08.31.06
Posted in The Story at 10:02 pm by Chef Matt
The song stuck in my head today was “Gin & Juice” by Snoop Dogg. I don’t even like rap. Jesus that is annoying. But the opening line referring to “so much drama in the LBC” seemed rather apt with reference to the latest developments about the future of the restaurant.
Simply put, there are not enough bathrooms to accomodate the number of seats the restaurant has. I am not sure how it got away with its current layout for so long, but with the transfer of ownership for the restaurant, and all new papers being filed, this is one of the things that the Arlington county paper pushers took note of.
Maybe if we just scattered these around the restaurant. I’m sure that woudl make all the inspectors happy… |
It is obvious to anyone who has set foot in the restaurant that there is no room for more bathrooms. Hell, if we had room to expand into, we would put more kitchen space, or a walk-in refrigerator first before adding bathrooms. But we don’t have that room, so it is moot.
But if the seating outside is taken away as a result of this code violation, then simply put, the restaurant would have to cease to exist.
So of course this spills over into a question of how to resolve this issue between the new and old owners of the restaurant, and that has the employees like myself concerned as to what happens next. Who is going to end up as owner? Will the place have to shut down? When will I learn the recipe for that really great fresh herb sauce?
Personally I see this all as a storm in a teacup, and the resolution will come both quickly and amicably. But it is amazing how quickly things can seem to spiral out of control in such a stress-laden environment as a kitchen. And speaking of stress: if one more person comes in and orders three steak and cheese sanwhiches with lettuce, tomato and mayo - I think I am going to lose it.
Matt
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08.30.06
Posted in The Story at 6:05 pm by Chef Matt
Two chicken parmesans fly effortlessly into the salamander while a pasta portioner full of spaghetti is pulled from the boiling depths of the cauldron on the stove. No sooner has the pasta slipped in with the red sauce in the small sauteuse on the front burners than two veal cutlets burst into flame on the pan immediately to the right as another batch of veal lemon (it’s supposed to flambé like that) is finished off. The chicken drops down to work level again with a beautifully browned crust of cheese on it, and receives its spaghetti accompaniment and the veal lemon is sauced and married to fresh vegetables. All the plates are cheesed, parsleyed and handed over to the runners while two lasagnas and a batch of spaetzle are started for the next ticket.
Total elapsed time: under 1 minute.
Let’s make one thing clear - this is not me at work in the kitchen. Well, “not yet” is perhaps the way I would like to think of it, but simply put, it is truly an amazing thing to see line chefs at work who know exactly what they are doing, and when to do it. Not a single wasted motion. No hesitation in any movements. Just pure completion of the tasks at hand with invariably perfect results.
With all the effort and stress on our faces that you or I my have when watering our lawns, the other chefs at Tirolo are able to work five lunch orders at a time, and still manage to have pleasant conversations with the customers and make sure that all other staff members (like me) are doing what we should be doing at the right times.
The crowds were pouring in through the open doors today. (Don’t they know we are supposed to get a lot of rain?!) And they really were crowds. Every other order was for a table of 6 people. It is much more pleasant to see 10 orders for two people than 2 orders for 10 people, believe me. Timing is everything in the kitchen, and when one dish is missed on a long ticket or something takes longer than expected or has to be redone (let’s just say, hypothetically of course, because someone added a bit too much red pepper…) then the whole careful balance of timing the tickets is thrown into chaos.
And it was that revelation today that helped me understand why it is so important to get everything right the first time. It’s not because of the wasted food costs or the delay to the customer - though these things are important, they can be absorbed through careful pricing and the fact that most customers are understanding of such things. But rather, a great set of chefs, while they look like they are effortlessly navigating a mighty sailing ship around Cape Horn in 40-foot seas, the fact is, they are dancing a perfectly choreographed ballet - and don’t do well with someone coming along and stepping on their toes. Everything is thrown off, and THAT is hard to recover from for them.
This guy is to “So You Think You Can Dance”, as I am to the other chefs at Tirolo.
(That was my first analogy since the SAT’s) |
So more than learning to cook at Cafe Tirolo, I think I am learning how to dance. Even if it won’t land me on “So You Think You Can Dance” any time soon (for the record, “No, I don’t think that.”), I think this will be the real lesson/skill of this first job that I take with me.
