eat a peach for hours

growing

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 01:31:34 -0500

keeping my head above water has been my primary goal since starting my life as a sous, but now that i’m a couple of months into the job i feel ready to pay attention to things other than mere survival. the dream as a young cook is always to put your own stamp on the food, whether specials or menu items, it’s a porny fantasy to create a dish that people pay for and hopefully enjoy. on friday, my first stab at a menu adjustment gets released to the dining public. it’s small, but i’m a baby steps kind of guy. saturday, however, represents the first service of a completely overhauled brunch menu, which will be presented as part of a condensed lunch menu for ease of service. attaining a base level of comfort with the job has been important for dealing with all of the little things that come up throughout the day. now, much more than on my first day, i feel ready to help mold the restaurant into something that resembles the utopian blueprints i’ve been typing about for the last three years: i want a calm, motivated, interested, passionate, and respectful kitchen. every day i think of ways to get there.

the way i’m approaching two months on the job as sous...

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 23:34:33 -0500

the way

i’m approaching two months on the job as sous chef, and while things are going well, i’m engaged in a personal struggle to be the person that i wanted to be my boss when i was coming up. to be blunt, that person wasn’t an asshole, cared about both food and people, and avoided hypocrisy like bullets in the matrix. i’ve been exposed to all kinds of bosses, each with strengths and weaknesses, and i’d be a fool to think that i’m no different, so in order to figure out what i’m okay at and what needs working on, i’ve had to become extremely self aware.

people are watching, always. young, impressionable minds are constantly nearby, sensitive to the way i do things and the way i say things. this has been enlightening, primarily in the way that i now understand why the “asshole” chef exists: it’s easier than being patient. patience with people is different than it is with a braise or other culinary pursuits, because of the dynamic nature of people and their relationships. i’ve been in kitchens that were generally dismissive of an individual’s needs, letting them toil away in mediocrity, and other places where people would be bullied into quitting. i’ve caught myself leaning in that direction, and i need to stay far away from that territory. it’s managerial laziness, and genuinely unfair. a manager’s job is to manage, even in a kitchen, and though i long for the fantasy based version of the job that revolves solely around food and cooking, it just isn’t that way. it’s my job to give my team the tools they need to become better. conversely, it isn’t my job to eliminate weak links by cutting them out of the chain. i’m there to fix them; fixing people is difficult, but not impossible.

i’ve discovered this task to be exhausting, mostly because it requires more time and effort than you think it will when you reach out. small corrections sometimes take weeks to be completed, while larger, more complicated issues, take weeks or months. everyone responds differently to the learning process, too, so comparing cook A to cook B is futile. it’s my job to figure out when we’ve hit a wall. from there, it’s up to me and those above me to figure out the next plan of attack.

i always imagined the job to be all about the food, but i spend most of my time thinking about people and the things they do to the food. if it sounds like a venting session, it isn’t, i’m just surprised by the job and its challenges. i’m genuinely stimulated by my work right now, and it suits my natural inclination to find a better way for everything. it’s nice to be in a position where i can actually try to make it happen, for myself, and the people that i work with.

my weird year this year’s most recurring theme on the...

Thu, 29 Dec 2011 17:37:20 -0500

my weird year

this year’s most recurring theme on the peach has to be my confusion with my personal trajectory. i had very different ideas for myself one year ago than i do now. for starters, i was done with professional cooking. i’d set new years eve as my final day ever behind the stoves, and then went about student life and all the crap that goes with it. three days into january i had accepted a part time job cooking asian street food. after all, it made the most sense financially to get paid as much as possible while hitting the books. the first few months of my new journey were spent going through the first two stages of grief: a bit of denial, and plenty of anger.

