'Below Deck' Season 11: Fraser Olender didn't want to fire Barbie when he spoke to Captain Kerry
"I guess she wasn't liking the attention I got from guests, I don't know what it was, but she was really difficult to work with," Fraser said
While Fraser Olender is among our favourite chief stews in the Below Deck franchise, Barbara "Barbie" Pascual may not agree, based on the relationship we've seen on Below Deck Season 11 (on Hayu in Canada).
Watch Season 11 of Below Deck, and catch up on previous seasons, on Hayu. Get one week free, then $6.99/month.
Barbie came onto the St. David with her own personality (which we love watching), and her own sheets, but talking about her luxurious lifestyle didn't have anything to do with Fraser's issues working with her.
"I've never judged her once," Fraser told Yahoo Canada. "I think she's fantastic. I think she has an incredibly vibrant, fiery personality, and outside of work, that is brilliant."
"We're good pals now and I never judged her for a second. I'm way worse than she is, but I have respect for authority. I don't roll my eyes. I don't ignore people. I guess she wasn't liking the attention I got from guests, I don't know what it was, but she was really difficult to work with."
Fraser did stressed that even though we're only seeing 41 minutes of 72 hours of filming for each episode, that "attitude" that Barbie had was "constant," from a professional and work standpoint.
"She just had a problem with everything," Fraser said. "I guess, as she said to herself, my dad's always said, Barbie, Barbie, Barbie, you are mother, and she's not. Not whilst to try to get her job done. It is what it is."
"Barbie and I had a really great relationship, obviously they're showing the downs as opposed to the ups, because I guess, more fun to watch. But in work she was incredibly insubordinate and I want people to understand that doesn't fly, and what would they do if someone like Barbie was disrespected as much as me."
'I didn't want to get her fired. ... Not yet anyway'
In the most recent episode of Below Deck Season 11, we saw Barbie make a little quip when setting the table with Fraser, saying "I'm just used to having a chief stew who tells me," with regards to how to lay the cutlery.
But while earlier in the season we saw Fraser go to Captain Kerry Titheradge to talk about Barbie's behaviour towards him, the chief stew stressed that the intention there was not to get her fired.
"It's really important with a new captain, and boy have I had my experiences with the new captains, to vocalize everything I'm going through," Fraser explained. "I didn't want to get her fired, I don't know why people are thinking that I tried to get her fired then. Not yet anyway."
"I went to captain to give him a breakdown of the current situation, what we were dealing with, and it's important for him to know these things so that if and when I do want to make an executive decision of bettering our crew, per se, he's going to be aware. ... It's not going to be a surprise to him. And I think it was a good approach. He was giving me advice on how I should deal better with this, I wasn't going to get rid of her, I was just telling him, but I appreciate his stance on, how can we use her and what is she good at. She's good at her job. She's incredible her job, but she's terrible to work with and lacks full, total respect for her boss."
'It's really important to be a nice person in the job'
Fraser has shown a soft side throughout the season as well, particularly when it came to talking to stew Cat Baugh, who hasn't been feeling particularly included in the group, and supporting chef Anthony Icracane dealing with the grief of his dad's death. Fraser himself opened up about his dad's cancer diagnosis and almost losing his father.
"It's really important to be a nice person in the job, I don't know why people think that you can't be a manager and a human being too," Olender said. "We do become a family, we do have to support each other and we do want to have a good time with each other."
"[Cat] needed support and I'm so ready to be prepared to give that to any of my stews. If I can sense someone is struggling then my god, if I could be the only person to help them out, I absolutely will."
Fraser Olender teases 'incredibly difficult charter' with Jill Zarin
One sneak peak we've gotten for upcoming episodes of Below Deck this season is an appearance by The Real Housewives of New York City alum, Jill Zarin, which doesn't seem to be the easiest charter of the bunch.
"I think that it was an incredibly difficult charter," Fraser said. "We were facing a lot of issues internally and then all guests, incredibly demanding, very demanding, some more than others. In this case, that was the case."
"But she's very funny and she's a joy to be around. I really enjoyed having her on board. Yes, it was tough, of course it was, but it was an interesting one."
