Chef’s Widow

A chef’s widow is a term used to refer to a person who is married to a chef. Chefs spend so many hours in work, at antisocial hours, that their wives and partners barely see them. I am married to a chef, a blog post about life, work, travel, and kids as a chef wife.

Jealous?  Don’t be. They call us chef’s widows for a reason. Chef’s are often married to the job. Their hours are pretty unbelievable and chefs don’t go home just because their shift is over. A high level of dedication is a requirement to make it in the hospitality industry. A post on what is a chef’s widow and what it’s like to be a chef’s widow.

No, my chef doesn’t rustle up gourmet meals for me at home every night, he cooks maybe once a year, if that. He’s never home to cook.

If he does cook it’s more likely to be instant noodles than some little fancy meal. Chef’s pay isn’t great either, we’ll never be rich.

His perpetual and unpredictable absence is one of the reasons we eventually quit the rat race to travel the world. Likewise homeschooling works well for us. School timetables, weekly and termly, just don’t fit with the chef’s hours.

What It’s Like To Be a Chef’s Widow

5 reasons chefs don’t cook at home.

• Chefs are always in work.
• Chefs have had enough of cooking by the time they get home.
• Chefs are unable to use domestic kitchen equipment and flounder around helplessly cursing pans for not being hot enough.
• Chefs do not go to the fridge and decide to rustle up something quick with a bit of broccoli and a lump of week old Stilton. They can’t function without ready made pots of stock and every ingredient known to mankind within easy reach.
• I don’t let him, he’s messy and very uneconomical and it’s my budget he’d be blowing, not the hotel’s.

Actually, 6, he likes my cooking.

Married to a Chef, Realities

• I see very little of my husband.
• He has 1, sometimes 2, days off a week and they are unpredictable, erratic and rarely on the weekend.
• Shifts and hours are subject to change at very short notice. ” I’ll be back at 9pm” can often turn into well past midnight depending on staffing, awkward customers, equipment failures and punctured bike tyres on the way home.
• 3 am by phone calls from the hotel happen too often. The breakfast chef starts at 3am and often doesn’t show up. He usually goes in to cover this sort of emergency, even on his day off.
• He works Christmas Day and New Year, every year. He will be working while the world is partying.

Why a Person Married to a Chef is a Chef’s Widow

Honestly, I rather enjoy being a chef’s widow, absence makes the heart grow fonder and all that, so we appreciate it when he is home.

The boys scream and shout ” Daddy!” and hurl themselves in his general direction if they hear his key in the door. I quite like having all that extra time to myself, not everyone can handle being a chef’s wife, but it suits me.

Perks of Being a Chef Widow.

There are some perks to being a chef’s partner. We have to go into the hotel on his days off and pay surprise visits to check that everything is running smoothly and the food is as it should be when he’s not around.

That goes for breakfast, lunch and dinner, across two restaurants. That’s a lot of top-notch free food and the boys are learning so much about the culinary world and how hotels run. They are so proud to go to “Dad’s work”.

We usually stay at the hotel over Christmas, it’s the only way we can spend any time with Dad on Christmas Day. He has time for opening presents in the morning and takes a couple of hours off in the afternoon between lunch and dinner to swim and play with us.

His current hotel is a very nice luxury 5 star in Port Douglas Australia. We get a rather splendid lunch which I don’t have to cook myself and I have time to relax in the pool with a mojito.

The kids are rather too accustomed to 5-star luxury and huge resort pools, it’s their norm, their Christmas tradition in Port Douglas. I don’t think they’d like a good old fashioned London Christmas like I used to know.

There are other foodie treats, like trips to local dairies and trying all the cheeses, the red carpet is always rolled out for such a potentially big customer. Discounts for hotel stays and food come in handy too, we once did a driving tour of the States, he was working for a big international chain then so we never paid for a hotel.

Another perk that only Australian ladies will appreciate. I’ve met Manu!

Perks aside, I like a bit of solitude, I’m more than content to get early nights 5-6 days a week and not have to worry about other adults and their plans. I’m a bit of an introvert and like my own company so being married to a chef suits me. I can’t be bothered to socialize much these days, I certainly wouldn’t want to go out without the kids and we don’t do babysitters. Net result, we don’t have a social life.

That would come as a huge surprise to those who know me from way back. I can go to bed with a book at the same time as the children, often all in the same bed, all with our books. It makes us a very tightly-knit little group.

Having plenty of time on my hands also allows me to write this blog. I was able to create a stay-at-home income, thanks to marriage to a chef. This location independent income allowed us to travel full-time for over 6 years. Chef was able to quit the kitchens and be a full-time traveller and dad. A digital nomad chef, there’s a thing!

So, no, I don’t complain about being a chef’s widow. Some do, there are an awful lot of divorced chefs out there.

I knew he was a chef when I met him and the hours have, if anything, become easier as he has gained seniority. Juggling two careers was tricky in the early days, I worked 9 to 5 and he just didn’t, but we got through those years and the years of early parenthood and childcare.

I think our shared goals have always been a help, both of us knowing we were working hard to take us closer to a dream. The homeschooling obviously helps, the kids are always around on Dad’s days off and we can take holidays outside of weekends and school holidays which are, of course, his busiest times.

So yes, I was a chef’s widow.  I can honestly say I’m quite happy to be one. See Chef’s own website here.

Leaving Hospitality, He Quit Being a Chef

At the end of our 6 or 7 years of full-time travel, we found ourselves stranded in Australia behind closed borders for the lockdown years. My income as a travel blogger was fully supporting our family back then.

The travel shutdowns during Covid decimated my earning power, and Chef had to return to the kitchens. He didn’t go back to 5 star resorts, he found work in a little bar-come restaurant in Port Douglas Australia. He hated it. The tiny kitchen, bad food, poor management, bad pay and perpetual lack of staff sealed the lid on the coffin of his Chef career.

He got a job working on a boat on the Great Barrier Reef. The money is better, it’s fun, its part-time, and he loves it. Hopefully, I’ll never be a Chef’s widow again. Our income reports from 2020 are in the related posts, below, plus some more recent updates on family life for us here at World Travel Family.

If you'd like to hire a car during your stay, use this car rental comparison tool to find the best deal!

We also suggest you take a look at this company to get a quote for all kinds of the more tricky adventure or extended travel insurance.

Try Stayz / VRBO for an alternative way to find rentals on homes/apartments/condos in any country!