So recalls making a minor mistake once at one of her previous restaurants, and her male colleagues giving her a hard time about it. “They started to put me down and say, ‘You’re still young. Why don’t you just go be a hostess? You shouldn’t become a head chef or climb up the kitchen ranks. It’s better if you just choose an easy job, with a pretty face like that.’
“I told them, ‘No. Just watch me.’”
So, who cut her teeth in pastry and worked her way through all the stations from the cold kitchen to the hot kitchen, can now be found on the pass at Gemma, running a team of five (incidentally, only one is male). When she’s on the grill, she cooks up dishes like dry-aged T-bone Fiorentina steak and Spanish octopus served with spiced Salmoriglio, romesco emulsion and feta.
The Malaysia-born chef started out at Tippling Club, then worked in New Zealand at three-hatted Auckland restaurant Clooney before the pandemic brought her back to Singapore. She then worked at Meta before settling at Gemma. At this year’s World Gourmet Awards, she picked up the Junior Female Chef of the Year award.
“I think throughout my career I’ve been looked down upon by a lot of male chefs. So I think the only way down the road was to go through it,” she said.
Standing at 159cm, “My physique is small, so there are definitely more challenges,” she pointed out, like carrying large, heavy things. What’s more, as women, “We also have a different kind of hormonal system” from men.
But mentally, she’s trained herself to be strong. She said, “I enjoy being in the kitchen and I enjoy pushing myself.”
SMOKY EYE LOOK
As a grill chef, not only must you command the fire expertly, your sense of timing has to be impeccable. Add to that the pressure of sending out perfectly cooked orders when the restaurant is slammed with guests, and you have a job that really takes a certain mettle to do. When you go home at night, you’re sweaty, smelly and exhausted from all the smoke inhalation.
“First and foremost, it’s hot as hell,” Kaur said. “It goes up to about 450 degrees celcius. The moment you touch or kiss any part of the grill, that’s it – it’s going to scar for life.” The other challenge, of course, is staying in control of the fire at all times. “Just imagine something that’s very untamed and wild,” she said.