Lunch for Arafat (Washington Post Op-Ed submission 2007)

Yassar Arafat, dressed in his usual khaki, military regalia minus his pistol (it would be returned after coffee), arrived with his entourage dressed in expensive, poorly tailored Italian suits. HRH Prince Alwaleed bin Talal was hosting the Palestinian leader at his new palace in Riyadh with a Chinese lunch that I, as his executive chef, was in charge of preparing. The conference taking place this week between the leaders of Fatah and Hammas, hosted by the Saudis in the city of Mecca, a stones throw from the holiest shrine in Islam, the Ka'aba, may produce similar results to the Arafat Alwaleed meeting--very few.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is a land of contradictions to say the least. Just ask the westerners who were just sentenced to jail and lashings last week for dancing and other vice related crimes after being arrested by the Mutawa'ah--the feared religious police. One day they were living in a furnished house in a secured compound with their families and the next they are surely dancing to another tune. When I was working in the Kingdom, my chefs used to come in bloodied after being beaten by the Mutaawa for being late to prayer. They harangued and threatened me on many occasions for speaking to nurses whilst shopping in Alazizia, the prince’s supermarket. Most Saudis have a good grasp of English and many wealthy ones with staffs use the word “immediately” quite liberally. We, as westerners, usually jump to it when the word is used. Typically though, a Saudi when faced with it will say, “Boukra, insha'allah”. (Tomorrow, God willing maybe, probably not.) We westerners move far too fast for our own good.

Lunch was called for--immediately. The table was set; place settings in the formal dinning hall, red china with overlaid gold costing around 25,000 dollars apiece and we could hold conservatively 120 in the hall. I was busy in the adjoining kitchen with Peking Duck, Spicy Crab with Oyster Sauce and Lobster Fried Rice when I tripped over one of the ten velvet covered gift boxes. There were no fortune cookies inside. They were about the size of a double briefcase and were to be presented to Arafat with a check for 10 million U.S. dollars. The prince likes round figures. A year earlier he had given 20 million dollars to rebuild the largest power station in Lebanon after Netanyahu and the Israelis bombed it. A couple of years later, he gave Mayor Giulianni and the people of New York ten million after the 9/11 bombing. Giulianni and the Jewish Lobby got their knickers in a twist because of a comment the prince made suggesting the U.S. should review its policies in the Middle East--that they may be flawed. Imagine that, flawed U.S. policies in the Middle East. I wondered afterward if Arafat’s check had bounced and the prince recycled it to NYC.

An assistant and I tended the buffet; we had to make Arafat a plate, as he looked fairly addled, his palsy had really taken hold. There were about 25 guests for lunch but we had, as usual, and in keeping with Arab tradition, enough for 125. I was desperate to finish up with the charade of Arab unity and go to my favorite underground pub for a beer, but thought it would be interesting to see what the gifts were. My own opinion was as long as the Jews were shooting at the Palestinians the rest of the Arab world could conveniently ignore their poorer cousins, with the possible exception of the good Kings of Jordan, Hussein and Abdullah II.

We wheeled out the 25 desserts and a selection of 50 ice creams and sorbets while other palace staff rushed around bringing out the mysterious boxes and the jumbo sized check; the same as lotteries use. It was like a game show. When opened to “ohs” and “ahhs”, the boxes contained machine guns and automatic rifles: an American vintage Thompson, a Colt/Browning, an AK-47 and a M-16. All of them were gold plated and “symbolic,” thus unusable for the cause of Palestinian independence. The one that caught my attention though--and I don’t think any body else noticed--was the shiny Uzi submachine gun.

I knew there was some geopolitical irony being fed at this lunch but I couldn’t figure it out. As far as I knew, Alwaleed would be visiting Ehud Barak in Jerusalem the following week. Contradictions? Who knows, I’m just the chef.

Mark Ceranski has worked as executive chef at Harrods and as private chef to Prince Alwaleed bin Talal along with many others. His memoir, POTBOILER: IN THE KITCHEN WITH ROYALTY, DICTATORS AND DESPOTS is being completed for submission to publisher.

Potboiler: In The Kitchen With Royalty, Dictators and Despots

What happens when a person has a steady supply of more money than God intended? He eats differently than the rest of us, for one thing, and few know this more intimately than Mark Ceranski, personal chef to some of the richest, most notorious, and controversial figures on the planet. Potboiler is Ceranski’s wickedly funny tour de force through thirty years in the extraordinary world behind the kitchen doors of Windsor Castle, Saudi royal palaces, luxury mega-yachts sailing from Cannes to Cuba, and the mega-kitchens of the hallowed Food Halls of Harrods in London.

One day he’s serving a romantic, candlelit dinner to the ill-fated lovers Princess Diana and Dodi Al Fayed, and the next he’s greeting Her Majesty in old jeans and sneakers because Scotland Yard mistook the backpack that held his change of clothes for a bomb – all the while making sure the foie gras doesn’t burn, the risotto isn’t overdone, and the gas grill isn’t blowing his staff into the high seas.

In Ceranski’s world “chopping block” has dual meanings; it’s a place where one can behead the chicken that’s being served for dinner as easily as one can (quite inadvertently) attend an execution – and where knowing how to prepare a good bowl of “kabsa” can keep a man out of jail. A world where “The Queen” can refer to Elizabeth II of England as well as the insufferable young playboy who wants you to procure more for his pleasure than merely the meat for the evening’s barbeque. Where a foul odor can mean anything from spoiled caviar to a dead body over the palace kitchen.

It’s an insanely seductive world where you’d better be on your toes no matter how many bottles of French wine you’ve managed to kill the night before because the English Prime Minister, Tony Blair, is dropping by for lunch. And you never know when you’re going to have to anesthetize a Russian billionaire with vodka before you assist with the removal of some Chechen War shrapnel in an impromptu operation. And you are no longer fazed when the host blithely throws $15,000 in small bills overboard for the amusement of his guests.

You just keep on cooking.

It’s a measure of Ceranski’s skill at storytelling that Potboiler is more than just a behind-the-scenes romp with the idle class. It is an enlightening and shrewd eye-witness account of geopolitical partying. Need favors for a luncheon with Yasser Arafat? What would be more appropriate than vintage American automatic weapons? Decide you want to change jobs? Try getting your passport back from the multi-billionaire Saudi prince who wants you to stay on.

The even more remarkable feat that Ceranski pulls off, however, is that though his observations are sometimes mercilessly sharp, he shares with readers his real affection for the unpredictable world of high-stakes cooking – and for the people who populate it. Whether he’s negotiating a truce between Hutu and Tutsi dishwashers battling in Harrods’ pastry kitchen or going head-to-head with Mohamed Al Fayed, Ceranski doesn’t let craziness or excess keep him from finding – and, in most cases, genuinely liking – the human being underneath.

A chef’s memoir must almost necessarily include recipes and menus. Ceranski’s does – the reader will be able to recreate in his/her own kitchen Elizabeth II’s favorite artichoke dish or the crème brulee for which Diana had a weakness. He or she will also take away the constructive culinary advice this master chef tosses off spontaneously, and generously, throughout his story.

Ceranski is probably the least known of the ‘celebrity chefs’ – discretion being a valued commodity among KGB agents, fornicating Bedouins, and celebrities healing broken hearts on the blue waters of the Mediterranean; thirty years of hot ovens, lost sleep, and personal sacrifice filling the bellies of the people who shape the planet as we know it has put Ceranski in the unique position to take readers on a preposterous, sexy/crazy culinary adventure. He is unpretentious and hilarious in the telling of a tale where there is always elegant food on the table, a bit of subterfuge in the background, and a pot on the boil.