i felt angry about the way i was treated as i left the old job - my work was instantly subject to a different kind of scrutiny once i had given 6 weeks notice. if i made a mistake, it wasn’t a human one, it was the failings of a burnt out line cook that simply didn’t care to do things right. perception is everything, and i suppose it’s natural to push away something that either appears poisonous, or doesn’t want to be a part of your team any longer. it’s an emotional thing to work in a kitchen, even more so to run one. to leave one can be the most emotional thing, and feelings are often hurt. mine were hurt, definitely, and i probably hurt theirs. over the course of a year i had transitioned from a knowledge hungry and enthusiastic line cook, to an embittered and spiteful one. when i started to be treated like one, it exasperated an already substantial problem. i should have quit the day i gave 6 weeks notice, or just toughed it out. it probably would have been fine either way.

working in a casual place while going to school was probably a bad idea. it kept me anchored to an industry that i was dying to escape. if you can believe it to be true, i was, as a line cook, hooked on the money. more believably, i was hooked on the work. the most important thing about this time was that i was working with people who cared about people more than about food. that isn’t to say that food didn’t count, but it wasn’t everything, and the team was well bonded when i walked in, and remains that way now that i’m long gone. atmosphere contributes to the product, as i had always suspected. i also became painfully aware that things aren’t always better somewhere else, but just different, and that at certain stages in life, it takes a very specific kind of different to be just right. when i started in victoria, the restaurant i worked in was perfect for me. when i was tired and sad, the casual asian place was ideal. i did well in school and did enough to get by at work, and by may i was on my way back to vancouver.

the plan was to get into sfu and plug away at a communications degree. i had been accepted, but in order to enter in a comfortable way, i told myself that i should make a little bit of money before jumping headlong into a four year program. it made sense then, that i try my hand at cooking in hotels. i knew only what i had heard according to kitchen lore: the cooks in hotels are highly paid and under worked, the exact formula i was looking for. given my mental state, i thought that i could deal with the shortcomings of institutional cooking. i endured a foolishly long interview/hiring process only to discover that, even as a wounded and hate filled cook, that i cared too much about the craft to use it in a way that went against my personal constitution. i’ve written at length about the specifics, but it was approximately here that i knew that i wasn’t all the way finished with cooking properly. i quit, for the first time in my life, without having a plan for afterwards.

craigslist is a mixed bag of bullshit cook jobs, but it is the way i usually find my way into a good job. word of mouth is good too, but i barely knew anyone in the city and was being really passive about my search. this passivity manifested in lethargy and a general uselessness that probably didn’t do much in the way of impressing my girlfriend. that was the lowest of the lows or the peak of the shit heap, depending on how you look at it. and then i found an ad from my current employer, so i sent a resume in and very quickly found myself having a chat with the executive chef of the company, as well as one of the chefs de cuisine. interviews are a funny thing; it’s usually two way sales pitch with each side explaining their own virtues and desires. i did little to oversell myself and tried to be both candid and honest about my goals. i said i would choose writer over chef, any day of the week, and that a life in the industry was not my ultimate goal. i thought i presented myself as a written off amc pacer, but apparently they saw something of worth that just needed a bit of help to get back on the right path. i did some work in a couple of the kitchen, and ultimately had the choice of where i would work. i took the job that did the least to disrupt the life i was hoping to have; full time days in a small restaurant with a small staff of nice and talented people. it was the smartest thing that i could have done, and perhaps the most important decision i have made in my cooking career. it didn’t feel like it at the time, but it was.

i wasn’t hoping for easy, i just knew that i couldn’t handle crazy. the night shift is home to the latter in most kitchens, and if i had signed up for it right away, i’d be getting ready for my second semester at sfu. no question. i did get a taste of the crazy though, but more importantly, i found that there are people out there that cope with it the same way i do. a dinner rush was challenging and pressured, but calm and organized. i kept expecting something to crack, but it never did. this was encouraging. i had given up on the possibility of this kind of environment coexisting with good food, yet there it was.

by the end of the first month i was postponing my education indefinitely, deciding instead to stay put and see what happens. after spending the first part of the year twirling about in a state of confused panic, i felt it would be better just to stay grounded and assess the situation from a sturdy place. then it all started to come back. the bitterness loosened its grip on me, and i quickly found myself approaching the job with passion as opposed to reluctance. opportunities for creativity were presenting themselves on a regular basis, something i hadn’t been faced with in years, so i jumped on it. things were going well. really well. and it was just when i was planning on telling the powers that be that i’d be interested in something more than a line cooking job that they approached me. there wasn’t any discussion of where, and the when was pretty vague. two months later, things became pretty clear.

