What Needs to Change for Kitchens to Become More Queer-Friendly?
Of all the high-stress jobs in the world, restaurant kitchens are uniquely demanding. Workers wrangle fire and knives, communicating under pressure as the orders pour in. And, on top of these built-in demands, kitchen culture has notoriously included aggression and abuse, and queer workers have been especially vulnerable.
Creating meaningful change and real systems of support within the industry is no easy feat. “The queer community, in food and otherwise, is not a monolith,” says Julia Turshen, cookbook author, activist, and founder of Equity at the Table, a database for marginalized voices in food. “I do think, in general, we'd like to see and hear more of our own stories, written and photographed and illustrated and food styled by us, reflected in food media.” Here, four people in the industry share their experiences and hopes for transforming kitchens into safer spaces.
Photo by Emily Sundberg1/4Cleo Zuli, educator, events curator at BLK PALATE, and prep cook at Rippers
I applied for my first job when I was 15, and my mother intervened and told me I could work anywhere except in the food industry. Later I learned that my mother worked as a waitress at this chain Mexican restaurant Chi-Chi’s after migrating to the U.S. from Haiti. When I took random catering gigs in undergrad, I was often (and still can be) stereotyped as "one of the boys" because of my presentation. Instead of not saying the misogynistic things, the guys I worked with would make offensive jokes and expect me to laugh along. Since then, I've been pretty committed to not working at places where I experience consistent judgment or stereotyping. It's sounds like a privilege, but it's been a form of self care as a queer, gender-nonconforming person.
None of the stories that have come out as a result of the #metoo movement about chefs and the food world surprise me. I wouldn't expect an industry that already overworks highly underpaid laborers to be exempt from the issues that other white, male-dominated industries also face. Back of house life that can be intense, demoralizing, and literally kept quiet in the back. We can't assume that everyone took gender studies or queer studies, or that re-conceptualizing the way folks have been socialized is simple. There has to be a commitment to professional development and creating accountability systems for those who are bent on making the workplace an unsafe space for others. An orientation or training isn't enough.
Photo by Emily Sundberg2/4Al Culliton, historian and mixologist at Fort Defiance
No matter what your queer status is or whatever, if you’re a woman in the restaurant industry or any industry, at some point you’re going to be infantilized or sexualized. Or both, which is really scary. I’ve dealt with being treated a certain way because I’m a woman, and people don’t always get my gender identity. Like yeah, I’m a dyke. I don’t know if you can say that but that’s what I call myself.
I started working in coffee in 2008. My boss owned a coffee shop with a bar attached to it, so I started drinking nice whiskeys and got hooked on Manhattans. I moved to L.A. and tried out more bars, and I loved all the ritualism and tools involved. The first time I made drinks was at a party back in New York—the bar was set up on an ironing board.
The constellation of businesses that support restaurants themselves is much more traditional than actual restaurants in the city. So dealing with reps and suppliers, sometimes they feel super, super square and don’t always get it. You can’t spend your whole working life trying to explain to people who you are, so that’s why it’s really important to choose when you take a beat and talk to someone that you work with because they said something that didn’t sit well with you.
There’s no handbook on these things, and here’s a temptation these days for people to be like “No, no, no, I get it.” We use so much shorthand, and see so much from our specific view of the world through our phones and through our computers, and I just think that sometimes people don’t want more conversation [about queerness] but we’re not going to stop having it. We can’t stop having it if we want to improve things for future generations.
Photo by Emily Sundberg3/4Erika Nakamura, butcher and consultant, J&E SmallGoods
In the earlier days at White Gold Butchers, Jocelyn and I chose not to make our personal relationship public because it’s no one’s business, but we also wanted to assert ourselves as strong women who are in charge in the workplace, and want to be taken seriously by both employees and customers.
I started working as a dishwasher, waiter, and prep cook in my godmother’s Indian restaurant in Tokyo, Japan when I was 20 years old. The most frequent stereotype I’ve received as a female butcher is people asking, “Are you sure you’re strong enough to carry that?” or a male customer looking right over my head to get confirmation from my male employee/apprentice that what I am saying is in fact correct.
Rather than consciously attempting to create a safe space by singling out queer folks, I would like to see queerness evolve to become just as normal as being straight, or black, or Southeast Asian, or gay or white. Being reminded of how different you are from others every day is the single most frustrating and liberating thing about being queer—frustrating because people constantly want to call you out (or treat you extra carefully), but liberating because you know that you’re special and that still matters too.
Photo by Emily Sundberg4/4Jocelyn Guest, chef and former butcher at White Gold
I started as a very scared line cook. I was out, and when my fellow line cooks found out I was gay, they all agreed I just hadn’t found the right dick yet. Because, yes, ill-socialized pizza cook, you know all about the right dick.
I've mostly worked for and with women, so my experience is different and I know that. But for better or worse, I will fire someone on the spot if anything untoward goes down. I’ve done it before and I’ll do it again. No matter who you are, nobody is irreplaceable. Kitchens are workplaces that should be both professional and safe—I think a lot of people could be reminded of that a lot more often. Also, we’re New Yorkers dammit. If you see something, say something.
