The search for the right kitchen

I expected that my first stage might not pan out. I arranged several stages in the course of a week so I would have the opportunity to compare them and figure out exactly what I was looking for in a work environment and from a chef.

My next stage was at The Breslin. Located in Midtown at The Ace Hotel, the Breslin is a British love child between Michelin star Chef April Bloomfield and Ken Friedman. The Breslin specializes in large format meals featuring roasted suckling pigs and whole lambs. I was prepared to walk into the kitchen, take orders, put my head down and work. I arrived early in the morning where I reported to the chef de cuisine, slipped into my whites and got to work on the morning prep list. Across from me, a butcher prepared a whole hog for the afternoon's suckling pig reservation and next to me, another cook made breakfast. 

The kitchen was huge. I worked in the prep kitchen, below the open kitchen upstairs in the dining room. About six people were assigned to prepping vegetables and as cooks arrived throughout the morning, some of them butchering and others working on other projects. I was asked to cut large quantities of vegetables and make the cumin aioli that is served with The Breslin's lamb burger, which is credited as on the city's best. The kitchen and crew were very focused and professional. Everyone tested their blades before getting to work, sharpening and honing their steel for desired sharpness. 


As I looked around the large prep table where 10-15 cooks organized their stations, I noticed that there was also an even ratio of males to females. I had wondered if a kitchen lead by a female chef would employ more females than the average male-dominated kitchen, and it appeared that in the case of The Breslin, that was true. The female cooks were strong. They were sassy. Even in their whites, they were hip, and all of them had tattoos and forearm scars. These chicks were badass. 


When I left my second stage, I was definitely interested. I had received great instructions and the kitchen was organized and professional. I admired how fresh each piece of produce was, and I was in awe of the large walk-in dedicated to whole hogs, large slabs of beef and lamb and a variety of offal. Sweetbreads, trotters, tongues, livers, hearts —They were all there, and it seemed like each part of the animal was being used at The Breslin. Unfortunately, I didn't have full-time availability with school and I got the impression that I needed more experience to work in a Michelin star restaurant.

Next stage: Resto, a German gastropub, headed by Chef Bobby Hellen. I staged there twice after I was contacted by Chef Hellen. I met him at the school's career fair, and he seemed interested in working with my school schedule.  What I liked most about staging at Resto was that Chef Bobby was present in his kitchen. He touched every plate before it left the small kitchen, ensuring each dish looked the way he wanted. With a small expo line and a couple ranges, Chef Hellen and two cooks turned out food while other cooks prepped downstairs. Chef Hellen was young, calm, collected, focused and mentoring. While I didn't learn anything particularly new at Resto, I did realize that it was important to me that the chef, where I worked, be present and invested and that the kitchen be on the smaller side. 


Which is what I found on my third stage at Paulino's under the instruction of Tony Liu. Paulino's, located several blocks away from FCI, was looking for a part-time cook for some days and evenings. I hadn't eaten there, but I walked past the place every night after school on the trek back to the East Village. When I met with Chef Liu, I was a little nervous. Here was a chef that had worked with Gray Kunz of the former Lespinasse, Daniel Boulud of Daniel, Floyd Cardoz of now shuttered Tabla, Mario Batali of Babbo and done extensive networking and traveling in Europe. Surely he was intense having worked his way through such kitchens, but to my surprise, he was not. He friendly was personable. I mean, the man asked me some serious food questions, but he was cool. 


What Chef Lui was doing as the executive chef at a casual Italian eatery and pizziera, I didn't know, but it became more apparent as I spent the afternoon throwing pizza dough. I took warm rounds of dough that had been left to rise and shaped them into pizzas, tossing them with my knuckles to ensure the dough did not break. The knuckles are the secret. Finger tips can puncture the soft dough, so it's important to be gentle and move your hands precisely. After a few fails, I had the pizza thing down. I was tossing, topping with the necessary ingredients and sliding the pies into the wood-fire oven. The cheese bubbled as the flames licked the crust from afar, creating charred pockets of air. After rotating the toasted pies, I'd then maneuver the pizzas out of the oven, run a slicer through each on and send them to the expo line. Everyone working at this restaurant had great energy, including Chef Lui, who I later learned was also the executive of Morandi, another Keith McNally restaurant. McNally also owns New York City favorites Balthazar and Pastis.  


I didn't end up working at any of these restaurants. Why would I spend my time working for free in all of these places to not end up taking a job at any of them? Surely, I must be crazy right? A lot of my classmates thought so. The Breslin and Resto needed someone available for full-time employment, which I didn't really have with school. I was offered a job at Paulino's where I could have worked the early bird shift through lunch, but decided against it because I craved more than pizzas and roasted chickens. As much as I enjoyed my time there, I was being directed elsewhere when I reflected. I wanted to see a kitchen with some real "wow" factor. 


