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The world of yachting is never short of weird and wonderful requests, something the chefs know all too well (yes, of course, I’ll make you sushi from scratch at 2am). Guest food preferences can sometimes leave these long-suffering crew members with a questioning look, outlandish shopping lists and growing piles of new recipe books.
The dieting sphere is a minefield of its own with no shortage of diet plans that promise quick weight loss. From Paleo, Zone, Miami Beach, Atkins, Keto to Cabbage Soup and Potato diets there really is no limit to the world of these fad diet options for superyacht owners and guests, with most diets usually celebrity endorsed, guests will sacrifice holiday time onboard a luxury yacht to shed a few pounds.
Failing to plan, is planning to fail…
As a yacht chef, you will have many tools at the ready to unleash your creative recipes however with fad diets this creativity will be seriously put to the test. When menu planning, do your research when you have to cater to a new diet, and find out what food groups are in and which are out. Start by delving into that new Keto recipe book that the bosses PA sent, read up on fad dieters blogs for inspiration and if you can take your original recipes and find substitutions.
The battle starts in store…
Located in remote island anchorages or small marinas lacking large stores, provisioning can be tough at the best of times even for the perfect guest preference list. From scouring tropical supermarket shelves for vegetables that are in season in the opposite hemisphere, getting up extra early for fresh fish, paying over the odds for good quality meat to flying vegan protein powder thousands of miles so the owner can have his breakfast smoothie bowl, where there is a request there will be a way. So for a fad diet, the best provisioning tip is to try and get as much notice as possible from the guests so you can work towards sourcing the right ingredients. A lot of these fad diets eliminate food groups so looking on the bright side, there will be whole aisles you won’t even need to venture down in the supermarket.
Be ready to embrace change…
A week before the owner comes on for their long summer trip they notify you that they want to start eating a Paleo diet. So you scrap your menu planning and start again, empty out your grains and stock up on protein whilst making sure you have enough eggs for a small army. Then when you are busy mid charter prepping a non-cheese cheesecake made from cashews, the owner may decide that they couldn’t live without a Sunday cheese board so has switched diets to Keto. Later that week the daughter onboard has watched a Netflix documentary and decides she no longer wants to eat meat, fish or eggs… Embrace, count down the days and think about your new found creativity having to cook with so many more restrictions. From this point on, yacht cheffing will only get easier right?
Featured image credit: stefanschenk.com
