The private chef industry is booming. As James Burke points out in this piece for The Times, more and more people want “restaurant-level food without leaving their gated driveways.” But what is it really like behind those gates? Burke lifts the lid on a world of “cruelty, chaos and cocaine consumption.” It may sound glamorous, but only those with serious stamina and a thick skin will survive this career choice.
Then again, I’ve also cooked for a mysterious heiress who lived in a seven-floor compound in west London. There were two security huts, a fingerprint scanner and five flights down to the basement kitchen — a dungeon of stainless steel. I never saw her face and was probably never closer than seven rooms away. I only felt her presence in the terror of her staff, each of whom, at some point, came into the kitchen in tears.
I made lunch seven times that day, and every time it was sent back. Eventually, I realised that she preferred her cucumbers to be cut into diamonds rather than circles. I decided not to go back the next day.
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