Sebastian Frank quit school at 13, learned his trade in hotel kitchens, and with his wife became the owner of Horváth restaurant in Berlin, where he cooks dishes with bright Austrian notes.
I don’t like to learn and teach. Or, to be precise, I don’t like being taught. More precisely still, I can’t stand stereotyped programs aimed at punishment, humiliation, and imposing a single correct opinion instead of nurturing students’ zeal, interest, and encouragement. It was like that at my school.
And you know what? I quit school at 13, determined to abandon accepted stereotypes. So thank you, my school years: I owe my current success to that experience. My name is Sebastian Frank, and I’m the worst student, a chef, and the owner of Horváth restaurant.
I grew up a very obedient and independent boy. It couldn’t have been otherwise, since I was the youngest of three sons in our family. My mother was always at work: as soon as she finished at one job, she ran to the next so that we had food and clothing.
Mom raised us to be responsible for our own actions and for each other. When I was still very young, I warmed up the cooked food and served it to the rest of the family. Over time, I began to cook myself and often experimented, and I became more and more convinced of my professional future: I would become a chef.
Leaving school was an easy decision; I would even say I did it with joy. Mom, of course, wasn’t thrilled, but I must pay tribute to her wisdom. She had always dreamed that I would get a higher education, hold a prestigious position, and become a respectable gentleman. Yet she calmly accepted my impulse to go to culinary school.
I was so serious about my decision that I immediately went to the nearest hotel and asked to work in the kitchen. It was during the Easter holidays, and after that I never went back to school. All I had to do was wash dishes and, occasionally, clean vegetables.
Still, I was happy to be doing something on my own, because it gave me a sense of self-importance and usefulness. And most importantly, I was happy that I had finally figured out the direction of my life.
Could I have imagined how unbearably difficult, and sometimes monotonously boring, my first year at culinary school would be? Of course not. Did I regret the path I had chosen? Of course not. Loud and bright, tedious, and very fast, my three years of study passed.
It’s hard to put into a couple of sentences, but besides cooking skills, I became an adult and learned to work in a team, to predict results, and to accept defeat. I studied at the school and kept working in the hotel kitchen at the same time.
This work is very different from the everyday cooking routine in restaurants and cafés shown in movies. A hotel is a kind of beehive that never sleeps: every hour there is something to do, and everything has to be done quickly and smoothly, otherwise there’s a problem.
I worked like that for a few years, until I realized how tired I had become and felt ready to work in a small team under the patronage of a master. And guess what? I joined such a team. However, my expectations were not met.
I worked in a small team under the direction of one person whose opinion, to put it mildly, was not up for discussion. But I learned to carry out tasks, to be creative within set limits, and not to be afraid of difficulties. With this background, my wife and I came up with the idea of our own restaurant.
At first, I was invited to Horváth as chef, and a couple of years later we bought the ownership rights. There were lots of interesting and unexpected things, periods of devastation and incredible moments of inspiration. But for me, this is life: it must boil like a rich broth!
How do I keep from sinking in all this? I don’t know. I have wonderful support in my family, my main incentive and motivation. I love spending time with our kids, and we have two of them.
I really value the personal time my wife and I have together and enjoy family evenings at home. I may sound like an old man, but so be it! It’s my emotion, and my magic of a happy life and great food.
Yes, it is true! In my restaurant we treat our guests to dishes with bright Austrian notes. However, I would call our dishes folk, original, and authentic rather than simply national. We have deliberately refused to use imported products uncharacteristic of Austria, and even in our cooking techniques we prefer our grandmothers’ methods, time-tested and historically tasty.
Of course, it’s hard to imagine how I relax, but I do. Most of all I enjoy a round of golf, only on my own, or fishing, once again alone. Sometimes I need to be alone, to put my thoughts in order, to analyze something, and in the end to enjoy the peace. If you want to succeed, you should learn how to relax!
For the project I cooked three dishes that, in my opinion, reflect the rich palette of Austrian cuisine and culture in general, as well as the philosophy of Horváth restaurant: new flavors of simple products. These dishes are Zucchini cooked in the poultry fat with fried vegetables; deep-fried celery with the sauce made of duck liver, dill and cucumber jelly; and Serbian paprika mousse with fried onions and crush of sauerkraut and white grapes.
