Think of how the kitchen of a classic French fine dining restaurant operates with military precision. From the chef de cuisine to the commis, each plays a role in ensuring flow is rigorously orchestrated and dishes executed to perfection. In their chef whites, the kitchen crew moves swiftly and efficiently. The executive chef keeps a close eye on his troops and barks orders to keep them in line.

It's a scene that typically plays out for many who aspire to take the boss's place one day. But not everyone adheres to the hierarchy of the kitchen. There are those who chafe under the regimen. In the old days, these upstarts would have been kicked out of the kitchen. Today, however, a few of these mavericks have revitalized the restaurant scene, brought fresh vigor and creativity to the menus, and literally thrown out the white tablecloths. Along the way, they've garnered rave reviews.

Meet three of these kitchen rebels whose outsize personalities have become as legendary as the dishes they create.

MARCO PIERRE WHITE: THE ORIGINAL BADASS

Marco Pierre White is the first "enfant terrible" among all that came after him. His story became myth thanks to his 1990 autobiography White Heat and its now-iconic portrait of a young chef sporting long untamed hair, a cigarette dangling from his lips, a kitchen cleaver in one hand, and an attitude that spelled trouble.

Born in 1961, White learned the ropes in fine dining kitchens around England, before becoming head chef of Harveys in London at the age of 24 and earning his first Michelin star. At 33, as the chef-patron of The Restaurant Marco Pierre White, he became the youngest chef to be awarded three Michelin stars. In his kitchen, he trained the likes of Gordon Ramsay, Jason Atherton, and a host of the best and brightest in Britain. He was at the top of the UK fine dining scene, with many proclaiming him the world's first celebrity chef.

At the peak of his stature, he did the unthinkable—he quit. He decided he'd had it with the unrelenting pressure, the lack of a personal life, and the quest for perfection that was taking the joy out of cooking. In 1999, he closed his restaurant, returned his Michelin stars, and retired from the kitchen. Since then, White has kept himself busy—but not in the kitchen. He owns several hotels, restaurants, and restaurant franchises. He works as a product endorser and hosted TV shows like Hell's Kitchen and MasterChef Australia. White is also developing future film and book projects.

In all the restaurants he owns or lends his name to, there's not a Michelin star in sight. While he exhibits all the traits of a "rebel" chef—the foul language, the smoking, the tabloid drama of his three marriages—his cooking remains as classic as it gets. Whether French, British, or Italian food, he likes his cooking to be honest, simple, elegant, where the ingredients are allowed to shine. I found that out firsthand at his popular Marco Pierre White Steakhouse & Grill in Dublin, Ireland.

With his portraits festooned around the space, I had, without a doubt, my best meal during the four days I spent in the Irish capital. The menu offers classic French bistro fare with British inflections. Many of the ingredients are sourced locally, including the Irish beef sirloin grilled to perfection that I enjoyed with a classic béarnaise and triple cooked fries (or chips to the Brits).

Since Marco Pierre White first rejected the Michelin star system more than 15 years ago, many chefs have followed suit. They decided to blaze their own trails, creating the menus they want without succumbing to the maddening pursuit of perfection that three Michelin stars demand. Especially in France, the most in-demand tables are no longer at expensive fine dining restaurants but at renegade spots like Le Chateaubriand, Frenchie, Septime; they're getting all the raves but without the stars. And the person who first opened the door to this brave new restaurant world happened to be Marco Pierre White.

DAVID CHANG: THE FOUL-MOUTHED GENIUS

David Chang decided early on that he didn't want to cook the way chefs do in the high-pressure environment of a fine dining kitchen, like the ones he worked in after graduating from culinary school. Instead, he traveled to Japan to learn how to make ramen and delve deep into Japanese food culture. Back in New York, he opened the hole-in-the-wall Momofuku Noodle Bar in 2004. Little did he know that his modest eatery would turn into a global restaurant empire and gain the respect of the world's best chefs, five James Beard Foundation Awards, and two Michelin stars for his "fine dining casual" Momofuku Ko. I recall dining at his second restaurant, Momofuku Ssam Bar almost 10 years ago, when his star was starting to ascend.

