From his recent trip in Manila to grace the opening of the latest branch of La Cabrera, Chef Gastón Riveira shared some personal thoughts and culinary secrets.
At 13, Gaston humbly started as a dishwasher in a restaurant in Buenos Aires. All because his father had the idea of letting him work as a dishwasher for him to regret his dream of becoming a chef and become a lawyer instead. But Gaston's early childhood was all about cooking, a penchance that he got from his grandparents.
Nevertheless he still pursued studying cooking after he finished secondary school. He entered the school of Alicia Berger and in parallel worked in different restaurants and hotels. Then he traveled to Europe, studied in Lenotre, France, and did internships in Italy, London and San Pablo, and with Alex Atala, in Brazil.
Until in 2002, in the midst of the social economic crisis in the country, he decided to set up a grill. "Meat is the national ingredient, what everyone likes,” he says. “I wanted it [the grill] to be an impeccable place where all the world could eat well and have a better time. I knew that for it to work, I had to have a good team and I, to be present, because a restaurant can not be operated by remote control."
T.Dining: What inspires you both in and out of the kitchen?
Gastón Riveira: The most important thing is the passion I have for food
T.Dining: What do you cook for yourself when you are at home?
GR: I like to go to a market that I have near my house and I look for the fresh fish of the day and I do it with grilled vegetables with wok or steam
T.Dining: What challenges have you encountered in the F&B industry that have made an impact on you?
GR: Maintain excellence in the menu, environment and service, despite economic changes and other circumstances
T.Dining: How do you see Argentinian cuisine evolving over the next few years?
GR: There are very good chefs luckily with great ideas. Sometimes all the products do not arrive, but the Argentine cook is very well trained technically and the most important thing that a cook has is cooking techniques--the more you know, the better.