Each stage revealed something very important to me. My first nightmare stage showed me that I didn't want to be working and learning from people who weren't dedicated to their craft. At The Breslin, I observed cooks working very sustainability with whole animals and extremely fresh products. They were all professionals too. Each cook at The Breslin had worked hard for their position. At Resto, I saw how dedicated and involved Chef Hellen was with his staff. He was essentially functioning as his own roundsman.  I also liked that Resto was on the smaller side. 


I wanted to find a combination of all these kitchens: Professional, focused, sustainable, chef-driven and all on the smaller side. Of course, this had to come at a price. If I wanted to be in a Michelin kitchen on a part-time basis, I needed to extern. My next step was finding a Michelin kitchen that would take me on, understanding of my hectic schedule. 


Did I find? You bet I did. I found it at Dovetail, and I'll tell you all about it in my next post. 

My first kitchen nightmare:

"For me, the cooking life has always been a long love affair, with moments both sublime and ridiculous."  
 — Anthony Bourdain

I hadn't expected my first kitchen stage to end with a failed drug deal, but I knew I had to leave with the sous chef pulled a large cloth sack from the front of his pants, revealing a large stash of hash, narcotics and hallucinogens.


"I'll sell all of this by the end of the day," he said, looking up at me with inviting, very dilated eyes. "You want anything?"


I continued to peel the pathetic "local" carrots the restaurant was using for the pantry station, showing no interest in his unprofessional offer. I had known he was high from the moment he arrived to the kitchen, nearly an hour and a half late. His long, seemingly unkempt hair was still vertical and his clothes were wrinkled and disheveled. He staggered a bit when he walked and appeared disoriented in his own kitchen. The executive chef, an alum from my program, arrived minutes behind him, only slightly more in tune.


"I'm good," I said, glancing away from his goodie bag.


"What kind of drugs do you do?" he asked, baffled by my disinterest.


"Nothing, really," I said, peeling my final carrot.


"Nothing? Wow. That's odd in this business." He stuffed his bag back into his pants and retrieved his phone from his pocket. He began pulling up his pictures, scrolling through images of naked women and paraphernalia. "I have all of this at my house," he said, trying to capture my attention.


"Look, is chef around? I think I'm done for the day." I had been in the kitchen an hour before his arrival, and before that I had waited at the bar for 40 minutes, where a handsome bartender attempted to reassure me that a chef would be arriving shortly to greet me. Instead a dishwasher showed me a changing room and gave me instructions for prep.


"Oh yea? Ok, well... I'll find him. I'll tell him that I think you'd be a good fit here. We're a pretty busy kitchen, you think you could handle it?"


I smiled, humored that this man had barely touched food since he had arrived, let alone observed my skills. I had prepped his entire station before he even arrived and made his scallop ceviche as he texted and threw pans in the dish pit with an unnecessary intensity.


"I'm actually not interested in working here," I said, removing the gloves I had insisted on wearing after I observed the sous touching produce with unwashed hands; Hands that had been in and out of his pants, each unclipped nail with dirt and resin beneath it. "I'd just like to say goodbye."


The sous began looking for the chef, eventually arriving back to tell me that he was sleeping upstairs in the dining room. Not totally surprised, I changed and grabbed my knives. I went upstairs and met the chef at the staircase, who was in a sleepy daze.


"Chef, thank you for the invitation to come in and stage. I'm headed out."


"Yea, what did you think?"


"Well, I think you're kitchen is a mess and your sous chef is highly unprofessional. He's clearly high and he tried to sell to me. I'm not interested."


He looked stunned as he searched for words. "Wow, well, I'll be talking to him," he said, in an unconvincing, apologetic tone. Afterall, he was probably just as high as his buddy.


"Have a good service," I said as I headed for the door. I walked out, put my sunglasses on, and continued down the street, back to the East Village. I'm not naive to the fact that kitchens are often occupied by criminals and drug users. I've met plenty of cooks with a past and various addictions, but I don't want to be in a kitchen where my supervisors are unprofessional. Point blank. The stage was a nightmare, but it showed me the kind of kitchen I didn't want to be a part of, on any level.


My search for the right fit continued. I don't care if I work with ex-jailbirds, junkies or drug dealers — I mean hell, I probably work with some right now. While I was staging in New York City, I just wasn't looking to work somewhere where personal problems and issues tampered with my goals: to deliver great food, to learn and to constantly seek improvement.


My next stage... coming soon!

