You were listening to Ruthie's Table four in partnership with Montclair.

Hello, and welcome to this bonus episode of Ruthy's Table four.

The question that I always ask people who have worked here for a while is do you remember your first day?

And so I thought today it would be really interesting to hear from two people, our executive chef, Sean Owen and Joseph Travelli, about their first day and how they think about somebody coming to work now on what will be their first day.

Sean, do you remember your first day?

I remember coming from my interview, I remember meeting you, but Rose interviewed me, and I've been very lost because it's really hard to find the River Cafe.

You get lost, don't they.

So if you can find it, then you're probably that's a step.

Exactly Road saying, I'll teach you to cook.

I'll teach you how to cup protuto to the perfect thickness, I'll teach you how to cook beans to the perfect cookness.

And I'd come from working for another chef called Darren Simpson, who you who also worked for you, guys, didn't he and he had sent me he was moving to Australia.

And he sent me here because he was like, I know the perfect place that will really suit you.

You should got work for Rose and Ruth.

Well he actually said Auntie Rose and Auntie Ruth.

And so then I got my first trial day, and I remember THEO Randall was on because he was a head chef at the time, and he gave me four jobs, which I would never give anyone on their first day.

It even crossed my mind, Riberliza, I'll just choke Fritty Cavalonierro Puree and dragon Cella Sauce or an r one of those.

And I was working so hard to get all that done, and I remember just being on my nerve for shift, and I remember Rose standing in the kitchen by the window and telling me that she gave me a job that afternoon.

Whereas now we would give people much more than more than a couple of hours.

They we believe to show pretty dragon Chillo, and they did it.

Well might say, don't let this.

Girl out of the front door.

We're keeping her.

But nowadays would never get someone that much to do.

So you came in what year, December ninety.

Nine, and so then I came in January two than one, so a year later.

And in this year in between when Shanna started here, I started working for your ex head chef called Darren who'd emigrated to Sydney.

And I worked with him in Sydney for a year and then he sent me here as well.

You know, which would be my dream.

You know, I was addicted to The Italian Kitchen on television.

The Italian Kitchen is a program that we did for Channel four.

ISTI rose and I two seasons.

I think one season was in London, and I think we did a season when we went to Italy.

Yeah.

I just remember being about twenty two or something or watching it and it was just so stylish and the food just looked so good.

And I remember asking.

I worked with this guy called Steve Harriet's actually has become a very very successful famous chef in the meantime.

But I remember saying to him, do you think I could work in a place like that?

And he was like, he's like, you should go.

I was I've never been to cooking school.

They wouldn't look at me.

It's like, no, you should go there.

And so anyway, I went to Sydney worked for Darren.

Darren sent me here and then I came in and yeah, absolutely was terrified.

I think I made southa Verde, which I would say is a pretty standard Yeah, you know, like entrance because you sort of see you talk to someone about chopping stuff up.

Then you talked to them about how to make something balance.

You know, it's very important kind of fundamentals.

And I definitely did that.

I remember doing that with Peter beg Yes was an incredible it's.

Jamie here, Jamie here, long, all of us still in the changing room, and then we used to have stars just come in and take photos of the locker because by then he was really famous.

I remember about a week later, I was terrified, and I think a lot of the new people they still do this.

I burnt myself really badly Cinber how and I was just used to being in let's be honest, Darren's kitchen where it was much more matcho, and it didn't really suit me to be honest in a lot of ways, although I in a lot of ways I loved it, but being here and burning myself really badly and just assuming I just cover it with a tea towel and carry on.

And then you brought me outside and gave me a cup of tea and sat me down, and I think I had to smoked a cigarette, and I just knew this was it in the right place.

And that was that thinking about covering up your mistake when you do something wrong and then you want to cover it up so that nobody finds out.

Have you ever thrown something away so that it's not of.

Course I still do.

I done one where I had.

I was cooking the pigeon on hot swarm, which is a wood oven section and you have to be by the time you're cooking on the wood oven, you're like quite an accomplished a cafe chef, aren't you.

So you're cooking the pigeon and it was with probably something that lentils and Swiss child and then.

One the theatic so we split a bit of crume fresh in at.

The end and then I finished service and I just got to the bottom of the bowl of crime fresh and realized I used the panicotta.

I saw the vanilla at the bottom of the bowl.

But what also I remember more than like obviously the food and the vegetables, and that guy who used to come with a big pig over his shoulder every week, and it just felt otherworldly to be honest to me, but then also just making friends.

Like in the first week I became friends with Shan and then I made those mistakes and she helped me out.

I just wasn't used to that.

My experience in Australia had been far from that.

It's like everyone on the line was trying to outdo the person next to them, whereas here it just felt like I was making friends and being helped.

I remember the story about the waitress who wanned her first day, maybe it's her second or third deck, and we found her crying and we said, why are you crying and she said, well, I came to work and I was so hungry.

I bought a croissant on the way, and Richard Rogers came in and saw that the bar and ate it.

I said, okay, well you better get used to that.

But it was also really lovely working here with Richard's office next door.

Their lights were always on, they were always here later than us, and I had that real feeling of that bustle of not just of them having lunch, but just being around designing buildings.

It's just really nice, and it was nice they used to come and ask us to look at drawings.

I remember going over to you remember going the model sharp see them, and then you know, we'd ask them to come over.

And taste a soup.

You know, it's a kind of very very but I think thinking about your first day and your first day, does that make you really think hard about a chef coming in here on their first day.

Nowadays, we generally interview people who would send in an interesting CV, a CV that doesn't have to have hundreds of top restaurants, a couple of a couple.

