Listening: But there's no release. Mo peace. I toss and turn without cease. Like a curse, open my eyes and rise like yeast.
What's my problem? I can't get no sleep.
Yeah. I can't get no sleep. It's been months since I was asleep before three. Now I'm riding right around half past four when I can even get somewhere in the general realm of rest. It's usually around half past five when I actually lose consciousness. I can't get no sleep.
Two weekends ago (my weekends, not 9-5ers weekends), I was up in Boston, in my own wonderfully comfortable bed, warm and surrounded by pillows, and I still couldn't sleep. I closed my eyes and turned off my music. Then when that wouldn't work, I turned on my music. After an hour of that, I turned it off again and turned on the TV. I ended up not getting to sleep until what I think was around an hour and fifteen minutes before the alarm went off telling me to get my ass in gear so that I could catch the bus back down to Hyannis.
I'm not entirely sure what I should do about my little bit of insomnia that I have. I don't really know what's been bringing it on, or rather, what's been taking it from being a simple night owl to becoming a full blown vampire. Sure, like everyone, I have things on my mind from work to personal. Nothing's new. I just wish I could get to sleep.
To top off the sleep deprivation, I woke up on my "Saturday" with a crick in my neck that's still here on my "Monday" night. I need a massage something fierce. A few years ago, I don't think I would have ever said that. Now, I just want a tiny Thai chick to crack all of my joints for the sum of 200 Baht ($6).
Anyhow, in other news, this past Tuesday was the staff party. Although there was a lot of drunken debauchery, including a "who has the biggest belly" competition and people eating sweetbreads on top of mashed potatoes with a veal bolognese sauce (really who orders that, let alone puts it on the menu... I understand the components, but putting them together is just wrong), and long-winded drunken speeches. Luckily I didn't partake of any of the debauchery, but I did witness most of it.
Normally, on a night like that one, I would have imbibed a little bit, and I did have a couple of beers and a couple of glasses of wine, but I was by far the most sober employee, save the intern who is just... well, strange. However, that day was the day one of the neck crick, so I opted out of drinking enough to get me the JT drunk walk as my pal Junko would call it. I probably had the least eventful night out of everyone there, which was fine, because I was still having a good time.
These days at the restaurant, though, have become increasingly more slow. I spent most of last Monday's prep time making dumplings. This time they were pork and foie pot stickers. Everything was from scratch down to the wrappers. When I cooked a few of them up, they were perfect. Pan seared and then steamed. I sat and wrapped sixty eight of them. It felt like it took me forever, but it was well worth it. I have pictures of all of my soldiers lined up in rows. We sent some of them out to VIPs as little treats.
Other things that I have been doing to keep myself occupied include making desserts for staff meal. I made a tart tatin one day and individual pear tarts another day. I've put my stamp on a few of the entree specials, naturally taking them in an Asian direction.
I'm still trying to figure out what's going to happen to me post-island. I know I'll be down in the ATL around Christmas, but after that I have no clue. My New Years plans are kind of up in the air, and I don't know if I'll be going on vacation or getting a job come January.
I have money in the bank right now, but I didn't bank as much money as I thought that I would this summer. I can't really justify depleting my savings for another three month trip unless I know for sure that I'll be stepping right into some work when I get back. And, if I do go on a three month trip, it means I'm no closer to taking my year off to travel.
I've also been getting back into listening to my electronic music. I had put it down for a little while, but I have been listening to it again. It was because of this that I thought about taking a little vacation at the end of March in order to go to the Winter Music Conference in Miami.
I miss going to see DJs. I miss the raves and losing myself as I bounce up and down to a fierce bass beat. Come to think of it, the anonymity that you have is a lot like the anonymity that you have traveling abroad. You're in a room with all sorts of different people with different cultures and understandings of what's going on around them. You all bond together with a shared experience of the music or the "Lost In Translation" moment that you all are having. I miss that.
So, I think that I might like to go to Winter Music Conference and the Ultra Music Festival. I think that seeing DJs again might be nice. I think that dancing until my knees hurt may be mentally therapeutic, and, yes, that means that I think that I need some mental therapy right now.
Anyhow, it's three in the morning. I'm going to go try to do some reading. I want to give a shout out to Manni who was the first to get back to me about my travel journal. He gave me a lot of good feedback, and a good place to start gathering writing samples. Hopefully I'll hear from more of y'all. Until then, some of y'all get some winks for me. 'Cause I know I ain't getting many these days.
Friday, October 30, 2009
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Day 158: Hog Wild!
Listening: Just when I thought I said all I could say, my chick on the side said she got one on the way. These are my confessions. Man, I'm thrown and I don't know what to do.
What's my problem? It's starting to get cold.
It's the end of days. By that, I mean that we're slowing down SERIOUSLY, and we're going from six day workweeks down to five day work weeks as of next week. Two of the interns have taken off. The last one was supposed to take off next Monday, but because of the way the internship had to be completed, he has to stay until the ninth of November. We've gone from having consistently over sixty diners a night to between twenty five, which we had last night, to forty, which we had two nights ago.
The bonus to it slowing down is that the sous-chef, the saute guy and I have started doing rounds. We'll all prep our home stations, but we'll work service on other stations. I'm working grill two nights a week and I'll be running a couple of days on saute and a day on the plating station a week or one day on saute and two on plating.
Yesterday I worked my first day on the plating station since last year. I'll be honest, I don't always make the prettiest plates. Sometimes I have a hard time gauging how to wing sauce off of a spoon and make it look nice when it hits the plate. I get nervous when I'm not comfortable on a station, which makes it harder for me to get it right. It's not like I shake like a leaf, but I definitely beat myself up when things don't end up looking like I want it to look like. I figure it'll take me a few more shifts before I get comfortable again.
What I really want to happen, probably won't. See if Chef would be willing to work the saute and the plating station, we could do a complete round robin. We could each take a day on the other three stations and work the weekends on our home stations. Chef pretty much sticks to hot apps or grill if he NEEDS to. The saute guy has expressed interest in working hot apps, and I enjoy my time on hot apps, whether I get buried or not. There's just something satisfying about seeing a perfectly browned, seared scallop. Then again, there's something satisfying about eating a perfectly browned, seared scallop as well.
In other news, the restaurant is holding its first annual Hogtoberfest weekend. Chef Matt Jennings from Providence's La Laiterie to run a few classes with my own Chef and Pastry Chef over this coming weekend, and will culminate in a Nose to Tail six course dinner with wine and/or beer pairings. It sounds like it's going to be pretty bangin'. We've got some jowls hanging in the walk in, tails in the brine, and ears already poached in addition to the house cured ham, mortadella and other tasty treats that Chef Jennings has in store. I strongly urge anyone who can make it down to Nantucket for this coming Sunday to book a reservation for the dinner.
Actually, I found the menu, and this is roughly what it's going to look like. We might tweak it a bit. In addition, if you're in the industry, you get the beer tasting cost for free.
Food:
Snacks
Fresh Ham & Cheddar Cheese Biscuits, Pork Rillette with Sweet Chili Jam, Pigs Ear Poutine.
1st
House Made Charcuterie & Assorted Favorite Garnishes
2nd
Boudin Noir & Smoked Jowl With Poached Pears, Arugala & Crispy Poached Duck Egg
3rd
Cast Iron Seared & Slow Roasted ginger Beer Pork Belly with Anson Mills Buttermilk Grits & Pickled Apple
4th
Pork Pie: Savory pork Shoulder & kidney Tart With Confit of Root Vegetables, Mustard & Parmesan Reggiano Cream
5th
Three Little Pigs Grilled Loin of Pork, Braised Pork Cheek & Crispy Tail with a Maple Parsnip Puree, Drunk Plums & Caramelized Brussels Sprouts
6th
“The King” Peanut Butter, Chocolate, Bacon & Jelly
$95 for Food
$120 food & Beer
$135 food, Wine & Beer
I also want to tell you that the pigs' ear fries are RIDICULOUS. Fucking RIDICULOUS. Makes me want to cry like a baby.
In other news, there isn't much other news. I told Chef that I would be dressing up as a ninja on Halloween. That's right. I'm going to look like a ninja on the line. Halloween is on a Saturday night, which means that it's going to be a crazy slow Saturday. I figure a ninja on the line might provide some comedy. What would be even better is if I could find a Storm Shadow costume. I mean, he already wears white...
Anyhow, finally, I'm still on the hunt for proper writing samples. I've decided to cut and paste all of my entries into a Word document in an attempt to clean them up and edit them a bit. I am still looking on feedback from my entries and which ones people particularly liked and which ones people didn't and why. So if you're reading, check it out and let me know. Hopefully it'll parlay itself into some sort of work for me. Til' the next entry...
What's my problem? It's starting to get cold.
It's the end of days. By that, I mean that we're slowing down SERIOUSLY, and we're going from six day workweeks down to five day work weeks as of next week. Two of the interns have taken off. The last one was supposed to take off next Monday, but because of the way the internship had to be completed, he has to stay until the ninth of November. We've gone from having consistently over sixty diners a night to between twenty five, which we had last night, to forty, which we had two nights ago.