Coming to a truce with my calling

 Graduation day with Chef Alain Sailhac

To cut to the chase, finding my career path has been challenging for me. I'm intrigued by a variety of areas within the restaurant industry and I can imagine myself succeeding in most of them. Deciding which one will ultimately make me the happiest is another matter — A matter that has introduced me to insomnia.

I haven't written about this due to a combination of factors; The biggest being that I simply wasn't ready to share my feelings and observations during my last three months in the concrete jungle. It wasn't easy accepting that something I planned didn't come to surface, and even harder to acknowledge what was really in my heart. Everyone at home knew I was going to culinary school and thought I was on the verge of landing my dream job at a culinary publication.

I moved to New York City just over a year ago. It was August 9, 2010. I packed my belongings into five boxes, ditched my other things in a storage, and left Kansas. I cried when I said goodbye, took a nap on the plane and woke up to look out the window before landing. There, the towering buildings penetrating the sky; Me, the girl from the Midwest, looking down to the cracks between buildings, aware I might be swallowed alive.

Last time I wrote, I was in the middle of level 5 at The French Culinary Institute. I had just completed my menu project (which I received "Best Menu Project" for during graduation) and I was beginning to see the light at the end of my EXTREMELY expensive culinary tunnel.  I was essentially working two jobs, going to school and externing on weekends. I had absolutely no time to spend on my blog, let alone sleep for that matter. I was determined to inhale all that New York City had to offer, especially since I knew in my heart that I might not be staying.

With that said, I should probably rewind some more. I moved to New York City, specifically, to break into culinary media. I knew it was going to be hard work and I was ready to show my motivation. As long as food was the subject, I was ready to alphabetize manilla envelopes and organize office supplies to get into the biz. After I adjusted to my school schedule I applied for several editorial internships and accepted a full-time editorial intern position with Food Arts magazine. I checked content for accuracy, made phone calls, assisted with advertising, organized archives and ate at way too many Midtown delis. After working seven hours everyday, I left with my change of clothes and either went up or down the 6 line, depending on if it was a school night or another evening of work. I worked all day on Saturdays and on Sundays I occasionally had a personal day where I slept, cooked and drank too many glasses of wine. 

The internship was a pivotal experience for me. It was after two months at Food Arts that I came to the great realization that I wanted to be in a kitchen, atleast for a little while. I applied for a test kitchen internship at Saveur magazine and was invited to come in and cook for an afternoon with their staff, and after that experience I was completely jazzed. The kitchen manager invited me to be a summer intern at the magazine, but it was full-time and unpaid. The real kicker was that I couldn't have a part-time job because it isn't unusual for the test kitchen staff to stay late. You can't have other commitments. The reality of this killed me. I just couldn't do it unless I lived in a cardboard box in Union Square.

I went back to the drawing board. As much as I was learning at Food Arts, I was feeling a little restless. I also knew from the beginning that this internship wasn't leading to a job because there wasn't room on their staff. I was also completely broke. Sure, this isn't unusual for an intern. All interns grow restless and survive on cheap noodles and pizza. The thing is, all I could think about was cooking in a commercial kitchen. After researching restaurants for the magazine, each of them inspiring me with their photos and menus, I thought to myself, "Could I be a part of something like this?" This question lead me to my career advisor's office, where I made the decision to apply for kitchen jobs.

For me, my heart and focus have always been dedicated to the creation of plates. Whether it was the ex-murderer Crip flinging a cheap ribeye into the window at Martini's Steak & Chop House when I was a 16-year-old server in Salina, Kansas, or as culinary student searing and plating a crispy duck breast in the L'Ecole kitchen, my attention has always been on the food and the hands preparing it. I want to tell stories of people creating great food and share recipes from the culinary brilliance of others. This is still at the core of the inquirer that I am. Part of me wondered, though, did I have a story I wanted to tell others with food on my own? Did I crave authentic cooking experiences? Should my editorial career be on hold?

I fed my curiosity and made some changes. I started staging around the city, trying to find the right fit. A culinary stage is when a cook works in a kitchen for a brief amount of time, usually for free, in an effort to network and learn new techniques. It's also custom to stage for jobs. It gives the cook and the chef a chance to see if there's good working chemistry. Staging in several places around the city was crucial. Not only did it prevent me from working in the most dysfunctional kitchen I've ever witnessed, but staging ultimately lead me to a kitchen where I really was able to observe and learn from true masters of their craft. I will save my stories about staging for another post, as several of them are rather involved.

