Hi, people! It's me! I'm alive! I know how to make pasta now! I wasn't side-eyed to death by a score of men in white uniforms my first week on the job. We haven't officially opened yet but let me tell you, this world is a new one. I have learned so incredibly much...because here's the thing: basically all of my skill and time spent cooking up till now seems a little, well, useless. I know it's not actually useless in the long run - I've got some great intuition and head-knowledge built up from years spent in the presence of cooking. But the way things are done among the pros renders the homemade way I've done it forever just wrong enough to knock me off my game and leave me feeling like a newbie. Thankfully, the people I'm working with are great teachers. They're patient. They're kind. They cuss cheerfully and swipe the third tray of macarons that hasn't baked properly into the compost and tell me it's the fault of the terrible oven, not me, and that it's getting replaced next week. I think what has stumped me most of all is less about the food we're making and more about the totally different equipment, terms, quantities and methods we're using. I wish I'd read Anthony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential before I started work here. I feel like I would've been much better prepared for the details of work in a professional kitchen. But hey - I didn't have any idea that I was going to soon be working in a fine dining restaurant, did I? This week has shown me that for those who want to learn, there is always opportunity. I do want to learn. And I have. And I will. And that's what makes me so excited for this job and this place.
All the same, I do wish I'd known more about the world I was entering - it would have saved me from so many embarrassing episodes born out of blatant ignorance. Needless to say, I've now Amazon Prime'd Anthony Bourdain's renowned book about working in restaurants. For now, I keep my mouth closed and my ears open. Read on to educate yourself - information saves pride. Haha...ha....
“Whachoo want, white boy? Burn cream? A Band-Aid? Then he raised his own enormous palms to me, brought them up real close so I could see them properly; the hideous constellation of water-filled blisters, angry red welts from grill marks, the old scars, the raw flesh where steam or hot fat had made the skin simply roll off. They looked like the claws of some monstrous science-fiction crustacean, knobby and calloused under wounds old and new. I watched, transfixed, as Tyrone - his eyes never leaving mine - reached slowly under the broiler and, with one naked hand, picked up a glowing-hot sizzle-platter, moved it over to the cutting board, and set it down in front of me. He never flinched.”- Anthony Bourdain, Kitchen Confidential
8 Things I Definitely Didn't Know About Restaurants:
- knives -
When you begin work at a restaurant, you will likely assume (reasonably, I thought), that along with the spoons, ladles, pots, pans, half-pans, trays, strainers, spatulas, bench-scrapers, mixing bowls, kitchen scales, forks, slotted spoons, towels, aprons, ingredients, stock pots, sauciers, and pinch-bowls with which your kitchen is supplied, someone would have thought to bring in a few low-profile chopping knives. I knew that chefs and cooks often bring in their own knives - knives they prefer, knives they have a weirdly symbiotic relationship with, knives they earned in culinary school or bought with their own money. But I seriously had no clue that every knife in this kitchen would belong to someone else or that borrowing one without asking would be tantamount to stealing someone's boyfriend for a kiss. I've never felt more adulterous than I did on my first day when I mistakenly picked up one guy's knife to slice a chunk of butter into two. He kindly told me it was his knife and that I could use it if I didn't drop it. I think I'd have sooner asked to read his texts than ever touch his knife again. BRING YOUR OWN KNIFE. As soon as I get paid, I know what I'm buying. Till then, my coworkers are being incredibly gracious and letting me sleep around with borrow their knives. But I'm getting my own as soon as possible; it's stressful being a serial adulterer borrower.
- dishwashers -
- kitchen scales -
- heavy things -
- cursing -
- heat -
Restaurant kitchens - like the belly of a dragon - are naturally a hot place. But I guess I didn't exactly think through how hot. It is July in Coastal Virginia. I haven't sweated this much since I worked as a landscaper, or that summer I virtually (and literally) lived outside and helped build our house from the foundation up. If rivers of perspiration are running down my spine, it's a dry day in the restaurant. It's difficult to stay hydrated, but on the upside I definitely don't need to visit a sauna for detoxifying purposes. I guzzle water constantly, wear a headband, and relish every single trip down to the basement for the moment of cool, quiet darkness it affords. Oh - the water is hot. REALLY hot. The oven is hot. REALLY hot. The pans crowding the stove are hot. REALLY hot. Everything is just generally really really hot.
- family meal -
- respect-
Everyone in the kitchen is crazy talented. I don't think I fully appreciated just how talented professionals at this food thing actually are - and I'm not including myself in that. These people know how to do the craziest things and respond to obscure instructions to "french" a chicken leg or "cut lardons," not with a panicked stare as I would, but with suave knife skills and a respectful nod. I'm floored by people's spacial skills, their technical knowledge, the fact that they know how to temper chocolate without a thermometer and can take thirty seconds of recipe instructions rattled off in one breath and emerge with an incredible end-product without having forgotten a single piece of the itinerary. They're not only talented, but so far have also been supportive as well. I've been told not to talk down about myself; I've been told that I'll be able to perform all of those fancy tricks in no time; I've been told that dinner service won't be that tricky since we've gotten the motions down: it'll be exactly this, just faster. Everyone in this particular kitchen is ready to learn. We listen up, we work hard, we are consulted for opinions and ideas and pulled aside in passing to taste spoonfuls of sauce and jam and chocolate and marinades. I have not once been made to feel like I'm less valuable a part of the team because I've had less experience. They brought me into the family and they're patiently teaching me all I need to know. For that I'm endlessly grateful. It's a priceless thing to be treated with voluntary respect.
“Bigfoot understood — as I came to understand — that character is far more important than skills or employment history.”
-Anthony Bourdain, Kitchen Confidential
(pasta shown is pressed with marigold petals as a just-for-fun weekend project)
"These meals are building a little work family and I love the feeling that we're beginning to belong together, not just individually." Something about eating together --- especially if it's food you've contributed, rather than buying it somewhere impersonal and it just showing up in front of you --- helps bond people, I've noticed. I'm still not entirely sure /why/. But it does work.
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I love this! I'm so glad that your new job is shaping up to be a challenging and rewarding experience with great people. I know from this last year that having supportive colleagues/mentors is probably one of the most important things for success. And don't worry - you'll figure those crocs out. Who knows? Maybe you'll even learn to like them. ;)
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