I'm on the menu
You might not believe it, but there's a lot of good energy flowing in the kitchen where I work. I know that I'm contributing to it. After working on the Emerald City Blues Festival, I have felt a renewed sense of purpose, vitality in my life. I worked very hard in the run-up to and during that weekend (12 hours of sleep over four days) but I got so much enjoyment out of it. I've realized something fundamental about myself: I enjoy creating spaces where people can enjoy themselves. It's only served to confirm the suspicion that I want to work in restaurant design/creation. I really love the idea of helping someone see the vision of their restaurant through from initial ideas to launch. Before the festival, I don't think that I would have been so ready to embrace someone else's vision, but now, I'm more of a people person. Me, a people person? I know.I'm happy to have figured this out and this enthusiasm has carried over into work. We're in the process of redesigning the menu and I've been playing with a lot of pastries. After seeing that cool episode of Good Eats recently about pocket pies, I came into the restaurant on Friday with a huge jones to make some pop tarts (the irony here is that, in a lot of ways, pastry class at school made me hate pastries ... but now in the real world, I love playing with them again). My chef saw them and, after a few minutes of conversation, we had a new dessert: a couple of mini pop tarts, one with blueberry and dried cherries, the other with vanilla apple cinnamon served on a plate with a shot glass full of panacotta. Pop tarts with milk.
We're also finding ways to use of all of that duck confit we have in the freezer. First choice? Duck confit risotto with honey mascapone. Delish.
2 Comments:
About time. Although, as you stated, its irony that you are now enjoying yourself in the pastry lab. I guess not having to make archaic desserts or the presence of radioactive looking fondant sludge dripping of baked choux crusts, helps. Though Marty, as being the only person who got the oppurtunity to work with you one on one for 14 months I found myself sometimes doing more observing of you then of the instructions at hand. You have a great gift that will probably keep you alive longer than most, that is the gift of being able to think ahead. Not just a few steps but way the fuck ahead, practically to the finish. Here in lies the virtue of your ultimate goal of becoming a restauranteur. Your brain is made for it. This isn't to say that sometimes you didn't think a little too far ahead and getting yourself in to a little trouble but you always pounded out a few shoes and made it out o.k.
S
Thanks for the vote of confidence, Stefan ;)
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