“‘Slutty Cheff’ sounds like such a bolshy name, but it was all spur of the moment,” anonymous chef, writer and author, Slutty Cheff says. “I was making a leftover roast beef sandwich, and I took a picture of it to upload to Instagram and called it a ‘Roast Queef sandwich’. That’s when I had the thought: food and sex. That’s really funny – that’s when I also changed my name.”
And so, her alias was born. In the little spare time she has – outside of working 60-hour weeks prepping for service in a windowless basement and having sex while still smelling like deep fat fryer, grease clinging to her hair and seeping into every pore – she writes sarcastically, smuttily and hilariously about food, sex and what it’s like being a woman in the male-dominated restaurant world. The audience? Her 44,000 followers on Instagram and avid followers of her culinary erotica-meets-kitchen-confessional column for British Vogue.
Her debut memoir, Tart: Misadventures of an Anonymous Chef (out 17 July), was scribbled in notebooks during service and written in her Notes app while riding night buses between 16-hour shifts. The result is a raw, riotous, and unfiltered account of life behind the pass in London’s restaurants and the world of modern romance outside it, from elbowing her way through the boys’ club that exists in kitchens across the globe to the pretentiousness of cooking school, all-night benders to take the edge off after work, mental breakdowns and, of course, dating and sleeping with fellow chefs.
For Slutty, it felt crucial that she was writing it while living it. If she’d had more time or written it in hindsight, she thinks it would’ve lost its immediacy and energy. “I’m quite happy to have had that real baptism of fire,” she says. “Ignorance is bliss. Just fucking do what you want and see if it works.”
Not since Anthony Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential have we been given such an all-access pass into the gritty underbelly and elitism of the restaurant world, or the Sex and the City-style scandalous dating confessions and juicy stories usually reserved for the day-after debrief with close girlfriends. Tart builds on these foundations, and Slutty writes so vulnerably in a way so few of us dare to be. Even if you’ve never worked in hospitality, her stories about work, dating and getting through life are utterly relatable: every job has a hierarchy (a pervy co-worker, unhinged boss or the one who never pulls their weight); we’ve all dated or liked the wrong person; and we’ve all made questionable decisions at one time or another.
“I’m kind of seduced by this world that is at times toxic and challenging because there are so many parallels,” she says. “Between that, and just being in your twenties, dating, making mistakes and figuring out who the fuck you are.”
Before working in kitchens, Slutty worked at a brand marketing agency – but quickly grew bored of office life, had a mental breakdown and moved back in with her parents. At home, cooking became her lifeline. It was something that gave her focus and a sense of purpose, helping to ground her. She reflects in the book: “Having something to watch, something to touch, something to smell, something to hear and something to taste is the fundamental way to ground me. Cooking keeps me on Earth.” This pushed her to enrol in cooking school and start pursuing it professionally, and she hasn’t looked back since.
Slutty is refreshingly candid about her frenetic, high-pressure life – and she never holds back from saying exactly what she thinks, much like catching up with a friend you haven’t seen in a while over a drink, where you inevitably end up getting more drunk as the night goes on and then just excitedly word vomit at each other. In 2023, her satirical post pretending to do a trial shift at TikTok star turned chef-owner Thomas Straker’s restaurant, Strakers, went viral. The post came in response to a now-deleted photo he had shared of his all-white, all-male kitchen team. Commenters quickly called out the lack of diversity, questioning how a team like that could exist in a city as multicultural as London and a neighbourhood with as much history as Notting Hill. That unexpected viral moment changed everything. Suddenly, people started paying attention.
“There were a lot of earnest DMs from female chefs and loads from male chefs, too,” she says. “It felt like this unifying thing where people were sharing their own stories and experiences.” But alongside the heartfelt messages came a wave of pressure from people starting to put her on the spot, expecting her to spark real change. “How are you going to change things for the experiences of females going into kitchens?” they asked.
Slutty explains that she didn’t feel smart or experienced enough to have that kind of impact, especially as she was still new to kitchens and still learning at that time. For her, telling stories in a way that’s engaging and entertaining often feels more powerful than setting out with the intention to make change. “I feel a bit icky inside when people try to put me in this box as some kind of activist or chef campaigner,” she admits. When she first started meeting with publishers, they pitched her book as a big campaign manifesto. “I don’t feel like I should have to take on the role of a changemaker,” she says. “I’m better at writing about lived experiences. I’m so desperate for women to have better experiences in kitchens because they’re such fucking special places. I just don’t want them to feel limiting for anyone.”
Since then, Slutty’s writing career has taken on a life of its own. She now writes full-time – a major shift from the heat and chaos. In the lull after finishing her book, she channelled her restless energy into a solo side project: Hot Fat, a self-described “porn mag” with a giant arse on the cover, which she wrote, designed, printed and hand-delivered copies as a treasure hunt across London herself. The zine is filled with pieces on “panna cotta titties”, “mise en pussy” and an agony aunt column unpacking the politics of pegging. These days, she’s focused on adapting Tart for TV. Lena Dunham has already shown interest and said she “devoured” the book.
