Kitchen hand becomes part-owner of top restaurant Noma

Ali Sonko, right, with fellow new co-owners restaurant managers Lau Richter and James Spreadbury. Photo / Instagram

One of the world's best restaurants now has a new co-owner - a kitchen hand.

Ali Sonko, 62, is a partner in Noma - the four-time winner of the world's best restaurant, the BBC and Guardian report.

Sonko, originally from the Gambia, has worked at the two-Michelin-star Copenhagen restaurant since it opened in 2004.

He was a farmer before he came to Denmark 34 years ago.

He was unveiled as one of three new partners, alongside two of its managers, the BBC reports.

"Ali is the heart and soul of Noma," chef Rene Redzepi said, according to Berlingske.

"I don't think people appreciate what it means to have a person like Ali in the house. He is all smiles, no matter how his 12 children fare. And, by the way, my own father was also named Ali, and he too worked as a dishwasher when he came to Denmark."

The restaurant has closed its doors at its current location, and will reopen in December as an "urban farm".

The BBC says Redzepi added: "This is only the beginning, as we plan to surprise several more of our staff with a piece of the walls that they have chosen to work so hard within."

In 2012, Sonko told Danish website BT it was the "best job" he had ever had.

Noma has been named the world's best by Restaurant magazine and three times in the San Pellegrino World's 50 Best.