After several stages for positions, I decided it was going to be more valuable for me to find a part-time extern position where I could still keep a front of the house job. This also meant I could spend time in a high-caliber kitchen, learning from chefs with a lot of experience. As much as I wanted extern full-time, it just wasn't financially possible. I learned that at the magazine. For those of you who don't know, an extern is a kitchen intern. Like other business models, kitchens cut labor costs by hosting externs. In exchange for training, the chef takes a student or recent graduate under their wing. In some cases the experience leads to a job. Well, I guess I shouldn't make it sound so mutually beneficial. I've heard of some kitchens abusing their externs and taking the help for granted. In my experience, however, the chefs I ended up working for were very much a mentoring group.

At Dovetail, John Fraser's Michelin-stared and New York Times 3-star restaurant, I found the right fit. Located on the Upper West Side on the corner of 77th and Columbus next to a Shake Shack, Dovetail was the definition of elegance without being stuffy and pretentious. Fine dining? Yes, but in a slightly more relaxed atmosphere. The service staff was polished and very knowledgeable, but the restaurant itself wasn't the white table cloth joint with a bunch of talking heads kind of place.

The kitchen at Dovetail is wonderful. It's the perfect size, although I know the cooks would argue that they definitely need more space to prep. In regard to other kitchens in the city, however, I have to argue that it's a nice size because if you stand in the middle of it, you can see everything that's going on in the other stations. And the food – The food at Dovetail is beautiful! Simply beautiful. Though the portions are small, every plate is executed with precision and grace. I'll touch on this more when I write more in-depth about specific restaurants I've experienced.

So I started externing at Dovetail on weekends and transferred to another Fig & Olive location where I functioned as a serving captain several nights a week and served during the Midtown lunch rush at Momofuku Má Pêche. I didn't sleep. I didn't have a life. I wasn't always pleasant. I didn't have a whole lot of money. But you know what, I value the last three months the most. I worked really, really hard.

Around the beginning of July I made the official decision to move back to Colorado. Though I had toyed with the idea for awhile, a big part of me contemplated trying to make a life in New York City. I had roommates, potential apartments lined up and a general direction in terms of where I would look for work. It was around this time that I also got word that my grandfather, a man who had been battling cancer for over a year, was dying. It was conveyed to me that I may not have the chance to see him again.

December 2010

People who know me well are aware how important my grandpa Hal was to me, and will always be for that matter. He was the man who was present when my single mother was struggling and my father was completing his training as a surgeon. My grandfather spent a great deal of time getting to know me as a young girl and influenced much of my development into a young woman. I was living in New York City for nearly the entire duration of his illness. Christmas 2010 would be the last time I would grip his hand and offer him hope of a future.

The combination of feeling extremely overworked, homesick and distant (from family and from myself, really) made me decide that I needed to move to Colorado, especially if I was going to pursue a cooking career, which is very demanding of time.  So I booked my ticket and began cutting ties. This proved to be more difficult than I imagined. Even as I reflect, here in this moment, I deeply miss people in New York City. I've written it before, but New York City is the place where I really got a true taste of the world, right here in the United States. I met people from all over the world, all of them pursuing a dream, even the most simple dream of freedom to work and provide.

Two days after my graduation from The French Culinary Institute I reunited with my family to spread my grandfather's ashes. We stood together, friends and family, looked out to the mountains on a clear Colorado afternoon, and released our feelings of grief with his ashes. It was the most peace I had felt in months. He is missed dearly, but I feel his presence everyday as I struggle to find out who I am and what I'm destined to do.

So what am I doing now? You'll have to wait for my next post. I have many kitchen stories I'm itching to tell though.

Bon Voyage Level 3!

After tonight I will have completed level 3, appropriately titled: "Discipline: Skills For Consistency And Refinement."

Though I haven't written much about this level, I will say that it has helped me produce more consistent and refined food. Whether my dishes are consistent and refined this evening during the midterm evaluation is another story, but I'm starting exam day with some confidence. I've written task lists for the possible recipes that I'll have to duplicate and I've practiced each of these dishes several times over the past two months.

Basically what will happen is this: My class will arrive to the kitchen this evening and we'll take a short written exam before we learn what two dishes we'll have to make for a panel of judges out of the 16 recipes we've been practicing. Lucky for us, our chef narrowed the selection to eight recipes. It may be rumor on the street, but most classes have to memorize all 16 recipes and be ready to prepare any of them. Needless to say, we're all pretty grateful.

