As a professional chef, there's lots of important rules you have to follow to make sure you're complying with health and safety regulations in the kitchen. But there's another rule you ought to follow away from the kitchen, according to Gordon Ramsay. The celebrity chef doesn't like to see his colleagues smoking, as he revealed to FoodSided, during an interview promoting season 19 of Hell's Kitchen.
While lots of chefs ignore the advice - and many of the show's previous contestants are keen smokers - that hasn't stopped Ramsay from opening up about his reasoning, and it makes a lot of sense.
"I'm not a big fan of chefs smoking," the celebrity chef told FoodSided, before explaining it is all to do with the effect it has on your taste buds. Sharing similar advice in a previous interview with the New York Daily News, he said: "The first thing I teach a chef is how to taste. If you don't understand how it tastes, you shouldn't be cooking it."
But the good news is people who quit smoking can notice an improvement in their sense of smell and taste within just 2-3 days according to the British Heart Foundation. While several studies disagree on how much smoking might dull your senses, Ramsay reckons it could even be the difference between winning or losing the blind taste test on his reality competition.
Speaking of his distaste for the habit back in 2011, Ramsay told Uproxx: "It’s like, would you go to a doctor who smoked six cigarettes a day?". "I’ve never smoked in my life," he added.
Elsewhere, the straight-talking celeb shared advice for chefs cooking at home, revealing many of us have been cooking rice wrong without realising it. Thankfully, the common mistake has a simple solution.
Simply add your rice to a sieve and run it under the cold tap before cooking, to help get rid of all the dust and starch. "Cold water, always, and just rinse the rice. That stops the rice from getting clumpy in the pan," he explained. "It ensures it gets really nice and fluffy when it’s cooked."
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