But even with all this momentum, she’s hesitant to moan about deadlines, writing and editing. Compared with restaurants, where you’re lucky to steal a moment to breathe, let alone rest, writing feels almost luxurious. “Chefs are a real fucking special, rare breed of human,” she says, smiling as she talks about her boyfriend, who is one of them. “He will work a back-to-back double like a cart horse with no complaints and just keeps going,” she says. “Whereas I’ll do a double and be like, ‘Fuck me, this can’t be human, this is fucking insane. I’m going to die.’ And that’s just the work. The job is only half the hurdle – then there’s dodgy groping arse stuff, the sexism, the pressure and the anger issues. That’s the horrible hurdle. It doesn’t always happen, and it’s relative to each kitchen. I think it’s getting better, and I really hope it is.”
““My anonymity makes me feel fucking amazing and I never really want it to go away, ever”
It’s this contrast that powers her voice: she loves the intensity of kitchen life but refuses to romanticise it. For women, the job isn’t just physically punishing – it comes with a whole extra layer of bullshit to navigate, from sexism to power games, and she’s not afraid to call it out. That honesty – raw and often hard-won – is also why she writes under a pseudonym. Slutty compares writing anonymously to the comfort of a weighted blanket. (Although she doesn’t own one, she imagines it would feel amazing to have.) Without that safety net, she believes she would have a panic attack. This sense of protection allows her to express herself more freely and write without fear. “I’m not comfortable with the world of Instagram. Portraying your real self in this curated way, oversharing, all the FOMO and a ridiculous amount of criticism from one stranger to another – I think that’s a really scary world,” she says. “My anonymity makes me feel fucking amazing and I never really want it to go away, ever.”
Keeping her identity hidden was a priority, and making all the restaurants, chefs and characters in Tart unrecognisable helped ease her anxiety. “I know it’s technically a non-fiction book, but there is no direct thing that hasn’t been modified,” she says. “That helped me deal with the panic of, ‘Do I share this? If it’s true, is it my truth to tell?’ I’m just conscious of not being a bellend.”
After time spent in both writing and the kitchen, Slutty knows the romantic pull of restaurant life never fades. There’s an electric, almost tangible sexual tension between front of house staff and chefs, fuelled by a camp theatrical shout of “Oui, chef!” and the neverending screech of the ticket printer machine. “Maybe this doesn’t actually exist and I’m making it all up, or maybe I’m a sicko in the head, but it feels primal. Humans are driven by that insatiable hunger and desire,” she says. Slutty believes there’s something romantic about working while the rest of the world sleeps – labouring through the day and night, preparing for others. “The generous act of bringing pleasure to someone else overlaps with sex, and the idea of serving someone before you serve yourself.”
In the end, Slutty Cheff is exactly what her alias suggests: messy, bold, funny and deeply self-aware – a woman driven by appetite in every sense. She’s not trying to be a voice of a generation or the poster girl for kitchen feminism. She’s just telling the truth, one greased-up, sex-soaked, sharp-as-a-knife line at a time. And maybe that’s what makes her so compelling: she’s not here to fix the system, she’s here to survive it – and in doing so, she’s accidentally giving the rest of us permission to be gloriously unfiltered, too.
Slutty Cheff’s Top 5 Summer London Dating Spots
“I am shit with hot weather,” Slutty Cheff admits. “So in summer, I cook at home and only hit restaurants after dark.” For her, London is less about landmarks and more about quiet familiarity. “I love London more each year I grow older. It’s home... no emotional attachment to the red buses or Tesco, just a common agreement not to make too much eye contact.” And the restaurants, she says, are where love, infatuation and disaster all play out. “I become greedy as fuck, and there’s such a love to it...” Here are her top five London restaurants for dates – whatever the outcome...
64 Goodge Street
“I went the other day and it’s like the original restaurant – it has all the things that make me think of sex: leather booths, candles, a clean open kitchen, expensive, delicious and classic food, a fancy name and bathrooms that smell good. I feel like a lady of the night whenever I go here, and that is exactly how I want to feel when going out with my boyfriend.”
01 Adana
“I never want to date someone who doesn’t like Turkish food, so for me it is vital to get that information locked in early doors. The lamb liver wrap and lentil soup are a perfect meal for me. It is probably one of my favourite meals in London, and I prefer going by myself, but it is a nice casual date spot where formal romance isn’t forced, so you can suss the vibe.”
Nando’s
“Mainly, to see what type of chicken your date orders. If they are a breast person, it is better to find out sooner rather than later, and if their favourite cut of chicken is breast, they prob won’t tend to your breast, I reckon.”
Sweetings
“Another excellent cosplay place. You and your date can go for lunch and feel like city bankers – there is old romance there. Plenty of tasty fishy treats, oysters and lots of people around to talk about. It’s a good people-watching spot to soothe the pressure of conversing.”
Goodbye Horses
“One of the only trendy wine bar and restaurant combination places that can cater to full throttle classy romance. The lighting, the wood, the art, the staff, the wine list and chef Jack Coggin’s menu all lend themselves to a pre-sex vibe – it is kind of like being on a cruise ship but with only sexy people, not loads of constipated OAPs. The cheese toastie is excellent if you want to be contemporary with your love and have that with natural wine, but there are also loads of delicious, more refined starters.”
