The kitchen, unlike the dining room or salon, where the gentry discuss wise and important matters, doesn't occupy much space in culture. The sensation was the English young and angry. A group debuting in the second half of the 20th century, creators practicing "kitchen sink realism." "Chicken Soup with Barley," and "Chips with Everything" these titles of Arnold Wesker's plays that speak for themselves. Wesker, who worked as a chef for some time, left not only plays but also essays, novels, and a cookbook. Before a cook starts ruling a country, they should become a cultural figure.
But only various enthusiasts and eccentrics, whether of English literature, labor history, or gastronomy and cooking, know Wesker. Those who would watch a boring movie and read a poorly written book just because there's a kitchen scene for 30 seconds (if it's a professional kitchen, maybe 10 seconds).
Regularly, with such films and readings, I have something like "Oh damn, seriously, where are the hairnets over the pots?" Anyone who hasn't worked in a kitchen probably doesn't know that hair under the hat is one of the most important rules in the kitchen. Since I have a long ponytail, I'm sensitive to this issue.
Such a minor inaccuracy (although the Sanitary Inspectorate might have doubts about it) but shows how untrue the world of cinematic stories is especially when it descends the social ladder and is supposed to talk about Morlocks, the class of servants living in the dark, serving the gentry. It's always the perspective of the gentry, bending over, sometimes with concern, sometimes with disdain, over the commoners.
Three otherwise outstanding, important, and telling a significant truth about kitchen workpieces didn't avoid this perspective. Two movies and a series in which the kitchen is the main character and leads the protagonist through almost Dantean heavens and hells. Mainly hells. Just hells... that's the job... I know something about it; I'm a Chef too. And I'm not normal either. And in the kitchen, like many people, I hide from the world and people.
I watched both seasons of The Bear. Almost in one go.
I'm impressed.
In the last episodes of the second season, when preparations for the opening were underway, I watched like a good thriller. But that's probably my professional craziness. I can pause a movie for a few seconds if there's a kitchen scene in some restaurant, just to take a close look at that kitchen.
And that's it - a professionally shown kitchen. Lots of details that I know from my own experience, like the clock.
A big clock hanging on the wall in a visible place for everyone, one of the most important things in the kitchen. Why a clock when everyone has a watch on their phone?
Even drugs appear episodically. Too episodically. Just like alcohol, bullying, violence. And that's the fundamental reservation I have about this series.
They're all so well-behaved there. Except for Richie, they all work like Boy Scouts in that place. They don't even curse!
One Richie, a thug. And the rest are like... well, like characters from De Amicis' "Heart." He was shy all his life and didn't have a girlfriend because of it. The second takes care of his sick mom. Damn role models. Maybe such, damn it, work in gastronomy in America, but not in Europe.
Like in the scene in the storeroom when Carmy drinks with someone... a fruit cocktail. In real life, it would rather be vodka. Or moonshine. Good moonshine is highly appreciated by hospitality workers who have refined tastes. Or homemade plum brandy, 70-80%. And someone brings it to work to treat colleagues for taste. Half a liter is gone in 5 minutes.
Working in the kitchen is not too respected or well-paid. That's the reality of workers in this industry. Physically demanding, responsible, and stress-loaded work, in a hurry. "Every second counts" literally means - work as fast as you can, and then speed up or you're out.
But there's something elusive that connects Anthony Bourdain, Escoffier, Daniel Humm, and an anonymous guy making hummus in a small bar who soon becomes nationally famous.
Something we can't name. There's torment and ecstasy in it, and a search for perfection, much like in Suskind's "Perfume." There's a romanticization of bad working conditions, burns, and injuries... psychopathic, bullying kitchen bosses, incompetent managers, and owners. Romanticizing drunk and/or stoned workers.
As Anthony Bourdain wrote, the kitchen is the "last refuge of the misfits." Alongside, of course, the shelter for the homeless.
And in reality, most of us are closer to the shelter than to being a culinary star like the heroes of these (excellent) movies.
You could say that The Bear, Burnt, and Boiling Point create a gastronomic trilogy. And in a way, they romanticize the pathologies of the industry. The dirty reality of professional kitchens. Cooking is trendy, working in the kitchen is much less.
These works share the character of the chef. A bit like the same one, shown from different sides (but always from the kitchen) and at different stages of life and career.
An outstanding chef with problems. I have a feeling that such a character is becoming one of the archetypes or memes (is there even a difference?) of popular culture. Along with the progressing normalization of the pathologies that fill the hospitality industry.
Alcohol, drugs, bullying, violence, exploitation, breaking sanitary regulations, breaking safety rules.
The next stage will be a live TV show ordering food by phone during a delivery workers' strike. In that company whose employees won't deliver a package, the union will be legalized. In others, all striking workers will be fired... Capitalists will sell us even the string we'll hang ourselves with.
And this is my huge objection to The Bear, Burnt, and Boiling Point, that this aspect is very little present in these movies. And the issue of workers' rights at all.
