You Must Commit.
The ultimate lesson under one of the greatest chefs of our time.
To an upcoming young chef like me, Chef Thomas Keller was nothing short of a God. In culinary school, the few of us who were truly devoted to our craft would spend the weekends experimenting with sweetbreads, and dissecting recipes from The French Laundry Cookbook. We read excerpts about Keller’s life and his restaurant in books like Michael Ruhlman’s ‘The Soul of a Chef’ with dreamy wonder. We aspired to be like him. Looking back today, the idolatry was a bit sickening, but we were young and passionate. These rockstar chefs were our heroes.
We would sit around and ponder what it would be like to have an opportunity to work for, and learn from this superhuman chef. I hustled hard and as luck would have it, I would land in Yountville right out of school, as a team member at the Thomas Keller Restaurant Group.
Chef Keller almost never came into the kitchen at Bouchon. It may well have been his brainchild, but it wasn’t his baby. That was reserved for the French Laundry alone. At the time, he was rarely around anyways, spending more of his days in NYC getting ready to open Per Se.
On this particular lunch service, Chef Cerciello and the Sous Chef, Josh, weren’t in. It was just the two line cooks, and myself prepping the oyster bar for dinner service.
I saw the tall slender shadow out of the corner of my eye, just outside the back door, walking into the cooler. It was Keller. His presence alone is jarring. Increasingly so when he didn’t come in the kitchen right away, anticipating while he shuffled between the two walk-ins for over an hour.
He walked quietly and gracefully into the kitchen and asked all three of us to stop what we were doing (in the middle of lunch rush, no less), and follow him to the walk-in. Looking directly into my eyes, speaking in a surprisingly gentle tone, “There is no reason I should come over here and have to spend an hour straightening up the cooler”. My heart sank into the deepest pit of my stomach. I have just let down God.
In Keller’s kitchens, there are non-negotiable rules. Some were unspoken but universally understood, like not talking, as this was not the place to socialize. Other rules were instilled from the second I entered the kitchen, like how to organize the walk-in, how to and how frequently we change out the ice for the skate and salmon (which was always laid upright in swimming position as not to bruise the flesh), and most importantly how to label everything. I spent about as much time writing on bright neon-green tape as I did shucking oysters. Organization and discipline was paramount.
I fucked up and I called upon every ounce of willpower to hold back from bursting into tears.
Prior to arriving in Yountville, I heard stories of Chef Keller’s temper and I was sure that one day I would witness it. But I didn’t. He was soft, calm, and disappointed, and that was much harder for me to deal with. 10 years later, and it’s still the only moment in my kitchen career I can recall with such clarity. But what I learned in this short one minute window with Chef Keller was more valuable that anything I learned during the whole previous year in culinary school. This single moment made me a better chef, a more humble worker, and a better leader.
What this one moment taught me…
- You must commit, to yourself, to your ideals, and to your team. There is no such thing as ‘almost’. You do or you don’t. This isn’t to say you always succeed. But you must commit to the best outcome possible.
- You must hold yourself to the highest of expectations. You cannot demand greatness from the people around you if you are not committed to greatness yourself. As cliched as it sounds, leading by example is the only true path to success as a leader.
- You must demand that your team do the same. Another of Keller’s ideals related to food, is that a dish can only be as good as it’s worst ingredient. This is why we didn’t put scraps in our stock as most other restaurants do. This concept applies to your team as well. You can only perform as well as your weakest team member.
Ian Borders,
Chef / Restauranteur / Editor, Soul of a Chef
