Known for its pizza, pasta and delicious veal dishes, Ciao Baby Cucina is a trendy chain; the kind of place that can be pretty buzzing in summer. Their menu may not be fine dining, but managing twenty three employees and ensuring that a menu with thirteen pastas, and seventeen pizzas, are all prepared to a consistent standard every night is no easy business.

According to the man who employs him, head chef at Ciao Baby Cucina’s Eden on the Bay branch, Bonfas Ncube is a natural. He’s been with the brand for the past six years, and when the new Ciao Baby branch was opened up at Eden on the Bay in Cape Town in 2009, he was selected to come down from Joburg to get it set up. We headed out to meet Bonfas and find out what it's like to work in a buzzing kitchen like Ciao Baby Cucina's.

I can imagine things get a little busy around here; what’s it like in the kitchen?

“In summer it is more than busy – it gets crazy”, says Bonfas with a smile. “The crazy is to make everybody happy, people who are happy will bring back two friends tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, they will bring back eight.”

What are the best and worst bits about your job?

“It can be difficult to get everyone working together, but when you are in the kitchens you are always busy, when you start working you have got preparation, after preparation you are serving, after serving you are cleaning. If you are a waitor, sometimes you have nothing to do, in the kitchen you have got no time to get bored.”

Where did you learn to cook?

“I learnt about cooking, when I was working in House of Prawns, in 1986. I started washing dishes, and then I started making salads. I made salads for a year, and then I became a griller, from there, I was a griller for one year, from there I went to the pasta section in the same restaurant, I spent about six years there. From there I left to join Buffalo, I went to Kalushias in Sandton, I spent 14 years there. From there I went to Ciao Baby – it was 2007. In 2009 I came to Cape Town, to start this Ciao Baby.

"I’m a kitchen manager – everything in the kitchen is in my hands, checking the orders, I am the coordinator, I am doing everything!”

Who would you cook for if you could cook for anyone in the world?

“I would like to cook for a president or a minister”

What are your favourite items on the menu?

"The seafood platter, with prawns, calamari, mussels and the chicken salad with gorgonzola."

After tasting the chicken salad myself, I have to agree. A far cry from the traditional dry chicken and half a head of Iceburg lettuce, this salad is packed with walnuts and gorgonzola and is certainly tasty. My dining partner and I also wolf down a pizza with a beautiful light base, and a very tasty veal dish. It seems Bonfas is a natural after all.