Day in the life: BOA Steakhouse executive head chef rustles up perfect dish

Marco Lucentini, the executive head chef at the BOA Steakhouse on the Eastern Mangroves Promenade, clocks in long hours running the restaurant. Silvia Razgova for The National

It takes only a few minutes to cook a steak, but the chef Marco Lucentini certainly has to put in the hours at his Abu Dhabi workplace. The 47-year-old Italian is the executive head chef at the BOA Steakhouse on the Eastern Mangroves Promenade, where the signature dish is a 40-day dry aged steak (Dh275). The steakhouse in the capital, which opened in 2014, is the first overseas venture by the celebrity-packed Los Angeles eatery of the same name. Mr Lucentini, who has experience at a Michelin-starred restaurant in his native Italy, lives in Abu Dhabi during the week but spends weekends in Dubai with his wife Janett and their son Roberto, 12. Here he describes the long hours that go into running a top restaurant.

8.30am

I wake up at about 8.30am or 9am. I just have a fast, single espresso. I don’t really eat breakfast – I’m always in a rush.

9.30am

I live very near to the restaurant. The first thing I do is check if everything is clean and working. After that I start to check the deliveries – the vegetables, meat and fish. Today we received fresh lobster, ribs and prawns. Because we are bringing in products from all over the world, sometimes if one is not available, the supplier will bring you what they have. So we need to be very careful to check. We need to check the quality, then there’s the quantity. Sometimes it’s 300g or 1kg less … So it’s better we check the amounts, because at the end of the year, it will make a difference.

12.30pm

Lunch starts at 12.30pm. I don’t cook all the time, because I have a fantastic staff. But sometimes when there is something special, or I need to do a new recipe, I will be the first one to make it. And after the recipe is ready, and training is done, my staff will cook it. I’m still a chef, because my time is spent in the kitchen, not in the office. Even if I’m checking the mail or doing something on the computer, I’m still in the kitchen.

2pm

I’m still at the pass counter, where the dishes are going out. I’m checking the standard of the dish. For me, the dishes that are coming out should look the same, and taste the same [as the original recipe].

3pm

Finally, at 3pm I have my lunch. Earlier in the day I’m going around testing, so I don’t feel hungry. But by 3pm, believe me, it’s the time to fill up my stomach. I don’t want to sound too patriotic, but I have pasta. I’m Italian, so I love pasta. It’s simple – maybe sometimes with vegetables, sometimes with tomato and basil, sometimes with fish. I sit with my big family here: We are 19 staff at the moment inside the kitchen, and we have 22 in the service staff. I spend more time with them than with my wife and our son. This is my second family.

6.45pm

We have a briefing with the service staff. Every day we have something special on the menu – sometimes truffles, sometimes a special fish or meat, a different type of cut, organic things. This will be shared in the briefing, and after that the waiters will pass on the message to our guests.

8pm

Stomachs start rumbling … everybody wants to eat at the same time – 8pm to 9.15pm is the main time. During the week we can do 120 or 130 [guests for dinner]; at the weekend it’s 180 or 190.

11pm

At about 11pm we have dinner. Sometimes it’s fish, sometimes a small steak, to see if it’s consistent, and that the quality is there – and also because I want to enjoy it. At lunchtime someone else cooks my food, but at dinnertime sometimes I do it by myself. Sometimes also I have nice Indian or Filipino food – which is fantastic, because my staff are from there.

Midnight

I’m leaving at about midnight. It’s a very long [day]. This is the lifestyle for a chef. When I get home, I just watch the news to see what’s going on in the world. Sometimes I need to do some menus. At night time, when it’s very quiet, I can see the picture of a dish in my head. And I love to prepare it for myself, because I want to see it from my head to the plate – how it can become the same. I’ll go to sleep at 2am or 2.30am.

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