The bonus to it slowing down is that the sous-chef, the saute guy and I have started doing rounds. We'll all prep our home stations, but we'll work service on other stations. I'm working grill two nights a week and I'll be running a couple of days on saute and a day on the plating station a week or one day on saute and two on plating.
Yesterday I worked my first day on the plating station since last year. I'll be honest, I don't always make the prettiest plates. Sometimes I have a hard time gauging how to wing sauce off of a spoon and make it look nice when it hits the plate. I get nervous when I'm not comfortable on a station, which makes it harder for me to get it right. It's not like I shake like a leaf, but I definitely beat myself up when things don't end up looking like I want it to look like. I figure it'll take me a few more shifts before I get comfortable again.
What I really want to happen, probably won't. See if Chef would be willing to work the saute and the plating station, we could do a complete round robin. We could each take a day on the other three stations and work the weekends on our home stations. Chef pretty much sticks to hot apps or grill if he NEEDS to. The saute guy has expressed interest in working hot apps, and I enjoy my time on hot apps, whether I get buried or not. There's just something satisfying about seeing a perfectly browned, seared scallop. Then again, there's something satisfying about eating a perfectly browned, seared scallop as well.
In other news, the restaurant is holding its first annual Hogtoberfest weekend. Chef Matt Jennings from Providence's La Laiterie to run a few classes with my own Chef and Pastry Chef over this coming weekend, and will culminate in a Nose to Tail six course dinner with wine and/or beer pairings. It sounds like it's going to be pretty bangin'. We've got some jowls hanging in the walk in, tails in the brine, and ears already poached in addition to the house cured ham, mortadella and other tasty treats that Chef Jennings has in store. I strongly urge anyone who can make it down to Nantucket for this coming Sunday to book a reservation for the dinner.
Actually, I found the menu, and this is roughly what it's going to look like. We might tweak it a bit. In addition, if you're in the industry, you get the beer tasting cost for free.
Food:
Snacks
Fresh Ham & Cheddar Cheese Biscuits, Pork Rillette with Sweet Chili Jam, Pigs Ear Poutine.
1st
House Made Charcuterie & Assorted Favorite Garnishes
2nd
Boudin Noir & Smoked Jowl With Poached Pears, Arugala & Crispy Poached Duck Egg
3rd
Cast Iron Seared & Slow Roasted ginger Beer Pork Belly with Anson Mills Buttermilk Grits & Pickled Apple
4th
Pork Pie: Savory pork Shoulder & kidney Tart With Confit of Root Vegetables, Mustard & Parmesan Reggiano Cream
5th
Three Little Pigs Grilled Loin of Pork, Braised Pork Cheek & Crispy Tail with a Maple Parsnip Puree, Drunk Plums & Caramelized Brussels Sprouts
6th
“The King” Peanut Butter, Chocolate, Bacon & Jelly
$95 for Food
$120 food & Beer
$135 food, Wine & Beer
I also want to tell you that the pigs' ear fries are RIDICULOUS. Fucking RIDICULOUS. Makes me want to cry like a baby.
In other news, there isn't much other news. I told Chef that I would be dressing up as a ninja on Halloween. That's right. I'm going to look like a ninja on the line. Halloween is on a Saturday night, which means that it's going to be a crazy slow Saturday. I figure a ninja on the line might provide some comedy. What would be even better is if I could find a Storm Shadow costume. I mean, he already wears white...
Anyhow, finally, I'm still on the hunt for proper writing samples. I've decided to cut and paste all of my entries into a Word document in an attempt to clean them up and edit them a bit. I am still looking on feedback from my entries and which ones people particularly liked and which ones people didn't and why. So if you're reading, check it out and let me know. Hopefully it'll parlay itself into some sort of work for me. Til' the next entry...
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Day 150: Electonically Ressurected
Listening: I love the feeling of being slightly lost, to find new spaces, new routes, new areas.... I love the lack of logic. I love the feeling of being slightly lost.
What's my problem? Stability doesn't suit me.
I got an e-mail from a friend of mine the other day that said, "its like youre electronically dead over there. i just checked your blog, which i havent done for awhile and you havent updated for a long time." It's true. It's been a whopping fifty-four days since I composed, even tried to compose a blog. I could tell you that I have been really busy, or that my computer broke, but those would both be lies. I have been spending a lot of my time veging out in front of my computer watching TV shows from back episodes of Joss Whedon's "Dollhouse" to the newest in a long line of shows that I liked that are/will be canceled, "Defying Gravity."
The other truths in the matter are that I have been all over the place since my last entry. I was up in Boston for the hell of it, in Maine for a wedding, hanging out with friends who came to the island to visit me, and a host of other things. Also, for a while I was sharing a day off with one of the interns and we'd hang out. That would curtail my alone time to plink out one of these entries.
Probably one of the biggest reasons that recently popped up over why I haven't posted is because I haven't had a day off in about a week and a half. See, the grill cook walked out on the line halfway through prep. That's right. The grill cook took his ball and went home. Let me explain how all of this went down.
Overall, our kitchen is tight. We all get along. We all get the work done. We all put it all down when it comes to everything from the food, to the cleaning to the staff meals we put up every day. We all did, except for the grill cook. He's the forty-three year old line cook. He doesn't scrub much. He puts in the minimal effort for staff meal, and he calls everyone out on anything he can, but can't accept criticism himself. That's how it all went down.
I didn't hear all of the altercation, as I was on the other side of the pass, but my sous-chef ended up calling him out on the fact that he does a half-assed job and that he doesn't really help much with staff meal, that he is the last one to wrap his shit up, the first one to be finished scrubbing (even if the job isn't done), and the first one to pop beers. His response, which I heard clearly, was, "why are you busting my balls?" to which the sous-chef said, essentially, "It's my job to bust your balls." From there, the grill cook said, "If you're gonna bust my balls, then I'm gonna go home."
Now, Chef could have stopped and diffused the situation at any time. But when he heard the grill cook say, "If you're gonna bust my balls, then I'm gonna go home," he decided to let it play out. The sous-chef then said, "Well, fine then, go home." And he did. He walked straight off the line, leaving his beef cheeks searing in the rondeau, and three quarters of his prep list unfinished.
That day I was supposed to work hot apps, and luckily, my prep list was short. At three o'clock on a Saturday (I'll repeat that, a SATURDAY), I had to switch gears, figure out what was going on with the grill station, and finish the prep.
Usually on the days that I work other people's stations (seeing as I have no home station being a rounds cook), I talk to the cooks the night before to figure out what's happening on the station. How much of what they have, what needs to be prepped, what they want set up for them after they get back from a day off. I like to be cooperative with the guys who own the station. I'm just the guest on their station. It's much harder to walk into a station relatively blind. It's totally doable, but it sucks a whole lot more.
I still rocked it out that night, but in that, I became the new grill cook and for the past two weeks, no one has had a day off except for the interns. I'm the new grill cook, and instead of bouncing between hot apps for two nights, saute for three, and grill for one, I'm on grill for at least four nights a week, and saute for two. In the midst of this crisis/wonderful event, I have committed to staying through Christmas Stroll, and will be leaving with the rest of the hot line sometime around December fifteenth.
Now this is both a blessing and a curse all in one. I really wasn't ready to go job searching in two weeks. Of course, my resume is updated, and I could find work if I wanted to. Was I mentally prepared? Not so much. It means that I'll be getting a number of paychecks more before I leave the island, though, and a potential bonus for staying until the end, but you never know. This also means that I could travel for a while this winter.
By finishing the job in the middle of December, I'm pretty much saying that I don't want to work until the beginning of March. Looking for steady work in the months of December, January and February in the restaurant industry is tough. After the New Year's celebrations, everyone goes on diets and stops going out to eat in order to pay back the credit card debt they incurred over the holidays. February has a flash in the pan know as Valentine's Day (gag me), but that's about it. It's when spring fever hits that people start going out again.
So, I've been looking for things to do. Of course, travel is first and foremost on my mind. I always feel a compulsion to leave the country. With reading so much travel literature lately, including anthologies, travel memoirs, and periodicals, I'm slowly realizing that, as much as I love what I'm reading, there's not a lot of travel lit geared towards me.
What I'm looking for is what I can do right now. I want to know how I can make my way right now. A lot of these long form books are great, but they don't tell me how I can do it now and what it's like to travel right now. The magazines are all geared towards desperate housewives and cubicle jockeys that have wet dreams about a cabana on the sand where an impoverished local will rub you down with coconut oil as you sip a frozen libation. Don't get me wrong. In a lot of ways its the same as it is for food lit. Half of it is food porn or unattainable dishes for the home cooks. It tells you what's out there that you can't have at home (for the most part), but it doesn't teach you how to cook right now. By that I mean to say that it'll tell you how to follow a recipe, but it won't teach you how to cook.
