Student heads up a world kitchen at new-concept restaurant

By her own admission, working at a busy new restaurant has required a big adjustment especially, when Gabrielle Flower, 19, is used to the quieter and less culturally diverse culinary setting of Whangarei compared with Auckland.

Nonetheless, the quietly spoken woman from Maungaturoto who two years ago, completed her Certificate in Catering Services Level 3 at NorthTec, while working part-time at Killer Prawn on Bank St and later full-time, is relishing the new challenge of big city life that she went looking for.

Gabrielle is only two months into a job at The Langham, Auckland a five-star hotel in Symonds St, but has already impressed its Executive Chef Volker Marecek – well known from MasterChef New Zealand for running a tight ship.

He is delighted with her performance in his team, saying she has fitted in really well to an environment that not only is very different to what she is used to, but has her succeeding in a much larger role while working with up to 35 staff members at one time.

Chef Marecek is so impressed he now has Gabrielle heading up the salad kitchen in the hotel’s new concept restaurant Eight, which opened just before Christmas that the youngster describes as simply awesome.

Eight can serve over 100 people at any one time and offers cuisine from eight different world kitchens. Diners are taken on a culinary journey through each dining destination as they create a menu of their choice.

The $2 million restaurant with its eight kitchens on public display serves breakfast, lunch and dinner daily, and is understood to be a first for New Zealand.

Chef Maracek says Eight, offers diners an exciting culinary experience comparable to restaurants found in the finest overseas five-star hotels.

He says guests enjoy having their meal choices prepared for them, which is where Gabrielle’s friendly manner and attention to detail has shown through.

“Gabrielle is in charge of the Garden Route kitchen and manages this with ease. She is always friendly and smiling and engages with the guests naturally, as she prepares salads quickly to their satisfaction. She is a great addition to Eight - fits in extremely well, and is going from strength to strength,” says Chef Maracek.

The budding chef, who realised her potential at NorthTec is noticing the differences between working at a restaurant in Whangarei, to a busy new Auckland restaurant.

She says the move to Auckland has presented a different set of challenges to the ones she experienced at Killer Prawn in Whangarei where she learnt her craft under Owen Sinclair.

The most notable difference being, that at Killer Prawn she had a number of responsibilities whereas compared with Eight she has one main task – heading up the salad kitchen which offers diners any variety of salad.

The biggest change for her has been adjusting to working within a much larger kitchen team and alongside a range of diverse kitchens and chefs.

The advantage of working in such an environment though, is that she is able to observe and pick up on other chef’s abilities.

“It is quite nice to see everyone else’s talents,” she said.

All in all, going to Auckland has given Gabrielle the refreshing change and challenge she has been looking for and plans to take as much as she can on board before testing her culinary skills overseas later on.

Not a bad outcome for a young Northland woman who was unsure about what she wanted to do for a career until studying the Certificate in Catering Services course at NorthTec which she says prepared her well for what she has faced in both Whangarei and Auckland.

ENDS

© Scoop Media