Because these are movies about the demons of the main character.
And that's their strength but also their weakness. Because by focusing on the individual, the social aspect disappears. And gastronomy is a social industry like few others. There's no restaurant without the society it works for. Guests. And the social relationships created in the local.
The social role of various kinds of pubs has been known for centuries. The shared consumption of food and alcohol, at a fundamental, biological, evolutionary level, creates strong social bonds. In the Korean language, the ideogram for "family" is a group of people eating together. Eating is a sense of security.
In a way, these movies reflect the reality of late capitalism/neoliberalism, which commodifies/monetizes every aspect of life, replacing social relations with financial/business relations of an alienated monad. Struggling alone with its demons. Losing shared meals, family, and community.
But these movies are also about dreaming. About a place and a level that I know I'll never work at.
And I understand perfectly someone who endured humiliation and bullying. I also endured many things to learn this craft better.
I think this is the best definition of what is sometimes called "culinary art." When performed by the greatest masters, it is undoubtedly a great art. Symphonies of flavors, textures, and feasts of colors on the plate. Classical and avant-garde compositions.
But at the level achievable and where most chefs work, it's a craft.
Craft is different from art, among other things, because it is repeatable. If I make one dish once, I'll make it 100 times. And that's expected of me. And someone else will make it the same way (at least theoretically).
So theoretically, your dish from my recipe will be the same as mine, in practice similar, because you don't know, for example, what fresh spices you're using.
That's why culinary recipes are an impossible art. "The map is not the territory." Even as accurate as Borges', covering the whole country. Or like a diary, so accurate that describing one day takes a year.
In The Bear, there's a slogan from a mysterious place in Copenhagen "Every second counts." It inspired me to a slogan I ordered and stuck on the wall in front of my workspace "Everything Counts." Because in the kitchen, everything counts. Every small element matters and affects the final dish. Recipes are like scores that the cook arranges anew every time.
I don't even aspire to the level of fine dining or molecular gastronomy. But such high cuisine as in The Bear, Eleven Madison, or Noma can be an inspiration for professional and home cooking.
Local products, wild plants, edible flowers (from childhood, I remember deep-fried elderflower flowers in pancake batter), it's sometimes a return to forgotten practices and products. On the other hand, Maillard reactions, caramelization, umami are terms that hide specific phenomena and physico-chemical reactions. If you know the principles of these reactions, you can apply them both in Eleven Madison or Noma and in-home cooking. Or in the fast-casual, like what I cook.
Fruits in savory dishes are a culinary practice, popular hundreds of years ago. Fruits are a source of sugars that react with proteins in Maillard reactions, which result in all the roasting and frying flavors, scents, and textures.
In a class-based society, everything has a class character. Also, what we say and how we say it, everything we create. From novels to outfits for an evening out. And this class position connects the heroes of these three stories. They are Stars. Such bosses as we watch in TV shows. And love. I also love cooking shows with chefs.
Because many of these TV stars are truly excellent chefs from whom every cook can learn a lot. Musician, poet, performer, occultist, and esoterrorist Genesis P-Orridge spoke about adopting the attitude of "I know nothing and learn from everyone on every occasion." It's a very good attitude in the kitchen.
Such celebrity chefs as Jamie Oliver and especially the Polish chef Karol Okrasa are bosses whose every word I absorb like a beer after a 14-hour shift at the fryer. There are shifts like that in the kitchen. My longest shift lasted 14 hours. And the longest working hours in a week were about 70 hours.
But such situations are not very present, because these shows actually show the work of the gastronomic 1%, the best, in a strong and secure position (in the sense that they won't be on the street tomorrow because they lost their job, which is real for most workers in this industry), high earnings.
Interesting and characteristic as the topic of money is little present in these movies. In The Bear, it appears as a theme of money for an investment, in Burnt, it's a debt for drugs, in Boiling Point, it's alimony. But it doesn't exist as a theme of salary, counting tips, contributing to drugs (also present only in the background when in real life, they're as present in the kitchen as alcohol). And even as accounting for the consumption of staff.
Are The Bear, Burnt, and Boiling Point worth watching? Absolutely yes.
Do they tell the truth about gastronomy? A piece of truth. Arranged and from the perspective of a few percent of the best in this industry. And that's what you should remember while watching.
For those who read to the end, an explanation of the clock. There are two reasons.
The clock on the wall is visible all the time and for everyone. So, for example, you can see how much time is left until lunch starts when everything must be ready; time is one of the most important factors in the kitchen.
And secondly, the phone next to the money is one of the dirtiest things in the world. Completely literally and in the sense of types of bacteria. One of the worst things you can do in the kitchen is pull out the phone all the time. The phone should be placed on a shelf outside the kitchen, and after use, the employee should disinfect their hands. Just like a cashier, if they take any food items. Pay attention to this because it tells you a lot about the level of cleanliness in the place, i.e., your safety.
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