The question is: are the dance steps I am learning here applicable only to Tirolo, or will they be useful everywhere I go? There will be only way to find out - but hopefully that will be some time from now.
Matt
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08.28.06
Posted in The Story, Greatest Hits at 7:02 pm by Chef Matt
Everybody now - all together:
“UN-BREAK MY HEAAAAAART!
SAY YOU’LL LOVE ME AGAAAAAIN!
SOMETHING OR OTHER WALKED OUT OF THE DOOR AND SOMETHING ELSE OF MY LIFE!”
This is the soundtrack of my brain in the kitchen today. It’s not like I like the song, it’s not like the song is even a well-known one to me as you can see. But about once every 13 seconds this song jumped into my head and was repeated at full volume. And it wasn’t Toni Braxton singing it either - at least that might have been tolerable. Rather it was some off-key disastrous version that is stuck in there for some reason.
“Wait, have you heard us do
Achey-Breaky Heart?!?” |
The “singing” in my head invaded like an infestation of locusts, only nowhere near as melodious. Cutting cucumbers? “UN-Break my heart!!” Cleaning salmon fillets? “SAY you’ll love me agaaaaaain!” Sautéing onions? “Blah blah blah walked out of the door and something out of my life!” Imagine putting the soundtrack to Alvin and Chipmunks singing your favorite song on a constant repeat on your CD player. And not the whole song, just 2 lines of it. That is my brain while in the kitchen.
But this torture is not just limited to R&B classics, but it can be any song, and it happens every day. Something is in my head every day - and it can be anything. A commercial jingle, a song I really love, a song I really hate, the last thing I heard on the radio that morning, or something I haven’t heard in years. But the only consistency, there is ALWAYS some song in there filling the void - and it can be really annoying.
Here are some of the songs that are the more frequent offenders:
But I am afraid if I ever hear the
Armadillo Song that my good friend Alejandra of Sent from My Dell Desktop is infatuated with, it would trump all of these forever. Thank God I have yet to hear it myself…
Matt
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08.25.06
Posted in The Story at 11:37 pm by Chef Matt
My first full-time work week is done. 8AM to about 9PM almost every day (only until 5PM today since we are not open for dinner on Fridays) this week. A total of 59 hours worked, on my feet and working full-tilt. So while may pay is in general low, there are a lot of hours that I am working, so the pay is adequate enough for me to fund my half of the family budget. But the cost to my physical well being is indeed steep.
And in a sense, it is only my first week…
Vic said it pretty plainly this week. If you want to make it in this business, you need three things:
- Brains
- Love of cooking/food
- Willingness to work incredibly long hours
I have never feared hard work. I am willing to do any task set to me, and never is there a job that I shy away from. The new owner was telling me about a person who came in for kitchen helper job. She asked him to grab something off a top shelf and he said “Oh, it’s too high!” She (rightfully) fired him on the spot. All the tasks in a restaurant are hot and potentially dangerous and many are unsavory to say the least.
Example: lifting a heavy pot of boiling water and 6 lbs of pasta over another such boiling pot with flames jumping up at your hands and arms while your back screams in pain at the heavy burden that you dare not drop. And that’s just the morning prep!
Which brings me to a certain distinction that needs to be talked about at this time. The difference between cooking at home for friends, family and so forth, and professional kitchen cooking.
Fortunately for me, I drew my inspiration to become a chef from other sources… |
The previous cooking style is what makes people like me (and most likely you as well gentle reader) fall in love with cooking. We invent new dishes and follow complex recipes and pour through cooking magazines like they were romance novels. And it is somewhere in the midst of all the creativity and adoration that is heaped upon us that we are lured into the realm of cooking as a profession.
And as I have mentioned before, cooking school does not prepare you for exactly what you are going to go through. They can’t because too many people would drop out quite frankly. And rightly so. This is not a vocation for everyone, and I hope that I am portraying that accurately in these postings.
The day in the early stages of working in kitchens consists of the following:
- Repetition
- Burns and cuts
- Repetition
- Heavy lifting
- Berating for everything you do
- Repetition
- No creativity allowed in your tasks
- and did I mention?…. oh yes, I did.
