When Rene Redzepi put together the conversation-starter for our current issue about how and if the culture of the kitchen needs to change, his colleagues at the MAD Symposium reached out to a spectrum of chefs to take their temperature on where the kitchen is, how they run their restaurants, and what they think the future holds. We’re happy to share a response from Iliana Regan, the chef of Elizabeth and Bunny, the Micro Bakery, and Wunder Pop in Chicago.
Intensity has been an essential aspect of all the fine dining kitchens I’ve worked in. In the casual restaurants I’ve worked in, the pressure is more about getting through service if it was high volume than the actual quality.
The intensity manifests in all sorts of ways. Sometimes it’s good intensity, with emphasis on service, food preparation, plating—all the things that should have intensity. It’s good intensity when it comes with the desire for us to be better as a team.
I think intensity can be bad when it is about those same things but for an individual’s personal gain over the other people in the picture—whether it’s just for the chef, or if it’s a battle of front of house versus back of house.