What is your idea of a perfect restaurant?
My idea of a perfect restaurant is one that is right next to the sea, where you can fish, forge and hunt every day and I would be cooking for just 10 people.

What is your greatest fear at work?
Cutting all 10 of my fingers off at the same time.

Which working Chef Do you most admire?
I don’t have on individual I admire every chef or cook that is in their kitchen working and protecting their kitchen. That is why I love Japanese cooking so much because even if they are 1000 years old they are still in the kitchen cooking. They die in their kitchens. I hope I die in the kitchen.

What part of work ‘you’ do you most deplore in yourself?
I am too direct sometimes.

What would instantly make you fire someone?
Being disrespectful to ingredients, or to those around him, or someone who talks too much.

What was your most extravagant purchase for your restaurant?
Kobe Beef. 

What is your favourite food journey?
Japan, all over, north, south…

What words or phrases do you most overuse at work?
Respect, Love, Family, don’t give up, support.

What do you regret most after all your years in the business?
Zero regrets.

What do you love most in about this industry?
Food.

What is your current state of mind?
Zen.

If you could change anything about the restaurant industry where you are, what would it be?
Nothing, because I would never be who I am if the industry was different.

What do you consider your most essential ingredient?
Love.

The work/life balance struggle is real.  How good of a juggler are you?  Tips?
I have no regular life. I have nine businesses… I am not a good juggler.

What is your most treasured kitchen tool?
My hands/My knife.

What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery?
I refuse to answer this question it’s too negative.

When you finally retire, were will you live?
I will live somewhere close to Patagonia, Montevideo or Colombia. I would actually love to live in the middle of an island where there is nothing. All I would need is salt and pepper and then I could cook anything.

What is your most marked characteristic?
Hard Working.

What is the quality you most like in a chef?
Consistency.

What is your greatest inspiration/motivation?
My mom.

Superman or Spiderman?
Batman

What is the first thing you remember cooking?
Kimchi

Beck or Clapton?
No. Notorious B.I.G.

You have to cook Escoffier’s death row meal.  Menu?
Scorpion.

Favourite kitchen word or phrase?
Label everything or else you’re fired.