Now while it may sound like I am trying to cast dispersion on the profession, or talk of it like it is a bad career path, let me say now that I still love it with all my heart. Every day I am seeing improvement in my skills. I can handle more of the line on my own each day, and my superiors (everyone else basically) trust me with more and more of the tasks at hand.
But I am still miles away from making up menu items, or suggesting directions for the restaurant, or even choosing which tasks I do and don’t do. I am the low rung on the ladder. The bottom brick of the pyramid. And I will remain there for quite some time. Instead of being in charge of my own kitchen and having all the adoration heaped upon me, which is what lead me to this career, I now do nothing but that which I am told, and when it comes to praise for the food, I am completely invisible behind the real “chefs” of the restaurant.
Quite the culinary “bait and switch”, huh?
But I digress. This all started with me just saying “I’m tired”. So very, very tired. Perhaps I should close with the lyrics from the song “I’m Tired” in the great movie “Blazing Saddles“. (Lyrics and performed by Madeline Kahn)
The late, great Madeline Kahn as Lili Von Shtupp |
Here I stand, the goddess of Desire
Set men on fire
I have this power
Morning noon and night it’s drink and dancing
Some quick romancing
And then a shower
Stage door johnnies always surround me
They always hound me
With one request
Who can satisfy their lustful habits
I’m not a rabbit
I need some rest
I’m tired
Sick and tired of love
I’ve had my fill of love
From below and above
Tired, tired of being admired
Tired of love uninspired
Let’s face it
I’m tired
I’ve been with 1000’s of men
Again and again
They promise the moon
They always coming and going
Going and coming
And always too soon
Right girls?
I’m tired,
Tired of playing the game
Ain’t it a crying shame
I’m so tired
God dammit I’m exhausted
Tired, tired of playing the game
Ain’t it a crying shame
I’m so tired
[Soldiers:]
She’s tired (She’s tired)
Sick and tired of love (Give her a break)
She’s had her fill of love (She’s not a snake)
From bellow and above (Can’t you see she’s sick)
Tired (She’s bushed)
Tired of being admired (Let her alone)
Tired of love uninspired (Get off the phone)
She’s tired (Don’t you know she’s pooped)
I’ve been with 1000’s of men
Again and again
They sing the same tune
They start with Byron and Shelly
And jump on your belly
And bust your balloon
Aye!
Tired, tired of playing the game
Ain’t it a freakin’ shame
I’m so…
Let’s face it everything below the waist is kapput!
[Soldiers:]
Tired!
Time now for some sleep.
Matt
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08.24.06
Posted in The Story at 10:58 pm by Chef Matt
In a previous post, when I spoke of my decreasing salary, I had some responses from people asking about the compensation that arises from the life of a chef. I guess this is a hard issue to tackle if only because there are a lot of different considerations to be taken into account.
First off, I am not going to say how much I make here since that would probably be improper considering that other people in my position may use this kind of information as leverage for their own positions, or who knows, maybe even coworkers are reading this… Just know that the $1/hr pay cut was a significant percentage of my salary - not something that will just “not be noticed” at the end of the month.
Secondly, there is the realization that for those who go straight into the culinary industry in their careers, this is not a low salary that they are dealing with. This is the starting point for working in the business. It is like any other industry, you start at the bottom at a low salary, and then climb up from there. In fact, what I make now is EXACTLY what I was making when I first started working at my old job. You know, the one I left to become a chef.
No. This is NOT going to be you. Get this idea out of your head.
Credit to Dennis Cox for the Illustration. |
(In short, to start this career is starting all over for me - and that is how all my fellow second-career types should be thinking about this. Think about the salary you earned right out of college, (assuming you didn’t get one of those ridiculous consulting gigs) and that is probably about what you will be earning when you start as a chef.
The catch is, if you are doing a “start over” career path like myself, it is hard to get used to the thought that you will have to go back to spending like you once had to before. Or not spending as the case may be. I think what makes it harder for a second career type like myself is that now there are more financial considerations that I can’t change in my life that I am part of. For example, I am now paying off a mortgage, which I was not doing when I first came out of college. Additional things like cable TV and my cell phone (grr) also make it so that I have regular bills to pay that I did not have before. And so while I may have the same thin slice of pie that I lived off before - it now has no “crust” if you will.
