Maybe I want to look like a butcher, chef.
Chef Jackson is particular about attire in his kitchen. Since I haven't posted any photos yet (I will, Mom, really, just hang in there), let me show you around from top to bottom.
You've got your white hat, which is a short, flat sort of thing that looks similar to a knit cap but with a little more shape. It's not the chef hats that you see standing 18 inches off the top of the head. Those are reserved for instructors. Most students roll the brim of the cap up in some fashion simply because the hats are big and sit high. I pull mine down in the back so it fits better. A few students wear the hats as they are, but no one talks to those clowns. Next you have your white neckercheif, which is really just like the one you had in the boyscouts, tied into a standard windsor knot. On most students you can barely make out the neckercheif since it is tucked beneath the chef jacket. The jacket is white, naturally, double breasted, with your name stitched on the right breast, the Cordon Bleu logo stitched on the left and the CCA logo on the right shoulder. On the left shoulder you have a small pocket with a slot for your thermometer, a black sharpee and a regular ball point pen. Then we have your trousers, which are cut baggy as hell, black and white houndstooth check pattern. Next, your white apron and two white side towels, each neatly folded and tucked into the apron. Finally, shoes. Black. Slip-resistant. Absolutely no, underline NO, sneakers. Many students prefer the slip on or clog style. I have a pretty basic lace up pair. Very round. Very black. Very unfashionable. Strictly utilitarian, I suppose. One of these days I'll plunk down the cash for a new pair of Docs, which do qualify.
Sneakers? Cuffed pants hanging down below the heel of your shoe? Sleeves rolled up rather than a single cuff? Side towels jammed into your apron? Go be a butcher, or so says Chef.
"Work clean, people. A customer just had the best meal they've ever had, they want to thank the chef. You aren't going to wander out to the front of the restaurant with a stained jacket and towels. If you want to be a mess, go be a butcher."
'Go be a butcher' is a common punchline for Chef.
As you can imagine, there is not a much room for expression by way of clothing, as we are all decked out in the same get-up. So, you find different ways to make yourself stand out? Personally, I like leaving skills class with a dirty apron, ragged side towels and a few stains on my jacket; it makes me feel like I did something. If you aren't getting dirty, you aren't playing.
Today felt like our first day of real cooking. We had to prepare two sauces, an espangole and a demi glace, and potato leek soup (the sauces were perfect, as I have nailed my routine on roux, and the soup was tasty if a little thick). I was managing to stay relatively clean, save for the odd splash of brown veal stock here and there. However, I was on stock team.
We have in the skills kitchen a 50 gallon steam jacket, which looks like a very large steel barrel, for making stocks (the skills kitchen produces stock for every other class). Inside that steam jacket today was 30 or so pounds of carmelized veal bones, 15 or so pounds of carmelized mirepoix and, of course, the stock. Step one is to empty the stock into smaller containers by opening at valve at the jacket's base. Once emptied of the precious stock, the remaining bones and mirepoix and scum must be shoveled out.
There is no way to work clean when up to your shoulders in spent cow bones and compost-ready vegetable matter. You walk away from stock team looking not only like a butcher, but like a butcher that was pulled through a 6 inch diameter sewage pipe. As the kicker, everything you own now smells like beef stew. Enjoy.
And as I left the skills kitchen, I was a fucking mess. A smeared, greasy, wet, stinking of beef, one side towel remaining as the other I threw away rather than attempt to clean it, fucking mess. Add to that picture, reader, the second cut I put on my left hand back on Monday and a couple nice looking burns that I profited from forgetting the physics of heat transmission. Ignoring pain while working the hotline is critical, but that will be examined with a later post.
I was a mess, and it felt good. Maybe I want to look like a butcher, chef.
Chef Jackson is particular about attire in his kitchen. Since I haven't posted any photos yet (I will, Mom, really, just hang in there), let me show you around from top to bottom.
You've got your white hat, which is a short, flat sort of thing that looks similar to a knit cap but with a little more shape. It's not the chef hats that you see standing 18 inches off the top of the head. Those are reserved for instructors. Most students roll the brim of the cap up in some fashion simply because the hats are big and sit high. I pull mine down in the back so it fits better. A few students wear the hats as they are, but no one talks to those clowns. Next you have your white neckercheif, which is really just like the one you had in the boyscouts, tied into a standard windsor knot. On most students you can barely make out the neckercheif since it is tucked beneath the chef jacket. The jacket is white, naturally, double breasted, with your name stitched on the right breast, the Cordon Bleu logo stitched on the left and the CCA logo on the right shoulder. On the left shoulder you have a small pocket with a slot for your thermometer, a black sharpee and a regular ball point pen. Then we have your trousers, which are cut baggy as hell, black and white houndstooth check pattern. Next, your white apron and two white side towels, each neatly folded and tucked into the apron. Finally, shoes. Black. Slip-resistant. Absolutely no, underline NO, sneakers. Many students prefer the slip on or clog style. I have a pretty basic lace up pair. Very round. Very black. Very unfashionable. Strictly utilitarian, I suppose. One of these days I'll plunk down the cash for a new pair of Docs, which do qualify.
Sneakers? Cuffed pants hanging down below the heel of your shoe? Sleeves rolled up rather than a single cuff? Side towels jammed into your apron? Go be a butcher, or so says Chef.
"Work clean, people. A customer just had the best meal they've ever had, they want to thank the chef. You aren't going to wander out to the front of the restaurant with a stained jacket and towels. If you want to be a mess, go be a butcher."
'Go be a butcher' is a common punchline for Chef.
As you can imagine, there is not a much room for expression by way of clothing, as we are all decked out in the same get-up. So, you find different ways to make yourself stand out? Personally, I like leaving skills class with a dirty apron, ragged side towels and a few stains on my jacket; it makes me feel like I did something. If you aren't getting dirty, you aren't playing.
Today felt like our first day of real cooking. We had to prepare two sauces, an espangole and a demi glace, and potato leek soup (the sauces were perfect, as I have nailed my routine on roux, and the soup was tasty if a little thick). I was managing to stay relatively clean, save for the odd splash of brown veal stock here and there. However, I was on stock team.
We have in the skills kitchen a 50 gallon steam jacket, which looks like a very large steel barrel, for making stocks (the skills kitchen produces stock for every other class). Inside that steam jacket today was 30 or so pounds of carmelized veal bones, 15 or so pounds of carmelized mirepoix and, of course, the stock. Step one is to empty the stock into smaller containers by opening at valve at the jacket's base. Once emptied of the precious stock, the remaining bones and mirepoix and scum must be shoveled out.
There is no way to work clean when up to your shoulders in spent cow bones and compost-ready vegetable matter. You walk away from stock team looking not only like a butcher, but like a butcher that was pulled through a 6 inch diameter sewage pipe. As the kicker, everything you own now smells like beef stew. Enjoy.
And as I left the skills kitchen, I was a fucking mess. A smeared, greasy, wet, stinking of beef, one side towel remaining as the other I threw away rather than attempt to clean it, fucking mess. Add to that picture, reader, the second cut I put on my left hand back on Monday and a couple nice looking burns that I profited from forgetting the physics of heat transmission. Ignoring pain while working the hotline is critical, but that will be examined with a later post.
I was a mess, and it felt good. Maybe I want to look like a butcher, chef.
