edited “What I Eat In A Day” video. The most popular ones involve regular meals with a healthy balance of nutrition, variety, and aesthetics. Each time I watch them, I wonder what my equivalent would look like. As chefs, eating is part of the job, but our way of eating lacks regularity, balance, nutrition, and most certainly aesthetics. When I’m working, the list of things I eat before midday may look like this:
1 mug of tea with oat milk, 1 toasted bagel with cream cheese, 1 banana, 1 black coffee (breakfast)
1 drop each of fish sauce, oyster sauce, and a soy-based stir-fry sauce (to make sure the bottles are labelled correctly, extremely unpleasant)
1.5 plums eaten during prep (I couldn’t resist)
1 oat flat white (caffeine)
1 crispy corner piece of smoked pork fresh out of the smoker (it was asking for it)
1 soft bun with scrambled egg and cheese (one of the chefs was feeling generous and made breakfast for everyone)
A slice of freshly cooked chorizo (the butchers were checking it was seasoned correctly and I was there at the right time)
1 cherry tomato (a coworker insisted I try them, they were indeed excellent)
1 fishball (to check the consistency)
A small bite of chili (freshly delivered, chef told us to try them - “You’re right, it is spicy but it still has a nice fruitiness to it”, I concur with a cough and a tear in my eyes)
An innumerable amount of spoonfuls of various sauces, pastes, and dressings (to check for seasoning)
4 bites of a beef shin curry (chef was testing a new dish)
3 bites of stir-fried pumpkin (chef was testing another new dish)
2 blackberries (it would be rude not to)
2 bites of beef shin curry (chef still testing dish, second variation)
3 cockles, 2 slices of pork belly, a corner of fried chicken, 2 spoons of plum salad, 3 spoons of fish curry, and 4 spoons of rice (team briefing)
Half a plum (still hard to resist)
By the time the restaurant doors open, my stomach has already been hit by a smorgasbord of foods. Once service is on the way, add several more bites of food to the list as I try the dishes before they go out. Maybe there is a wrong order, so there will be something to snack on. One of the waiters kindly hands me a piece of chocolate they brought in that morning. I chug a cup of ice-cold sparkling water with freshly squeezed lime and a pinch of salt (with all the sweating I’ll be losing a lot of salt), and I’ll have another few bites of a dish that is being tested and refined. After the lunch rush is over, we sit down for the family meal which – on a full day of work – may well be the only real meal of the day. If I’m working dinner service too, add another several hours of random bites and spoonfuls and finish the day with a plate of greasy wasted leftovers at midnight and potentially a beer or two to celebrate the end of service.
I am no health expert, but this seems a far cry from the inspirational “What I eat in a day” and the kind of lifestyle recommendations you might see from a dietician.
A chef gets paid to cook – that much is obvious. But to cook good food, we need to use our sense of taste and our (supposedly) refined palates. So not only do we get paid to cook, but we get paid to eat. Cheffing without eating isn’t an option.
That doesn’t usually pose too much of a problem, as anyone who chooses to work in a kitchen tends to be more than happy to eat and to do so frequently. However, it does mean that you have little control over what you eat in a working week.
For many people today, the food they eat reflects their culture, their dietary requirements, and their personal preferences. Chefs have little choice but to throw most of these standards out of the window as soon as they step into their place of work (allergies and religious limitations excluded of course). Following a particular diet or even maintaining a somewhat healthy balance of foods and nutrients is basically impossible. You constantly need to be tasting produce, sauces, pastes, and dishes to understand the ingredients, adjust the seasoning, and to send out each dish in its best form. Eating as a chef is a far cry from how most people consume food. Other than the daily family meal, eating for us is not primarily to fuel or satisfy, but to learn, understand, and perfect a dish. To improve as a chef, you will need to eat.
A day off is therefore not just a time for physical and mental respite, it is also an opportunity to give our stomachs a much-needed break. It allows us to follow a more regular eating schedule for a change, and eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner like a normal person. Now, having a simple homecooked meal at midday (the time when normal people have lunch) can feel like the highest form of luxury.
That being said, cheffing has allowed me to taste a plethora of amazing dishes and ingredients (for free) which I may not otherwise have been able to try. Insane seasonal local or imported produce and ingredients, juicy grilled meats and fish, silky sauces, fragrant curries, bubbling soups, delectable fried snacks, salty noodles, sticky rice, buttery bakes and luscious desserts… so admittedly, as long as my stomach allows it, I really can’t complain.