Hmm… an apple pie with no crust is just…applesauce, huh? |
(I am hoping to win a nomination for “worst food-related metaphor” for that one…)
Working in my favor, I have a wonderful and supportive wife who makes a good salary and is able to make sure we don’t fall into any sort of financial ruin in this “lean” period for me - though I am making sure I keep up my half of the household expenditures. So far at least…
But absent such a safety net, what is one to do in such a situation? Well, my advice is to take this part of the change in your career very seriously. You are going to be making a lot less than you are accustomed to (I am in the neighborhood of making only 25% of what I did before…) and so I would draw up a budget. Some things you spend money on now on a subscription basis are going to have to go. Some examples:
- Cell phone/blackberry/huge number of minutes plan
- Expanded cable TV with on demand and internet package
- Tivo
- Netflix
- Regular manicures (trust me, nothing will make your hands look good)
You get the idea. Draw up a budget now. No really, do it. Without taking into consideration how little you are going to make when you start off, you are never going to afford it.
And it really would be a shame to not be able to live your life’s dream simply because you need the money for rent.
Matt
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08.23.06
Posted in The Story at 11:34 pm by Chef Matt
I’ll start off with what I am sure is the question that is at the forefront of your minds given my last post: “Have I been fired?” The answer is: “Not yet.” I am making huge progress on the line, but the little mistakes plague me here and there. But they are becoming fewer and are occurring less regularly. While the progress is in the right direction, I live in the constant fear of having my skills “top out” at a place that is not good enough. I just hope that my boss will keep backing me through this tough time. So far, so good.
But now for the fun of today. For today’s fun, we have to go back in time one week. Last Wednesday night was apparently very very busy. Epically busy. The kind of busy you write epic poems about. I mentioned something about it in my post of my first double shift. In fact, I started doing double shifts last Thursday as a response to how busy last Wednesday was. Every time it has gotten busy since then, I would say something along the lines of “Wow, it’s getting busy…”, the response would invariably come back “This is nothing compared to last Wednesday…”. It has achieved mythical proportions.
Watermelon at work. It’s not just for elementary school teachers anymore. |
But something else started last Wednesday. The new owner brings in watermelon on Wednesdays for all the staff at night. Last Wednesday was the first instance of this (and given how busy it was, it apparently was quite the affair in and of itself…). But this was my first Wednesday night working myself, and I can safely say the following about eating watermelon in the kitchen:
- Wash your hands before eating watermelon - especially if you have been peeling raw sausages beforehand.
- Wash your hands after eating watermelon - it is a wet, messy, sticky food. This is all well and good when you are eight years old, but not when you are trying to cook for the masses.
- There is a lot of water in watermelon - this is helpful considering that I spend all my spare moments in the kitchen drinking water anyway.
- Having a seed spitting fight in the kitchen is a bad idea. (Just kidding!) (Umm, about my actually having a seed fight that is… having the fight is indeed a bad idea…)
Have you ever noticed how watermelon flavored candies don’t taste like watermelon, but they all taste like each other?… |
So now I have one more thing to look forward to each week. Sure, there is the weekend and payday and all things like that, but come on - watermelon? It’s awesome.
(Of course ask me how I feel about it in 3 months when I have been eating them for 12 weeks and they are out of season…)
Matt
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08.21.06
Posted in The Story at 11:50 pm by Chef Matt
The following is a complex set of things to explain, so I will do my best to try and explain it all in a way that keeps it in the light I really see it in. In its entirety, this is all a positive series of events that are occurring, and even though there are parts that sound bad at first, trust me, this is all for the best.
I have now been at Cafe Tirolo for 5 weeks. I know, it is hard for me to believe as well. I have gotten the morning prep down perfectly, to the point where I can usually set-up all of the lunch items for multiple stations and some of the dinner items in just the time it used to take me to do about half the morning work. The sandwich station is not much of mystery any longer - that took me about 2 days to figure out all the nuances of. And there are soups and sauces that need to constantly be made throughout the week that I am now entrusted with on a regular basis.