The travel that I want to read about deals with the pitfalls and the trials of traveling off the cuff. I don't want to read about hotels that cost over a hundred US dollars a night. I want to hear about the ones that cost ten, but are still nice. I don't want to hear about all inclusive tours and resorts. I want to hear about how someone got lost going from the train station to the hostel/hotel and the people they met along the way. I want to hear about how exactly someone got from point A to point B and what they did in those locations.
One of my pals thinks I should publish a book. I dunno if I'm up for that yet. It seems like too much of a long, drawn-out process. I think I'd be much better writing for a periodical. What kills me is that there isn't really a venue for the types of stories that I would want to write. Conde Nast Traveler and Travel & Leisure cater to the jet set rich folk. They don't want to hear about sleeping on a bare bamboo floor in the middle of the jungle. They need their four hundred count linens. Outside and Backpacker magazines seems to cater more toward the people who want to just go hiking and camping, along with some other adventure sports. I thought about maybe Esquire, GQ, and Playboy, but they all seem to be a little bit high end to enjoy the type of travel that I would be writing about. The options that I came up with were Budget Travel and National Geographic Adventure, although I may be a bit less family friendly than they would like, and possibly a freelance piece for Maxim magazine.
A couple of my friends also said that I should be looking for places to publish online, as magazines are folding left and right (R.I.P. Gourmet). The problem with that is that there are so many lame ass bastards (myself included) writing bullshit and publishing it for their own self-importance. I suppose that I could try to write for a website like nerve.com, which would be fun, but what's most important is that if I write for someone, it's legit. I don't want to put out meaningless content. I want to bring my travel experiences to people who want to know what I've learned through travel, not get someone wet in the knickers over ANOTHER white sand beach, though I do have some stories that would make one wet in the knickers over white sand beaches.
So, my goal is to get my feelers out there by mid November. I want to see if anyone would be willing to subsidize my travel habit, or at least suggest a little methadone.
Anyhow, it's time to finally finish the posting. Hopefully, I'll have more time to post from now until the time I leave the island. Hopefully, my readership hasn't dropped off completely. But, for now, that's all I have.
What's my problem? Stability doesn't suit me.
I got an e-mail from a friend of mine the other day that said, "its like youre electronically dead over there. i just checked your blog, which i havent done for awhile and you havent updated for a long time." It's true. It's been a whopping fifty-four days since I composed, even tried to compose a blog. I could tell you that I have been really busy, or that my computer broke, but those would both be lies. I have been spending a lot of my time veging out in front of my computer watching TV shows from back episodes of Joss Whedon's "Dollhouse" to the newest in a long line of shows that I liked that are/will be canceled, "Defying Gravity."
The other truths in the matter are that I have been all over the place since my last entry. I was up in Boston for the hell of it, in Maine for a wedding, hanging out with friends who came to the island to visit me, and a host of other things. Also, for a while I was sharing a day off with one of the interns and we'd hang out. That would curtail my alone time to plink out one of these entries.
Probably one of the biggest reasons that recently popped up over why I haven't posted is because I haven't had a day off in about a week and a half. See, the grill cook walked out on the line halfway through prep. That's right. The grill cook took his ball and went home. Let me explain how all of this went down.
Overall, our kitchen is tight. We all get along. We all get the work done. We all put it all down when it comes to everything from the food, to the cleaning to the staff meals we put up every day. We all did, except for the grill cook. He's the forty-three year old line cook. He doesn't scrub much. He puts in the minimal effort for staff meal, and he calls everyone out on anything he can, but can't accept criticism himself. That's how it all went down.
I didn't hear all of the altercation, as I was on the other side of the pass, but my sous-chef ended up calling him out on the fact that he does a half-assed job and that he doesn't really help much with staff meal, that he is the last one to wrap his shit up, the first one to be finished scrubbing (even if the job isn't done), and the first one to pop beers. His response, which I heard clearly, was, "why are you busting my balls?" to which the sous-chef said, essentially, "It's my job to bust your balls." From there, the grill cook said, "If you're gonna bust my balls, then I'm gonna go home."
Now, Chef could have stopped and diffused the situation at any time. But when he heard the grill cook say, "If you're gonna bust my balls, then I'm gonna go home," he decided to let it play out. The sous-chef then said, "Well, fine then, go home." And he did. He walked straight off the line, leaving his beef cheeks searing in the rondeau, and three quarters of his prep list unfinished.
That day I was supposed to work hot apps, and luckily, my prep list was short. At three o'clock on a Saturday (I'll repeat that, a SATURDAY), I had to switch gears, figure out what was going on with the grill station, and finish the prep.
Usually on the days that I work other people's stations (seeing as I have no home station being a rounds cook), I talk to the cooks the night before to figure out what's happening on the station. How much of what they have, what needs to be prepped, what they want set up for them after they get back from a day off. I like to be cooperative with the guys who own the station. I'm just the guest on their station. It's much harder to walk into a station relatively blind. It's totally doable, but it sucks a whole lot more.
I still rocked it out that night, but in that, I became the new grill cook and for the past two weeks, no one has had a day off except for the interns. I'm the new grill cook, and instead of bouncing between hot apps for two nights, saute for three, and grill for one, I'm on grill for at least four nights a week, and saute for two. In the midst of this crisis/wonderful event, I have committed to staying through Christmas Stroll, and will be leaving with the rest of the hot line sometime around December fifteenth.
Now this is both a blessing and a curse all in one. I really wasn't ready to go job searching in two weeks. Of course, my resume is updated, and I could find work if I wanted to. Was I mentally prepared? Not so much. It means that I'll be getting a number of paychecks more before I leave the island, though, and a potential bonus for staying until the end, but you never know. This also means that I could travel for a while this winter.
By finishing the job in the middle of December, I'm pretty much saying that I don't want to work until the beginning of March. Looking for steady work in the months of December, January and February in the restaurant industry is tough. After the New Year's celebrations, everyone goes on diets and stops going out to eat in order to pay back the credit card debt they incurred over the holidays. February has a flash in the pan know as Valentine's Day (gag me), but that's about it. It's when spring fever hits that people start going out again.
So, I've been looking for things to do. Of course, travel is first and foremost on my mind. I always feel a compulsion to leave the country. With reading so much travel literature lately, including anthologies, travel memoirs, and periodicals, I'm slowly realizing that, as much as I love what I'm reading, there's not a lot of travel lit geared towards me.
What I'm looking for is what I can do right now. I want to know how I can make my way right now. A lot of these long form books are great, but they don't tell me how I can do it now and what it's like to travel right now. The magazines are all geared towards desperate housewives and cubicle jockeys that have wet dreams about a cabana on the sand where an impoverished local will rub you down with coconut oil as you sip a frozen libation. Don't get me wrong. In a lot of ways its the same as it is for food lit. Half of it is food porn or unattainable dishes for the home cooks. It tells you what's out there that you can't have at home (for the most part), but it doesn't teach you how to cook right now. By that I mean to say that it'll tell you how to follow a recipe, but it won't teach you how to cook.
The travel that I want to read about deals with the pitfalls and the trials of traveling off the cuff. I don't want to read about hotels that cost over a hundred US dollars a night. I want to hear about the ones that cost ten, but are still nice. I don't want to hear about all inclusive tours and resorts. I want to hear about how someone got lost going from the train station to the hostel/hotel and the people they met along the way. I want to hear about how exactly someone got from point A to point B and what they did in those locations.
One of my pals thinks I should publish a book. I dunno if I'm up for that yet. It seems like too much of a long, drawn-out process. I think I'd be much better writing for a periodical. What kills me is that there isn't really a venue for the types of stories that I would want to write. Conde Nast Traveler and Travel & Leisure cater to the jet set rich folk. They don't want to hear about sleeping on a bare bamboo floor in the middle of the jungle. They need their four hundred count linens. Outside and Backpacker magazines seems to cater more toward the people who want to just go hiking and camping, along with some other adventure sports. I thought about maybe Esquire, GQ, and Playboy, but they all seem to be a little bit high end to enjoy the type of travel that I would be writing about. The options that I came up with were Budget Travel and National Geographic Adventure, although I may be a bit less family friendly than they would like, and possibly a freelance piece for Maxim magazine.
A couple of my friends also said that I should be looking for places to publish online, as magazines are folding left and right (R.I.P. Gourmet). The problem with that is that there are so many lame ass bastards (myself included) writing bullshit and publishing it for their own self-importance. I suppose that I could try to write for a website like nerve.com, which would be fun, but what's most important is that if I write for someone, it's legit. I don't want to put out meaningless content. I want to bring my travel experiences to people who want to know what I've learned through travel, not get someone wet in the knickers over ANOTHER white sand beach, though I do have some stories that would make one wet in the knickers over white sand beaches.
So, my goal is to get my feelers out there by mid November. I want to see if anyone would be willing to subsidize my travel habit, or at least suggest a little methadone.
