A chef has dished the dirt on her life as a full-time yacht chef.
Micaela Anthea Markides spends half her year cooking aboard luxury sailing yachts, under pressure and intense scrutiny.
The 31-year-old is responsible for feeding ultra-high-net-worth guests, who expect food on the same tier as Michelin-starred restaurants.
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Her working days routinely stretch to 14 or even 16 hours – but she’s on call 24/7.
“It’s not for the faint-hearted,” Micaela, who is originally from South Africa but based in Bali, told What’s The Jam.
“If a guest craves a midnight snack, I’m back in the galley, no questions asked.
“This pace demands far more than endurance; it requires precision, discipline, and systems refined over years.
“I’ve invested immense time and energy into mastering techniques and workflows that allow me to perform at this level for extended periods, without ever compromising the standard expected aboard a superyacht.
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“The food I create has to rival what you’d expect in the world’s most refined fine-dining restaurants.
“Superyacht service operates on an even higher plane.
“There is no room for repetition or complacency.
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“Each dish is conceived anew, constantly refined and elevated to ensure the experience remains exciting, indulgent, and upholding a world-class standard.”
There are no fixed menus, no true breaks, and no such thing as “off duty”, Micaela noted.
Unlike traditional restaurants, where menus are planned weeks in advance and creativity can be constrained by structure, yachting allows her to cook entirely on instinct.
Lunches might be relaxed, family-style sharing platters. Dinners, however, often unfold as five-course tasting menus, carefully paced and meticulously plated.
Micaela said: “I make whatever the guests want, nothing is out of bounds.
“I’m at their full disposal and cooking to their preferences is my top priority, but the goal is to offer something entirely singular – meals so distinctive they could only exist in this setting, on this vessel, at that moment in time.
“Every dish must be memorable.
“To me, food is art, and I approach it with deep intention and discipline.
“Every plate is meticulously composed, balancing flavour, colour, texture, and complexity, transforming each meal into an experience rather than simply sustenance.
“This devotion to craft is not just my profession.
“It’s my passion.”
Micaela has shared some of her guests most outrageous requests.
She said: “Most of the time, requests are non-negotiable.
“You have to make it work one way or another, depending on the type of boat.
“Even while being at sea, yachts have contacts everywhere – sometimes to the extent that helicopters deliver lobster tails to the boat while the vessel is anchored out in the ocean.
“Guests have asked for 2kg of the finest baeri caviar to be bought.
“This huge amount of caviar was for only five people and had to be flown in from France while the vessel was in the Caribbean islands.
“They wanted caviar with almost every single meal.
“Sometimes the guests go fishing and end up catching something. More often than not there’s an expectation that the fish will immediately become the next meal – so any meal and menu plans need to be discarded and reimagined with the fresh fish that has been caught.
“I’ve had guests who only eat one type of prawn and it had to be extra large king prawns – anything less than that was not acceptable.
“The clients and guests pay exorbitant amounts of money to charter or maintain and own these vessels so the standard and the efforts need to match this.”
Micaela has been a chef for seven years, six of them spent working on yachts.
Before committing fully to life at sea, she worked on the popular island of Koh Samui, Thailand, where she opened two restaurants and acted as head chef in both.
But it was yachting that ultimately won her over, despite it meaning her kitchen sometimes wobbles on the waves.
Micaela said: “Cooking at sea as a private yacht chef is completely different to cooking on land.
“As the sole chef on yachts, I have the kitchen completely to myself, it is my space, I am the head of the department and I make my own decisions and work schedule.
“The captain is my superior but anything to do with food is my domain and I am in charge.
“The freedom for expression and creativity is also so much more extensive on yachts than on land.
“I can wake up in the morning and decide to cook anything I feel like, be creative as I feel like, use any ingredients, try any new skills.
“I’ve every single piece of equipment you could imagine at my disposal.
“I much prefer working on boats at sea than on land.
“The kitchen is however moving a lot of the time, when we are sailing or at anchor.
“This does make my job a bit more difficult during these times but the oven is on a gimbal and everything in the kitchen is designed to keep things in place with reinforcements and latches.
“I’ll always choose being on the water every time!”
On seeing the world, she went on: “We travel constantly.
“My vessel does seasons in the Caribbean islands, Sweden and the Balearics.
“We can sometimes be on a different island or country every week.
“We live, work, eat, sleep on our moving home and get to see the most breathtaking places the world has to offer on the water.
“Land-based jobs could not even compare to this opportunity.”
A typical charter day begins long before the guests wake.
Micaela rises at 4:30am, starting with meditation to ground herself, before stepping into the galley.
By 6am, breakfast prep is underway, with bread baking, pastries rising, fruit platters assembled and breakfast specials planned.
Breakfast service usually runs at around 9am.
After cleaning down, she prepares lunch for the crew, served promptly at midday, while simultaneously prepping guest lunch for 1:30pm.
The afternoon is spent cleaning, prepping canapés and planning dinner – sometimes interrupted by sailing, during which she helps hoist sails on deck.
Crew dinner is served at 5pm, canapés at 6:30pm, and guest dinner at 7:30pm.
After service ends around 9pm, she cleans the galley, preps for the next day and finally heads to bed by 10pm.
To make the intensity sustainable, Micaela works on a rotational schedule.
She does two months on, two months off, while getting paid all year-round.
Micaela added: “That rhythm is intentional.
“It allows me to show up fully during my on-periods, delivering food and experiences at the highest level guests deserve, and then step away to recover, travel, and continue learning.
“In an industry that never truly sleeps, this balance is what makes excellence sustainable and keeps the 24/7 environment not just manageable, but purposeful.”
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