However, it is the busy line work - the heavy lifting of the restaurant at its busiest times, if you will - that continues to elude me. It has been 5 weeks, and I am still struggling on the line. No matter how you slice it, this is not good. So much so that the new owner has realized that I should not currently be earning a full-on line cook’s pay just yet, and has bumped my hourly wage down by $1/hr since my skill set is stuck at the level of prep cook and sandwich maker. For this, many other restaurants quite possibly would have fired me, but I was spared the axe. (Pay attention to this point any would-be chefs out there! The early jobs are hard, and you may not get such understanding treatment!)
(This was the part I warned you about that sounds really bad… but it does get better…)
However, my boss - the new owner - was able to figure out what the problem was. (Thank God!) The problem was that the old chef/owner, Vic, was never letting me work on the line. I have always been the outsider looking in on all the fast-paced work of the line. I have tried to learn what I could by watching what was going on in front of my befuddled eyes at mach 16. When I try to mimic these actions, I of course fail since I have never really tried any of them myself, nor have I received any sort of instruction on how to do them. In short, I wasn’t “getting” any of it because I wasn’t doing any of it.
The new owner has now changed things, so that Vic works on prep cooking (which he enjoys since it gives him more of a rest). I now work with Miriam on the line. Just the two of us (unless it gets super-busy when Vic can come in). I was fully in agreement with my new boss about how my skills were not where either of us wanted them to be, and this would be a great way for me to advance my skills quickly. Today was the first day of this new schedule, and I have to say, I think I may have learned more today about timing of dishes and how to make more menu items than on most any other day I have worked so far.
Some see the glass a half empty.
Some see the glass as half-full.
I see it as water that I need because I am always so damn thirsty in the hot kitchen! |
In addition, I am now a full-time full-timer. That is, I will be working double shifts every day that we are open for lunch and dinner (M-Th). So while I am taking a minor pay cut in my hourly wage, the number of hours I am being given has just increased by about 18 hours/week, so at the end of the day, I am actually now taking home more money.
And finally, my boss has agreed that once I get my skills in line - when I can work the line like a pro - my pay will come right back up to where it belongs. In short, she has given me a goal, and some serious motivation. And I don’t like backing down from challenges.
So it is time for me to play in the big leagues. Hell yes, I am now full of doubts. I have just been “called out” in the least subtle way imaginable. In short, it is sink or swim time for me.
I plan on swimming myself.
Like I said, I am positive about all of this - I have a goal, and I’ll let you all know when I get there.
Matt
P.S. And I know I still owe you all a recap of New York! It is coming - I just thought this was a little bigger and more on-point with the story-line of becoming a chef…
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08.17.06
Posted in The Story at 10:15 pm by Chef Matt
Over 12 hours of work. Only one short break in the middle of it all. It was a hectic day for me, but apparently not as hectic as the night that preceeded it all.
I came in this morning to do my morning prep work, and I noticed that out on the counter there was a lot more pasta than usual to be cooked as well as all the cans for a fresh batch of tomato sauce. Normally this isn’t such a big deal except for the fact that we had made an entire batch yesterday. To have gone through an entire batch of tomato sauce in one day means business was indeed booming. The set up which usually only takes me an hour and a half took me a full three hours today, and I was still working hard at prep work (to replace everything that was used up yesterday) when I began cooking for the new customers coming in.
Lunch was hectic but not record-breaking, but with the fears of a repeat of last night tonight, my neighbor decided to keep me on for this evening as well. It was a long, hard day, and I look back on the set-up work I did this morning as some distant memory - like it was several jobs ago. As if all of that happened before my last performance review or something, when in fact, it was only just this morning. And tomorrow I will have to start it all over again…
Kobayashi, right, is the world-record hot dog eater.
Sonya “The Black Widow” Thomas, left, is my personal hero. |
Well actually not - they don’t need me for this Friday, and so I get a three day weekend, and so I am headed off to New York for the weekend. I will finally get a chance to try a Nathan’s hot dog on Coney Island. I think we are going to see a Broadway show or something as well, but that is of course a distant second to a good food-related experience for me!
Do I plan to attempt to break Kobayashi’s record? No. But I do plan to enjoy every last bite of my dogs. I’ll let you know how it goes!
Matt
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08.16.06
Posted in The Story at 11:15 pm by Chef Matt
In my last post I mentioned how I was having trouble with the pizza crusts still. Well a good way to learn any cooking technique is through practice and repetition, and yesterday I had my shot at that. The sandwich station was busy as all get out, and in addition, they needed me to work on the pizzas as well. And work on them I did.
