more cheap shots and bon mots; a note on the Jackson-Dylan battery.
Chef Bitch didn't do anything horribly offensive. It was tone and attitude, a willingness to make examples of people not in the procedural groove. At a guess, most chefs are built in the same way.
Chef Jackson, perhaps early 50s, was a marine before he became a chef. Consequently, he approaches his job with a drill instructors eye for detail, but does so with affability. He demands more from these new chefs than they do of themselves, has a sink or swim style, but does it all with what feels like kid gloves. All the while, Chef teaches directly from the book. No nonsense, no tricks, no screwing aorund with recipes. Do it by the book, get you technique clocked. Dylan is maybe 30, graduated from CCA a few years ago and worked on the some of the busiest lines in SF. He takes Jackson's book and shows you where you can save a step, a trick here or there that will give you the extra 1-2 minutes that you will always need. Where Dylan is cocky, Jackson is humble. Where Jackson demonstrates the correct method, Dylan demonstrates 3 ways to circumvent it while maintaining the essence of the product, and does so on the sly so as not to openly undermine Jackson.
A prime example came early this week when learning the proper european omelet. Beat the hell out of three eggs, to the point they are almost foam. Using non-stick pan (the only time we do, in fact) over low heat with a tablespoon of butter or so, gently push the egg mixture toward the middle of the pan with a plastic spatula until the egg begins to set. At that time, you leave the egg alone for a minute or two. Lay your ingredients in the middle, wait another minute or so and fold one third of the omelet over itself, then you slide the omelet onto the plate using the pan to complete the fold. You end up with a perfectly folded, oval shaped omelet. Eurpoean omelets have no color; they are never browned. If your heat is up to high, the middle will be to runny. To cook it through, you end up browning it. We're talking 6-8 minutes, tops.
Than there is the Dylan method. High heat. Not blistering, but high. All steps the same until the egg sets. Once it has, make sure the the omelet is moving freely in the pan, then flip it. Once flipped, fill it, fold it and plate it immediately. No color, no runny middle, perfect - and you made it in half the time.
Jackson tells you to learn to cook before you start doing tricks. Dylan shows you how to flip large product, like eggs, by using a roll of masking tape in a pan, and small product by using dry beans. Then he shows you how to do it with both hands at the same time.
Last, the thinning of the herd is now in full swing. The food science final, which included a 5 minute oral presentation (I chose food additives, yawn), was harder than I anticipated it would be, and the grades around the class showed it. Don't worry, kids, I managed to maintain my A's. Worse, Evan, one of my tablemates, has reportedly left the program. If that's true, I'll miss him. He had his shit together around the kitchen and I liked working with him. These days I am working with Joe, who you'll remember from the consomme caper. We get along pretty well at the stove. I'd still rather work alone, but we are producing too much in each class to allow it.
- Pen ink all over my jackets isn't so bad: I was at the North campus the other day and saw students coming out of butchery looking like MASH extras coming out of a triage scene.
- I guess this really is a sort of trade school: some poor slob got a 17 out of 50 on the food science final. Ouch. Pal, you dropped almost $50k to learn this shit. Open a book, huh?
- What doesn't kill me: between week-old, room temperature stocks, buffet steam tables that haven't been changed in three hours, and all the raw egg products I've tasted, I am building up some serious immunities to food borne illness.
- Hey, man, I'll give you a pack of cigarettes for those: clean, dry towels are gold around here, a barterable commodity, and there are never enough of them. Nevermind my two side towels. I burn through thoseeach night in about an hour.
- I think I left that rosetta stone around here somewhere: Chef tends to interchange "t" on the recipe board for both teaspoon and tablespoon. Trust me, there's a big difference.
Chef Bitch didn't do anything horribly offensive. It was tone and attitude, a willingness to make examples of people not in the procedural groove. At a guess, most chefs are built in the same way.
Chef Jackson, perhaps early 50s, was a marine before he became a chef. Consequently, he approaches his job with a drill instructors eye for detail, but does so with affability. He demands more from these new chefs than they do of themselves, has a sink or swim style, but does it all with what feels like kid gloves. All the while, Chef teaches directly from the book. No nonsense, no tricks, no screwing aorund with recipes. Do it by the book, get you technique clocked. Dylan is maybe 30, graduated from CCA a few years ago and worked on the some of the busiest lines in SF. He takes Jackson's book and shows you where you can save a step, a trick here or there that will give you the extra 1-2 minutes that you will always need. Where Dylan is cocky, Jackson is humble. Where Jackson demonstrates the correct method, Dylan demonstrates 3 ways to circumvent it while maintaining the essence of the product, and does so on the sly so as not to openly undermine Jackson.
A prime example came early this week when learning the proper european omelet. Beat the hell out of three eggs, to the point they are almost foam. Using non-stick pan (the only time we do, in fact) over low heat with a tablespoon of butter or so, gently push the egg mixture toward the middle of the pan with a plastic spatula until the egg begins to set. At that time, you leave the egg alone for a minute or two. Lay your ingredients in the middle, wait another minute or so and fold one third of the omelet over itself, then you slide the omelet onto the plate using the pan to complete the fold. You end up with a perfectly folded, oval shaped omelet. Eurpoean omelets have no color; they are never browned. If your heat is up to high, the middle will be to runny. To cook it through, you end up browning it. We're talking 6-8 minutes, tops.
Than there is the Dylan method. High heat. Not blistering, but high. All steps the same until the egg sets. Once it has, make sure the the omelet is moving freely in the pan, then flip it. Once flipped, fill it, fold it and plate it immediately. No color, no runny middle, perfect - and you made it in half the time.
Jackson tells you to learn to cook before you start doing tricks. Dylan shows you how to flip large product, like eggs, by using a roll of masking tape in a pan, and small product by using dry beans. Then he shows you how to do it with both hands at the same time.
Last, the thinning of the herd is now in full swing. The food science final, which included a 5 minute oral presentation (I chose food additives, yawn), was harder than I anticipated it would be, and the grades around the class showed it. Don't worry, kids, I managed to maintain my A's. Worse, Evan, one of my tablemates, has reportedly left the program. If that's true, I'll miss him. He had his shit together around the kitchen and I liked working with him. These days I am working with Joe, who you'll remember from the consomme caper. We get along pretty well at the stove. I'd still rather work alone, but we are producing too much in each class to allow it.