a chat with the bosses in late november resulted in one of those “impossible to refuse” offers; a sous chef job at the largest restaurant in the company. i had been over this situation in my mind dozens of times in my career, but the actual experience was much less celebratory and more solemn than i had imagined. i knew, immediately, that what was coming was going to be much harder than being a line cook. i also knew that i was ready to take it on, so i did, and i am.

with one full month of the job behind me, i’ve already experienced the restaurant at its busiest and craziest. there have been 7 and 8 day stretches, complete with 14 hour days, and now i’m on the last day of a 5 day mini vacation. it all feels so unlikely, but i’ve come to expect that from life. the opportunity at hand is so good that i don’t feel wistful towards the path i am now leaving behind.

it has been a weird, but good, year.

the top ten new musics of 2011 in alphabetical order

Sun, 25 Dec 2011 20:21:37 -0500

colin stetson - new history warfare vol. 2: i’m unafraid to admit that other people know more about certain things that i do, though it wasn’t always this way. so, when a former boss of mine extolled the virtues of “jazz”, i started sampling around hesitantly. i latch onto brass, and lean towards melody, but this guy absolutely mangles the saxophone. i used to listen to music for one reason, the hooks, but these days i’m finding other reasons to put a pair of headphones. this shit is genuinely exciting, because i’ve never heard anything like it. and… he’s kinda canadian, if that matters.

http://youtu.be/HKcilfL2aFc

chad van gaalen - diaper island: this guy is completely canadian, and had his fingers in the production of two albums by women, the best thing to ever come from alberta. you can hear their influence on him, this time around, and the resulting album is definitely his best. there’s a song called shave my pussy. that’s it. that’s real.

http://youtu.be/hKHD6INztfA

charles bradley - no time for dreaming: i used to have zero patience for old music. i also used to be an idiot. while my status as a reformed idiot is debatable, what is not is that old music is important. this kinda falls into the old/new category, because this guy is somewhere between 50 and 60, and laid down some serious soul vocals on top of some tunes provided by menahan street band. there is something to be said about a weathered man singing about hard times with a voice so strained you can’t help but believe him.

http://youtu.be/0bbgHTdSPJ4

james blake - self titled: this isn’t the kind of music a younger me would have thought older me would be into, but it is. it’s melancholy, sure, but is sonically unique. the heavily electronic musicianship stutters and swells behind an oddly auto-tuned falsetto of a young british man. this is a record about sound. you don’t need to speak the language to know he’s a little bit sad. my girlfriend is wrong about this album. actually, was. she recently admitted i was right about it.

http://youtu.be/MVgEaDemxjc

javelin - canyon candy: it’s a short but sweet sample driven record that came out of the blue. it’s western and electronic, dusty and moody as anything i’ve ever heard. music heavy on samples often rides the coattails of a preexisting nostalgia; this album manages to create an image of a past that i wish existed for myself. an electro western for robot john wayne.

http://youtu.be/mMGBZJ4Q0zo

kurt vile - smoke ring for my halo: if i had to pick a representative for the direction i hope rock n roll moves in, this guy would be the guy. it’s guitar forward music that interlopes between folk and grungy goodness. it sounds pretty when he wants it to, and sludgy when he doesn’t. everything feels intentional and crafted, without sounding anal retentive, y’know?

http://youtu.be/F1VmLdZvUlo

m83 - hurry up we’re dreaming: i wasn’t ready for this jelly a few years ago. it takes a certain amount of comfort with oneself to listen to the glammy synth stuff mostly appropriate for coming of age 80’s movies. i’m over the hump, so to speak, and really get down with this. it’s better loud. it’s prettier loud, too. that’s rare.