The possible combinations I'll be making this evening:

Filet de Orata Américaine & Pots de Créme
orata filet in a white wine sauce with mussels and shrimp & vanilla custard with a cookie straw


Aile de raie á la Grenobloise & Tarte aux pommes
sautéed skate wing with brown butter, capers, lemon and croutons & apple tart


Ofeufs poché sur macédoine de légumes, Sauce Hollandaise & Poulet rôti, grand-mére
poached egg on a bed of diced vegetables with hollandaise sauce & roast chicken, grandmother-style


Consommé Prinatiere & Cotê de porc, sauce au poivre vert
beef consommé & sautéed center-cut pork chop with green peppercorn sauce


Our chef will pick two of these combinations and half the class with produce one set and the other half of the class will produce the second set. We'll make four plates of each dish so the judges can see just how consistent and refined we cook/plate. I'm comfortable with all of the recipes, but I'm hoping that we make the skate dish with the apple tart and the consommé with the pork chop.

Once we know what recipes we'll be making, we're given two and half hours to present the first dish and about 40 minutes to finish the second dish. This seems like a lot of time, but it's a chunk of time that really goes by quickly when you're busy at work. You can't simply focus on one recipe because the recipe that's due after the first one requires prep time, and in some cases it's a lot of prep time. There's butchering to be done, stocks to be reinforced, vegetables to be cut, and a lot of actual cooking time to factor into the equation.

We've been practicing for this test for awhile now. We've had mock midterms, producing two dishes each for chef's approval. This has usually gone well, but tonight will be the first time proctors will be in the kitchen observing how we cook. They'll examine everything from our uniforms to the edges of our knives. They'll watch to make sure we're working in a logical sequence, and if we're working cleanly. Each misstep is a point off, and each misstep could potentially harm the overall dish, which would mean an additional loss of points when the dish is being judged by a panel of alumni. The timing, the temperature of the serving vessel, the temperature of the food, the presentation of the dish, the consistency and flavor of the overall product — It will all be judged.

"Once you have mastered a technique you hardly need look at a recipe again, and can take off on your own." I hope you're right, Julia Child. I hope you're right.

I have a big project due in a couple of months and chefs have advised that students start early, so I've been thinking a lot about my project concept. The assignment is to plan and budget a four course meal for eight people. The menu needs to have a focus and it needs to reflect what we've learned about planning menus so far. I don't have to actually cook for eight people, but I will need to make each dish and take a picture. It's not a requirement to write my own recipes, but I'm interested in testing my recipe writing abilities.

The honey selection at Kalustyan's, 123 Lexington Avenue

Every since I visited the Union Square Greenmarket for the first time late in the summer I've been intrigued by the variety of honey available in the city. My intrigue grew when I visited Kalustyan's speciality fine foods market several weeks ago.  I've never seen so many brands and flavors of honey! They even had truffle honey! At $17 a pop, I didn't buy it, but I wanted to... that's for sure. An idea that I've kind of settled on for this project is using a different honey for each course, showcasing a different technique for each segment of the meal. To narrow my focus even more, I'd like to research and develop a Mediterranean menu with seasonal ingredients, which only seems appropriate since I work at a Mediterranean restaurant and I'm already exposed to some of the flavor profiles.

Fresh branzino

Tonight I borrowed an idea from the restaurant and purchased a whole branzino (a Mediterranean sea bass) and roasted it with lemon, thyme, and olive oil. I went to Whole Foods, picked out my fish, and cleaned it at home. I wanted to incorporate the raw clover honey I also bought, so I decided to serve a salad with honey-candied pine nuts, Kalamata olives, red onion, and feta cheese. I made a honey balsamic vinaigrette to dress the salad and roasted some potatoes with garlic, thyme, and olive oil for a side dish.

 

I'm going to continue to experiment with honey and write about my research. Hopefully my project will be pretty well documented by the time it's due. If anyone has suggestions or recipes they'd like me to try, please email me your ideas at laurenbhendrick@gmail.com.

20 Things I Learned In Level 2

1. Improvise. Sometimes the cake doesn't come out of the pan as planned...

2. Expect the unexpected. You can make a butternut squash purée in an hour unless the squash is cut into small cubes. The oven doesn't care that the dish is due and the squash isn't ready, and neither does chef.

3. In good pairings, wine makes food taste better and food makes wine taste better! What a nice relationship.

4. I don't really fancy organ meat ("offal"), but I have faith that there are a lot of chefs out there preparing organ meats in some delicious ways. Chef April Bloomfield at The Spotted Pig already changed my mind about chicken livers, and chefs at The American and at Del Posto have confirmed my belief that foie gras is an irreplaceable luxury. I know the practice behind foie gras is cruel — there's no denying that — but if a server offers to let's say, ladle foie gras over a crispy duck breast, I'm afraid that I'm just not prepared to turn it away.

5. The term "venison" applies to meat of deer, elk, caribou, moose, antelope, and pronghorn. The USDA classifies meat from deer, elk, bear, moose, rabbit, alligator, and armadillo as red meat.

