I have never envied the chef\/owners of high-flying restaurants. Who could possibly thrive under the immense pressure of serving perfect food perfectly, night after night? And then be expected to break even, let alone turn a profit?<\/p>\n
No wonder so many high-end restaurant kitchens are laboratories of abusive behavior. The merciless Gordon Ramsay<\/a> is hardly an outlier.<\/p>\n But Rene Redzepi, the celebrated chef who introduced conceptual Nordic food<\/a> to the world when he opened Noma in Copenhagen more than two decades ago, has allegedly taken the stereotype to new, sadistic heights.<\/p>\n A New York Times investigation<\/a>, sparked by Instagram posts from a former Noma employee, landed with a crash just days before the restaurant\u2019s sold-out 16-week, $1,500-per-person Los Angeles pop-up<\/a> opened Wednesday.<\/p>\n Between 2009 and 2017, the New York Times reported, Redzepi \u201chit, jabbed and shoved workers for minor errors and punched them when enraged by an infraction. He threatened them with blacklisting, deportation and public shaming.\u201d<\/p>\n When there were customers in the dining room who could see into the open kitchen, said the Times, \u201che would crouch under the counters in the open kitchen and jab them in the legs with his fingers or a nearby utensil, like a barbecue fork.\u201d<\/p>\n He should have been sued, or investigated. Not celebrated. <\/p>\n I\u2019ve been seeing lots of online debate about which is more offensive: patronizing a chef accused of brutalizing his employees or dropping that kind of money on a single fancy dinner.<\/p>\n I don\u2019t hold it against anyone spending their own money on an uber-fancy meal, although I am slightly repulsed by the fetishization of the food at places like Noma or the French Laundry, where I\u2019ve eaten a couple of times. Nor would I expect anyone to cancel a reservation because of a chef\u2019s past wrongdoings \u2014 and Redzepi insists that after years of therapy, his behavior is a thing of the past.<\/a> <\/p>\n But his history leaves a bad taste for some. \u201cThere\u2019s something about supporting a chef who multiple former employees claimed punched a colleague in the ribs (and berated him until he admitted that he liked giving DJs oral sex), among other abhorrent behaviors, that makes me lose my appetite,\u201d wrote Times restaurant critic Jenn Harris, in an essay explaining why the Noma pop-up is a hard pass for her.<\/p>\n Jason Ignacio White, Noma\u2019s former head of fermentation, who began posting<\/a> past Noma employees\u2019 distressing accusations of abuse<\/a> by Redzepi on Instagram last month, led a protest Wednesday<\/a> at the pop-up site, the Paramour Estate in Silver Lake. He was joined by the labor rights group One Fair Wage.<\/p>\n White has said that Redzepi owes reparations to the young professionals who worked incredibly long hours for free, and traded their dignity and mental health for the opportunity to have Noma on their resumes. <\/p>\n \u201cNoma broke me,\u201d read White\u2019s sign. \u201cYou bought a ticket to a crime scene,\u201d read another.<\/p>\n American Express, and others, pulled sponsorships<\/a> for the pop-up a day before its opening.<\/p>\n While the first dinner went on as scheduled, the deluge of bad press led Redzepi to unexpectedly announce<\/a> he would \u201cstep away\u201d from Noma, as well as from MAD, the nonprofit he founded that\u2019s focused on the future of food. \u201cI cannot change who I was then,\u201d he said in an apology posted online<\/a>. \u201cBut I take responsibility for it and will keep doing the work to be better.\u201d<\/p>\n Redzepi, who built his business on the backs of unpaid interns, or stagiaires, from all over the world, closed Noma\u2019s physical doors a few years ago. It turned out that without all the free labor, his business model was unsustainable<\/a>. Noma now operates as a food lab, and travels the world as a pop-up.<\/p>\n How does a man who pioneered an entirely new cuisine, whose restaurants have been named best in the world a half-dozen times, whose contributions to Danish culture and tourism led the queen to knight him, become so toxic?<\/p>\n