The Disappearing Chef

Once, chefs were everywhere.
They were grinning from the covers of magazines, headlining food festivals, hosting shows, posting selfies from the pass. Their Instagram grids were tiled with tattoos, tweezers, and tattoos holding tweezers. For a while, it felt like being a chef meant being a brand.

But something is shifting. The most interesting chefs — the ones actually changing how we eat — are vanishing from the feed. No reels of them sprinkling Maldon in slow motion, no personal TED talks about “why I cook.” Instead, they’re busy doing the work: writing menus in silence, cooking behind closed kitchen doors, skipping the interview requests, quietly perfecting dishes until they no longer need to talk about them.

Meanwhile, others are still out there shouting — filming behind-the-scenes TikToks, posting pictures of their dog between courses, making sure you know what’s on tonight’s staff meal. Their food might be good, but their presence is louder than their plates.

The disappearing chef isn’t vanishing out of shyness. It’s strategy. It’s a flex. A restaurant that opens with no preamble, no hashtag campaign, no countdown post has already set a tone: “if you know, you know.” The mystery pulls people in.

And the louder the others yell, the more it sounds like panic.
The quiet ones are already winning.