Chef!, Series One (1993)

Gareth Blackstock:
See, in life, Piers, different people want different things. Some want large fortunes, some want carnal knowledge of vast number of the opposite, or indeed their own sex, and some want to write down the numbers of all the British rail diesel locomotives currently in service. Chacun à son goût. Me, my single aim in life is to send the finest, best presented food through that door there. That's it! And if it's at the cost of a few human lives, well, that's fine by me.

Restaurant Manager:
Gareth, please…be reasonable!

Gareth:
Reasonable?! What are you talking about, reasonable? Since when am I reasonable? Do reasonable people produce eighty covers twice a day of the finest gastronomic experiences in England?! Do reasonable people get two Michelin stars? Do you think it's reasonable to spend your life walking around dressed like this?! Reasonable?! I'm a raving bloody lunatic! If I wasn't cooking I'd be out doing serial killing! You look at me, you see a personality problem under a silly white hat. Don't talk to me about reasonable, I don't do reasonable!!

Gareth:
I get the feeling that we're in the general area of the topic of discussion now. Could we now get to the point? I mean, what has brought to you all this way that might interest your old school-extremely-slight-never-liked-you-anyway, probably-flush-your-head-down-the-toilet-as-soon-as-look-at-you-acquaintance?

Everton Stonehead:
Well, I've decided that I wanna work in a decent kitchen.

Gareth:
You are no doubt waiting for me to say to you 'It pains me to say this' or 'It gives me no pleasure' YOU WILL WAIT IN VAIN! I am Gareth Blackstock. I am seriously unpleasant. I am a bastard. What am I?

Piers:
You're a bastard, Chef.

Gareth:
You Got It!.

Gareth:
Ahh so you have a drreeeaamm, Everton. How unspeakably delightful for you.

Gareth:
Let me explain the order of things for you. There's the aristocracy, the upper class, middle class, working class, dumb animals, waiters, creeping things, head lice, people who eat packet soup, and then you.

Gareth:
Well I guess this is Crispin's Day. All we have is remaining stocks and what I'll buy today. We've lost two porters and a commis so the people in the room are IT. Piers and Everton whose duties once included keeping the kitchen clean will now concentrate solely on the preparation of food so no change there then. The morons will survive on tips alone, little babies. And it occurred to me that since you're all working for nothing you might think I'd be inclined to treat you all with greater caring, patience and understanding but then I realised that even in THIS kitchen no one could be THAT stupid,

[A customer has asked for salt]

Gareth:
Nothing else you wanted, was there?

Customer:
What?

Gareth:
A splash of Lea & Perrins? A dollop of Daddies to stir into the artichoke and hollandaise coulis? It really is no trouble, we could send someone into town. I can get you any thing you like to enhance the flavour of your food. Salad Cream, Newman's Own, Branston Pickle. You only have to ask. A little Tobasco perhaps or barbeque sauce, a spoonful of sandwich spread maybe. A nice packet of cheese and onion flavour crisps to sprinkle over your monkfish and salmon gratin. We could even get you a prawn vindaloo or family sized pack of chicken drumsticks or menu Beef for two persons with special fried rice and extra sweet and sour pork balls if you like, I mean we don't mind going to a bit of trouble to please the customers here, really. SALT!!! I'm going back to my kitchen now although GOD KNOWS WHY! I mean, do you have any idea of number of highly-skilled man hours over a three-day period have gone into producing this dish?! Which is brought to your table at the zenith of its powers? Its taste, flavours, texture and temperature at the peak of perfection, and WITHOUT TASTING IT YOU CALL FOR SALT?

Lola:
Your salt, sir.

Gareth:
I hate you with a passion you can only dream of.... bon appétit.

[Gareth storms off. Lola is still hovering near the table]

Customer's Date:
Pardon me?

Lola:
Yes?

Customer's Date:
Got any mustard?

Gareth:
Everton. This is a restaurant in which we serve the finest food that can be prepared by man. If you can think of anything more appalling to find on your plate than a used Elast-o-plast, then I don't want to know what it is. Search the pies, and when you are finished, take your sharpest knife, point it at your chest, and hurl yourself violently forward.

Gareth:
Is there no one else interested? Oh, Mrs Rather Nasty Smell, Mrs Fortis-Perkins. Jolly good. Nice lady. I liked her. SNOTTY COW, what's wrong with it?

Reporter:
I expect you microwave a lot of this stuff, do you?

Gareth:
(visibly contains his rage) Strange to relate, no.

Reporter:
Oh come on. You buy things in bags and boil them up. My friend told me.

Gareth:
No, actually, we don't. You see this is what we call a kitchen. We are chefs. We prepare the food from scratch!

Reporter:
Don't worry, I'm not going to print anything about the cooking!

Gareth:
Please don't print that picture. I was being wordlessly sarcastic. Marcel Marceau would have been proud.

Following Everton's thorough search for his missing plaster

Gareth:
All the pies ruined?

Everton:
Yes, Chef.

Gareth:
All the pasta re-wrapped?

Everton:
Yes, Chef.

Gareth:
D'you find it?

Everton:
Yes, Chef.

Gareth:
Good.

Everton:
It was under the soap in the toilet.

Gareth:
(beat) What an entirely charming interlude. (beat) You're a PRAT, Stonehead!

