When was the last time you were very excited?
"I'm always very excited, it's a problem. I'm excited about things related to my family, and at 'Master Chef' I get a lot of excited about people who manage to 'jump in.' Themselves, and 'Master Chef' is their stage. They come as an underdog in their sense, and it's exciting to see them rise to a place they do not believe they will reach. Excites me.These are moments for which it is worth me to get up and do another season.
"I've been there since day one. When a season starts I don't always have the strength, but when the cameras go on I see people who want to succeed, and our feedback can change their lives. There's a danger in being a judge, probably for so long, and I ask myself - maybe it's Enough? When you judge someone you have to say to yourself 'It's not related to me, it's only related to a human being'. "
When was the last time you failed?
"I fail almost every day because some of the hunger to succeed is also fed by lack of success. There is no shelf called success, and you sit on it and pick from it. There are failures, like unmotivated cooks returning from the corona, and I think I have not read this map enough Solution.It happens in all industries, and it's a kind of big failure.The people's breaking point is very low, and there's no drive either.
"Something happened in the world. I, in order to understand what French or Italian cuisine is, saved and traveled and came back with experiences that will accompany me for a lifetime. Today people sit at home and are exposed to everything that happens in the world through networks. It is not the same experience. "You can't get roots into the ground. You don't get excited about anything, and you don't connect to anything."
When was the last time you felt proud?
"I really like that people come out of my restaurant, 'Jaffa Tel Aviv', who open their own restaurants and are successful, and if I have to help I help. I feel great pride when I see them - people like Tomer Tal, Tomer Agai, Chilik Gurfinkel and others who worked for me. I am not Injured when they leave, on the contrary. Competition is a good thing. It's stressful and annoying - but it's the fuel that wakes you up. If you're alone, you will fall asleep. Theirs, and it's stunning. "
When was the last time you participated in a non-"Master Chef" reality show?
"In Corona I was offered to participate in 'The Singer in a Mask', and it took me less than a tenth of a second to say yes. I think if I were not a cook - I would like to sing. Singing is like a prayer coming out of your body, and it's the most exciting it can be.
"I was the octopus, and the experience inside the mask was amazing. Not only are you not recognized, you suddenly realize we live in endless regulation. They look at us, examine us - how I speak, what I do. I can not swear on the road without being seen - and suddenly I'm in complete intimacy, the mask on my face and I kind of go back to the womb, alone. It set me free, I could think inward about things I had almost no time for. "In two or three years. I'm an only child and I know how to be alone, I don't know anything else. It was very soothing."
When was the last time we pardoned you?
"Right now, when I was voted the most popular chef restaurant on the Zap site. You don't have to fly on it too much, but it's pleasant. I do not rub shoulders with colleagues, I do not go to bars and hardly to restaurants.
"The problem is that today everyone wants to judge reality shows, because the TV show took up a very important place. I got there a long time ago, because when I started 'Garlic, Pepper and Olive Oil' it was not yet oh-ha-tralla. Aharoni, Ruthi (Brodo), Eyal (Monday) and I have been together for a long time.We are almost 300. But on TV we are looking for people who will be stars from day one, and if you are not a star you have no place.
"I do not feel that the young people are blowing in the back of our necks, I applaud them. I think they should be given a place. The judgment should also be of the new world. I combine an old and new world. A world before and after the corona, I pass like a messenger race, I run with an open ear and attentive to the new world, otherwise I will not have communication with them.
"Today you have to reinvent yourself all the time. In Corona I said to myself 'come on close everything, stay with one small restaurant and live, who needs it', but I'm not there. "99, and I have meals in the companies I'm responsible for. I want to do things. I live and breathe and kick. My dad my age would lie in bed and complain."
When was the last time you received a review?
"I get reviews and feedback all the time. One of our things, the chefs, who have a hard time with it, is the Israeli openness, which throws everything in your face. Many times the criticism is unjustified, and there is a big gap in this issue in Israel compared to abroad.
Here if the dish in the restaurant is not tasty for you, the waiter will give you something else in its place and maybe even compensate you with a final dish.
Abroad if you complained and the chef tastes and in his opinion everything is good, the dish will not be replaced, and you will also pay for it, and you will certainly not receive compensation or dessert.
"There were reviews I got that I didn't like. The critics have questions like 'why is the kebab like this' and 'why a kebab at all', and they also go into prices. There's a lot of populism in it. For example, a comparison of 'the most expensive fish dish' I saw. What's its weight, as if nothing matters other than the price.Such superficiality annoys me.
"There are critics who are monolingual, and an editor on one of the TV shows once told me that it's easiest to sting the strong because it brings ratings. So where's our food culture? There is none. What about Paragon for someone strong? Better to sting him because it brings ratings. Of self-importance.