Anyhow, it's time to finally finish the posting. Hopefully, I'll have more time to post from now until the time I leave the island. Hopefully, my readership hasn't dropped off completely. But, for now, that's all I have.
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Day 96: When The Stars Explode Under Water
Listening: I'm not sure all these people understand. It's not like years ago, the fear of getting caught, of recklessness and water.
What's my problem? I really can't get a nice day off.
Another Thursday off and another day not worth going to the beach. Not only is it cloudy, but it's raining again. Some don't believe me when I say that I have shitty days off, but here we are again. The skies are gray and the pavement is dark with moisture. The coffee house is crowded and people are being douchebags about places to sit and waiting in line for coffee.
I talk a little bit to one of the girls at the counter. Coincidentally, she seems to be the only one who gives good, speedy service. She looks a bit exhausted. She must have been in the weeds for at least the last half hour as I have been sitting here, and I don't know how long the line was before I even got here.
The other girl behind the counter is total hardcore lesbian and is indifferent to the numbers of orders coming in. If she were about five times faster, she would be on par with the girls who work at the Diesel Cafe in Davis Square, but not as hot, as far as lesbians go.
Since it's raining, the Vagabonds are here in the coffee house. They never order anything. They just take up space and smell like dirty hippies. I think one of the guys here is one of the owners, and he seems to like them. He should be behind the bar digging the girls out of the weeds.
I remember despising the Vagabonds from last year. I think that even if I didn't despise hippies, I would still hate the Vagabonds. At least my least favorite Vagabond hasn't shown his face that much this year. He was the one who wore his nasty loose pants so high with suspenders that it gave him (a guy) cameltoe. The least that they could do was order something. They never order a damn thing. They just take up space and smell.
Now, the owner gets off his ass and takes out the trash, but the customers are still at least eight deep. It's not like these people are out to dinner, sitting at a table conversing with each other enjoying their evening. These people want their coffee and they want it now.
But enough about the crappy day unfolding for other people in front of me. Let's talk about current events aside from the crappy day.
So, on Monday night, we had a long, hot service in the kitchen and I decided that I wanted to go swimming. My room mates decided that it was a good idea, so it was the four of us who lived above the restaurant, one of my room mate's friends, and our boss' cousin who all decided to go. We drove out to Nobadeer Beach on the south side of the island, and promptly hopped in the drink.
I can't remember the last time that I went swimming at night. I know for sure that it wasn't in the ocean. Maybe it was one night at a pool in Disney World all by myself. It was great though. It was dark and the waves were coming in. I only went out far enough for the water to come up to my neck at its lowest point. Some of us were body surfing. Some just dove over or through the waves. The water was just warm enough to not freeze us and just cold enough to cool us off after spending the past five hours in front of a piano spouting flames.
Even after getting out of the water, it was still pretty warm. We tossed around my light up frisbee. It was a helluva good time.
It was such a good time that we decided to do it on Tuesday night as well. This time, Pies came out with his dog, and one of the servers came out with a friend of hers from San Francisco. The water was a bit colder, as was the air, but it was still worth going in the water. I had spent the night on the grill, selling upwards of twenty ribeyes, eighteen pork, and a dozen each of the veg tart and the grilled salmon. Oh yeah, and I sold out the last four guinea hen specials from the night before. It was a busy night, split fifty-fifty between the saute guy and I. I had one ribeye come back for being undercooked, but I still think that I'm getting better with every shift that I work.
Anyhow, we went back to Nobadeer on Tuesday night with Pies and the server. Pies brought his little Logitech iPod speakers, and the server brought some booze. This time, though, we swam out further.
It was a little bit more frightening on Tuesday. It was cooler and the water was a bit cooler as well. The fog had rolled in on the island, to the point where we could barely see twenty feet in front of the car as we drove to the beach. The sky was cloud covered to the point where the shape of the moon was obscured by the hanging mist. A few stars poked through but for the most part, there was barely enough ambient light to make out where people were. There were a few times where I was afraid we lost Pies' dog, but he always came back. Pies was never worried. He says that his dog never goes far.
Another reason to be afraid going out further is because there have been two sharks seen off the coast of the island, and sharks feed at night. There was no real danger, because the sharks never come up that far, even during the day, but it's that irrational fear that keeps you a little bit more sober.
There was a big payoff for going out further though. Once I went out about ten feet further from the point where I could touch the bottom, the phosphorescent algae showed up. I had heard about it last year, but I never made it out night swimming last year, so I never saw them. I had imagined it being like how a gasoline slick looks on water, except shimmery and glowing. I had it all completely wrong.
The server who came out with us had seen them before and said it was like the stars were exploding under the water, and she was right. It was like, when you move your arms and legs to tread water, all of a sudden all of these stars light up in the water and follow the current that you created with your movement. Unfortunately, with my glasses off, I could only see the ones that I created with my arms and hands. It was cool though. I tread water there for a long time just watching the phosphorescents light up like stray pixels on a screen.
I didn't go out there with the intention of seeing them, but when the server brought them to my attention, It was like magic. It was just so cool. I think it's something I'll tack onto my list of things that I have seen that I think other people should see sometime too. I have a lot of things on that list, many more things than a lot of other people have.
I hate to sound arrogant about my life and what I've done, but I am extremely fortunate to have been able to do what I have done in my life. I've been to Japan and spent time in a local's home, as well as been able to travel to different cities in Japan with a native speaker who also enjoys good food. I've gone to raves in Amsterdam. I've traveled for a month on my own all over Europe, and three months in southeast Asia. I've switched careers into a profession that I love with the emotional and mental support of my friends, and bootstrapped myself up to a point where I'm well respected enough to work at well respected restaurants, and well respected enough to put specials that sell out on the menu.
Man, in some ways I live a completely charmed life. A lot of people I know make more money. They have more things. They live more comfortably. However they never go anywhere, do anything or see anywhere. Sometimes I wish I could slap them all and tell them to get out there and see what's going on out there. Eat something new and authentic in the place where it was born. See somewhere that's older than the skyscrapers and McMansions that are all too common here at home.
I know that, chances are, a lot of my friends will retire with more than I will. The life of a cook either ends up in riches, in the poor house, or in another career. My parents pester me to contribute to a Roth IRA, but after working for the corporation, I don't believe in all of that shit anymore. What I do now is I save my money for a while and then I go out and do things that I want to do. I enjoy my life. I'm not waiting until I'm too old to climb up mountains, too comfortable to sleep on the floor of a bamboo hut, and too broken to think that I can't do anything but go through the same motions every day to take two weeks off a year to do something close to nothing. I want to see more stars explode under water and I want to see more amazing sunsets from even more amazing temples made by amazing people an amazing amount of time ago.
Anyhow, I'll end that bit of rant now and start on another rant. The grill cook. Bag-a-douche. He's such a little bitch. No one in the kitchen likes him with the exception of Chef. He does minimal work, criticizes everyone, calls other people out, and throws them under the bus. He's forty four years old and is still just a line cook. He has no right to tell someone they're doing it wrong if his professional stature at his age says anything.
I worked his day off on Tuesday, and we had thirty or so steaks in the marinade at the end of the night. I had sold around twenty or so steaks on my busy ribeye night, so I thought thirty would be enough. I didn't pull any up from the freeze. We sold a lot of ribeye last night as well, more than I sold on the night before. At nine o'clock, an hour before the end of service, he's counting down steaks and freaking out. He pulls some from the freeze and tries to quick thaw them and then he proceeds to throw me under the bus for not pulling any steaks. At the end of the night, he still had a pre-marinated steak or two. It was close, but he had enough. He couldn't stop talking about it. He never mentioned my name, but we all knew what he was insinuating to Chef. He's a little bitch. I maintain that I didn't do anything wrong.
And to top it all off, he gives a lot of his prep work to the prep guy instead of prepping the station himself. He really doesn't prep much of his own mise en place. A lot of the things that he does is piddly shit. I can easily prep his station from top to bottom every day. Saute is much harder. There's a lot more knife and stove work. Grill has to cut packages of meat open and marinate or brine. He has to shell crawfish and pick cilantro. It's a dum-dum prep list. So, when it's time to throw work at the prep guy's list, I'll see what everyone else is giving him and then I'll throw on what I think he can handle, because I know that grill should be able to prep from the top down easily every day. He gets pissed at me for not throwing the prep guy ninety percent of his work. He talks his ass off during prep and only does what's necessary to get by. So he gets pissed when he actually has to work. Yesterday night he asked me who was I to say what should and should not be on the prep list. I shrugged it off. He's a fucking shoemaker.