Gareth:
I'm very glad you made this, Piers. It's reminded me why we never have Vegetable Terrine on the menu. It does indeed look like a Tuscan Summer; it tastes like a Neapolitan compost heap.

Gareth:
Vegetables for a mullet?

Otto:
Nearly done, Chef.

Gareth:
Nearly?

Otto:
Well, a moment or two.

Gareth:
Now is when they are needed. The fish is peaking, there is no nearly. You must peak together. Has your wife never mentioned this to you?

Otto:
We're almost there, Chef.

Gareth:
BIN!!! What is to most important element of cooking?

Everton:
Ingredients.

Gareth:
TIMING! Ingredients was the most important element this morning.

Gareth:
You're a pea-brained, prat-faced, talentless, pillock-headed cretin, what are you?

Everton:
I'm a pea-brained...

Gareth:
If you took an intensive course of intelligence injections and studied till you drop, then one day you might make it to moron third class failed. Give me strength! I don't want to shout at you.

Everton:
No, Chef

Gareth:
I want to batter you with a hard and jagged kitchen implement! I'm only restrained by the ludicrous liberal pinko laws that we've got in this country!

Everton:
Yes, Chef.

Gareth:
In a sanely ordered, civilised society anyone found making runny mayonnaise would be tortured to death slowly in front of a warm applauding audience! Egg yolk, mustard, rescue it drop by drop!

Gareth:
Piers can cook in his sleep, you know. It's amazing. How do I know? Cos I've never seen him do it awake!

Gareth:
(on the phone) I'm 62. I came to it late in life because of all the time I spent as a mercenary in Angola. Well, I'm sorry. I'm just bored of being asked my age by tabloid journalists who can't count to two unless they have a topless model in front of them.

Gareth:
Do you know, I was thinking the other day about how kitchens used to be in olden times. Little things we used to do back that we've all but forgotten about since, like, for example, how we used to clean them from time to time. Piers! You see, this is my explanation for why the surfaces in this kitchen are so low: it's the foot or two of crap we've accumulated underfoot, making us seem that much taller. Piers, dear heart, you've found a brush! How wonderful. Haven't seen one of those since I was a small boy. Where did you get it? The Science Museum? Go carefully, Piers; there my be a Roman Mosaic hidden underneath.

Gareth:
No! What is that?

Everton:
This is hollandaise sauce, Chef.

Gareth:
What for?

Everton:
For this Dover sole.

Gareth:
No, no, no, Everton! A little herb butter. What is the essence of cooking?

Everton:
Ingredients? Timing? Cleanliness?

Gareth:
Restraint. This Dover sole needs that hollandaise sauce like the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel needs a coat of brilliant white emulsion.

Gareth's father has made an unwelcome return

Janice:
Those things he said about you when you came top at school when you were nine.

Gareth:
Yes. (Jamaican Accent) "Have to move de boy to a better school. The other children must be as thick as pig shit." (normal) Then when I won the sprint: (Jamaican) "Well, he gets so much practice running away from an honest days work!

While preparing his famous dumplings, Everton requests that his colleagues look away

Gareth:
Everton, let's get a couple of things straight. I am Chef de Cuisine, this is my kitchen.

Everton:
Of course.

Gareth:
You have learned all my recipes.

Everton:
Well...

Gareth:
Recipes which have won this place two Michelin stars. Recipes which will remain your faithful standbys all your cooking career.

Everton:
I know...

Gareth:
And I'm not allowed to learn (Jamaican accent) Uncle Ivan's secret to his dumpling?

Everton:
He made me promise on my honour sort of thing.

Gareth:
Everton, I am not going to turn my back in my own kitchen!

Janice:
How's it going?

Gareth:
(smiles) Everton's making some wonderful things.

Janice:
Good!

Gareth:
His dumplings are a dream, his Guinness Punch is to die for. (expression breaks) It's hell. Hell! He's such an insufferably cocky little smarty-pants I want to smack him in the gob! I hate him. I wish I'd never heard of Caribbean food.

Janice:
Then don't do it.

Gareth:
I must! My father is bringing his latest floozy, Dorothy, on this special night. She loves West Indian food. We will serve the finest the world has ever known. He won't be able to slag it off because she will be in ecstasies with every mouthful and he'll have to admit it's the best he's ever had. Te-he. Stubborn little git!

Gareth:
This is personal. I want to be rude, I'm hoping to cause offence! I have a life long abhorrence to violence inflicted on women, but I am giving urgent consideration to an exception in your case.

Mrs Courtney:
[shocked] Mr Blackstock!

Gareth:
I have just seen your bill! It is for the sort of money which rarely changes hands without the aid of a gun, and a getaway car! There are names at Lloyds, sitting alone in darkened rooms with revolvers who owe less than this! It's a disgrace! You're charging me so much money! You can afford to eat in my restaurant! I don't know why you don't just take up drug trafficking and have done.

Mrs Courtney:
Now look...

Gareth:
It would mean a sharp drop in your income, granted.

Mrs Courtney:
Chef, you've never complained before?

Gareth:
This isn't a bill. This is grievous bodily invoicing! I trusted you, Mrs Courtney. "Bring me the best," I said, "and I will pay you what is fair!"

Mrs Courtney:
Well, yes.

Gareth:
And you betrayed my trust. And you have done that which I dread most in all the world.

Mrs Courtney:
What's that?

Gareth:
You have proved my wife right!