Pablo Albuerne: "I had a time when I wanted Michelin stars, but it passed quickly"

Gastronomy

Pablo Albuerne Alba Giné

This Asturian and his alter ego, Gipsy Chef, have thousands of followers on the networks and their unorthodox recipes receive millions of visits on the Internet

Professional cook and private chef, publishes' Gipsy Chef.

My world in 40 bestial recipes', a unique cooking manual, between the biography and the cookbook

Pablo Albuerne

(Oviedo, 1976) is not a typical character or cook.

He transmits energy,

, good vibes and

alike, and one does not distinguish well when he speaks or when his

, does, with whom he sweeps the Internet and who thousands of people follow on

and gastronomic portals (

and

From RTVE).

Gipsy Chef was born from the need that the chef Pablo had to

, "two of the things I like the most", he often says.

Now, after two years of work, both "things" have adopted the

of a book:

(Ed. Libros Dome), which goes on sale on Thursday 19.

Provocative, he shies away from rules and limits, and he cooks the same as

for billionaires as he does next to a Metro entrance or in the two restaurants he has in Sitges (La Zorra and the El Santo sandwich shop).

Pablo Albuerne

, yes, but he has behind him an established

(hospitality school, restaurants recognized in his native land or with a Michelin star ...) on which he has developed a

cuisine

... fair and a party.

At work as Gipsy Chef.Alba Giné

Your unorthodox recipes take the cake.

What does Gipsy Chef, alias of Pablo Albuerne, have to succeed wherever he goes? The proximity and lack of artifice, both in speech and in recipes.

It's all very intuitive, people make them and see that they work.

faithful to the

, personal and professional photos and their own illustrations.

The book looks more like a travel notebook than a manual to use.

Is it some kind of autobiography? Yes, although there wouldn't be enough books to tell everything that happened to me, because I go around more than a clock.

It was born with the intention that people get to know my world a bit, I don't want it to be a novel either because I'm not a writer, and my passion for cooking, which is embodied in recipes of my own, you say that your ideas are the result of chance and of a touch of need.

Little to do with 'official' cuisine ... I like to get away from his speech and his energy.

The tweezers, the latex gloves, the bizarre ways of speaking ... They are things that stand between food and the person and that take you away from the ultimate goal, which is to eat something delicious.

I flee from that, which makes me more free when it comes to cooking: I do it anywhere, I have no prejudice to mix things a priori impossible ... I have a wide background as a professional chef, a long career and a technique that allows me to approach the kitchen in a normal way. Are you continuing to learn?

I continue to recycle to the beast at the gastronomic level, I follow the latest things that come out, to me, what I like the most is to keep learning.

I learn from everything, even the one who tells me that this is crap.

I think that continuous learning is what gives me this energy and this roll. With that good vibes, what should good food be like? Rich, above all there is nothing;

well, same ethics.

Now what comes first is aesthetics and it cannot be, the first thing is taste.

Pablo Albuerne in his restaurant La Zorra (Sitges) .Inma Quesada

Do you usually go to haute cuisine places? I go to many restaurants, also the so-called haute cuisine, because there is haute cuisine implies that there is a medium and a low, and that is something that bothers me a lot.

I consume all kinds of cuisine, but if I have to choose between a super traditional and a haute cuisine, I will tell you that perhaps I am more inclined towards the former, because I value flavor more than other things that, although they are good, are not eaten. for photographer and you stayed in the kitchen, what happened in between? Something very simple.

I wanted to be Cartier-Bresson with three years of studies and it was impossible.

I was passionate about photography, in fact it has served me later to tell stories with images, but it was not made for the BBC (weddings, baptisms and communions).

And the kitchen came to turn my life around.

I was 20 years old and one night, at the home of one of my best friends who was studying hospitality in Santiago de Compostela, I opened a book by Santi Santamaría.

It awakened something that I had not yet identified, my love for cooking, and the memory of my grandmother, a great cook who with five ingredients did wonders.

I felt my grandmother in Santi, it was a somewhat mystical revelation, and I am the least mystical there is on the face of the earth.And one day in 2001 you went to Sant Celoni (Barcelona) to work in El Racó de Can Fabes, the three Michelin stars of Santi Santamaría.

It was predestined.

I had spent all my apprenticeship at the Oviedo Hospitality School, plus the internships and the almost two years that I was working sending him resumes, but he didn't pay attention to me.