http://youtu.be/dX3k_QDnzHE

tinariwen - tassili: when you get beyond the surface of jazz, you can’t help but find a bunch of interesting african music. these guys have been around for a while, and i’ve only just found them. a friend told me they existed. he didn’t tell me exactly how rad they are. it’s soothing and bleak at the same time

http://youtu.be/iorfsFAJJsI

wilco - the whole love: saturday night live isn’t always funny, though it tries, but it often plays host to some pretty talented groups. wilco didn’t make sense to me until a few years ago when they were playing snl in promotion of sky blue sky. it was then that i learned that wilco could really fucking play, and they don’t really hide that fact on their newest album. i’m going to see them in the new year, if the world still exists by then.

http://youtu.be/yWP4bI37mCE

yellow ostrich - the mistress: the dodos did for me a few years ago what yellow ostrich did for me earlier this year: surprise me. they take the standard arrangement of percussion, guitars, and vocals, and go ahead and make it sound fresh. it’s rythmic and classically melodic, with perhaps the most creative use of harmony i’ve heard in ages. it would be easy to dismiss these guys as the authors of typical indie stuff, but they are clearly tapped into something deeper. try it.

http://youtu.be/D1KCsOT1VaM

christmas

Thu, 15 Dec 2011 16:05:53 -0500

christmas day is the one day that most people around these parts agree that it’s okay to unwind, and for that reason i love christmas. hustle breeds hustle to the point where people feel guilty when they aren’t, even if they are justifiably exhausted. my brethren in the service industry deserve a day or two to kick back and not have to worry about a restaurant and its patrons. the month of december is a bit of a nightmare in terms of being stretched to and beyond personal limits of handling pressure, so i can’t say i enjoy the days leading up to christmas and new years so much, and instead prefer to set my sights on january. by january the world will have reset itself, and the frenzied behaviour of the masses will have curtailed in favour of a more rational kind. the need to eat in massive groups, all at once, will disappear for the better part of the year. it’s slow, and that’s boring, but it’s necessary after what always goes down in december.

kitchens are dangerous

Mon, 05 Dec 2011 23:30:08 -0500

i’ve never been much of a cutter. instead, i burn myself. this is my way of getting to know the physical space of a restaurant kitchen: i bumble about, sentimentally clinging onto old habits and previously enjoyed repetitive motions, occasionally brushing against something very hot. it’s a bizarre way, but it is my way. i’m six days deep into my new position in a different kitchen, and i think i may have burned myself on enough things to have a good idea of where i’m not supposed to go. everything is different in a new kitchen. it takes no time at all to realize just how much of a robot you’ve become, even after a few short months in another space. the pans, for example, are a little more rustic, and so they don’t respond the same way to the previously prescribed flick of the wrist as they did in my former kitchen home. as a result, i often find my whites not so white, speckled with errant sauce that is initially quite hot. i think the moment all this accidental touching of hot things stops, i won’t be the new guy anymore.

onward and upward

Sun, 04 Dec 2011 04:10:00 -0500

a while a go i was approached with a potential opportunity, the kind a cook cooks for. i was asked by the boss if i would be interested in climbing the ladder a little bit, from the cook rung to sous chef one. i excitedly admitted that i wanted to take the step, and then i waited to hear word of the when and where variety. now i know those things, and it is officially in full swing.

i recently wrote about the perils of misusing the term “chef”, so it’s strange now to have people using that word in reference to myself. i have tried to tell them to stop, but they won’t, so i guess i’ll just roll with it for now. i’m being eased into the position, which is for the best because the machine is going full tilt through december. there are a lot of seats in the restaurant. as a result, we feed a lot of people. this means it’s a daily grind, a sort of eternity spent keeping afloat. every sous chef and chef i’ve ever had has played a part in shaping who i will be once i become a fully formed sous; i’m a larvae right now. there is plenty of work to do.

goodbye roma

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 02:07:00 -0500

i arrived in their hands a wounded, embittered shadow of the person i try to be. somehow they saw something they wanted to keep around, so they did. that was at the end of july, and now four months later i find myself setting my alarm clock for pretty fucking early for one more time. tomorrow is my farewell shift at campagnolo roma, and on wednesday i’ll be found at campagnolo wearing my white clogs and some freshly pressed sous chef pants.

