What's Killing Our Best Chefs? By Chris Hill

DISCLAIMER: I will never earn a Michelin star, so I can’t speak of the pressure and stress involved in obtaining one, much less, keeping one.... but there’s a question worth asking - at what cost? Recently another chef great, owner of three Michelin stars took his own life. It blindsided everyone.

I’m not going to pretend like I understand what might be going through anyone’s head, especially in their last moments amid a suicidal struggle. It has to feel overwhelming. Excruciating.

I’ve worked my way up the line, built and run a team, and have found a modicum of success in doing so. I showed up year after year at my restaurant not getting paid, while investing everything I had into this dream that never really panned out for me financially - at least how I’d envisioned it.

That aside, along the way I had the opportunity to build bonds I never knew were possible and found myself tested in ways I never would have imagined that have allowed me to grow - physically, emotionally, and certainly mentally. The restaurant industry and more specifically, the kitchen, has in a lot of ways shaped who I have become. It’s been my sanctuary of sorts - a place where I’m completely focused and in the zone. Hours go by feeling like minutes. Adrenaline has been known to get the best of me, especially in the thick of the rush.

It’s a feeling that never gets old and I imagine it’s the same feeling an actor gets on stage, an athlete feels on the field under the lights, or that a fiction writer feels as a story reveals itself in their mind hovered over a legal pad. It’s a feeling you can’t ever really gets sick of, but it’s not something you’re born with — it takes time to develop and mature. If I had to quantify it for cooking, I’d call it equal parts honing the craft, working as a team towards a common goal, and finally, the imperative nature of having to execute on demand. When these parts are in confluence life in the kitchen should be in harmony - often it’s not, though. To understand why not, we must first understand what success looks like to the industry and what keeps harmony from prevailing.

We show up, give everything we have by committing ourselves to being the best we can every day. That, alone, is a good enough reason to be proud, but much of the restaurant industry is a tangled web of sorts — spun from a place that’s still trying to find itself. It leaves many of us disappointed, some broke as well, while others, pay the biggest price of all with their lives.

Presumably, they can’t handle the stress, the pressure, the high stakes and ubiquitous assumption that there’s no feeling or emotion in the kitchen. All of this combined with an often unattainable vision of what success is gets the best of some of the best. Chefs, many, in pursuit of Michelin stars and other noteworthy bragging rights, are striving for a place that doesn’t exist.

This place is always moving and the load seem to get heavier, the higher the stakes. Much of that weight seems handed down from a culture and an industry that defines success (in a lot of ways) in being more innovative, creative and out of the box than the next guy. It keeps us continually looking into the mirror, asking ourselves, how can I be better?

Not necessarily better than who I was yesterday, but rather, better than the expectations