I was frustrated and about to leave the kitchen when, during a family meal, my brother arrived with his girlfriend from Barcelona.

His father had gone to class with Santi Santamaría ...!

After a week and a half, I was already working with him.

I stayed for a year. And then? I went to Ra, a restaurant with a lot of vibes where the Barcelona scene and the heart of Barcelona were.

I had come to Barcelona a bit like Paco Martínez Soria, because I had never left Asturias, and in El Racó I worked 14 hours a day, six days a week and on the seventh I slept like a dormouse ... Suddenly, I discovered that fuss .

It was four or five years in which I came out what is not written, but I also worked hard ... and I even set up a catering company, which collapsed. Failure that would be the beginning of your success ... Yes.

I went to Menorca with 50 euros and a motorcycle that I had bought in installments.

I was going on a hippie adventure, with the idea of ​​finding a millionaire to cook for and forgetting about the scandals, the costs.

And be careful with what you want, because it is fulfilled.

After a month and a half he was in Ibiza, enrolled in the Paz, a marvel of sailing, and cooked for a millionaire and his family.

We hit it off and they asked me to go around the world for three years cooking for them and I said yes.

Gipsy Chef cooking on the street.Alba Giné

And did

Gipsy Chef

start

on that trip

? Yes.

I have always liked to write and tell stories and I began to tell my family what I was experiencing ... even though I gave up on the fifth email.

Then, the idea of ​​counting kitchen things came up, but in a different way.

I came from such picky haute cuisine, which made me grind so much ... and I wanted it to be closer, because we are cooks, not aeronautical engineers;

We make a potato good, not a plane fly.

And the idea grew. Why Gipsy Chef? My closest circle in Asturias calls me a gypsy and the closest one outside, a

.

I liked the concept of the

as a nomad and libertarian and that of the chef as a structured character with rules.

And since I had experienced that contrast of being unconventional in a corseted world, I opted for Gipsy Chef. You become something different and you begin to be successful, what was the reaction of your sector? I am still the same.

I have clients of very high status with whom after so many years I maintain friendship, and I have not changed;

I will be in a milk restaurant, but I will remain the same.

And, the truth, the world of the kitchen has never paid attention to me, but I have not needed it either;

I needed more people's attention.

Although I also had a time when I wanted Michelin stars, but it passed quickly. Did you ever consider it? I had a project in Barcelona, ​​which I think would have been successful, but I lacked the perseverance that was needed.

I saw that my life would be a

and I do not conceive of life with just one thing.

Get in a place and spend five years until a guy comes to tell me I'm cool and gives me a star?

I've seen people so preoccupied with these things that they forget to enjoy the road, which is the important thing. You like to provoke ... Yes, it is a way of waking people up and making them think a bit.

Sometimes it creates harshness, but I am in favor of opening up the debate on many things and the best way is by provoking ... How is sincerity seen in the kitchen world? As in the rest of the world.

In any case, honesty is not incompatible with education.

I am sincere and clear.

I am very lucky with my social networks, there are criticisms, but I try to take them with humor and humor, and from any criticism, no matter how ruthless it may be, there is always something to rescue and some truth.

I try to respond with sarcasm and grace, because humor helps you to withstand the blows of life. What is the basis of your kitchen? Affection and flavor.

His videos have a funny and roguish air.Alba Giné

How would you explain to someone who does not know Gipsy Chef who he is? I would tell him to sit down, look and open your mind.

That what is going to happen has nothing to do with what you have seen so far and that, after 10 videos, at some point you will feel like cooking.

I say that my recipes are just a starting point, I'll give you an idea, if you want to do it to the letter, fine, but also dare to try. After a lot of effort and setbacks you have achieved success, what is the formula? The greatest success is feeling happy with what you do, the rest are mandangas and egos, although it is cool to be recognized because you have written a cool book or because you have made a great recipe ... But for me, success is happiness with I do things, when it is not like that, it shows a lot. You have two premises in Sitges affected by the closure of the Catalan hotel industry, how do you see the situation in general? The politicians improvise so that we anticipate.

The hotel industry is one of the great engines of the country and right now I don't know if it will survive. How did we get out of this? Throwing eggs and a bit of rebellion.

I think that if we were closer together everything would work better.

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