“The Bear” Effect: Separating Chef Fact from Fiction.

I am a chef and I have watched the first two episodes of The Bear before giving up.

Engaging with the stresses of prep and the anxieties and dynamics of a restaurant kitchen was not what I needed on my day off. The regular panes of the clock ticking closer to the time of opening while they were drowning in jobs was enough to give me an unpleasant itch and forcefully remind me of the rush I go through each time I scramble to finish off my prep before service.

As such, my experience with The Bear has been fairly limited. I am aware of the high-quality production of the show, appreciate the brilliant casting and performances, and I am in the know of Jeremy Allen White’s current sex symbol status. So while I do want to watch it someday, right now, it is not the content I want to consume in my free time.

I am, however, very aware of the impact the show has had on the reputation of my job.

It is no exaggeration to say that at least every other time I mention to someone that I work as a chef in a restaurant, their immediate response is: “Have you seen The Bear?”, or “Oh, is it like The Bear?” (One of my colleagues once brilliantly suggested that the next time someone with an office job asks me this question, I should retort with, “Oh so you work in an office? Is it like The Office?”).

Depending on how long I think the conversation will last, I will respond with a knowing nod and smile, or I will jokingly justify my limited run with the show with the reason that two episodes were enough to give me PTSD.

But it does make me realise that my profession seems to have gained a kind of trend status.

This is not entirely new. Over the last few decades, the status and esteem of chefs have seen various boosts thanks to the rise of celebrity chefs, books, and other media related to chefs and restaurant cooking. Anthony Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential may be considered the book that propelled chefs and their lifestyles onto a more visible mainstream platform.

Restaurants stopped being the place where you just go sit and eat. Instead, people started to look up from their plates and see who was making their food.

With the rise of cooking shows, including Jamie Oliver’s Naked Chef and Gordon Ramsay’s Hell’s Kitchen, wider audiences gained an insight, not only into the passion and skill that went into cooking, but also the pressure and drama involved in the profession. A few years ago, the Netflix series Chef’s Table made a point of introducing the whole breadth and depth of an individual chef’s life and vision. It was less about the food and the restaurant and more about the personality who created and maintained them.

The chef, previously hidden away in the kitchen, was shoved into the limelight.

Open kitchens are now a frequently seen asset in a modern restaurant. Customers want to see the chefs in action and have the option to interact and talk to the person making their food (which may all be very well for the extroverted chefs, but for those of us who – to some degree – are in the kitchen so they don’t have to talk to customers, this can feel like a cruel twist of events!). With the popular chef image represented in the media, there is the expectation for chefs to be charismatic, tough-looking characters, speedily chopping vegetables, flambéing and tossing food in sauté pans, plating dishes, shouting out orders, cautions, and Yes Chef!’s, all the while being surrounded by smoke, steam, and fire. The more imaginative customers may even look at a chef and wonder what traumas, substance abuses, and other troubles they may be hiding behind their carefully crafted dishes.

I would argue that most people are basing this image on the media they have consumed, which these days, tends to be The Bear. Realistically, I can’t really take an issue with that. It appears that the show is well-researched and evidently very well-received. And the consequence is that people react with great joy and awe when I tell them of my job title, which in turn makes me feel good and proud about what I do. However, I would point out that a lot of this awe comes from the romanticisation of the hardships of the job, particularly the dramatized versions presented on TV. And usually, most of the drama comes from the experience of the individual characters within the context of cheffing, not the profession itself. Not all chefs are troubled with trauma, debt, and toxic coworkers.

We are also just people with a job. Our days just don’t happen to involve a desk, computer and a 5pm commute, but a knife, a pan, and a 1am finish.

So, as much as I love the attention and respect chefs receive these days, it may be appropriate to point out that the job is not always as dramatic and intense as it is often portrayed. I am sure The Bear is a brilliant show, and I look forward to watching it one day. But it does not define an entire profession.

Sincerely, a very untroubled and drama-free chef.

XX