On a more positive kitchen note to end off with, there's a local farmer who is producing the most amazing produce. This week, he dropped off some beautiful shiso leaf and Chinese celery among other things like five types of basil, salt wart, Thai lemongrass, and purple potatoes. Tuesday night, Chef knew that he would be running a bass special, but was a bit burnt out and wanted to wait until the next morning to figure it out. I threw out a couple of ideas and he said, that it sounded good and we'd refine it in the morning. When I got in yesterday, I threw the idea out at him. Sake glazed bass, crispy sushi rice cake, ginger/lemongrass shrimp broth, brunoise pickled ginger, chili and Chinese celery with a tempura shiso leaf. It came out amazing. The perfume off the dish was sick and it sold out within the first half of service. Twenty five portions, out the door before eight o'clock. It was awesome. I came up with it and Chef helped refine it.
Anyhow, that's where I'm at now. I just took some time off from writing the blog to show the cookie my travel pictures. Next week, Killa and I may head up to Boston for our day off. He went to get a tattoo in Hyannis for today. I think I'll go grab dinner somewhere and then I'll try to get a ticket to see G.I. Joe. at a quarter past eleven. Good times for a rainy day. Well, not really, but I'm trying to look on the bright side. Time to shut down for now. Hopefully next week will be brighter, or at least more urban.
What's my problem? I really can't get a nice day off.
Another Thursday off and another day not worth going to the beach. Not only is it cloudy, but it's raining again. Some don't believe me when I say that I have shitty days off, but here we are again. The skies are gray and the pavement is dark with moisture. The coffee house is crowded and people are being douchebags about places to sit and waiting in line for coffee.
I talk a little bit to one of the girls at the counter. Coincidentally, she seems to be the only one who gives good, speedy service. She looks a bit exhausted. She must have been in the weeds for at least the last half hour as I have been sitting here, and I don't know how long the line was before I even got here.
The other girl behind the counter is total hardcore lesbian and is indifferent to the numbers of orders coming in. If she were about five times faster, she would be on par with the girls who work at the Diesel Cafe in Davis Square, but not as hot, as far as lesbians go.
Since it's raining, the Vagabonds are here in the coffee house. They never order anything. They just take up space and smell like dirty hippies. I think one of the guys here is one of the owners, and he seems to like them. He should be behind the bar digging the girls out of the weeds.
I remember despising the Vagabonds from last year. I think that even if I didn't despise hippies, I would still hate the Vagabonds. At least my least favorite Vagabond hasn't shown his face that much this year. He was the one who wore his nasty loose pants so high with suspenders that it gave him (a guy) cameltoe. The least that they could do was order something. They never order a damn thing. They just take up space and smell.
Now, the owner gets off his ass and takes out the trash, but the customers are still at least eight deep. It's not like these people are out to dinner, sitting at a table conversing with each other enjoying their evening. These people want their coffee and they want it now.
But enough about the crappy day unfolding for other people in front of me. Let's talk about current events aside from the crappy day.
So, on Monday night, we had a long, hot service in the kitchen and I decided that I wanted to go swimming. My room mates decided that it was a good idea, so it was the four of us who lived above the restaurant, one of my room mate's friends, and our boss' cousin who all decided to go. We drove out to Nobadeer Beach on the south side of the island, and promptly hopped in the drink.
I can't remember the last time that I went swimming at night. I know for sure that it wasn't in the ocean. Maybe it was one night at a pool in Disney World all by myself. It was great though. It was dark and the waves were coming in. I only went out far enough for the water to come up to my neck at its lowest point. Some of us were body surfing. Some just dove over or through the waves. The water was just warm enough to not freeze us and just cold enough to cool us off after spending the past five hours in front of a piano spouting flames.
Even after getting out of the water, it was still pretty warm. We tossed around my light up frisbee. It was a helluva good time.
It was such a good time that we decided to do it on Tuesday night as well. This time, Pies came out with his dog, and one of the servers came out with a friend of hers from San Francisco. The water was a bit colder, as was the air, but it was still worth going in the water. I had spent the night on the grill, selling upwards of twenty ribeyes, eighteen pork, and a dozen each of the veg tart and the grilled salmon. Oh yeah, and I sold out the last four guinea hen specials from the night before. It was a busy night, split fifty-fifty between the saute guy and I. I had one ribeye come back for being undercooked, but I still think that I'm getting better with every shift that I work.
Anyhow, we went back to Nobadeer on Tuesday night with Pies and the server. Pies brought his little Logitech iPod speakers, and the server brought some booze. This time, though, we swam out further.
It was a little bit more frightening on Tuesday. It was cooler and the water was a bit cooler as well. The fog had rolled in on the island, to the point where we could barely see twenty feet in front of the car as we drove to the beach. The sky was cloud covered to the point where the shape of the moon was obscured by the hanging mist. A few stars poked through but for the most part, there was barely enough ambient light to make out where people were. There were a few times where I was afraid we lost Pies' dog, but he always came back. Pies was never worried. He says that his dog never goes far.
Another reason to be afraid going out further is because there have been two sharks seen off the coast of the island, and sharks feed at night. There was no real danger, because the sharks never come up that far, even during the day, but it's that irrational fear that keeps you a little bit more sober.
There was a big payoff for going out further though. Once I went out about ten feet further from the point where I could touch the bottom, the phosphorescent algae showed up. I had heard about it last year, but I never made it out night swimming last year, so I never saw them. I had imagined it being like how a gasoline slick looks on water, except shimmery and glowing. I had it all completely wrong.
The server who came out with us had seen them before and said it was like the stars were exploding under the water, and she was right. It was like, when you move your arms and legs to tread water, all of a sudden all of these stars light up in the water and follow the current that you created with your movement. Unfortunately, with my glasses off, I could only see the ones that I created with my arms and hands. It was cool though. I tread water there for a long time just watching the phosphorescents light up like stray pixels on a screen.
I didn't go out there with the intention of seeing them, but when the server brought them to my attention, It was like magic. It was just so cool. I think it's something I'll tack onto my list of things that I have seen that I think other people should see sometime too. I have a lot of things on that list, many more things than a lot of other people have.
I hate to sound arrogant about my life and what I've done, but I am extremely fortunate to have been able to do what I have done in my life. I've been to Japan and spent time in a local's home, as well as been able to travel to different cities in Japan with a native speaker who also enjoys good food. I've gone to raves in Amsterdam. I've traveled for a month on my own all over Europe, and three months in southeast Asia. I've switched careers into a profession that I love with the emotional and mental support of my friends, and bootstrapped myself up to a point where I'm well respected enough to work at well respected restaurants, and well respected enough to put specials that sell out on the menu.
Man, in some ways I live a completely charmed life. A lot of people I know make more money. They have more things. They live more comfortably. However they never go anywhere, do anything or see anywhere. Sometimes I wish I could slap them all and tell them to get out there and see what's going on out there. Eat something new and authentic in the place where it was born. See somewhere that's older than the skyscrapers and McMansions that are all too common here at home.
I know that, chances are, a lot of my friends will retire with more than I will. The life of a cook either ends up in riches, in the poor house, or in another career. My parents pester me to contribute to a Roth IRA, but after working for the corporation, I don't believe in all of that shit anymore. What I do now is I save my money for a while and then I go out and do things that I want to do. I enjoy my life. I'm not waiting until I'm too old to climb up mountains, too comfortable to sleep on the floor of a bamboo hut, and too broken to think that I can't do anything but go through the same motions every day to take two weeks off a year to do something close to nothing. I want to see more stars explode under water and I want to see more amazing sunsets from even more amazing temples made by amazing people an amazing amount of time ago.
Anyhow, I'll end that bit of rant now and start on another rant. The grill cook. Bag-a-douche. He's such a little bitch. No one in the kitchen likes him with the exception of Chef. He does minimal work, criticizes everyone, calls other people out, and throws them under the bus. He's forty four years old and is still just a line cook. He has no right to tell someone they're doing it wrong if his professional stature at his age says anything.
I worked his day off on Tuesday, and we had thirty or so steaks in the marinade at the end of the night. I had sold around twenty or so steaks on my busy ribeye night, so I thought thirty would be enough. I didn't pull any up from the freeze. We sold a lot of ribeye last night as well, more than I sold on the night before. At nine o'clock, an hour before the end of service, he's counting down steaks and freaking out. He pulls some from the freeze and tries to quick thaw them and then he proceeds to throw me under the bus for not pulling any steaks. At the end of the night, he still had a pre-marinated steak or two. It was close, but he had enough. He couldn't stop talking about it. He never mentioned my name, but we all knew what he was insinuating to Chef. He's a little bitch. I maintain that I didn't do anything wrong.
And to top it all off, he gives a lot of his prep work to the prep guy instead of prepping the station himself. He really doesn't prep much of his own mise en place. A lot of the things that he does is piddly shit. I can easily prep his station from top to bottom every day. Saute is much harder. There's a lot more knife and stove work. Grill has to cut packages of meat open and marinate or brine. He has to shell crawfish and pick cilantro. It's a dum-dum prep list. So, when it's time to throw work at the prep guy's list, I'll see what everyone else is giving him and then I'll throw on what I think he can handle, because I know that grill should be able to prep from the top down easily every day. He gets pissed at me for not throwing the prep guy ninety percent of his work. He talks his ass off during prep and only does what's necessary to get by. So he gets pissed when he actually has to work. Yesterday night he asked me who was I to say what should and should not be on the prep list. I shrugged it off. He's a fucking shoemaker.