"Honestly, they also wrote me reviews that were nasty, but between the lines I found things I could take from and learn from. We should grit our teeth, try to clear our egos and evil and see what can be taken and improved, but it takes experience and resilience because there is always fear. "That restaurant would fall. Once upon a time, Ron Meyberg, who was sharp but violent in his writing, stepped up when he wrote at the end of his review of me 'I would like to meet him in a dark alley' - and I replied, 'Come on.'
When was the last time you were very scared?
"In Corona there was a moment when I said to myself 'What, my whole life enterprise will go down the drain?'
There was a moment of anxiety. Business is my home, it's the idea that my children will be organized in the future. Restaurants are a business that knows how to go back very fast and bring you down very fast. On the other hand, we are a generation that knows how to put money aside. We also received compensation. The corona brought us back, but it's okay. Whoever does not know how to live in business, who will not go into business. In business there is forward and there is backward, you are once up and once down. If you are unable to contain it, do not enter it. To the kitchen, if you can't handle the heat. "
When was the last time you thought
about politics?
"I did not think to go into politics. I was offered, there were inquiries from all sorts of parties, including one of the religious parties, but I do not want to. I want to come home at the end of the day. I feel I can help people much more from the outside, than get into that swamp.
"I belong to the Association of Restaurants and Bars, and Zebman Corona led, together with CEO Shai Berman, a fierce struggle in favor of the compensation of the restaurants.
The struggle was without shouting, without right or left, regardless of politics, and we succeeded.
"Every time I speak, they listen to the other side, and I know that because when I left the studios, I would get calls from ministers' offices listening to what I said."
When was the last time you surfed social media?
"I'm constantly on Instagram, mostly looking at classic cars. I also upload content myself, because my team sits on my head, but networks are a danger. You can get addicted to it. I can upload a photo or video of myself and get thousands of likes, but it's not appealing. Me. I do not live it. "
When was the last time you gave
good advice?
"A lot of people ask me for advice, and I feel great about it. In the end I have a gift I received, and I think when you receive a gift it's not just yours. Take what you need, and pass it on. I'm involved in tribute and tribute evenings. We did this a few years ago to Reviva Apple, which founded an elite confectionery here when there were only rugels and boraxes in Israel. She fell ill, and on the eve of the tribute she was very excited and had the opportunity to say goodbye to people. "There has to be something very social. We are now working on an evening honoring Margaret Tourist, which will take place on August 2."
When was the last time you thought about a career abroad?
”When I was younger I thought about it, and I admit that lately I have been thinking about it again.
I was offered a job in Dubai and the UAE, but that did not interest me.
What turns me on abroad is that you can come anonymously and get real feedback. Abroad there is a more culinary open audience, for example in Paris.
It intrigues me to know how I will get there.
On the other hand, I'm 63. Maybe at age 70 I'll do something abroad.
When was the last time you were on vacation?
"This month I was on vacation with my wife in Thessaloniki. When I'm on vacation I manage to disconnect and rest. I like to go on vacations only with my wife, Siegel. We've been together for 30 years, when I was a successful and famous chef at Keren. The restaurant accountant told me she must know someone I did not want to. She sat on my head for half a year and then, when I had my 31st birthday, I had a party and told her to bring the girl she wanted to marry me. And it is part of the management of the partnership in our catering company. "
When was the last time you prepared
a very tasty dish?
"A week ago, when I made a meal with Meidan Siboni who makes Japanese food. I made my own Mediterranean Japanese contra: I filled a small puff pastry, a pocket like this, with a tartare I seasoned with kitchenware, smoothie, eggplant and egg. "I was kicking myself. It still excites me and makes me happy to prepare dishes, and it takes a lot of courage to say 'exhausted' one day. That's why I find new challenges and innovate for myself all the time."
When was the last time you went to the doctor?
"I recently went to do tests, and they didn't turn out really well in terms of my sugar, and I're thinking what to do with it. It's a story that went a bit out of proportion. They published that I was diabetic, and I did not. Everyone who meets me asks what about sugar. So everything's fine guys, there are harder things. I lowered bread and sugar, and my problem is with fruit, which I really like. Or pasta, how can I give up pasta? So once a month I do I have proper pasta. "
• • •
When did you first open a restaurant?
"At the age of 24, when I bought Keren with a partner and we reopened it. I was young, and I would dream dreams and go after the dream. If I had a degree in economics at the time I would not open the restaurant, but I had no boundaries. The name 'Keren' remained that "We did not have the money to replace the sign, and we did not see where it was going. We were just happy to have a restaurant."
shirshirziv@gmail.com
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