the secret chef

Kitchen Confidential: Looking back to look forward

Chefs are restless creatures. We would be restless creatures in whatever field we chose to work in, but there is…

Kitchen Confidential: The Secret Chef on keeping calm

Let’s call him Dexter. Dexter was an IT consultant who had made enough money to buy a house with a…

Kitchen Confidential: The secret chef on lessons from history

Sometimes, despite my best efforts, I wonder if the inherent requirements of restaurant cookery and service are even remotely compatible…

Kitchen Confidential: The secret chef makes a case for industry change

When established commercial and social norms are upended it can often take years for new business models and behaviors to…

Opinion: The Secret Chef on the hospitality labor crisis

Crisis is a big word. It’s a concept that suggests an immediate, present, untenable situation that presents itself with little…

Kitchen Confidential: reasons to be cheerful

It has been hard to chisel out even the tiniest nuggets of creativity and positivity from the coalfaces recently. By ‘recently’,…

More time to think: the Secret Chef on navigating Covid-19

There are times when I envy those who bow their heads toward Rome. There must be something freeing about confession…

True grit: The Secret Chef reflects on Covid-19

Whatever I write here seems insignificant. There is now no need for us to imagine the unimaginable because it is…

The secret chef: 10 trends for 2020

The clock ticks louder when we mark the advent of a new decade: nostalgia and expectation the twin weights that…

Kitchen Confidential: The Secret Chef on bullying

We are tight, you and I. Our pact is unspoken, but we both know how it manifests itself. In return…