On a more positive kitchen note to end off with, there's a local farmer who is producing the most amazing produce. This week, he dropped off some beautiful shiso leaf and Chinese celery among other things like five types of basil, salt wart, Thai lemongrass, and purple potatoes. Tuesday night, Chef knew that he would be running a bass special, but was a bit burnt out and wanted to wait until the next morning to figure it out. I threw out a couple of ideas and he said, that it sounded good and we'd refine it in the morning. When I got in yesterday, I threw the idea out at him. Sake glazed bass, crispy sushi rice cake, ginger/lemongrass shrimp broth, brunoise pickled ginger, chili and Chinese celery with a tempura shiso leaf. It came out amazing. The perfume off the dish was sick and it sold out within the first half of service. Twenty five portions, out the door before eight o'clock. It was awesome. I came up with it and Chef helped refine it.
Anyhow, that's where I'm at now. I just took some time off from writing the blog to show the cookie my travel pictures. Next week, Killa and I may head up to Boston for our day off. He went to get a tattoo in Hyannis for today. I think I'll go grab dinner somewhere and then I'll try to get a ticket to see G.I. Joe. at a quarter past eleven. Good times for a rainy day. Well, not really, but I'm trying to look on the bright side. Time to shut down for now. Hopefully next week will be brighter, or at least more urban.
Thursday, August 6, 2009
Day 89: Little. Yellow. Angry.
Listening: Time ain't standing still, and there ain't no way to get it back.
What's my problem? Ducks weren't defrosted.
So I have a reputation in the kitchen. I'm known both as the dirtiest (not to say unclean, but definitively the most crass) and the angriest guy in the kitchen. I make the meanest mama jokes. I tell things how they are. And I get irked by little things. So whenever I'm in a kind of get disgruntled, someone inevitably says, "ZEN!!!, Little. Yellow. Angry." That's me. I need a t-shirt with that printed on it. If I ever try out for a reality TV show, I'm going to send in a video with all of the people that I know saying that I'm little, yellow, and angry.
When I get in a press on the line, I tend to get a bit snippy. I start cursing. I start getting testy with people. Last night was a good example of it.
It started off a little bit shady to begin with during prep. The night before, we had set out a case of duck breasts to thaw. The next day, I was supposed to separate the breasts, remove the tender, and trim up and score the skin before marinating them. On an average night, the normal saute cook sells around fifteen ducks. I had fifteen ducks in the marinade before the case of frozen breasts. The most that we had sold in a night was twenty. When I got to do the butchering and marination of the ducks, they were still frozen. They're never still frozen the next day at three in the afternoon. The pastry chefs must have come in earlier than normal and chucked them in the walk-in fridge before they had finished defrosting.
So I had fifteen ducks in the marinade. It was a Wednesday night. We'll roll with fifteen butchered ducks. The third ticket that comes in orders five ducks and takes out a third of my stash. That's quickly followed by ducks on each of the next three tickets. Half of my duck mise en place is demolished. It's not even half past seven yet. I was already sweating the garnish on the dish too, because the normal saute guy didn't prep the starch two days in advanced like we usually do.
It seems as if whenever he works, he sells less than the average number of ducks per night, and when I work, I sell way more than the average number of ducks. By the time I had run out of ducks, the night wasn't even halfway over, but the ducks were defrosted enough to butcher and use.
I also normally render off a number of duck breasts before the beginning of service, so I don't have to spend the time doing it as the crush comes in. I started with eight rendered, and as I said earlier, they were all gone before seven thirty. So with every subsequent duck order, "Awwwww, fuck YOUUUUUUUUUU...." could be heard escaping from my lips.
Not only was I buried in duck all night long, selling the record for this season at twenty one, I was also running the bass special. If there's one thing that people love, it's bass. I sold twenty of those that night too. Another twelve tuna or so and at least thirty flounder topped it all off. I was selling at least four entrees for each one coming off grill.
There was one pickup where out of twelve dishes, I had ten of them, and then the guy working the plating/expediting station asked me if I can pick up another flounder and a tuna, my reaction was, "I don't give a FUCK!" So he adds it on. Then, not only do I not hear the extra tuna tacked on, thinking it was only a flounder that I had to add on, but he didn't call out that one of the flounders was a medium-well. So, I'm picking up seven flounder, two tuna, and two duck, but one of the tunas I don't know about. The guy guy working the plating station asks me the duck as I'm putting the flounder on the plate, and I'm like, "What FUCKING tuna?" Then he asks me which flounder is medium-well, and I say, "You didn't call out a FUCKIN' medium-well!" So I pick up a flounder put it back on a sizzle platter and grab the one that I had fired as medium-well, put it in the broiler and brought it back up to temp.
We did a hundred and fifty dinners last night and I'm sure that I did at least ninety of them. I think that grill did thirty five or forty, and hot apps did ten or fifteen apps as entrees (cheap ass mother fuckers). So, as I'm getting railed, I'm spouting expletives as I render ducks, pick up ten dishes at a time, sear and roast fish, heat up garnish, and think that the guy deciding the pickups is a moron for not analyzing the tickets better and putting together more realistic pickups. I think that if I was less organized and focused in on the order of operations, I would have been, not only buried, but totally lost in the weeds. There was only one time that I didn't have my all-day (all-day is what we call what we have on order), and it was on the last two tickets where I hadn't fired a flounder. Luckily, flounders are one of those dishes that you can do on the pickup.
But, yeah, I got railed all night long. I felt like a two dollar hooker getting fucked by a big sweaty beast for two hours straight. When the dust cleared, I was satisfied with my performance, and I had made it through the night without running out of anything, though the mise en place was DESTROYED. There was almost nothing left. I had vinaigrettes still, mussels for the tuna dish, scallions and that's about it. The regular saute guy had to rebuild the place from the ground up.
The night before, I worked the grill. We did a hundred and sixty people that night and I did a good job. There was nothing sent back and all of my food looked great. I got worked just as hard as the saute guy, and I had a lot of fucked up orders too. But I survived it with no one sending anything back or getting any negative feedback. I was so relieved at the end of the night. I didn't talk about how well I was doing all night long, like I was a pitcher in the middle of a no-hitter. In my mind, though, I I was ecstatic that I had found a groove and that I was rockin' it.
Speaking of groove, I had a really nice moment last Sunday. The past couple of Sundays, I have been waking up early to catch brunch with a friend of mine. This week, I woke up and turned on the TV as I waited for my friend to get back to my text saying that I was up and ready to go. The end of the movie Groove was on TV, right at the part where Digweed walks into the rave and drops the epic track "Heaven Scent" by Bedrock. "Heaven Scent" has to be one of my all time favorite progressive house tracks. When I hear it, it still gives me goosebumps and puts the hair on the back of my arms on end. I can feel it tingling down my spine as the beat washes out and the synthesizers push the theme. Not only does it bring me back to my DJing days, but it levitates me just like it used to back when it was played on the floors of clubs and warehouses. It's an amazing way to wake up. I think that maybe I should wake up to that song every day.
Anyhow, today, though, was a bit of a wash. Originally, killa, the cookie and I were planning on spending the entire day at the beach with our brand new beach grilling permit, Pies' smokey joe, a cooler full of wine and grillable foods, and a frisbee. Needless to say, it rained today. All day. It's okay, because I was up until five in the morning watching TV and really just needed the day to relax. So, that's what I'm doing. Relaxing. You gotta chill out so you can be the little, yellow, angry guy on the line.
What's my problem? Ducks weren't defrosted.
So I have a reputation in the kitchen. I'm known both as the dirtiest (not to say unclean, but definitively the most crass) and the angriest guy in the kitchen. I make the meanest mama jokes. I tell things how they are. And I get irked by little things. So whenever I'm in a kind of get disgruntled, someone inevitably says, "ZEN!!!, Little. Yellow. Angry." That's me. I need a t-shirt with that printed on it. If I ever try out for a reality TV show, I'm going to send in a video with all of the people that I know saying that I'm little, yellow, and angry.
When I get in a press on the line, I tend to get a bit snippy. I start cursing. I start getting testy with people. Last night was a good example of it.
It started off a little bit shady to begin with during prep. The night before, we had set out a case of duck breasts to thaw. The next day, I was supposed to separate the breasts, remove the tender, and trim up and score the skin before marinating them. On an average night, the normal saute cook sells around fifteen ducks. I had fifteen ducks in the marinade before the case of frozen breasts. The most that we had sold in a night was twenty. When I got to do the butchering and marination of the ducks, they were still frozen. They're never still frozen the next day at three in the afternoon. The pastry chefs must have come in earlier than normal and chucked them in the walk-in fridge before they had finished defrosting.
