Speaker 1: Because when you where your face will from, that will
Speaker 1: bring everybody down. So don't worry, be happy. Well, don't
Speaker 1: worry if you happen to be in Bermuda today, it
Speaker 1: is a bombing seventy five degrees mild winds of about
Speaker 1: seven miles an hour. Well being in Bermuda thanks very
Speaker 1: much to Elbow Beach, Bermuda, an ocean front enclave of
Speaker 1: classic style and contemporary of luxury. Our next guest, well,
Speaker 1: I have to just say, Kathleen, I would never in
Speaker 1: a million years have thought that I would be broadcasting
Speaker 1: about twenty yards from a clear blue piece of water.
Speaker 1: It's turquoise, and I have to say I love being
Speaker 1: on the beach and this is some of the most
Speaker 1: turquoise clear water I have ever swimming in my entire life. Now,
Speaker 1: have you ever had the experience where you go someplace
Speaker 1: on a holiday and you think, boy, wouldn't it be
Speaker 1: great to stay year and open a business. Wouldn't it
Speaker 1: be great to just open a restaurant or start cooking
Speaker 1: and hopefully people will come and well, you know, as
Speaker 1: a matter of fact, um, going down to the beach
Speaker 1: always makes me hungry, and it's it's nice then to
Speaker 1: be at the place that not only has a beautiful beach,
Speaker 1: but not to eat. I was giving you that. I
Speaker 1: was giving you the baton so that you could introduce
Speaker 1: our next guest, Surge Botelly, who has been here in
Speaker 1: Bermuda for, as it describes him, forty plus years. He
Speaker 1: is the executive chef here at Elbow Beach, Bermuda, and Surge,
Speaker 1: thank you very much for having us. Thank you very
Speaker 1: much for having me here on your radio show. Well,
Speaker 1: how did you tell us your story about how does
Speaker 1: you come to be here? We actually I came by plane, Okay,
Speaker 1: I had some friends, I guess someone say asked you
Speaker 1: that before I stayed. I was born in Switzerland. That's
Speaker 1: where I came from, and some friends came to work,
Speaker 1: and then the following years we came here. And actually
Speaker 1: today me certy is my anniversary of arriving to Bermuda
Speaker 1: in nineteen nine at six twenty. So you have many
Speaker 1: years experience in the restaurant industry and and certainly here
Speaker 1: in Bermuda. Tell us more about the restaurant group that
Speaker 1: you're part of, and of course there's why Mickey's there's
Speaker 1: Cafe Leto. You have a variety of restaurants here on
Speaker 1: the result. Yes, we do have three restaurants. We have
Speaker 1: Mickey's with I called that a little bit of an
Speaker 1: Italian bistro. We have Caffe Leado was a little bit
Speaker 1: more upscale, silver plated dinners, and then we have a
Speaker 1: fun part with Sea Breeze where we serve top us
Speaker 1: and sushi. So what do you have to do to
Speaker 1: compete on an island like this? There's lots you know,
Speaker 1: that's one of things people do when they come to place.
Speaker 1: Everybody wants deed, what do you? What do you? What's
Speaker 1: your challenge in the industry? Traveling around? See what's coming?
Speaker 1: What's we got all the all the new items coming
Speaker 1: on the market. What's the vegetable of the yale last year?
Speaker 1: What's kale? I think this year it's cauliflower? What they say, Well,
Speaker 1: it's keeping up with the website and see what's coming
Speaker 1: up all the time. Can we just go back to
Speaker 1: your career just a little bit, because being in an
Speaker 1: island nation, everything has to really be brought in more
Speaker 1: or less right about okay, So you've had to create
Speaker 1: a vision of and a version of food and culinary
Speaker 1: excellence that kind of mindset. Yes, I mean we need
Speaker 1: also to say thank you to the wholesale because they
Speaker 1: follow the trend. So they're bringing food that we request
Speaker 1: and we can get food in Bermuda and I can
Speaker 1: call today at twelve noon and have my food coming
Speaker 1: from New York or the Boston area by two more
Speaker 1: afternoon at two o'clock. Uh, And that helps a lot.
Speaker 1: That helps a lot when you go to visit New
Speaker 1: York's used to visit certain restaurants and you see what
Speaker 1: they're doing and you follow up with the whole saleer
Speaker 1: to get that. So what course one of the advantages.
Speaker 1: You also have lots of great fish listening just to
Speaker 1: around this island. And of course that's something that is
Speaker 1: is wherever you are getting very very fresh Christian How
Speaker 1: much pressure can it be some of the some of
Speaker 1: the fresh catch you have here in Bermuda sometimes, I
Speaker 1: mean we get fish in six hours locally. I mean
Speaker 1: you were asking me yesterday about wawhoo, that's one kind
Speaker 1: of fish is running now we got to now running.
Speaker 1: We got redhind running or fantastic, fantastic fish. Doing business
Speaker 1: on an island is also a challenge because you have
Speaker 1: a seasonal. We do have a seasonal we have now
Speaker 1: starting the summer season until roughly label day and then
Speaker 1: we work a lot with our corporate clientcy on the island,
Speaker 1: with the insurance business and so on. And the locals
Speaker 1: you know, and these people, I mean that community travels
Speaker 1: a lot, so they're expecting to find the same that
Speaker 1: they find in New York, London, nord Zwick, right, and
Speaker 1: that keeper Tonal tolls to continue doing what we want
Speaker 1: to do. What about Bermuda is in the midst of
Speaker 1: a big push to to expand the tourism industry. We
Speaker 1: really bring more people in faculty to be speaking later
Speaker 1: in the show to the head of the tourism authority
Speaker 1: here in Bermuda. Changing taste, changing generations. How do you
Speaker 1: respond to that? As a chef? What I see a
Speaker 1: lot coming up. It's actually the fusion between different countries
Speaker 1: coming now before we have the Italians. Now we're mixing
Speaker 1: Italian food with maybe Oriental food and so on. And
Speaker 1: that's due to the people who are traveling to the island.
Speaker 1: We need to to give them what they want. Put
Speaker 1: to that and just last point, I know that you've
Speaker 1: cooked for a lot of celebrities, right, you're a lot
Speaker 1: of Hollywood stars, and so can you give us some
Speaker 1: detail maybe? Yes. The biggest thing I did was for
Speaker 1: Royal and as the Queen of England did for President
Speaker 1: Bush Junior Senior Colonel Powell, Princess Alexandra kissing jow and
Speaker 1: so on, and uh, what do you make for them?
Speaker 1: I cannot tell you know it was for the queen
Speaker 1: was some fish, some bermuda rock is. Uh. It was
Speaker 1: very interesting because they came six months in advance and
Speaker 1: we knew a lot of things in advance, what they want,
Speaker 1: what they didn't want, some little twick so also for
Speaker 1: my for my money's sakes or things like that. Do
Speaker 1: you get nervous when you have to cook for a queen?
Speaker 1: I used to, But yes, you get nervous. You you
Speaker 1: get a little bit nervous. But you need to treat
Speaker 1: everybody as superstar. You know. Well it looks like you've
Speaker 1: got got your You're just a man to do it,
Speaker 1: I hope. So, Sarah, thank you so much for joining.
Speaker 1: Thanks you really appreciated well, so far, so good. I
Speaker 1: think we're gonna come back next month another show please
Speaker 1: series Hotel Executive Chef Elbow Beach, Bermuda talking to us
Speaker 1: about how you keep it up, how you keep it
Speaker 1: going in the restaurant industry in Bermudia. A lot more
Speaker 1: coming up on Kathleen Hayes. Pimpots were taking stock on
Speaker 1: Blobrig Radio