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Knives and Spoons: A Chef's Story of Kitchens, Addictions and Mayhem
Not yet published
Expected 9 Jul 26'A vital new voice who speaks so powerfully about addiction' – Bryony Gordon, journalist
'It'll show all those who love The Bear how to really tear up a kitchen' - Camilla Long, journalist
'Magnificent, brutally honest and very funny . . . I never wanted it to stop' - Jon Spiteri, restaurateur
'Ali gives a proper insight into not only how he has worked, but into how he has thought . . . Do learn from him' - Jeremy King, restaurateur
'A story of hope, love, cooking and redemption. Brilliant' - Tom Parker-Bowles, food writer and critic
From working in some of London’s most prestigious restaurants to scrubbing fat from kitchen floors, Alasdair Gill’s life as a chef has been a series of exhilarating highs and harrowing lows. But so too has his private life. Taking readers behind the swinging kitchen doors of London’s dining scene, he shows us the major contradictions in his life, from crossing paths with Anthony Bourdain and preparing dishes for the ultra wealthy to hiding in drug-fuelled kitchen dens and a wake-up call that nearly ended his life.
Knives and Spoons is a raw and honest look at the chaotic and often toxic world of professional kitchens, filled with fierce and unforgiving moments, but also a testament to the power of finding one’s craft and the long road to recovery.
For readers of Kitchen Confidential and Tart, this is a candid insider account of life on the frontlines of London's food scene.
'It'll show all those who love The Bear how to really tear up a kitchen' - Camilla Long, journalist
'Magnificent, brutally honest and very funny . . . I never wanted it to stop' - Jon Spiteri, restaurateur
'Ali gives a proper insight into not only how he has worked, but into how he has thought . . . Do learn from him' - Jeremy King, restaurateur
'A story of hope, love, cooking and redemption. Brilliant' - Tom Parker-Bowles, food writer and critic
From working in some of London’s most prestigious restaurants to scrubbing fat from kitchen floors, Alasdair Gill’s life as a chef has been a series of exhilarating highs and harrowing lows. But so too has his private life. Taking readers behind the swinging kitchen doors of London’s dining scene, he shows us the major contradictions in his life, from crossing paths with Anthony Bourdain and preparing dishes for the ultra wealthy to hiding in drug-fuelled kitchen dens and a wake-up call that nearly ended his life.
Knives and Spoons is a raw and honest look at the chaotic and often toxic world of professional kitchens, filled with fierce and unforgiving moments, but also a testament to the power of finding one’s craft and the long road to recovery.
For readers of Kitchen Confidential and Tart, this is a candid insider account of life on the frontlines of London's food scene.
Audible Audio
Expected publication July 9, 2026
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Review of advance copy received from Publisher
This is what happens when someone throws Kitchen Confidential, a mountain of cocaine, unresolved trauma, chef whites soaked in fryer oil, and the world’s most hostile dinner service into a blender and hits purée.
I mean that as the highest compliment.
This book grabbed me by the throat from page one and screamed “YES CHEF” directly into my nervous system. It’s chaotic, filthy, self-destructive, hilarious, heartbreaking, and so aggressively accurate that I think every ex-hospitality worker will have at least three stress flashbacks while reading it.
The kitchen food chain section at the start BROKE me. Absolutely destroyed me. The fake Latin taxonomy of kitchen staff? I was wheezing as I remembered everyone I’d ever worked with and how accurately it described them.
The breakfast chef (scramblius maximus) whose weakness is being “likely to be a serial killer.” The pastry chef (precisis sugarbitch) who’s “the neurodivergent cousin of the chef de partie” (bigdickus disgruntlus). The floor manager (cuntus wankertits) thriving in their natural habitat of “drinking at the bar” while suffering from “limited allies.”
It’s so viciously specific that you instantly know these are real people the author’s absolutely fought in a walk-in fridge at 2am.
And if you’ve ever worked in a kitchen, you KNOW this is documentary-level realism.
It felt like I was there.
Right there in the kitchen.
Oil and sweat soaking through my uniform, four separate cuts bleeding profusely from my knuckles, pots clattering all around me, someone screaming "where the FUCK is the fucking OREGANOOO?", grinding my teeth while checking the clock until my next cigarette break, all while someone cries in the walk-in and another chef's one minor inconvenience away from a complete psychological collapse.
