As a young boy, Mr. Serge Bottelli - executive chef of Cafe Lido - was surrounded by the restaurant business. "I came from a family where my grandfather owned a restaurant, I helped him out whenever I could, and became interested in the trade.'' Today, as head chef at one of the best restaurants in Bermuda, he has cooked for dignitaries such as President Bush, Princess Margaret and Princess Alexandra. But where did he start, and what keeps him going? Mr. Bottelli is 38 years old, and underwent his apprenticeship in Switzerland, his home country. After graduating to chef, he acquired a job at a prestigious five star hotel in Zermatt, a mountain village in Switzerland, where he worked for five years in a team of 45 chefs. Mr. Bottelli moved to Bermuda 16 years ago, and began working at Il Chianti in the Botanical Gardens. When Il Chianti was bought by The Little Venice Group ten years ago, he kept his job and began working at Tavern on the Green. Almost four years ago, Cafe Lido was opened, and Mr. Bottelli teamed up with Cafe Lido manager Mr. Gioacchino Di Meglio to create one of the best restaurants on the island, for its food, service and location. Mr. Bottelli is president of the Chef's Association in Bermuda and a member of the Chaine des Rotisseur, an association of gourmet food chefs. He is probably the most successful chef on the island, and he loves every minute of his job. "My old teacher told me that you can't like your job, you must love it,'' he said. "It's a lot of pressure and behind the scenes work, preparing and organising, but I enjoy it.'' The menu at the Cafe Lido changes with the season, or every seven to eight weeks. Mr. Bottelli said that he comes up with new ideas every day, always something different to please the customer. "Customers are my testers, if they like something, I will do my best to improve it, I love the smile on their faces when they like the job that I am doing.'' But Mr. Bottelli's job does not stop at cooking. He plans to hold cooking classes at the Cafe Lido in January and February next year. Although Mr. Bottelli is the head chef, he has many chefs in the kitchen that produce the food. "I hand-select my chefs, one of them has been with me for seven years,'' he said. "This article does not just reflect me, if reflects all of them and their hard work.'' Mr. Bottelli also plans to bring in different chefs to preform at the Cafe Lido for a week at a time to bring some variety into the line-up. Besides that, Chef Serge takes over Mr. Di Meglio's job when he goes off on trips. "We are a team, and we produce,'' said Mr. Bottelli. Mr. Bottelli feels that he wouldn't be where he is now if was not for Mr. Di Meglio: "Mr. Di Meglio gives me the tools to do my thing, I have room to experiment, we work well as a team.'' Chef Serge has many hopes for the future, including running the best restaurant in Bermuda, which he might just be doing right now. "Everybody is born good at something, I was born to be a chef, and I'm good at it,'' he said. Mr.

Bottelli, who lives with his wife of ten years, went on to talk about the stress of his job -- he only gets six hours of sleep a night. "You need to have a very understandable wife for my job,'' Mr. Bottelli said. "And she is.'' PHOTO THE MEN BEHIND THE IDEA - Manager Mr. Gioacchino Di Meglio (on left) and executive chef Mr. Serge Bottelli smile with pride for their restaurant extravaganza.

BEAUTIFUL VIEW - Large sliding-glass doors and open windows offer diners a water view and compliments their meal.