Flounder "My Way" - Panko pecan-crusted flounder with citrus beurre blanc, wilted spinach, & butternut squash purée

6. Veal is meat from a male calf that is 2-3 months old and it's delicate, tender, and pale in color because the calf's movement is completely restricted and its diet is monitored. This is a just a reality.

7. I now know more about custards, frozen desserts, crusts, and soufflés than I ever thought I would as a classic culinary arts student.

8. The difference between all purpose flour and cake flour is a BIG one. As a novice baker I used AP flour in place of cake flour all the time because I didn't want to spend the extra money, but it's a small difference in price that's worth it. Gluten, a network of proteins in flour and grain, is largely responsible for the shape and texture of a baked item. AP flour has a protein content of 11-12 percent and cake flour has a protein content of 8-9 percent. What does this mean? The type of flour used and how it is manipulated will yield pretty specific results. If you're serious about baking, knowing your flour and purchasing flour specific to your baking needs will make a huge difference.

9. Chilling dough and batter does matter. In the past I would rush chilling times specified in recipes, but I now understand that chilling is important because it allows the gluten networks to relax.

10. Appreciate handmade puff pastry! It took someone a little bit of time to make.

Apple tarts and a pear-almond cream tart

11. White chocolate is a chocolate impostor. It isn't chocolate at all. It's made out of sugar, milk soils, and cocoa butter.

12. In the words of Eldridge sous chef Nick Haxton, "I'm your chef, not your dietitian," but a food professional should know a thing of two about nutrition.

13. Sheep's milk has the highest fat content (7.5 percent) compared to goat's milk (4 percent) and cow's milk (3.7 percent), but reindeer (17 percent) and fin whales (42 percent) have the highest milk fat contents. Reindeer milk, anyone? How about cheese made from human breast milk? New York chef Daniel Angerer did just that earlier this year with his wife's breast milk. Check out the New York Post March 2010 article.

14. Making ricotta is easy. All you need is milk, citric acid, and salt. Food Lab blogger J. Kenji Lopez-Alt posted a nice tutorial on SeriousEats.com.

15. Gnocchi is versatile, easy (to my surprise), delicious, and can be easily edited for seasonal purposes. Spinach or squash can be added to the dumplings, the sauce served with the gnocchi can be light or heavy, and gnocchi can be served as a side dish or main course.

Roasted beet salad with endive, watercress, pears, Roquefort, & walnuts

16. There really is beauty in simplicity.

17. Real, French-style scrambled eggs ("oeufs brouilles") shouldn't take less than 15 minutes to make. They're cooked over medium-low heat with constant stirring and the final product should be soft, creamy, and thick.

18. The truth about sugar substitutes is that they're awful. Thank you, Chef Tim. Read this article. Raw sugar all the way!

19. Desserts are cheap for most restaurants to make, so why do you think restaurants send out birthday treats and "apology desserts?" It's cheaper than sending another entrée or booze.

20. At the end of the night, despite what went wrong or didn't get chef's approval, I'm still doing what I love.

Japanese Crab Cakes & Avocado Wasabi Cream

Sunday nights have a new meaning for me these days. I used to spend my Sunday night with a cup of coffee at my desk preparing for the next day's test or in front of my TV during the good o'l days of owning a TV and subscribing to HBO. These days Sunday has become my fun day, or atleast my fun night. It's the only night I'm not working or in class.

My roommate and I now invite a small group of friends over for dinner and drinks. We all pick a theme in week in advance during dinner. It started with an evening of fresh Mexican food and margaritas and has since progressed into vague themes like texture, childhood, and spice. This last Sunday was spice and I made Japanese-inspired crab cakes with avocado wasabi cream. I looked at several recipes for crab cakes and combined elements from a couple, eventually coming up with my own recipe.

Japanese Crab Cakes & Avocado Wasabi Cream

For Crab Cakes

1 lb lump crab meat

1/2 a small red bell pepper, ciseler

2 stalks of green onions, white parts only, chopped

1 small leek, emincer

1/2 a fresh jalapeno pepper, minced (without seeds)

1 tablespoon chives, hacher

2 eggs

1 1/2 cup panko crumbs

Cayanne pepper, to taste

Salt & Pepper, to taste

Canola oil

For Avocado Wasabi Cream

1 cup heavy cream

1 avocado

1 tablespoon wasabi paste

1 tablespoon fresh lime juice

1 teaspoon fresh jalapeno, minced

Crab Cakes:

Chop vegetables and combine in a small bowl. In a large bowl, whisk eggs until mixed and add crab meat. Coat the crab meat and add the chopped vegetables, mixing ingredients well. Add 3/4 panko crumbs and mix well. Season according to taste preference. The mixture should be moist. Refrigerate for 1 hour.

