Some things are simply in our blood. For the Shirley family it’s restaurants – even if they did not always plan on it.
Celebrated chef and restaurateur Norma Shirley passed away one year ago. In her lifetime, she opened several successful restaurants both in the United States and then in her native Jamaica. An internationally acclaimed culinary innovator, she was dubbed the Julia Child of the Caribbean, featured in international publications and receiving many awards. She was living in Sweden, working as a midwife, when her son, Delius Shirley, co-owner of the equally acclaimed Ortanique restaurants, was born. It was only when she moved to the US and met Terence Hill, a spaghetti western actor, that she considered cooking for a living. A self-taught chef, she opened her first restaurant, The Statin Restaurant, in Stockbridge, Massachusetts when Delius was 9-years-old.
Returning to Jamaica in 1986, she opened the first Norma’s on Belmont Road. “From there she opened a second, then a third, then a fourth restaurant. It just snowballed,” her son recalls. “A lot of people really feel she revolutionised the West Indian view on food. She educated West Indians that it’s not all about a boxed lunch. She encouraged people to use fruit and vegetables more, to promote what your island has to offer. That was her gig, her fame.” Norma Shirley was also instrumental in changing attitudes towards working in the service industry. “Unfortunately in the West Indies that whole idea of servitude is embedded and people don’t want to serve tables. She tried to change that point of view and really advocated that with a lot of Jamaicans and West Indians. That’s why we have now made this culinary foundation in Jamaica [The Norma Shirley Scholarship Fund]. This is the first year we are doing it. We take an underprivileged child and the foundation will pay for them to study hospitality management for four years at the University of Technology in Kingston.” The Ortanique restaurants support the foundation by donating $1 for every Norma’s Terrace Salad sold both here in Grand Cayman and also Miami.
Jamaican and Caribbean cuisine was not always Norma Shirley’s specialty, however. “My mother’s cooking was more European style, probably due to the fact my dad was English. He was accustomed to eating very rich, French foods. Later down the road she incorporated that West Indian style with classic French cuisine and created her own style of food,” Mr. Shirley said. As a child, he did not even taste a peanut butter and jelly sandwich or a McDonald’s until he was at least 7 years old. “When I went to school, my mum used to make me Brie cheese sandwiches and Foie gras,” he said. “When I got a little older and I understood the whole barter system, I would trade my school lunches with the other kids.” By the age of 9, Delius was working as a dishwasher twice a week after school at his mother’s restaurant. She did not, however, push him to pursue a culinary career himself. When it comes to cooking, Mr. Shirley said, “I always say, a chef creates, a cook emulates. And I’m a cook.”
His mother had natural ability to create a feast out of virtually nothing, he says, but he does not have the same flair. Although he watched and absorbed a wealth of knowledge about the business of running a restaurant, his mother never sat him down and taught him how to cook. One of the most valuable lessons she did teach him though, was how to manage staff. “We run a very family style restaurant,” he said. “Every person who works in the restaurant is considered part of the family. My mother was a big proponent of that – she taught me to work side by side with staff, get down in the trenches with them, and earn their respect that way.” Throughout high school and college, Delius worked in restaurants because the hours were flexible and it was a good way to make some money, but ultimately he studied finance. “When I got out of college I was a financial analyst for almost a year,” Mr. Shirley said. “I didn’t enjoy it as much as I’d like to so my mum said, ‘Why don’t you come to Jamaica for six months and help me open my new restaurant?’.” A year and half later, when the restaurant was up and running, Delius returned to Miami to open his own restaurant and in this, his mother encouraged him all the way. “The restaurant was called Norma’s on the Beach,” he said. “I named it after her. At that point her popularity was huge, not only in Jamaica but internationally, so I thought, ‘Right, let me ride her coat tails through the door’.”
It was Norma who introduced her son to Cindy Hutson, who is now his partner in life and business. “They got along like peaches and cream,” he said. Much like Norma Shirley, Ms Hutson is an acclaimed self-taught chef, and has made a name for herself for by mixing culinary traditions from different parts of the world. And just like his mother, Mr. Shirley, along with Ms Hutson, has since gone on to open seven successful restaurants under the Ortanique banner, in addition to consulting on three more.
Source: www.compasscayman.com