So I had fifteen ducks in the marinade. It was a Wednesday night. We'll roll with fifteen butchered ducks. The third ticket that comes in orders five ducks and takes out a third of my stash. That's quickly followed by ducks on each of the next three tickets. Half of my duck mise en place is demolished. It's not even half past seven yet. I was already sweating the garnish on the dish too, because the normal saute guy didn't prep the starch two days in advanced like we usually do.
It seems as if whenever he works, he sells less than the average number of ducks per night, and when I work, I sell way more than the average number of ducks. By the time I had run out of ducks, the night wasn't even halfway over, but the ducks were defrosted enough to butcher and use.
I also normally render off a number of duck breasts before the beginning of service, so I don't have to spend the time doing it as the crush comes in. I started with eight rendered, and as I said earlier, they were all gone before seven thirty. So with every subsequent duck order, "Awwwww, fuck YOUUUUUUUUUU...." could be heard escaping from my lips.
Not only was I buried in duck all night long, selling the record for this season at twenty one, I was also running the bass special. If there's one thing that people love, it's bass. I sold twenty of those that night too. Another twelve tuna or so and at least thirty flounder topped it all off. I was selling at least four entrees for each one coming off grill.
There was one pickup where out of twelve dishes, I had ten of them, and then the guy working the plating/expediting station asked me if I can pick up another flounder and a tuna, my reaction was, "I don't give a FUCK!" So he adds it on. Then, not only do I not hear the extra tuna tacked on, thinking it was only a flounder that I had to add on, but he didn't call out that one of the flounders was a medium-well. So, I'm picking up seven flounder, two tuna, and two duck, but one of the tunas I don't know about. The guy guy working the plating station asks me the duck as I'm putting the flounder on the plate, and I'm like, "What FUCKING tuna?" Then he asks me which flounder is medium-well, and I say, "You didn't call out a FUCKIN' medium-well!" So I pick up a flounder put it back on a sizzle platter and grab the one that I had fired as medium-well, put it in the broiler and brought it back up to temp.
We did a hundred and fifty dinners last night and I'm sure that I did at least ninety of them. I think that grill did thirty five or forty, and hot apps did ten or fifteen apps as entrees (cheap ass mother fuckers). So, as I'm getting railed, I'm spouting expletives as I render ducks, pick up ten dishes at a time, sear and roast fish, heat up garnish, and think that the guy deciding the pickups is a moron for not analyzing the tickets better and putting together more realistic pickups. I think that if I was less organized and focused in on the order of operations, I would have been, not only buried, but totally lost in the weeds. There was only one time that I didn't have my all-day (all-day is what we call what we have on order), and it was on the last two tickets where I hadn't fired a flounder. Luckily, flounders are one of those dishes that you can do on the pickup.
But, yeah, I got railed all night long. I felt like a two dollar hooker getting fucked by a big sweaty beast for two hours straight. When the dust cleared, I was satisfied with my performance, and I had made it through the night without running out of anything, though the mise en place was DESTROYED. There was almost nothing left. I had vinaigrettes still, mussels for the tuna dish, scallions and that's about it. The regular saute guy had to rebuild the place from the ground up.
The night before, I worked the grill. We did a hundred and sixty people that night and I did a good job. There was nothing sent back and all of my food looked great. I got worked just as hard as the saute guy, and I had a lot of fucked up orders too. But I survived it with no one sending anything back or getting any negative feedback. I was so relieved at the end of the night. I didn't talk about how well I was doing all night long, like I was a pitcher in the middle of a no-hitter. In my mind, though, I I was ecstatic that I had found a groove and that I was rockin' it.
Speaking of groove, I had a really nice moment last Sunday. The past couple of Sundays, I have been waking up early to catch brunch with a friend of mine. This week, I woke up and turned on the TV as I waited for my friend to get back to my text saying that I was up and ready to go. The end of the movie Groove was on TV, right at the part where Digweed walks into the rave and drops the epic track "Heaven Scent" by Bedrock. "Heaven Scent" has to be one of my all time favorite progressive house tracks. When I hear it, it still gives me goosebumps and puts the hair on the back of my arms on end. I can feel it tingling down my spine as the beat washes out and the synthesizers push the theme. Not only does it bring me back to my DJing days, but it levitates me just like it used to back when it was played on the floors of clubs and warehouses. It's an amazing way to wake up. I think that maybe I should wake up to that song every day.
Anyhow, today, though, was a bit of a wash. Originally, killa, the cookie and I were planning on spending the entire day at the beach with our brand new beach grilling permit, Pies' smokey joe, a cooler full of wine and grillable foods, and a frisbee. Needless to say, it rained today. All day. It's okay, because I was up until five in the morning watching TV and really just needed the day to relax. So, that's what I'm doing. Relaxing. You gotta chill out so you can be the little, yellow, angry guy on the line.
Friday, July 31, 2009
Day 82: A Grand Day Out
Listening: Some would say I was a lost man in a lost world. You could say I lost my faith in the people on tv.
What's my problem? Didn't make it to the Bean.
Well, I didn't make it to the Bean today. The Bean is the local coffee house with free wifi, uninspired service and quality beverages where I usually park my ass for hours at a time on my day off as I read, twiddle around on the internet and blog. I meant to go there this evening, but better things presented themselves.
Starting this week, my room mate/the intern, who is known in the kitchen as "the crazy eyed killer" and is referred to by other names including "crazy eye," "killa," "crazy mutha fuckin' eyed killa," and "pickled fucker" had the same day off. We knew this was going to happen a couple of days ago and we planned on going to the Downy Flake, the closest approximation to a diner on this hellhole for real people and playground for popped collars.
We didn't get going until half past eleven when the pastry assistant, who shares a name in common with a specific cookie (and I find quietly amusing... and no it's not Oreo), called to see of the killa wanted to grab some lunch. He informed her of our plan and she decided to join us for a noontime breakfast at the Downy Flake.
I know the pastry assistant casually, as in, when she and the pastry chef are really busy, they're still there when I go in to prep, we have some pleasant conversation, and then go about our merry way. The killa knows her a bit better, because as an intern, he gets more time off due to the fact that he's hourly and not a salaried employee. Therefore, during his time off, he can socialize with her because she's typically done before noon. So they had a number of dinners together before, but this was my first time getting to know her at all.
But, we had the late breakfast. I had the Flake Special, which included two eggs, some bacon, some home fries and a donut. To that I added on a single pancake and a bottomless cup of coffee, which I milked 'til we were the last table sitting before they closed for the afternoon.
It was nice getting to know the pastry assistant who shares a name with a cookie (heh). She's a down home southern belle with a boyfriend waiting for her down in Nashville. She reads a lot of food lit including Michael Pollan books. She has never worked the line in her life and kind of wants to work for a test kitchen someday. Generally a cool, seemingly intelligent person.
After breakfast, the killa and the cookie waited for me as I got a haircut. Now, the killa insists that all of his days off are sunny and beautiful. I insist that all of my days off are crappy and disgusting. So, what happens when we have the same day off? Well, half of the day is crappy and the other half is great. Luckily the morning blew, so the afternoon was pretty nice. It was so nice, in fact that we ended up packing a cooler and heading to the beach.
I actually got into the water today. It was surprisingly warm, a fact that the cookie would not agree with. But, for New England, the water was almost tropical. The waves were out in full force with surfers kicking crazy turns and taking some diggers. The wind was blowing too. It was a little bit chilly, but I was determined to get some of my color back. I'll freeze my little Asian nipples off if it means regaining what I worked so hard to achieve in places like Koh Tao and Nha Trang.
I also started reading one of the books that I requested from the library. I requested a book on taking a gap year, and for the most part, it was really geared towards people who are looking to take their year in or around their college career. It was also geared mostly towards the Brits, to whom the idea of a Gap Year is not only a commonplace thing, but it's also something recognized by the government. There was a small section geared toward "North Americans." It included some good resources that I plan to research a little bit more like different agencies that aid people on taking gap years and such. I think that all of my talk about the idea of a gap year has sort of inspired the killa to take one once he gets out of culinary school.
We stayed at the beach for a long time because one of the servers at the restaurant said that she would come out. She said she would be an hour or so, and it was more like or so. She showed up after we had been there for a good three hours. It was okay though. We got to see her smiling face and shared a bit of our wine with her. She ended up heading out to catch a few waves on her board after a short while and we decided that we were gonna go grab some food. And we were hungry.
After the three of us got cleaned up, we headed over to Straight Wharf. In the past, I hadn't been really all that impressed with their menu or their food. I remember Gabriel Frasca from back in his Spire days and the food that he was putting out was nothing short of bangin'. At Straight Wharf, it's a little bit more subdued. But after looking at the menu, we ended up in the dining room. I gave a shout out to my boy Sean, who was working the bar kitchen on that night, and Gabriel was out doing a private function.
