F is for food – and fun

Take 350 chefs, some mature and well seasoned, others not quite so. Assemble in an orderly fashion, spice with foreign flavouring, divide into several parts, stir up, simmer down, bring back together and glaze with revelry. There you have the 20th Caterer & Hotelkeeper Chef Conference.

It is inevitable that, when three or four (or three or four hundred) chefs are gathered together, their conversation will be the usual mix of controversy, contrast and catering conundrum. What's interesting is how the issues under discussion at the Chef Conference have moved with the times.

In 1986, for example, the conference covered such topics as the "pros and cons of the sweet trolley" (Prue Leith for, Michel Roux against) or the various uses of sous-vide. Flash forward 16 years, and the topics are broader, wider, deeper.

Much of the discussion between delegates last week, as in the previous four or five years, was not just about food and cooking, but about the skills shortage, job mobility, career progression, working abroad, team motivation, health and safety legislation, bullying, drug abuse, employment law, workers' rights, etc, etc.

This is the stuff of kitchens today. Being a modern head chef, particularly in a medium-sized-to-large establishment, is more about being a manager than a cook.

The same could be said of many disciplines in food service and hospitality, of course, as any employer or his representative will often find themselves concerned more with rules and regulations and the proper way of doing things than with the essential element of their job, which is to deliver a quality product to the customer.

But nowhere is this ideal compromised as much as in the kitchen.

This is not to rail against good employment practice or clean kitchens or healthy food - all of which have their place in the modern environment and can, indirectly, improve the customer experience. No, it's just an acknowledgement that, when someone like Anthony Bourdain strides across the stage saying: "I don't really mind if food kills me, so long as it's good," it reminds us that the essential, basic ingredient in any dish of food is enjoyment.

Sometimes we get too hung up on the science and technique and environment of cooking, and forget that it is all about enjoyment. The preparation should be enjoyed and the eating should be a pleasure.

Yes, there are serious issues surrounding food and kitchens, and these shouldn't be ignored; and healthy eating needs to be considered.

But the consideration of serious issues shouldn't make the whole business serious. Wherever food is consumed - be it in a fine-dining restaurant, a hotel banqueting suite or a hospital ward - it needs to be enjoyed. Stifle the fun in the preparation and you kill the pleasure in the consumption.

There will always be a call for ingenious dishes, and there will always be pressure to comply with procedure and regulations. But don't let that take anything away from the basic fact that, despite the stress of the modern working environment and the distractions of fashion, food is fun. Everything else comes second.

Forbes Mutch
Editor
Caterer & Hotelkeeper