Alasdair Gill, a professional chef who spent a decade in London's kitchens before moving into private catering, has written a tribute to the "rejects, geniuses and emotional refugees" who staff the city's restaurant brigades. In a commentary for The Standard, Gill describes kitchen crews as "London's last uncharted pirate ships," crewed by a motley collection of immigrants, aristocrats, ex-cons, addicts, and obsessives, all tasked with serving expensive meals to hedge fund managers.
A Typical Brigade: A Russian Car Thief and a Brain-Injured Academic
Gill paints a vivid picture of the characters he worked alongside: a Russian car thief, a Mancunian ex-heroin addict who had upgraded to methadone, a Cambridge graduate estranged from his trust fund, and a former academic who, after a brain injury, could no longer read tickets but could instinctively tell when the lamb was resting. There was also Rico, a 6ft 7in Ghanaian kitchen porter with hands so scarred he could pull cast iron from the oven bare-handed.
These were the people who gathered for Tuesday morning briefings, past the bar and down the sticky stairs into the kitchen. Gill notes that while the brigade looked different in every restaurant, the same types of people always appeared.
The Sleep Competition: A Stark Contrast
Gill recounts a poignant moment from a December shift in central London. After 14 hours on his feet, he went outside for a cigarette and saw a table of office workers erupting in applause. They were competing on sleep scores using Oura rings. A waiter suggested the kitchen staff should try them for energy. Gill retorts that Kenny on meat hadn't slept properly since passing out in the larder hugging a sack of potatoes, and Rico's pulse likely couldn't be detected through his scarred hands. The brigade ran on nicotine, caffeine, and unresolved childhood trauma, not wellness apps.
"If the app told us our stress levels were high? What then? Service still starts at six," Gill writes. He contrasts the corporate world's wellness seminars and resilience coaches with the kitchen's espressos blended with cooking wine, Lucky Strikes, and the vague agreement that someone on larder might storm out by last orders.
Kitchens Collect Broken People
Gill argues that kitchens don't create broken people; they collect them. The dyslexic kid who couldn't pass exams, the refugee who barely speaks English, the addict trying to outrun himself, the obsessive, the awkward, the anxious, the angry, the failed artist—all find a place in hospitality. "It won't cure your alcoholism, your depression or your inability to maintain eye contact at staff gatherings. But it might hand you purpose," he says.
He warns that the slow suffocation of British hospitality is not just about losing restaurants; it's about losing one of the last places where damaged people can become useful. "One in five restaurants fear closure this year," he notes, citing crippling VAT, absurd energy costs, and relentless labour shortages. With every closure, a brigade is scattered back into the world—a collection of square pegs who somehow found a square hole.
More Than Just Dinner
Gill emphasizes that people don't just buy dinner at restaurants; they buy people, ambience, theatre, and the space to celebrate, drown, plot, and commiserate life's milestones. Meanwhile, downstairs, the pirates are just trying to survive another service. He criticizes government talk of productivity and wellbeing, arguing that hospitality has always been where Britain's misfits washed up. "It may not be the most conventional workforce, but I can tell you this with absolute certainty: it's not a sector of slackers in need of more cuts. You'd find a better 'sleep score' and 'recovery rating' in a hostage negotiation than a London gastro," he concludes.
Gill's memoir, Knives and Spoons, is published by Pan Macmillan.
