Who am I and what am I doing here?

My name is Peter Olsson and I’m 29 years old. I’ve been working as a chef for 11 years and I have multiple well-merited restaurants on my resumé. Since just over five weeks back, I can also call myself a type 1 diabetic. I remember myself already in the hospital deciding to make something good out of my condition – combined with my profession. But before getting into that, let us back up to nearly a year ago.

We’re in the middle of June and I have been working as chef for ten years. To work as a chef is not, contrary to what people may think, a glamorous job. It’s a physically heavy job with many, long and poorly paid shifts. The food habits are terrible and unfortunately there is a macho culture in the industry forcing you to stay on top of your game, and reporting in sick does not exist.

I love food. I think, live and breath food and to me another life than the one as chef is unthinkable after all. I’m very happy with my choice of profession. All of sudden I start to lose weight. A colleague who has been out of town for three weeks states that my face is thinner. This is the first but far from last time someone tells me how thin I’ve become.

During fall I change work site. I get an opportunity to work at one of Gothenburg’s absolute top restaurants with one star in Guide Michelin. I was planning on taking a few weeks of vacation, but this was a chance I couldn’t resist.

The job is going well, I perform well and I’m growing a lot as a chef. Suddenly I feel the thirst. I can drink 7-8 liters of water every shift, while still losing weight. Once when getting up on the scale, I have lost 15 kgs – from 76 kg to 61 kg.

During the winter my head chef quits his job and I change work site once again. Yet another star restaurant is employing. During the fall I have been feeling very tired but I consider that being a normal consequence of hard work. Now, when looking back, I can see every symptom, that I back then ignored. I was just starting my career for real, working my way up, and I had no time to be sick. So I closed my eyes to it. Also, I had no knowledge about type 1 diabetes and its symptoms, which lead to me collapsing on a Thursday night in March. At home, alone, on my toilet floor. I had gone to the toilet and was feeling exhausted, both physically and mentally. So I collapse and am gone for four hours. If I back then had known what I know today, it wouldn’t have had to go that far.

So.. I am a chef and pretty good at cooking. I want to enlighten, inform and inspire within an area where the knowledge level today is frightening. The little I knew five weeks ago is proof of that.

As my tool to make a change, I will use what I know best – being my cooking. In the future I will share recipes as well as tips and tricks making the time in the kitchen easier and more fun. At the same time I want to make clear that I’m no form of dietician – and what works for me might not work for others. Consider my food and my recipes inspiration: pick out the good parts and make the food your own. And dare to fail! I do it all the time despite my experience. It’s when you fail and learn from it that you make progress in the kitchen and will become a better chef.

My food philosophy is built on what I have chosen to call ’logic food’: a healthy way to look at food. Clean without additives, locally produces whenever possible and seasonally based, preferably organic. But I’ll tell you more about my philosophy and my thoughts on good food another time.

I have to go now. The food- and insulin clock is ringing and it’s time to start preparing tonight’s dinner. I will be working with cabbage, onion and chick peas – maybe it will become something to share here later on?

I’m so excited to share my knowledge and experience – and hopefully being able to help another person or two to better and healthier results in the kitchen. What do you say – let’s do this, huh?

Peter Olsson, ”Chefabetic”