four months isn’t a very long time, but plenty happened. for a while it was hot out, whereas now it really isn’t. see what i mean? what i really mean, is that i was kindly nursed along from a sullen state to a more confident one. if i was an investment, i was definitely a “buy low” kind of deal. the first month at roma was good. i’m even willing to say it was great. but i had a feeling that somehow it was too good to be true, and that i’d be found out for being a fraud. i kept waiting for something bad to happen, for someone to tell me that it wasn’t working out and that i should probably find somewhere else to peddle my wares. to my surprise, it never happened. in fact, things continued to get better, and the doubt started to shrink and continued to do so until it didn’t exist any more. that is precisely when i started to feel ready.

i can’t even begin to describe just how impossible this seemed at the outset. let’s just say that when i interviewed for the position i was very clear that a career in professional cooking was no longer my goal. in january i had tried to sell my knives and most of my cookbooks, but the world intervened and refused to provide me a buyer. i screwed around for the first half of the year (arts classes and cooking fried rice), and now i feel like cooking is the way forward.

philphys: “Plongeur is one of the slaves of the modern world....

Thu, 24 Nov 2011 21:31:20 -0500

philphys:

“Plongeur is one of the slaves of the modern world. Not that there is any need to whine over him, for he is better off than many manual workers, but still, he is no freer than if he were bought and sold. His work is servile and without art; he is paid just enough to keep him alive; his only holiday is the sack… [they have] been trapped by a routine which makes thought impossible. If plongeurs thought at all, they would long ago have formed a labor union and gone on strike for better treatment. But they do not think, because they have no leisure for it; their life has made slaves of them.”

- George Orwell

time

Mon, 21 Nov 2011 12:23:00 -0500

cooking and time are married and divorced all at once. good food usually takes time to make, but often i feel as though there just isn’t enough of it to go around. the ability to manage a clock is perhaps what separates me, a professional cook, and someone who is cooking at home. preparing one thing at a time would guarantee the best results, but it isn’t a fiscally sound way of approaching a day’s work. it can also be boring. instead, the day is spent trying to get everything done without getting anything wrong within the confines of a set period of time. i’ve learned the hard way that food will not wait, and that the incessant tones of an expired timer must be acknowledged or whatever it is that the timer was originally set for will probably become compost. it is seldom convenient when things suddenly become “ready”, and often they’ll become ready at once, which sounds delightful but is less desirable than if they became ready in succession. prep lists are like snowflakes in that there are (supposedly) no two exactly alike. ingredients vary as well in shape, size, and condition, as do the circumstances of a kitchen. equipment falters, which has a way of turning a 2 minute task into something that stretches beyond a half hour. i am painfully are that getting everything done is impossible, as there will always be something more to be done, but this does not keep my mind from being disappointed when i fail to do so. at this point in my career, i am less concerned with preparing a “perfect” ______ (no such thing), than i am with getting everything done properly in a timely fashion. this season’s edition of “lucky peach” (read it, please) is all about the “sweet spot”. it’s a broad topic, but in relation to time, the sweet spot is all about taking on the exact right amount of work so that it all comes out properly. take on too little, not enough gets done. take on too much, things probably aren’t right. there is a spot, right in the middle, where speed and efficiency become one. i remember reading about NBA basketball player tim duncan, who appears to move more slowly than many other players. he, however, is undeniably successful in spite of his seemingly slow approach to the game. it was said that he moved at the speed that offered him the most control of his game. he operated in the sweet spot, and dominated from it. everybody has a sweet spot. everybody’s sweet spot is different. we each need to find ours.

cheeseburger sloppy joes… like many north american...

