Gagnaire and Biles - armed with a pencil, notebook and an eraser ? come up with new menus, based on recent inspirations and the ingredients in season.
Working for pleasure
But it’s not all business with Gagnaire; he is keen to emphasise the need for chefs to keep the pleasure in their work.
“It’s what I try to teach Olivier: you must pay attention, not to go too quickly, it’s like a marathon, you must manage your life.
“Sometimes you must push, and sometimes you must take time for yourself,” he counsels.
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Biles says he strives to pass this on to his team: “We try to respect our guys, to give them responsibility and to treat them properly, we give to them what they give to us — a lot.
At least everyone is happy and we try to make it as comfortable [as possible], everyone is far from their family and everyone is a little bit lonely and it doesn’t make sense for them to get [stressed] at work.
“We are a small team but we have a big structure around us from the hotel which is really organised…a great working environment.”
Gagnaire too is keen to credit the support of the hotel environment InterContinental provides, without which he doesn’t think Reflets could operate.
“I think with a kind of restaurant like Reflets, if we were alone, it would be difficult to manage. For the menu. This kind of restaurant, if we are not busy for two or three days it is not [too bad], because we have the hotel, and we do not have this stress.
When you are alone it is very stressful because it is difficult to manage. Here we have the business of the rooms,” observes Gagnaire, who operates all his restaurants out of hotels bar London’s Sketch.
However, he says this can only work if the head chef is allowed the time he needs to be creative and cook, with the hotel’s other departments supporting him.
“Sometimes there’s a problem in a big hotel for the chef,” admits Gagnaire. “Olivier is lucky because here there is enough protection. In a hotel the chef must make so many orders, have so many meetings, spend time, so he cannot cook, and the chef [is supposed to] cook! You must make money... but your real job is to cook.”
And with that, the pair turn back to their notebooks, scribbling down their latest inspirations, while the team quietly prepare behind them; it’s easily the calmest kitchen I’ve ever been in.
“We must work!” declares Gagnaire, and they are soon immersed in their culinary bubble.
I say my farewells and retreat carefully, leaving the chefs to do what they love best; cooking.
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