Avocado Wasabi Cream:

Combine all ingredients in a blender and mix until smooth. Refrigerate until ready to use.

Cooking:

Remove crab cake mixture from the refrigerator and make small crab patties, rolling each in the remaining panko crumbs. Reserve patties on plate or dish with parchment paper. If pan-frying, heat canola oil in a saute pan on medium high heat. If baking, heat oven to 350 degrees. Fry each cake until golden brown and drain of excess oil on plate with paper towels. If baking, allow cakes to bake for 20 minutes or until golden brown.

Serve crab cakes with avocado wasabi cream and fresh lemon.

This Sunday's theme is breakfast. I'm still scheming on what I'll be making.

Bruschetta

I noticed my $5 loaf of whole grain bread was getting a little dry, so I decided to use it by making some bruschetta. It's one of my favorite snacks that can easily be a meal too. I cut a few slices of bread and brushed a side with olive oil. I placed the bread under the broiler until each piece was a litte golden and chopped some farmers market tomatoes, canned olives, and fresh basil. I topped each piece with a crack of pepper and a little salt. It was a great way to use some aging bread.

Finally, free time

I finally have time to wash my underwear. After nine days of working, eight of them doubles, I'm happy to report that I've had three days off to do whatever I want.

Sunday I went to Trader Joe's and picked up some necessities. I'm pretty happy when my fridge is stocked with salad fixings, goat cheese, tortillas, salsa, almond milk, vegetables, and beer. My roommate works on weekends, so I decided to buy some salmon for dinner. I marinaded it in maple syrup, soy sauce, and fresh ginger and served it with barley and stir fried zucchini. We ate some edamame and cucumber dumplings for an appetizer. Mae has never had to cook for herself, so cooking in our tiny New York City kitchen has been enjoyable and new for both of us. In the mornings I usually saute myself an assortment of vegetables and serve them with eggs over easy.

Yesterday was the first time I was able to shop for anything that I didn't have to wear to work. I stocked our kitchen with a few items I found at cheap home furnishing store down the street and stopped at a farmers market. I was really surprised to see how many farmers markets are in the city! There are a variety of markets and all of them are huge! How they're able to transport all of the fresh produce is beyond me. I'm glad it's all available. Mae has learned that shopping for me usually entails kitchen items and groceries, not necessarily shoes and clothes. "On Friday we're going shopping," she said. "Oh great, I've been wanting to go inside the big Crate & Barrel!" I told her. "No, like real shopping, Lauren." I'm a lost cause.

Last night I was invited to observe a class at the French Culinary Institute where I'll be attending evening classes beginning next Thursday. When I arrived to the building I was issued a chef jacket and hat. I was introduced to a prospective student and together we were led to classroom of students prepping their cooking stations for class. The chef instructor told us he would be teaching how to cook and serve shell fish. I looked to the dry erase board that hung in front of the classroom. "Class Plan of Action" was written across the board with a list of tasks to accomplish:

Class Plan of Action

-Court bouillon with vinegar

-Sauce Americaine

-Moules a la marinere

-Escargot Bourguignon

-Scallop with parsley coulis

-Oysters & clams

The class met at the head of the classroom where the chef began to lecture about the versatility of sauce Americaine, which is a rich lobster sauce made using the entire lobster. He then grabbed a live lobster and began to prepare the class for the execution the lethargic sea creature. I watched as students began to squirm, some of them laying their eyes on a live lobster for the first time. I have memories of my father submerging live lobsters into boiling water for their final moments, but I'd never seen anyone kill a lobster like this chef did.

He held the creature with both hands, knuckles up, and twisted its body like a wet rag. Water and bodily fluids began to seep from the lobster's broken shell and the chef began to pull the organs from the head cavity. It was quick, and probably more painful for the students watching than the lobster. He then stuck a thick needle through the lobster's dismembered tail to prevent it from curling and the class watched as the dead specimen's legs continued to flail. The lobster's meat was placed in a bowl separate from the cracked shells, which would later be used to enhance the court bouillon. He then dismissed the class to preform the same routine at their individual stations.

I watched as students held their lobsters, some of them hesitant to commit lobster murder. Shells cracked and lobster bodies began to clank against the steel bowls at each station. Once the lobster preparation was finished, the class began to prepare their sauce Americaine and some steamed mussels. The smell of simmering garlic, butter, and lobster stock began to drift through the air. White wine hit my nose and I could hear the chef saw at crunchy baguettes. Broth foamed in each pan as parsley and slabs of butter were tossed into the mix. All I wanted was a slice of baguette and an invitation to dip it. Alas, the mussels were steamed and a buttery liquid was drizzled over their yawning shells. "Would you like one?" one of the students asked. She could probably see me salivating.