The orders continued to pour in for pizza after pizza - in fact I had never seen so many orders for them in a single day. Additionally, they kept coming in even after we were technically closed for lunch. Three guesses as to what we will still serve to people even after we are supposed to be closed up…. Time’s up, if you said “subs and pizza”, give yourself a gold star. And of course that is exactly what I was working on, kept calling me back into action.
But the bright side of all this over-emphasis on this station made it so that something finally clicked in me on how to make the pizza crusts come out right. It is hard to explain with words - which is why Vic had so much trouble explaining it to me - but i got the finger motion down right yesterday so that there is actually a small crust on the edge of the pie, which is exactly what he was looking for.
By the end of the day, the pizzas I was producing were looking good - so much so that Vic was indeed impressed. (You have to pay close attention to when chefs are happy with your work. It is their job to make sure you feel like a numbskull as much as possible, so compliments are hidden… I could see one here.)
“Daniel-san, your crust shows improvement, but your toppings are still not distributed evenly…
So, paint my house!” |
But the real impressive part came at the very end of my shift. By 3:30 even the most die-hard late-lunchers were done coming in and ordering belated pizzas, so I was free to get my own lunch. Vic was cooking a pizza himself for his daughter, who also works at the restaurant. When his was done, he realized he had overloaded it with toppings and said, “Hmm… maybe I should have gotten you to make this pizza…”
As far as compliments from chefs go, that is like getting your own ticker tape parade.
So add one more skill to my repertoire. Only about 15,000 more to go…
Matt
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08.14.06
Posted in The Story at 6:58 pm by Chef Matt
No, I am not working at a new job, and no, I don’t know about the dessert gig just yet, but rather, I have a new gig within Tirolo. The restaurant ownership transition is almost complete - lots of forms to sign involved in the process apparently - and this means lots of transition in the staff. Hell, that’s how I came aboard in the first place.
But one of the people that left is the guy who mans the sandwich station. So, they have put me there for now so as to fill in that hole for the time being. My job now is to make Meatball Subs, Italian cold cut subs, Chicken Parmesan subs, Italian sausage subs and Steak and Cheese subs. Not particularly difficult work, but vital to the operation of the restaurant of course.
What is key to this new position in the restaurant is something one of my instructors once told me. Basically he would work at every station in a restaurant at some time or another. Once he felt he could do them all, he moved on to the next restaurant.
Now let’s get one thing VERY clear: I am MILES away from knowing how to work all the stations in this restaurant. There were two new specials today I had never seen before (a baked trout and a chicken spaetzle), most of the sauces and all of the pastries are things I have never made before, and I am still struggling with how to get the pizza crust exactly the way my boss likes them.
There is still lots to learn for me, so this was a good situation for me to learn a little more.
That being said, as a man raised by a couple from Philadelphia, I know a good steak and cheese sandwich when I see one. And while the ones we have at Tirolo are about as good as can be expected outside of South Philadelphia, I have a question to pose to all the people of DC:
Cheese and onions only. Yes. |
Why do you keep ordering cheesesteaks with lettuce, tomato and MAYO? These are not turkey sandwiches people! What the hell are you people doing? Mayo is great stuff, but not on a steak and cheese. Please, save me the agony, and keep the salad out of your steak and cheese sandwich. The following items are acceptable toppings for a steak and cheese sandwich:
- Steak
- Cheese (provolone is best, Cheez Whiz is more authentic)
- Grilled/sautéed onions
- salt and pepper
- Hot peppers
- a little bit of ketchup
If you like them:
- Sautéed mushrooms
- Sautéed green and red peppers
Good lord, you can’t even taste the steak and cheese with all that rabbit food in there. Wrong wrong wrong! |
End of list. Notice that mayo did not make the list. It is not there, it does not belong there, and you should be ashamed for asking for it. And for those who say, “Well everyone likes it their own way, and there is no wrong way to have it..”, let me just say this:
No.
You’re wrong.
Shut the hell up.
Anyway, I am sure many of you will now flood me with your preferred cheesesteak toppings and additions. But I’ll leave you with this: It’s not the meat or the toppings that make them so good in Philly… it’s the rolls.
Matt
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