A former employee of Dabiz Muñoz reveals what it's like to work at DiverXO.

Dabiz Muñoz (Madrid, 1980) is considered one of the world's leading chefs. Awarded three Michelin stars for his main restaurant, Diverxo, he has revolutionized Spanish cuisine with his innovative style and boundless creativity, utilizing avant-garde techniques influenced by world cuisines, particularly Asian cuisine.

Muñoz's fiercely demanding approach and constant pursuit of innovation have led him to a prominent position in global cuisine. In fact, he has been named the best chef in the world on several occasions, according to lists such as The Best Chef Awards.

Although Dabiz Muñoz is behind other projects such as StreetXO and RavioXO , his flagship restaurant is DiverXO . Located in Madrid, it offers a radically innovative gastronomic experience that breaks with traditional haute cuisine concepts.

In this regard, a former DiverXO employee has shared his experience working at Muñoz's restaurant . In an interview for the podcast 'Un Chino y Medio,' Chinese chef Jiale Pan reveals various details such as his salary and the selection process.

In the podcast hosted by influencers Lin and Jiajun, the Chinese chef recounts his beginnings at DiverXO. To learn more, we have to go back to the time of the pandemic, when the chef already had his third restaurant up and running. "I sent my resume, and three days later I received an email saying, 'Come on, we're going to interview you,'" he says.

In the interview, which he conducted with Dabiz Muñoz's right-hand man, Pablo Soriano, he had to answer questions such as whether he knew who the prestigious chef was: "They wanted to make it clear to me that DiverXO was a place of hard work ."

During the podcast, the hosts joked about Jiale Pan's hairstyle, which features a mohawk very similar to Dabiz Muñoz's signature hairstyle. "I kept it a bit because of DiverXO's influence , because that's where I learned the most," says the Chinese chef, who admits he was very "embarrassed" to be around the restaurant owner.

Jiale Pan talks about her experience working at DiverXO and highlights that it was “very strict” and “demanding”: “I can define it with two words: ‘Fast’ and ‘good’ .” In particular, she mentions the long working days at Muñoz’s restaurant: “ It’s a lot of hours . We don’t have a fixed start time. It’s decided each day depending on the customers. The earliest is 7 a.m., and we leave at 12 p.m. or 1 a.m ..”

DiverXO's prestige makes many people want to work in these types of restaurants "for free" to learn. "You can have no training and write for a three-month internship, and there's a chance they'll take you on. If you have training, you have a better chance of getting paid ," says Jiale Pan.

In this regard, the Chinese chef reveals that he started earning around €1,200 at DiverXO and later received a raise to €1,400. "The goal of all chefs who start working at any restaurant is to learn a lot from different places and then open their own restaurant. Otherwise, working hard for a salary like that isn't worth it," comments one of the presenters. "That was my goal," the Chinese chef replies.

Regarding the restaurant's staff turnover, Jiale Pan comments that there were people who "only lasted one service." "Most of the time they leave because they can't keep up with the pace of work we have; it's overwhelming, and some people don't like the environment," she explains.

In Jiale Pan's case, he was able to keep up with DiverXO's frenetic work pace. "If it weren't for my own business , I would have stayed longer ," says the Chinese chef, for whom Muñoz's restaurant was a pivotal step in his career as a chef.