‘Nobody gave me a chance’: how chef Uwe Opocensky eventually succeeded in Hong Kong
- The globetrotting German recalls stints at El Bulli, in Spain, Mosimann’s, in London, and Krug Room in Hong Kong
- Opocensky almost didn’t make it to Asia, but was given a break by the Aberdeen Marina Club and has never looked back
Where did your interest in food come from? “My grandmother and mother. I grew up in Worpswede, an art colony in northern Germany. From the age of five I remember helping my granny make cookies for Christmas. She had an old hand crank to roll out sheets of dough. We made cookies to fill 12 boxes and sent them to relatives. It was 10 days of work but what’s not to like about sweet things?
“When I was nine years old the microwave came out and I didn’t like it. I asked my mother how to reheat food after school, how to make mashed potatoes. From there I started cooking breakfast for my parents and helping with lunch.”
What was your first job? “In Germany, around the age of 14, you either go to vocational training or university. For the former you choose three jobs you are interested in, and people in those jobs speak to you, and then you do a three-month internship.
“I wanted to become a chef and interned in a restaurant in my village, and I was fascinated by the heat, stress and running around. I pitted cherries and washed pots, but I knew this would be for me. By 16, I was cooking full time.”
As chefs we have one chance to make a first impression; if you don’t do well, people will remember you for what you have not done well
How did you get to London to work for Anton Mosimann? “While I was in the national service, in 1993, I spent 1½ years in a restaurant where one of the chefs was into competitions. I competed with him in the world championships in Switzerland and we came fourth out of 1,500 teams. That’s where I met chef Anton Mosimann, who was one of the judges.
“I went back to the army, did another competition and came in third, with the prize being a weekend in London and dinner at Mosimann’s, where I met him again. I asked him for a job and he told me to apply. I got it when I was 21 and I worked there for nine years.