Class continued, and before I knew it I had been observing for an hour and a half. Luckily, when I turned in my issued chef coat I knew dinner downstairs at L'Ecole was waiting. My admissions officer invited me and a guest of my choice to eat at the restaurant on the school's tab. I will cook at this restaurant during my last 200 hours of training.

Mae was my guest and we enjoyed a cocktail at the bar before we were sat for our five course meal.

Dinner was fantastic. Mae and I asked our waiter about the sweetbreads on the menu since neither of us had tried them before. Sweetbreads are thymus glands of beef, pork, or lamb that are usually pan fried. Sensing our hesitation to try them, he didn't push us to order, but instead mentioned that he might bring us a surprise at some point in the meal. When our meat courses arrived, sweetbreads accompanied our osso buco and lamb dishes. We each tried them, but we didn't finish them. While the taste wasn't bad, the texture was different... almost like fried soft fat.

After five liberal courses, we were feeling full and sleepy. We pushed ourselves to walk home, and even though I was slightly uncomfortable, I smiled the whole way home. The evening definitely made me excited to start school next week. It's really happening!

Why Cook?

"We may be glorified servants, catering to the whims of those usually wealthier than us, but we are tougher, meaner, stronger, more reliable, and well aware of the fact that we can do something with out hands, our senses, the accumulated wisdom of thousands of meals served, that they can't." Anthony Bourdain, The Nasty Bits

"When did you know you wanted to be a chef?" My sister asked, just the other night while we were watching the final episode of Top Chef Masters. Marcus Samuelson, now Top Chef Master, told the story of growing up as an Ethiopian adopted child in a Swedish home, a past that has forever influenced his culinary success. While Swedish cuisine undoubtedly sculpted his palate, his roots in Ethiopia planted an ever growing ambition to raise awareness about the culture and the cuisine. Even though he spent hours cooking alongside his Swedish grandmother as a child, it is his dedication to multicultural cuisine that has made him great, which is an achievement that wouldn't have been possible without his particular history.

So when did I know I wanted to cook and be a chef? My past isn't nearly as intriguing as Samuelson, but I do know that I have always been drawn to food. My mother said that as a young kid I would constantly remind her when food was getting low in the house, worried that we would run out of things to eat and eager to visit the grocery store. I loved being surrounded by rows of fresh produce, aisles of perfectly stocked boxes of cereal, and chilled cases of cheese varieties. I remember asking permission to go stand in the dairy section because I enjoyed the cool temprature and I wanted to study the collections of yogurts and Pillsbury cookies. I was a weird kid.

My mother was a single parent after she and my father were divorced. Neither of my parents could afford meals out and food at home had to be affordable, quick, and simple. I remember eating a lot of instant potatoes, macaroni, crockpot fixings, and peanut butter sandwiches. My sister and I saw our father on weekends when he wasn't tied up with medical residency obligations. At some point meals with dad got nicer. We were no longer eating our standard ham steak dinner with macaroni and baked beans. My dad was cooking lamb, stewing seafood bisques, and reading about how to make his own pizza dough. What was even better was that my dad was inviting me to help him in the kitchen.

I really began to value nights in the kitchen with my dad. He began asking for my input and provided the means for me to explore desserts. He'd make dinner and I'd make dessert. I eventually started making dinners and started experimenting with course meals. It was my father's praise that really fueled my love to cook. Maybe I wasn't the child that matched his athleticism or academic success when he was in high school, but I was creating meals that he liked.

Last month I made the trip home to cook a father's day dinner for my dad. I talked to the chefs where I work and asked them what they would make for Father's Day. Chris Wofford, the Executive Chef at Ten, suggested that I poach seabass like the kitchen staff does in the Ten kitchen. I liked the idea and Chef helped me get my hands on fresh seabass.

I transported the seabass back to Salina and prepared butter sautéed seabass like my friend Nick Haxton, Sous Chef at Ten, taught me. I placed the seabass on a dense bed of lemon risotto and placed delicate pepper curls on the fish as a garnish, which is a technique I also brought home from the restaurant.My dad said it was the best seabass he has ever had, which is quite the compliment coming from a man who was born near a coast and later spent years living in Charlson, SC., while he was stationed at The Naval Academy. I prepared several versions of fried calamari as a appetizer and served a spinach, strawberry, candied walnut, and gorgonzola salad with a balsalmic reduction. It was perfect.

Watching people smile over a meal is the greatest satisfaction for me, and my dad's smile was wide that evening.