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In my first year of college, where I was studying pre-med, I had the required meal plan in the dining hall. I didn't like that, as I've loved being in a kitchen since I was a child, and I was always cooking in high school.
My college dining hall had little gourd pumpkins, squash and garlic as decorations, and I would take these back to my dorm and cook them for my roommates, using our tiny toaster oven. I realized that that was what brought me the most joy: cooking for others.
So I transferred schools, studied food service management at The Rosen College, University of Central Florida, and got a job at the Walt Disney World kitchens, where I fell in love with being a chef. I started my own catering business after graduation, while also teaching high school culinary arts. I still hold both jobs but, during summer vacations, I work as a chef on a private yacht.
The food industry is all about networking—you have to know somebody to get in. During the summer of 2021, I got a message on Facebook from an old family friend, who said her old boss was looking for a chef on his yacht. I asked her to pass on my contact information and that night I had the online interview and was offered the position. Within a week, I flew to where the boat was docked in Miami.
I had always been interested in being a chef on a yacht. I've seen Below Deck—I'm not an avid watcher, but it was something that I've always wanted to try. I kind of missed being in the industry, too. Being a teacher, you don't get the same experiences and pressures that you do working in a kitchen.
I've just completed my second summer on the yacht. I work on the same yacht with the same family every year—a Cuban couple who often fly out their friends and family to join them. We go out for a month or two around the Bahamas on their 90 feet yacht.
It's a pretty glamorous yacht, complete with a hot tub and gym on the upper deck, as well as four guest rooms, two crew rooms and six bathrooms. It's always spotless. I'm in charge of keeping the kitchen clean, and the captain and the first mate are constantly cleaning the outside of the boat.
On a typical day, I wake up at 6.45 a.m. and prepare breakfast in the kitchen. I have a huge window in my galley, so I'm able to stare out at the turquoise water while prepping, which is a highlight for me.
The stewardess and I make everyone coffee and serve the guests as they wake up. We keep a distance between the guests and the crew. We converse with the family, of course, and I think they enjoy our company, but we try to stay out of sight and not intermingle too much.
There are no specific times for breakfast or lunch so you have to be really good at just reading the room. I might wake up at 6.45 a.m. but sometimes the family doesn't want breakfast until 10 a.m.—and the food has to be ready to go.
They like a simple breakfast, like oatmeal with different toppings—fruits, chocolate or nuts. Also eggs Benedict, avocado on toast, or a healthy salad with smoked salmon, arugula, capers, onions and a light lemon vinaigrette.
At some point after breakfast, I have a little break and take my coffee out on the bow of the boat, and plan the menu for the day. But that menu can change, depending on the availability of produce and input from the owners.
I usually get a morning briefing from the owners. I might have something on the menu and they could say, "You know what, I'm not really feeling like having beef tonight." In that case, I would pull a fish or any kind of seafood, like scallops or shrimp, as they thaw out really easily. And the owners are always in the mood for fish.
Between breakfast and lunch, I do all of my prep work for lunch and dinner. After lunch, in my downtime, I either go swimming, tan up on the deck, or take a nap. Usually I take a nap because I'm exhausted. Then, 30 or 45 minutes later, I'll come back out and see if the crew needs help with anything, before I start preparing dinner.
I don't really get to do much sightseeing. One time the owner took the captain and I golfing on one of the islands, which was amazing. And sometimes I have an hour to explore if I go to the grocery store, but I always have to be back in time to cater to the guests.
The owners like to eat dinner on the deck, so they can watch the sunset. Dinner is quiet and easy when it is just the owners on board, but when their friends and family join there can be up to 20 people. Then it's all hands on deck, and the crew help with bringing up the plates.
I cook a lot of Asian food—including Pad Thai and Thai Red Beef Curry—as that's my speciality. The owners also love braised dishes, where the meat is really tender—like my braised short ribs—and Italian and French cuisine. Anything that's really hearty, with a buttery or thick tomato base sauce.
They seem to absolutely love my food. They rate it—which I like as, in a restaurant, you're stuck in the back and you don't really see how the guests are enjoying their meal. Every night on the yacht, when I would come to pick up their dishes, the owners would rank the dish and tell me if it made it to their top three. It was a fun, playful game. I like criticism because I want to know how to do better, but they never said anything rude.
Incidentally, the top three dishes last season were the Thai Red Beef Curry, Duck à l'Orange with a puréed fennel, and Hungarian Chicken Paprikash.
Working on a yacht is different to working in a restaurant because you're the only person creating the dish. You can be as creative as you want. Anything that goes wrong with the food, or anything that goes right with it, always comes back to you. I think that gives you a lot of pride and motivation to do things correctly. It's really rewarding.
I enjoy secluding myself in the galley and being in charge of everything—not just cooking, but also inventory. We've got $18,000 worth of inventory on board, so 80 percent of my job is managing products. I'm a very organized person, so it makes me happy to be able to manage everything.
The couple love having their family and friends around—I think there were just five days out of the total 50 days we were on board this year where it was just the owners.
The relationship between staff and guests is different depending on who comes on board. The owners' kids and their significant others are younger so they match well with the crew and want to engage us in stuff like hermit crab racing on rainy days, and making TikToks together. But sometimes, if an older family member comes on board, there is more of a chill energy on the boat.
But all of the guests are enjoyable. I love the variety of guests, with their different characters and life experiences. At the end of their stay they often give us some kind of gift from the island or a tip. One of my favorite gifts has been sea salt from the Bahamas ocean.
In my experience, there is far less drama working on a yacht than you see on Below Deck. It is not as intense. The same kind of attention to detail goes in, that you see on the show, but I think the drama is put in to make the show entertaining. I get along well with the staff—they're the funniest and sweetest people—and my experience of working with this crew and the guests has been a joy.
The only thing I don't like is the lack of access to produce. In America, we have everything right at our fingertips. If you run out of a product in a restaurant, you can go to Walmart and pick it up. But on the boat, you might be anchored 500 feet away from shore and have to take a dinghy into the island, then a taxi to the store. It's a three-hour trip.
Even when I could get to a store in the Bahamas, there wasn't much there because of the Covid supply chain issues. The produce didn't look too great, either, probably because it took days to be shipped to the island. So a pint of strawberries that you'd get in the U.S. for $2.50 was $12 in the Bahamas—and half of them were going moldy. It was expensive and hard to find fresh produce, so I'd always have a backup of frozen fruit and vegetables on the yacht, alongside the 700 pounds of frozen meat.
There has been some talk from the owners about going to the Mediterranean next year, and I've been telling them how much better the food would be because I would have access to farmers markets if we went to France or Spain. I hope to work on their yacht every year, as I enjoy working in the industry and love the pressure and stress of working in the kitchen. Plus, it has opened up so many more opportunities on TikTok, YouTube and Facebook, where I now run virtual cooking classes.
Abby Cheshire, 27, runs live cooking classes once a month on Facebook, and is also on TikTok at @abbyinthegalley.
All views expressed in this article are the author's own.
As told to Katie Russell.