As the night went, we ordered some sauteed squash blossoms, a house made caviatelli, and Island Creek oysters on the half shell for our starters, and the scallops, the striped bass, and the halibut for our entrees. The cookie had a glass of sauvignon blanc. The killa had a glass of chardonnay, and I had a glass of the gruner. As a mid course, they sent us half orders of the Straight Wharf lobster bake, which included shelled butter poached lobster, little neck clams, chorizo, and fingerling potatoes over a sweet corn puree. Mighty tasty. I have no clue why they chose to send that as a mid course. It's an expensive thing to send. They charge a market price for it, which happened to be $42. What means that they sent out what essentially would have cost a normal person about $61. On top of that, when we ordered dessert, I ordered a glass of brachetto d'acqui, and they brought a glass for each of us. And, yes, we all got dessert.
I walked out of dinner both full and buzzed. Throughout the day I had about a half a bottle of wine plus a couple of glasses of wine with dinner. It doesn't seem like much, as it was spaced out over about four hours, but I think my dehydration from my six day work week in a hella hot kitchen and only being able to replenish my fluids so much made the booze take hold a little bit more. The night before, I was tipsy after a beer and two drinks when I met my friend out. I guess I have to be a bit more careful. I'm not about to feel like a bag of shit because I wasn't careful.
After dinner the killa and I came back to the restaurant and invaded the kitchen as the rest of the cooks were finishing their prep lists for the next day, but I was getting the sleepy drunk action, a trait passed down from my father, and went upstairs and crashed out for a couple of hours.
I probably should have just passed out for the night but I woke up to answer some text messages and to get something to drink. I ended up watching "Definitely, Maybe" with one room mate and then watched a couple of episodes of "The United States of Tara" with another. And now it's five in the morning. It's really time to go to sleep. We're expecting to do over two hundred on each of the next two days, so I have to get my rest so I can get my game face on. Two hundred covers in a recession is a good thing, but it also means that more people are ordering apps and entrees. This means that the hot apps stations gets fucked both ways. I gotta get ready to bend over and brace, because I'm gonna get fucked in a very uncomfortable place (like the back of a Volkswagon).
What's my problem? Didn't make it to the Bean.
Well, I didn't make it to the Bean today. The Bean is the local coffee house with free wifi, uninspired service and quality beverages where I usually park my ass for hours at a time on my day off as I read, twiddle around on the internet and blog. I meant to go there this evening, but better things presented themselves.
Starting this week, my room mate/the intern, who is known in the kitchen as "the crazy eyed killer" and is referred to by other names including "crazy eye," "killa," "crazy mutha fuckin' eyed killa," and "pickled fucker" had the same day off. We knew this was going to happen a couple of days ago and we planned on going to the Downy Flake, the closest approximation to a diner on this hellhole for real people and playground for popped collars.
We didn't get going until half past eleven when the pastry assistant, who shares a name in common with a specific cookie (and I find quietly amusing... and no it's not Oreo), called to see of the killa wanted to grab some lunch. He informed her of our plan and she decided to join us for a noontime breakfast at the Downy Flake.
I know the pastry assistant casually, as in, when she and the pastry chef are really busy, they're still there when I go in to prep, we have some pleasant conversation, and then go about our merry way. The killa knows her a bit better, because as an intern, he gets more time off due to the fact that he's hourly and not a salaried employee. Therefore, during his time off, he can socialize with her because she's typically done before noon. So they had a number of dinners together before, but this was my first time getting to know her at all.
But, we had the late breakfast. I had the Flake Special, which included two eggs, some bacon, some home fries and a donut. To that I added on a single pancake and a bottomless cup of coffee, which I milked 'til we were the last table sitting before they closed for the afternoon.
It was nice getting to know the pastry assistant who shares a name with a cookie (heh). She's a down home southern belle with a boyfriend waiting for her down in Nashville. She reads a lot of food lit including Michael Pollan books. She has never worked the line in her life and kind of wants to work for a test kitchen someday. Generally a cool, seemingly intelligent person.
After breakfast, the killa and the cookie waited for me as I got a haircut. Now, the killa insists that all of his days off are sunny and beautiful. I insist that all of my days off are crappy and disgusting. So, what happens when we have the same day off? Well, half of the day is crappy and the other half is great. Luckily the morning blew, so the afternoon was pretty nice. It was so nice, in fact that we ended up packing a cooler and heading to the beach.
I actually got into the water today. It was surprisingly warm, a fact that the cookie would not agree with. But, for New England, the water was almost tropical. The waves were out in full force with surfers kicking crazy turns and taking some diggers. The wind was blowing too. It was a little bit chilly, but I was determined to get some of my color back. I'll freeze my little Asian nipples off if it means regaining what I worked so hard to achieve in places like Koh Tao and Nha Trang.
I also started reading one of the books that I requested from the library. I requested a book on taking a gap year, and for the most part, it was really geared towards people who are looking to take their year in or around their college career. It was also geared mostly towards the Brits, to whom the idea of a Gap Year is not only a commonplace thing, but it's also something recognized by the government. There was a small section geared toward "North Americans." It included some good resources that I plan to research a little bit more like different agencies that aid people on taking gap years and such. I think that all of my talk about the idea of a gap year has sort of inspired the killa to take one once he gets out of culinary school.
We stayed at the beach for a long time because one of the servers at the restaurant said that she would come out. She said she would be an hour or so, and it was more like or so. She showed up after we had been there for a good three hours. It was okay though. We got to see her smiling face and shared a bit of our wine with her. She ended up heading out to catch a few waves on her board after a short while and we decided that we were gonna go grab some food. And we were hungry.
After the three of us got cleaned up, we headed over to Straight Wharf. In the past, I hadn't been really all that impressed with their menu or their food. I remember Gabriel Frasca from back in his Spire days and the food that he was putting out was nothing short of bangin'. At Straight Wharf, it's a little bit more subdued. But after looking at the menu, we ended up in the dining room. I gave a shout out to my boy Sean, who was working the bar kitchen on that night, and Gabriel was out doing a private function.
As the night went, we ordered some sauteed squash blossoms, a house made caviatelli, and Island Creek oysters on the half shell for our starters, and the scallops, the striped bass, and the halibut for our entrees. The cookie had a glass of sauvignon blanc. The killa had a glass of chardonnay, and I had a glass of the gruner. As a mid course, they sent us half orders of the Straight Wharf lobster bake, which included shelled butter poached lobster, little neck clams, chorizo, and fingerling potatoes over a sweet corn puree. Mighty tasty. I have no clue why they chose to send that as a mid course. It's an expensive thing to send. They charge a market price for it, which happened to be $42. What means that they sent out what essentially would have cost a normal person about $61. On top of that, when we ordered dessert, I ordered a glass of brachetto d'acqui, and they brought a glass for each of us. And, yes, we all got dessert.
I walked out of dinner both full and buzzed. Throughout the day I had about a half a bottle of wine plus a couple of glasses of wine with dinner. It doesn't seem like much, as it was spaced out over about four hours, but I think my dehydration from my six day work week in a hella hot kitchen and only being able to replenish my fluids so much made the booze take hold a little bit more. The night before, I was tipsy after a beer and two drinks when I met my friend out. I guess I have to be a bit more careful. I'm not about to feel like a bag of shit because I wasn't careful.
After dinner the killa and I came back to the restaurant and invaded the kitchen as the rest of the cooks were finishing their prep lists for the next day, but I was getting the sleepy drunk action, a trait passed down from my father, and went upstairs and crashed out for a couple of hours.
I probably should have just passed out for the night but I woke up to answer some text messages and to get something to drink. I ended up watching "Definitely, Maybe" with one room mate and then watched a couple of episodes of "The United States of Tara" with another. And now it's five in the morning. It's really time to go to sleep. We're expecting to do over two hundred on each of the next two days, so I have to get my rest so I can get my game face on. Two hundred covers in a recession is a good thing, but it also means that more people are ordering apps and entrees. This means that the hot apps stations gets fucked both ways. I gotta get ready to bend over and brace, because I'm gonna get fucked in a very uncomfortable place (like the back of a Volkswagon).
Friday, July 24, 2009
Day 76: Why So Sad?
Listening: Blackbird singing in the dead of night. Take these broken wings and learn to fly. All your life, you were only waiting for this moment to arise.
What's my problem? Dave Matthews has been making me sad.
So Dave Matthews has been playing in the kitchen all through prep and it's been making me sad. I love Dave Matthews, but it's not good to listen to music that makes you sad when you have a hundred and fifty covers on the books. It just makes no sense. We should be listening to Rage Against the Machine or Body Count's "Cop Killer." Maybe I'm just in a sentimental mood. Hope I don't get my ass kicked tonight. It's hot apps though. It's cake.
What's my problem? Dave Matthews has been making me sad.
So Dave Matthews has been playing in the kitchen all through prep and it's been making me sad. I love Dave Matthews, but it's not good to listen to music that makes you sad when you have a hundred and fifty covers on the books. It just makes no sense. We should be listening to Rage Against the Machine or Body Count's "Cop Killer." Maybe I'm just in a sentimental mood. Hope I don't get my ass kicked tonight. It's hot apps though. It's cake.
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