Situated in a nondescript part of downtown Manhattan, the place seemed to pretend like it wasn't serving exceptional food. We sat on stools at a bare table with only chopsticks for cutlery. The waiters wore T-shirts and ripped jeans. So, I never expected the menu to garner surprise after surprise—his now iconic pork buns, apple kimchi paired with bacon, and a binder thick with wine selections. While I had read that David Chang was changing things up in New York, it was only then that I fathomed how radical that change was going to be. How did he do it? Perhaps it was by chance, but in the long run, it probably had to do with his obsession with ingredients, his crazy-high standards of quality, and his genius at melding haute cuisine, junk food and Japanese and Korean flavors. It also helped that David Chang was as "out there" as his food—irreverent, profane, with a love for drinking, and a sometimes nasty temper.

David Chang now sits on top of a veritable restaurant empire, with various versions of Momofuku in New York City, Toronto, Sydney, Washington DC, and soon Las Vegas. He also opened the wildly successful Milk Bar (inventor of the infamous crack pie, compost cookie, and cereal milk), co-founded the award-winning Lucky Peach magazine, invested in the food delivery service Maple, and recently launched his own app-driven food delivery service Ando. During a trip to New York last year, I ate at Fuku+, his new fast-casual chicken joint that offers a crunchy, spicy fried chicken sandwich that has taken the city by storm. There are plans to expand Fuku+ across the US. But despite the fact that Momofuku is getting more corporate, David Chang is anything but. In a recent interview for Fast Company magazine, he talked about how he came up with the unusual Italian-Asian concept for his latest New York restaurant, Momofuku Nishi. He said, "I was like, you know what? F*** it. Let's do it. That's our strategic vision: Let's just f'ing do it." High-low haute cuisine with the heart of a rebel – that's David Chang's world.

ALVIN LEUNG: A DEMON IN THE KITCHEN

While the image of the "rebel" chef has taken hold across kitchens in Europe and the Americas, let's not forget that Asia has its own share of rule breakers, starting with Bo Innovation's Alvin Leung. Calling himself the "demon chef," Alvin Leung first gained international prominence when he was featured in the Hong Kong episode of Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations. With his sleeveless black shirt, "demon chef" in Chinese characters tattooed on his arm, and puffing a cigar while plating his dishes, he impressed Bourdain with his unconventional style and modernist riffs on Chinese classics, which he calls "X-treme Chinese." Unlike David Chang and Marco Pierre White, Alvin Leung is largely self-taught as a chef.

Born in Britain and raised in Canada, he trained as an engineer before opening an underground restaurant in Hong Kong, which eventually became Bo Innovation in 2005. He bypassed the years of rigorous training that traditional Chinese chefs undergo, and found a way to apply modernist techniques to traditional Chinese ingredients and dishes like xiao long bao, century egg, and taro. He stood up to being judged by the exacting standards of the discerning Hong Kong dining public. Astoundingly, Leung managed to wow critics, earning him raves and three Michelin stars by 2014. Leung has become a much sought after speaker at food symposia around the world, including the Philippines where he spoke at the first Madrid Fusion Manila in 2015.

During his talk, he let his imagination run wild with his own version of "X-treme Filipino" cooking, infused with humor and creativity. His favorite Filipino dish, fried eggplant, became a charred eggplant whisky drink. Lugaw transformed into a creamy risotto. He also demo'd a Coca-Cola chicken featuring foie gras, a coconut vinegar reduction, and frozen Coke powder. In 2017, he was back in these shores for "The Future of Food" conference organized by the Center for Culinary Arts Manila. He shared his experience of bringing innovation and new ideas to a cuisine as tradition bound as Chinese cooking. With his larger-than-life persona, Alvin Leung plays by his own rules where innovation, creativity, and a certain "demon" attitude are the norm.

This story first appeared in Vault Magazine Issue No. 23 2016-2017