I was having actual flashbacks.
Like that time we all got drunk after dinner service and decided we didn’t want to be trapped in a car on the way back to the shared flat, so naturally the logical solution was travelling ON TOP of the car like a group of sleep-deprived raccoons in chef whites.
Or that time I moved a plate approximately 0.2mm and the head chef Lost. His. Shit. Started throwing plates at my head while screaming that I was a failure and he was going to strangle me if I didn't get out of his sight this instant.
Ah yes. Hospitality.
The best of times. The blurst of times.
It doesn’t feel polished or sanitised or like someone carefully curated their Bad Boy Chef Stories™ for publication. It feels like being cornered outside a pub by a chef holding a cigarette and multiple catastrophic life decisions while they tell you things that should stay between them and their therapist.
It’s aggressive. Blunt. Self-deprecating. Funny in the way only profoundly broken people can be funny. One minute you’re laughing at kitchen warfare and feral chef behaviour, and the next it casually guts you with the reality of addiction, burnout, self-loathing, and trying to survive an industry that eats people alive for sport.
Oh, and there are recipes???
Under all the screaming and chaos though, there’s real vulnerability here. The author never glamourises addiction or kitchen culture, even when he’s making it hilarious and making you pine for the good old days. The book understands that kitchens are simultaneously addictive, toxic, exhilarating, cruel, life-affirming, and totally incapable of producing emotionally stable adults.
Thank you to Pan Macmillan for the ARC
I mean that as the highest compliment.
This book grabbed me by the throat from page one and screamed “YES CHEF” directly into my nervous system. It’s chaotic, filthy, self-destructive, hilarious, heartbreaking, and so aggressively accurate that I think every ex-hospitality worker will have at least three stress flashbacks while reading it.
The kitchen food chain section at the start BROKE me. Absolutely destroyed me. The fake Latin taxonomy of kitchen staff? I was wheezing as I remembered everyone I’d ever worked with and how accurately it described them.
The breakfast chef (scramblius maximus) whose weakness is being “likely to be a serial killer.” The pastry chef (precisis sugarbitch) who’s “the neurodivergent cousin of the chef de partie” (bigdickus disgruntlus). The floor manager (cuntus wankertits) thriving in their natural habitat of “drinking at the bar” while suffering from “limited allies.”
It’s so viciously specific that you instantly know these are real people the author’s absolutely fought in a walk-in fridge at 2am.
And if you’ve ever worked in a kitchen, you KNOW this is documentary-level realism.
It felt like I was there.
Right there in the kitchen.
Oil and sweat soaking through my uniform, four separate cuts bleeding profusely from my knuckles, pots clattering all around me, someone screaming "where the FUCK is the fucking OREGANOOO?", grinding my teeth while checking the clock until my next cigarette break, all while someone cries in the walk-in and another chef's one minor inconvenience away from a complete psychological collapse.
I was having actual flashbacks.
Like that time we all got drunk after dinner service and decided we didn’t want to be trapped in a car on the way back to the shared flat, so naturally the logical solution was travelling ON TOP of the car like a group of sleep-deprived raccoons in chef whites.
Or that time I moved a plate approximately 0.2mm and the head chef Lost. His. Shit. Started throwing plates at my head while screaming that I was a failure and he was going to strangle me if I didn't get out of his sight this instant.
Ah yes. Hospitality.
The best of times. The blurst of times.
It doesn’t feel polished or sanitised or like someone carefully curated their Bad Boy Chef Stories™ for publication. It feels like being cornered outside a pub by a chef holding a cigarette and multiple catastrophic life decisions while they tell you things that should stay between them and their therapist.
It’s aggressive. Blunt. Self-deprecating. Funny in the way only profoundly broken people can be funny. One minute you’re laughing at kitchen warfare and feral chef behaviour, and the next it casually guts you with the reality of addiction, burnout, self-loathing, and trying to survive an industry that eats people alive for sport.
Oh, and there are recipes???
Under all the screaming and chaos though, there’s real vulnerability here. The author never glamourises addiction or kitchen culture, even when he’s making it hilarious and making you pine for the good old days. The book understands that kitchens are simultaneously addictive, toxic, exhilarating, cruel, life-affirming, and totally incapable of producing emotionally stable adults.
Thank you to Pan Macmillan for the ARC
Displaying 1 of 1 review