HARASSMENT IN THE KITCHEN
Time of reckoning upon us
There are many reasons to boycott a restaurant.
Disappointing food is the most obvious, but chances are you’re also not going back if waits between dishes were too long, the waiter was surly or you were seated next to the bathroom.
In the last year, however, another reason to boycott restaurants has come to the forefront: behind-the-scenes ethics — more specifically, allegations of abuse and sexual harassment. And there have been many. The case that blew open much of the debate in Canada occurred in 2015 when Kate Burnham, a former pastry chef at Weslodge Saloon in Toronto, filed a sexual harassment complaint with Ontario’s Human Rights Tribunal.
Three months ago in Ottawa, Matthew Carmichael, chef and partner at the restaurants Riviera and El Camino (both recommended in this column in September), admitted to sexually harassing women in the workplace, saying: “I’m using the opportunity to take ownership of my actions and shed light on my behaviour.”
In Montreal, chef Giovanni Apollo (né Jean-Claude) has been accused of abuse and sexual harassment by several former employees, as detailed in reports by Radio-Canada and La Presse.
If you go back to 2009, you’ll find sexual harassment allegations against Chez Alexandre owner Alain Creton; the case was settled in front of the Commission des droits de la personne.
That sexual harassment exists in the restaurant industry is not news, but the extent to which it’s so deeply ingrained in restaurant culture is.
As the #MeToo movement snowballed after allegations were levelled against Harvey Weinstein, several famous American chefs were called out for alleged sexual harassment, most prominently Mario Batali and New Orleans-based John Besh. Since then, some lesser-known chefs and restaurateurs have also been cited for abusive behaviour. No doubt, more will follow. The abuse accusations today are primarily sexual in nature, but abuse in professional kitchens isn’t a new phenomenon. Watch an episode of Gordon Ramsay’s reality show Hell’s Kitchen (or better yet, Boiling Point, a 1999 documentary miniseries about Ramsay), and you’ll see a chef who yelled, swore and disparaged his way to the top.
Anthony Bourdain is often seen as the epitome of the glorified bad-boy chef, but it was Marco Pierre White, Ramsay’s mentor and now longtime rival, who made the abusive, surly chef — complete with scowl and cigarette hanging off his bottom lip — the prototype for a generation of irreverent young cooks.
Even Batali couldn’t take the wrath of White, walking out of his kitchen after receiving a pan of hot risotto on his chest.
Then there is Joël Robuchon, for whom New York chef Éric Ripert worked at the Parisian restaurant Jamin early in his career. In his memoir 32 Yolks (Random House, 2016), Ripert writes that Robuchon pressured his cooks so much that “some guys shook all the time. Some went downstairs and cried in the stairwell. I saw a few guys punch the walls. Some guys suffered crippling anxiety attacks.”
The pressure for Michelin recognition became the justification for such abuse in the highstakes quest for perfection.
While distinct from sexual abuse and harassment, general abuse has long been accepted, even glorified, the pervasive expectation being that diva chefs have tempers.
And sometimes, it seems, raging libidos.
But the time of reckoning has finally hit the restaurant industry. So widespread are the accusations now that the American food website Eater features articles with titles like “Stop inviting known bad men to food festivals.”
Another recent Eater article, titled “James Beard Awards committee asks voters to consider chefs’ behaviour in nominations,” details the request of the James Beard Foundation for the judges of its prestigious restaurant and chef awards to follow its lead by “thinking about respect and integrity when making recommendations for the semifinalists,” as “award winners are held up as role models.”
That’s all fine and good, but then comes this request: “If you have concerns about a chef, restaurateur or beverage professional, or about the culture around a restaurant or restaurant group, leave the person or business out of your nominations.”
This, for me, is where it gets a little uncomfortable. The chef world is rife with cliques, deep rivalries and heaping piles of gossip. Having heard stories for decades about certain chefs being sexual harassers, abusive to employees, sexist, racist or displaying other vile behaviour that holds them back from being role models, I would have good reason to boycott a startling number of Montreal restaurants.
Yes, there are serious cases of abuse, but it’s crucial that we stick to facts rather than hearsay and don’t let rumblings of accusations turn into witch hunts.
And when there are proved or admitted allegations of sexual harassment, what’s next?
One of the restaurants in New York that represented the worstcase scenario is the Spotted Pig.
The main target of the Spotted Pig allegations is restaurateur Ken Friedman, but Batali, a partner in the business, was also named in a New York Times investigative report that ran on Dec. 12. Yet weeks later, Times restaurant critic Pete Wells stated, there was still a two-hour wait for a table at the wildly popular gastropub.
Meanwhile, Weslodge receives rave reviews on social media and Apollo’s public Facebook page counts hundreds of messages of support for a chef who to this day denies all accusations. Life, it seems, goes on. My cookbook collection includes titles by Besh and Batali, and though I could toss them, that seems futile. Boycotting restaurants seems like the smarter move. I will not be lining up to eat at the Spotted Pig, Batali’s Del Posto, any restaurant associated with Apollo, or any other establishment where my money will end up in the pockets of the potential culinary equivalent of a Weinstein or Gilbert Rozon.
As for the chefs watching this all go down, the time couldn’t be riper to rethink the dynamics in their kitchen. Wells has called on male chefs to speak out against harassment in the industry, writing: “Restaurant people are famously loyal, so perhaps it is unrealistic to expect mass denunciations of Mr. Batali and Mr. Besh. What has been so infuriating, though, is how few leaders in the industry have been willing to go on record against the behaviour itself — behaviour that was, after all, banned by federal law several decades ago.”
Hard-working, talented chefs deserve to be held up as role models, but that comes with responsibility that many appear to have a hard time living up to. From what we’re seeing, women are calling out men, and many women are supporting women. But for the most part, the men aren’t calling out the men.
It appears they’re closing ranks, as they have been for a long time. I recently spoke to two chefs about these issues; one nonchalantly claimed that “everyone knew about Batali,” and the other said, “I found a solution to this problem: no more women in my kitchen.”
For those who don’t already adhere to one, it’s time to establish a new moral code in professional kitchens. I’d start with a copy of this memo once posted at San Francisco’s Stars restaurant by chef Jeremiah Tower: “I have observed several of the kitchen staff engaged in touching each other — inappropriately — such as pats on the buttocks from one cook to another. You must refrain from any touching that might be misinterpreted. It is simply not allowed. If I or your supervisor observe any actions of this kind during your workday, it will be immediate cause for disciplinary action. You have all been advised of the implications of sexual harassment; it is not allowed in the workplace among co-workers or from supervisors. Please be aware … it is the law!”
By the way, the date of that memo? July 1993.
I found a solution to this problem: no more women in my kitchen.