Tue, 15 Nov 2011 11:59:00 -0500

cheeseburger sloppy joes…

like many north american housewives, i too find myself cooking the same or similar things to the point that they just aren’t exciting any more. this is exact moment when one is expected to listen to their inner (or outer) fatso and create a delicious bastard of two popular snack foods. i think they were a pickle and some shredded lettuce away from being anything amazing, but i’m still glad i made them. i didn’t google it, and i don’t plan on it. i invented this in my own reality. chances are, however, that paula dean wipes her face with these before bed on a nightly basis.

i cooked them with out a “recipe”, i guess, but if you can’t imagine what goes into something like these, here you go: two fists of ground beef, an onion, a couple piece of celery, a small amount of tomato soup. that’s the sloppy joe part, here’s the cheeseburger section: ketchup, black pepper, mustard, finished with diced cheddar. i dressed the bun with mayo. as previously mentioned, a bit of lettuce and pickle would go a long way with these things.

top five: ways to recover from the work week

Mon, 14 Nov 2011 14:42:48 -0500

right now, just this second, i have decided to start doing top fives. i’m a cook, so i fucking love making lists, so it makes sense for me to do this here. this is the internet, so i’m allowed to do this. i’m also allowed to stop writing them without notice. you, as it stands, are allowed not to read these things.

number five: watch some stories

movies are good. television shows are better. i recently gave up on the walking dead because the acting and writing are competing for the designation of being the worst. that’s okay because boardwalk empire is inspiring (haircuts, taking care of business, etc.), and american horror story is bizarre and worthwhile. #occupychesterfield

number four: go watch a canucks game (for free)

this isn’t for everyone, because not everyone is friends with a season ticket holder that happens to be out of town every now and then, but it’s a great way to relax. i did this last night, and i still feel great.

number three: ride a pony

i have a bicycle, and i use it to get to and from work. this worked out really well when it was warm outside, but now the sun doesn’t have full custody and we only see it every now and then. rain and wind make the ride a mess. i should buy rain gear, and perhaps a bike that is a) my size (that’s why it’s my pony), and b) suitable for treacherous conditions. as it stands, it’s better for parking outside of coffee shops than getting my body to important places in one piece. regardless, there is nothing like blasting down main street at 6AM, with the wind and rain slapping you in the beard, only to arrive at work barely on time with soggy jeans and a cold pair of hands. if that doesn’t sound fun, it is. what’s truly special, rain or shine, is hopping on the pony and riding away from work on whatever day happens to be friday. it’s incredible.

number two: see people

i like the people i work with/for, to the point where it doesn’t feel like 40-50 hours of forced company. that said, i see my girlfriend and other friends far less regularly, so setting aside what little part of my weekend that can be spared is totally worthwhile.

number one: drink a beer(s)

the great thing about number one is that you can put it together with any of the other things on this list, and if you’re lucky (and not a problematic drinker), you just might double your fun. there’s a time and a place for beer. that time is after, never before, work. the place can be anywhere that won’t cause problems with the police. i like my couch or a bar stool.

testing

Thu, 03 Nov 2011 00:22:29 -0400

i’m an idea guy. i struggle to bring them to life. i am working on it.

i could use a heavy dose of patience, which is absolutely a required trait of any cook who wants to graduate from taker of orders to giver. i want my concepts to actualize immediately, and it doesn’t always work out that way.

there are blessings in my life right now: one, i’m afforded the time to tinker with ideas, and two, i have access to trustworthy critics. frankly, these are the best parts of my job. it’s frustrating to be sent back to the drawing board repeatedly, but less so when i’m sent there with ideas and valid criticisms. it is a test of diligence and discipline to tweak an idea incrementally until it can’t logically progress any further. then, and only then, is it “ready”.

this process had led to a toughening up of my inner critic. i’ve come to expect more from myself, and i’m better than ever at realizing when something either isn’t right, or could be better.

the goal, i suppose, is to make something that doesn’t require any fine tuning. this may never happen.

wine

Wed, 02 Nov 2011 00:45:02 -0400

a recent article in the atlantic, i think, pointed out that people, even experts, don’t always know what they’re talking about when it comes to wine. some experiments took place that really exploited the shortcomings of the human mind, and unfortunately exposed some people for being pompous. with food and drink, i try and categorize things as either good or not, with most things falling under the category of “good”. i’m lenient, but i also know where to go for what. enter, expectations. expectations are a bitch, and are notorious for being the ruiner of many things. i’m talking about a burger at so and so’s, or the star wars prequels. i try not to have expectations. when i don’t, things seem to work out.

