REIF OTHMAN

“I do not want to leave a memory. Only legacy. A memory is like… You know... You remember. Then you forget. But legacy? Legacy is forever!” Chef Reif Othman laughs heartily at his own response to a question about his future plans. It seems a quirky answer from a man who has arguably already built his legacy in Dubai . But it is also the answer of a humble man who may well be a legend of his time, but has fought his way up from the humblest of beginnings.

Reif Othman on Finding his drive and curiosity

Nearly all chef tales start out with some sort of family influence. The tale of internationally renowned Chef Reif Othman is no different. His father was a corporate man, and his mother owned a small cafeteria which sold Malay food to local workers. “We still wonder how they met,” he jokes before revealing that his earliest childhood memories involved not following in his father’s footsteps as you might expect. No, he walked in the footsteps of his mother to the local town market. Even at a very young age.

“I still do not know why she would take me instead of my sister,” he says, but perhaps she sensed in him an interest and a spark of talent that he was still too young to realize. ”She would do her shopping and gossip with all the other housewives. I was the only kid there. I think I grew up there,” he ponders with a smile.

And in many ways, he did. It certainly kindled in him the curiosity that has been so defining for his life and career: He fondly remembers staring at the fresh fish and produce in wonder. Watching how his mother carried them back with her. How she prepared them afterwards. “I was always curious,” he admits, and probably too young to fully understand. As he got older, as any young boy would, he started asking questions: “How do you cook this? Why did you do that?” - and his mom? She would happily tell him and show him.

From then, Reif would spend his weekends and school holidays following his mom into the kitchen. Here he would help her with preparations, getting his hands deep into the business at an early age. “It taught me a lot of diversity even back then,” he admits, “like the fact that with just one ingredient, even a humble potato, you can make a thousand different dishes. Food is magical like that.”

Learning by doing - School vs experience

Determination is another quality that came early in life to young Reif. One day, in his early teen years, he told his mom quite honestly: If I am going to be a chef, I do not think that cooking this type of food will bring me to where I want to be in life.  And so, a rather drastic choice for a boy his age was made, and he dropped out of school to start learning. He got a job at an Italian restaurant,  making pizzas. It was not much. But for Reif it was a different and wide open world. He had quit school to pursue his dreams first hand and his father, the business man, obviously was not happy. “What about your future,” Reif imitates, yet admits that his father was probably right to some extent.

A compromise was reached and at the age of about 15, Reif went into culinary school in Singapore. This time, he stayed there for all of two years before once again growing restless. “I realized that going through school is a great way to develop fundamentals, to understand the processes,” he admits, “but… even so, I felt like going to school was a poor alternative to working in a real kitchen and learning by doing.” So, young Reif dropped out of school again - this time never to return. Instead, he set out on a quest to work his way up from the bottom.

Othman’s starting position in the culinary world was about as far removed from the glitter of his current career as one could possibly imagine. He started out washing dishes at a local restaurant in Singapore. “The dishwashing station  is an absolute shithole,” he recalls. “After about six months, I was finally moved into the kitchen where I immediately showed my worth.”

From then, it was a fast track learning experience for the young chef. He worked in French kitchens to get a feel for the fundamentals. He worked in American kitchens to get a feel for consistency. In Asian kitchens to learn the passion. He moved around like that for a while. All over the world, from kitchen to kitchen, picking up on techniques, flavors, consistencies and much, much more. He would work for free and spend his hard-earned savings to sustain himself through hard labor.  He would even eat, work, sleep and shower in the kitchen to make them stretch as far as possible.

“I still had all these questions,” he trails on through his past. “Fuck, how do asparagus grow? Why is this fish so expensive? How are scallops caught? I was still constantly wondering and wanting to learn.” It was a tough learning experience for Reif, but a good one at that. Working his way through kitchens, finding his answers, learning about ingredients, visiting farms and local fishermen. Yet, all the hard work put in and the knowledge earned, he firmly believes, is exactly what prepared him for the unthinkable feat that came next.

Reif’s friend got a job as head chef at Burj Al Arab and called in Reif as a sous-chef. He worked here for about a year, he states, rather matter-of-factly. And after that, Reif did what any young man would do, he fell victim to his own naivety. “There is nothing in Dubai,” he thought,”it is too boring, too hot.” So back to Singapore Reif, now 25 or 26, went. Here he meddled in operating his own restaurant adventures, he explains fast forwarding now through his achievements. It was a big role for someone his age, he willingly admits, he made a number of mistakes, but he grew and earned a lot. Including the fact that maybe Dubai was quite a fitting working environment after all.

Zuma, The pinnacle of fame?

In 2009, Reif returned to Dubai as he was offered the role as executive chef of Zuma. “It was a massive operation” he remembers, “500 covers a day. But quality-driven and consistent.” And his well-documented achievements at Zuma is probably what taught the young man some of his most important lessons of his career. Including running a top-tier operation, but certainly also how to handle and talk to staff.

And he seems to have done well.  Some 12 years down the road, some of those very people are still with him. Even through eventually leaving Zuma to focus on his own career, through founding his own numerous restaurant ventures, through doing popups in Cannes, franchises in Bahrain and through winning numerous awards such as Chef of the Year, Restaurant of the Year and Asian Restaurant of the Year in the process.

Reif Othman on finding peace through simplicity

Indeed, it has been one hell of a run for the small, curious boy from the market, who today, on the back end of a global pandemic, has decided to take things a little more slowly. But no less playful and fun. His newest venture, Reif Japanese Kushiyaki, is an intimate no-fuss Japanese street food inspired establishment. And this constellation seems to please the innovative chef. Who, for now, seems to have taken a step down from the halls of fine dining towards a more casual experience. 

“Do I want to open my own fine dining restaurant,” he asked himself. “Do I want to splurge on the interior? Do I want a Michelin star? I would love to, of course. Do I want to be amongst the top 50 best? Of course! But for now, I want to keep it simple. Back to my humble beginnings.”

And he has achieved just that with Reif Japanese Kushiyaki, a mid-tier restaurant offering consistency and quality. A restaurant that offers the full experience of eating in a fine dining environment, set in a casual space. A restaurant that draws on his travels, memories and his experiences in life. A restaurant that combines the simplicity of Japanese cuisine with his own roots and mixes in French techniques and finesse to cater to an international audience. And a restaurant so close to his heart that his next big plan in life, he says, involves turning it into a franchise. 

For a chef who has spent the past 30 years of his life in the fast lane, building fine dining successes in his name, a mid-tier franchise seems a humble dream. And perhaps a perfectly timed dream, too.

Read also: Reif Kushiyaki - Tokyo street food meets Dubai class in a perfectly casual setting

“At the end of the day, I want to relax and spend some time with my wife and my kids,” he laughs. Hinting to the tolls and sacrifices that a life in fine dining entails.  “They always tell me: You will never stop. Which is probably true. But I can slow down. I want to build a franchise out of this and after that I want to start thinking again: what is next?”

What is indeed next for creative genius and serial entrepreneur Reif Othman? 

Maybe not even the man himself knows. All we know for certain is that the man that grew out of the small boy from the market. The man for whom the sky is now the limit in Dubai, the world’s premier culinary destination. Well. He Seems perfectly happy during these strange times, being financially independent, spending time with family, hatching new ideas and turning skewers at his small, casual Reif Japanese Kushiyaki.