"A Marriage Carved Up"
Chef Magazine
October, 2001

Marriage in the world of chefdom is a movable feast often with slim pickings. "Anyone who tells you it's bliss is lying," says Chef Chris Prosperi, co-owner of Metro Bis, Simsbury, Conn. Prosperi's wife, Courtney Febbroriello, an ex-family therapy student, is joyously writing a book about the indignities of being a chef's spouse. Prosperi and Febbroriello are but one of many committed duos. Still, zonked out, divorced chef's lost in a time warp - wary of ever loving again - could be the ultimate food cost.

A Midwestern chef with one divorce under his belt says, "I think anybody working 65 to 70 hours a week, is jeopardizing a relationship. You're married to your job. With some of us in this business, it's a character flaw - the drive to be noticed, respected and to succeed."

Sick of missing holidays and eternally single, Ron Geron ditched his job as a chef at The Ritz-Carlton, Boston, after a 25-year industry career. He returned to school, turned his skills toward financial management and is now blissfully engaged. "I wanted a normal life," he says.

It's All In Your Head

Dr. Arthur Freeman, professor and chair of the Department of Psychology at Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, refuses to blame workload for the marital wrack-ups or amorous failures of chefs. "Lots of people work 12 hours a day," he says. "The issue is not simply that both people have to be in the business. The issue is an agreement on the stress of the culinary life. You have to understand you are not married to Robert Young or Loretta Young, who come home and put on a cardigan sweater or an apron."

Spouses who demand storybook families probably won't find fulfillment married to restaurant chef. Irreconcilable expectations brought on by ungodly work hours did not allow the marriage of Chicago restaurateurs Gale Gand and Rick Tramonto to flourish after the birth of their child. Divorced, they continue to run their restaurant, Tru, as a duo, "married to the business" in the truest sense of the word. Chefs forced to increase their work loads to support growiug families can inadvertently leave them feeling abandoned. Father of four Peter Katsotis "bailed out" of his family restaurants to have time for his own family, switching gears, first as a research chef for a seasoning company, now as director of training and implementation for Sodexho based in Gaithersburg, Md, where the hours are kinder.

"There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so: Freeman Says, quoting from Shakespeare's Hamlet. How partners think about their fates and each other can be more devastating than the chef's long hours, it seemsƒ

Bolster Your Ambition by Staying Hitched

... Restaurateur Ellen Gray explains the marital magic cauldron thus: "The marriage shapes the restaurant and the restaurant shapes the marriage. We live and breathe tbis restaurant. We would Iive on top of it if we could." Part of a totally consumed culinary duo whose 2 year-old son has inspired children's cooking classes, Ellen handles the business, PR and purchasing at Equinox, the D.C. restaurant she runs with husband, Chef Todd Gray.

But even though these flourishing marriages and business partners might. appear to be identical entities, they are not. Happy culinary duos appear to know how to play house, play games and keep a separate space, for themselves. "Couples that play together, stay together," says Dr. Eva Stubits, clinical psychologist in private Practice in Houston, espousing a familiar adage. Both the Grays and the Bubens nourish their marriages apart from the business - to the point where both women cook for their Chef husbands. And, while the Grays relish Sunday theater outings and escape between shifts to hike together, the Bubens hunt and fish.

Relax and Stop Trying So Hard!

Of course nurturing love requires a certain calmness vulnerable, to the tensions of stealing waitstaff, aggravated customers, broken equipment and wrong deliveries. "Stress-management skills are particularly important to People working as Chefs," says Stubits, a specialist in couples issues and stress. Avoiding self-flagellation through realistic thinking and doing the best you can are important, she says. She also recommends physical exercise, meditation and relaxation exercises to help people cope better. Beyond the Relaxation Response: How to Harness the Healing Power of Your Personal Beliefs (Berkley Pub Group, 1994) Dr. Herbert Benson is a helpful volume. Of course, even a hushed reference to meditation or breaks leaves many quietly rolling their eyes, declaring stress the Chef's unavoidable "birthmark."

Happily, the industry may be attempting to change its ways, buckling under its own stress. "More and more restaurants are insisting on five-day weeks for employees, including chefs, as restaurants flounder with turnover due to burned-out, overworked employees," says Steve Hussey, general manager of Aquitaine, Boston, from his experience as an industry consultant. "Then again. a lot of the pain in the restaurant business is self-inflicted. You feel you can't leave," he adds.

Clearly. industry is not the sole culprit in a complex matrix in which compulsiveness and perfectionism play ample roles. The marital life of a chef can be no picnic with staggering hours, mind-boggling stress, clamoring families, ample alcohol and circling groupies. ("Foodie groupies-outside, inside, every-where," laughs Gray. "They're hilarious' I know women who only want to marry chef's.") Nonetheless, love need not be a sacrificial lamb cooked up according to industry dictates, social pressures or bad behavior. There is every reason to believe that compassionate, committed love could well be the product of one's own thinking.

Ethel Hammer, a Chicago-based freelancer, is married to a chef.

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