wine is a nice thing to be introducing myself to. i have zero expectations, really. i don’t know enough about wine to be put off by fickle things like labels or brands or what have you. i’ve had plenty of wine, but i’ve had plenty more beer, so drinking wine is a completely different experience. i’ve set boundaries, primarily that i won’t spend over $20 before tax on any one bottle. the bottle pictured above rang up just a penny less than the limit, but it was/is really good. this recommendation comes from a serious laymen, but according to that article, i think we all qualify as laymen. the more you know, the longer the list of reasons not to like something becomes. i am guilty of this snootiness. it is ugly. i’m trying to get over it by drinking wine and keeping an open mind about it.

two fridays

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 20:24:11 -0400

there is life after work, and in this business of food and cooking it can be easy to become obsessed with the job. it is a fine line between attention to detail and obsession, and it’s best to come no closer to the latter than to tiptoe on that line. so, with that in mind, i can express just how much i enjoy my friday: a lot. i had a wonderful teacher in elementary school who would lay out our entire workload for the week on monday, with hopes that we’d get it all done on friday at some point. some kids would hang on till the bitter end, but i enjoyed the transparency of the system, and went after the sweet reward of “free time” if i managed to get my shit done properly and in a timely manner. that freedom was a powerful motivator when i was a kid, just as it is now, even though it doesn’t quite work the same way. this week i wrapped up on sunday as per usual, galloping into daylight and into my glorious weekend. i enjoyed that night as i normally would, only to wake up the next morning and find out i would be needed to work that evening. no sweat, i said, and went about going to work. the magic of that situation is that i was afforded the precious opportunity of experiencing TWO FRIDAYS in succession. that, my friends, is a nice thing.

peace.

Fri, 21 Oct 2011 23:22:55 -0400

there are many reasons to drink beer with friends. when it happens i can always count on the presence of laughter and shop talk. sometimes, however, opportunities arise. last week i was offered the opportunity to visit the okanagan for secret reasons. i gladly accepted and soon found myself en route to the interior. the last time i did that drive i was 14 years old, sitting beside my father in a moving truck on our way back from a 10 month trial run as albertans. the truck had a warning light for the brakes that was perpetually illuminated. the light, unfortunately, had a very loud buzzer that sounded as long as the light was on. it was a very long trip. i didn’t take in the scenery that time, but this time i did. i grew up surrounded by mountains, and in a town that could only be reached by way of a very windy and treacherous road. the trip to penticton reminded me of going home, even though i was going somewhere i had never really been. i had driven through, yes, but i would never say that i had been there (i’m saving the details for a post over at urban diner, so look over there in a few days or so). as a cook it is an important drive to take, given that you zip through some pretty prominent growing areas of produce and grapes for wine. there’s also an abundance of livestock, and that’s easier on the eyes than the nose. it was like driving through the pictures of a calendar, months september through november. everything was orange and yellow, except the sky which was the kind of blue you won’t see until next year. it was beautiful enough that i wished penticton was further away. alas, it wasn’t, and we soon found ourselves partying down until eventually having one final drink at some place called the barking parrot. the next day was wide open, and fortunately just as beautiful. it’s a quiet place this time of year. most of the tourists have buggered off, and the downtown core doesn’t hum the way it does in metropolitan areas. i was really able to relax there, and it was quite clear that the citizens were as well. perhaps that’s why they live there. the cultural spoils of the city can’t be had in smaller places, just as the peace and quiet can’t be had in a city. even in the wee hours of the night, when you can almost hear yourself think, some asshole on a motorcycle rips past your apartment, seemingly to remind you that you need to get out of town once in a while. go somewhere.

