This article was first printed on August 9 2023. It has been republished (November 22) to add context to an interview with Thomas Straker published on the same day, which you can read here.
Last week, an anonymous hospitality worker shared a tongue-in-cheek Instagram post about a fictitious trial shift at a restaurant. “They told me it was the first time they’d even seen a woman in a professional kitchen,” the post read. “And to that I replied: ‘Wow, thank you guys, for being so open minded and welcoming me with such massive muscley open arms’.” It got ruder — and funnier — from there. More than 8,500 people liked the post and suddenly @sluttycheff became the hottest name on the restaurant scene.
The post was a comment on Thomas Straker, the chef who made his name on TikTok (two million followers and counting), after he shared a photo of his kitchen staff, eight white men who all look a little alike. Needless to say, it sparked a debate over diversity and inclusivity in restaurants. Why, in such a multicultural city, are there no women or people of colour in his team?
Straker himself responded to the backlash, firstly calling for “solutions, not problems” but later apologised for his words, announcing he was “committed to ensuring diversity in my restaurants”.
By Slutty Cheff’s own admission, she very much “took the piss” in her missive, playing up to a macho stereotype — propagated by shows such as Disney’s The Bear — of ludicrous banter and sensationalised hard graft. “Give this post a Pulitzer,” wrote one admirer. Another, Lorde — yes, the pop star — commented: “This is what I log in for.”
As quickly as that, Slutty Cheff became a phenomenon. At the time of posting, she had 1,000 followers. Within days, she had more than 12,000 and last Friday she published a piece in Vogue. Did she mean to become an industry spokeswoman? “I’m incredibly overwhelmed,” she says, over coffee. “It’s been positive. Friends have messaged saying ‘don’t worry about hateful comments’, but I haven’t seen any. At the moment, I have more than 500 message requests — I’m not used to it.” Might one of them be from Lorde? “I’ve not spoken to her.” Or, more pertinently, Straker? “He’s not been in touch.”
Slutty Cheff is bashful, perhaps caught a little unawares by the attention her Instagram post received. She says her intentions aren’t to be vitriolic. Rather, she wants to make people laugh. After a gruelling 60-hour week in the kitchen (she is a mid-level chef at a well-regarded London restaurant), it is a way to unwind. Still, if she provides a platform to raise what some might perceive as issues in hospitality, all the better. “I wrote it in bed, hungover, on my phone. I did worry that he might get angry, but I posted it. Then I cycled to a Vietnamese restaurant, ordered pho, and my phone wouldn’t stop buzzing. I was shocked.”
Instagram jokes aside, Slutty Cheff says she believes there’s progress to be made in the restaurant game. She wants to see better representation of women in kitchens, as well as in books and on TV. “Female chefs have been messaging me to say, ‘thank you so much for talking about this’. And I love chatting to other female chefs — I love hearing their stories. That’s the nicest thing. And it validates my own experiences, which have sometimes been really hard. I’m not on some mission, but to have all these people who I’ve followed for years, and looked up to, get in touch, is really special. It made me cry.”
So, what’s next? “I’m going to do more posts, yes. Not about Straker. I don’t have an interest in slating people for the sake of it.” Are others up for the chopping block? “I’ve had people tell me, ‘oh, you should do him or him or him next’, but I’m not going to do that.”
She says she has designs on writing a book, championing women and talking about her life — a relatively “new and young” chef — in the kitchen. Does she feel a responsibility? “I’ve not been a voice or a platform before, but I would love to help if I can,” she says. “I would love women chefs to have more coverage, and I’d love their stories of success to be talked about.”