Of restaurants that they've worked in.

Of note I would say, rather than being the first job that they've ever done.

But it's not to say we don't take people at that level.

So then they've come and to a couple of days in the kitchen, so we can see how they move in a kitchen, live skills, cleanliness, approach, their kind of manner, and sort of spatial awareness.

You don't think that that's something you look out for, but people can just it's almost like doing a dance in the kitchen.

Everyone moves around everyone really sort of organically, almost don't they And a good.

Chef I think has that they're especially.

Aware and you can learn it you can learn it.

It's not like something that you have to have or not.

But I did.

It's really good and I'm off and asked that question, how do you know and when do you know that somebody's going to be an important part of a team.

When do you know that somebody can work in the kitchen?

So after a week you have an intuitive sense of whether they were, where they move them, where they accept criticism, the way other chefs respond, the where they cook.

Of course I agree with that, and I think we've got such a good team that get along really well, you know, in a specific kind of river cafe camaraderie way, like quite often I love it if I've been on holidays and then they'll come back and Chana say, oh, I interviewed so and so you know you're going to really get on with them, you know.

It's just sort of part I always employing people doesn't start if you want a job as just say.

Yes, Because I always like to think that a lot of London kitchens they are short staffed, and I think that running a kitchen that's short staffed is a way to get everyone working too.

Many shifts, more shifts people work, the more they start to hate their job.

Chefs often do a shift called a double shift, which is it's usually nine in the morning till eleven at night.

That's an average, and many chefs and many London restaurants will do three or four.

Of those in a week.

And having done that when I worked in other restaurants in London, you start to lose your quality of life.

And so I genuinely think that the more you can turn cheffing into like a career where you work good hours, and then the more you enjoy your job and you go home and you cook, and you read cookbooks, and you go out to eat, and you meet hang out with chefs and hang out with friends.

So to have that, you need to have chefs.

So you can't run the chefs into the ground making them do all these doubles because it's not the best paid industry to be in, so you've got to give them a world life balance.

Totally agree.

So we need a lot of chefs.

And also having quite a lot of chefs gives us the ability to train people.

You know, we're really good at training people, but we're not especially quick at it.

You know, it takes ages.

But thinking back to it, in the you know, twenty years ago, we used to employ people and I won't say who they are or where they came from, but they'd arrived here and they were clearly broken from kitchens.

They were exhausted.

That doesn't really happen anymore.

So I think maybe as a whole industry, way way, way, way better.

Also because Rose and Ruth weren't.

You didn't come from petitions, so you ran it with reason, with just that's how a business runs.

We work good hours, week of food, we take breaks, and I'd never I'd never worked anywhere where the respect was so mutual, and it was amazing to see women doing that and that, and I think that creates longevity in this in the River Cafe, because it.

Was done by a pioneers of that.

Well, do you think there is I think when you say that that we didn't have I certainly had absolutely no experience of another restaurant, So I didn't have a concept, as you say, of the way you do it.

You'd run it the way you run an architecture office or you know, a lawyer's office or a doctor's office.

It wasn't.

But when a journalist used to call me and say, it must be so exhausting being a chef, and I used to know it must be so exhausting being a journalist, you know, because any career where you work, you know that many hours a day.

I mean, it probably is more physical.

It is the curtain goes up and you have to be ready and you have to be.

The other thing about the kitchen, what I was thinking is quite unusual was the fact that we never had titles.

I still don't know you.

I still don't know what it's a chef.

I don't know what together this a chef depart, I don't know what that does.

I don't know, but all you need to know is that he's in charge.

You probably worked that out quickly, and then everyone else is.

Genuinely some people are better chefs than other people because you can see that people have been cooking longer.

But there's no title chef, which is a hard concept to get your head around.

So isn't as a last question to someone coming, would you have any sort of advice for them on their first day.

I think you don't want to be too stressed, but you also don't want to miss When you come to River Cafe, it appears very relaxed.

The sort of house style is very open and friendly, but it is also like very diligent and hard working.

So we expect to see people really concentrating and they want to learn, and they're interested in the ingredients and want to talk about food.

I agree with that obviously, absolutely.

I think you should definitely take it seriously.

I think it warrants it.

But at the same time, just try and be yourself as much as you can.

Ask questions.

Ask questions for sure.

Yeah, of course, be as nosey as you can, and you know, be asking what everyone's doing, and you know, take a real interest.

I'm impressed with people who really have their heads now, you know, really focused on what they're doing.

I think we're pretty I hope.

That we're encouraging and we're understanding and it's a great world another.

Who've come through.

Not even just the big names that you've got obviously, the Jamie Olivers and thea Randalls and April Bloomfields, you fairlies, we've also got you know, the Thomas Parry's, the Stevie.

Park, loads of it.

It's a great place to learn.

It's a great place to learn.

When people leave, I say, you know, some of them go to open a little place in New Zealand.

Some of them, you know, open a big restaurant.

So I think, as long as you take what you've learned from here and keep cooking.

I remember getting when I got smugged in Florence and I lost my wallet.

I didn't know what to do because I had not a single penny on me.

So I called Linda in the office and she organized for an ex member staff who is living in Florence now to come with an envelope of money.

It sounds a little bit like this sort of secret service.

What I reckon.

Go to many many places now around the world and we can probably yeah.

Okay, first days, second days, third days, fourth days, one year, ten years, twenty five years, amazing, We just keep going.

Thank you, Thank you for listening to Ruthie's Table four in partnership with Montclair