cooks

Fri, 14 Oct 2011 02:13:11 -0400

somehow, as if by witchcraft, i managed to get together with a bunch of my friends last night. this is rare because we’re all cooks, and i don’t usually see any of them one on one, let alone all at once, because we’re usually busy playing a little game i like to call “cook the food”. i’ve always been open about the fact that the people i’ve met and will meet in this industry play a large part in my overall interest. there’s a commonality between us, a shared burden, if you will. and that burden is just for us, because no one could ever truly understand. you either know, or you don’t. there are many kinds, just as there are people, but i’ve come to realize that if i find myself in the company of a stranger who also cooks, it doesn’t take long to cut through the small talk and get to things that are actually interesting. i met my current boss, long before he hired me, at a campfire on vancouver island. we were drunk, as were hundreds of other cooks gathered for the chef’s congress, and he told me about the virtues of temple. as in the temple from a roasted pig’s head. he insists to this day that it’s the best part.

most of us don’t earn much money, and so you’ll notice that cooks are prone to associating pride in a job well done with self worth. some folks lump that together with finances, but it would be a dire description of our persons if we did the same. so, when you’re all at a table drinking beer and telling stories, every one is more or less of equal standing. it’s a nice thing, and it’s too bad that it’s so rare.

nerd alert: aeropress

Mon, 10 Oct 2011 21:32:17 -0400

that right there is an upside down aeropress, a highly recommended and affordable coffee gadget i picked up at elysian coffee on west broadway. i’ve been eying one of these up for a while, but finally caved and got one plus a reusable metal filter for about fifty bucks. this is the latest addition my growing stable of coffee nerd gadgetry, which now includes a hand powered burr grinder, a scale, and a now dusty french press. anyway, it’s upside down because the internet says it works better that way, something about the “oils” from the “bloom”. it’s basically a syringe with a fine filter instead of a needle. the result, because of the vacuum pressure, is something like a really clean espresso and a french press. it’s good, though i need to tamper with the grind before it’s just right. it’s fast too, so that’s a plus. the thing also cleans super fast so double plus.

a guy, a girl, and a dirty burger

Sat, 08 Oct 2011 00:56:44 -0400

yet another topical photograph taken months ago. this is a post about being a cook and having nights off, and that is a marriage proposal directed at swedish twins who also happen to be hockey wizards. there simply aren’t any dots to connect. thousands of years from now, when the future people are rummaging around on the internet, they may stumble upon my little square and wonder what it all means. anyway, tonight was a friday night, and a year ago that meant something very different from what it means to me now. it used to mean hard times. now it means good times. i don’t know that it’s going to last forever, actually i’m sure it won’t, so i do what i can to take advantage of the sweetest schedule i’ve ever had. i do this by going out to dinner, and tonight i ate at refuel while watching skinny, sugar, and paulis do their thing. i’ve been doing the day shift for about two months now, and it still feels strange to make my exit while it’s still light out. ultimately i’m engaged in line cook rehab, getting back on solid ground and feeling good about everything. the mornings aren’t as busy as the nights, and that means i get my mitts on the good work - making ravioli, ragu, sugo, cakes, and the like. this is what i love about cooking. having an idea, or being charged with a task, and navigating my way through it until it becomes real. that’s cooking.

i sometimes have the pleasure of watching others do this, and it’s the best. the first time through a concept or technique is a blast to be around for. there are nuances to everybody’s approach. some people are aggressive, others cautious and technical, and then there are the cowboys who do things that are risky but sometimes pay off. the boss made two kinds of bruschetta using spleen and heart. these aren’t on the menu, but in a perfect world they would be. it was just for us to eat and learn from. off the cuff moments in the kitchen have a way of rescuing the mind from monotony, and the best places manage to squeeze these moments in regularly. i’ve been privileged to work in places that provide me with the opportunity to learn, and i never want to find myself in a situation where that isn’t the case.

the return of (real) sports

Thu, 06 Oct 2011 20:49:41 -0400

tonight we turn the page on last season by starting all over again. for now, i’ve got evenings off, and that will afford me precious time to micromanage my championship fantasy hockey team, the bearded ladies. there will be beer, and friends, and shouting, and cheering, and a whole gamut of things that people do in this country when men on skates hit one another and go real fast. this time of year is when we hibernate, and most of the good things the sun provides go away until it comes back full time next year. i’m excited about a lot of things these days, but the return of my beloved canucks takes precedence this evening.