Writing a Menu Entry (The Joy of Cooking...Raccoon)

Thursday is the day for 'In the News', and today it took up almost half the class. Upfront and center was the Bruni's review of Daniel, a slavish 4-star ode to a beautiful space and pretty food. I questioned Richard about Bruni's view of the service as incredibly present and detail oriented -- surely the staff knows who he is and caters to him? It seems Bruni has a legion of less high-profile foot soldiers who also hit up the restaurants at other times to help confirm what the reviewer interprets.

It seems Gordon Ramsey has a 3rd show being imported, the F-Word. According to Richard, celebrity chefs control a lot of what the public think about food and dining, but the danger in that is that the celebrity chef industry gives control to a lot of non-food experts. Case in point: according to polls, the highest paid chef in America today is....Rachel Ray, a woman who isn't actually a cook.

We reviewed this blurb about the recent closing of NYC's Fiamma, a bellwether of bad economic times to come for a lot of fine dining establishments. Another story from the Times shows a restaurant which needs $6 million gross minimum to stay open it's first year, and based on it's model and the times, is absolutely doomed. Richard briefly told an anecdote, but held back some details because he hopes to have the main character come in and speak to us. It seems some South American baker wanted to open up a second location in NYC. By hiring the wrong people, the budget want from $1.25 mil to over $5 mil -- which is a tough nut if your selling cakes and coffee. On top of that, the lease for the space which all this money was spent on was improperly negotiated and ended up with a 1 year lease! Suffice to say, the place didn't stick around.

Richard left us with a story from the Kansas City Star: Raccoon: It's What's for Dinner, most appropriate after last week's NY Times feature on squirrel. Who knew that the 1938 1st edition Joy of Cooking contained raccoon dishes?

Next we broke into groups for another menu entry workshop. Every student was supposed to write three menu items from their concept restaurant. My concept is in flux and will try to write it this weekend. Pastry didn't write anything, and Northfork was absent today. Chicago gal's concept is for a neighborhood authentic Mexican eatery. I won't go through the whole process, but I'll show you one entry, along with Richard and the class's work on it:

Mole Negro: Braised Chicken Breast smothered in traditional Mexican mole sauce (an unsweetened savory sauce of herbs and chocolate.) Served with our traditional rice, refried beans and choice of corn or flour tortillas.

And the commentary: Braising is not the best method for cooking chicken breast -- it will be tough and dry, and will fall apart. Either offer multiple parts of the bird or change the method. It says it's 'smothered' in sauce, while 'smothering' can be read as another, contradictory method. No parentheticals. Don't repeat the word Mole from the name of the dish, just describe the sauce. And if we're aiming for authentic, you must be accurate -- Mole is about the chocolate, but also very much about the chiles. As much as you may want authenticity, it may be compromised to suit your clients -- if you're opening shop on the Upper East Side for Ladies Who Lunch, then whole chicken breast and tamed spices may be in order. The language of the sides miss some opportunities to show value -- "refried beans", what, from a can? Or some marvelous concoction brimming with smokey pork and cooked for 36 hours?

Slovak Ricky Martin's 3 menu items were a notable disaster, notable not for the technical side of their composition, but their content and contempt for the average eater. Beef tar tar with quail egg, goat cheese croquettes with panko, petit lobster rolls -- small dishes for twits. Raw ground beef with raw egg may be the one 'out there' dish on a more comforting menu, but then lumps of goat cheese? Blechchch!

Richard finished up the class with listing the main food groups of a dessert menu. They are:

• Chocolate
• Fresh Fruit
• Cake (texture)
• Pastry
• Creamy
• Crunchy
• Hot/Cold (can depend on season)

A good dessert menu will hold all seven of these groups, but doesn't necessarily have to be 7 dishes -- they can overlap. Something like Chocolate Hazelnut Cake has chocolate, cake and crunchy all in one. There should be a variety in the level of sweetness -- a fruit and cheese plate would be on one end of the spectrum, while a pecan pie would be on the other.

Next week, we delve further into the details of writing a menu.

Writing A Menu Entry, Continued (Mobbed Up)

The class started with Richard opening up the floor to stories from the students, a.k.a. 'odds and ends'. Russian Pam Anderson went to One if By Land, Two if By Sea with her husband and unsurprisingly were impressed by the 'romantic' decor but underwhelmed by the just-good food. Baseball Cap Kid, with out a hint of irony, told us about he and his girlfriend ordered from TGIFriday's, and when he drove over to pick it up, he had to walk through a crowded bar and get the attention of a bartender, just so he could retrieve his order. According to Richard, similar places like Applebees have a curb-side pick up service to avoid such silliness. On top of that, the order was packaged in an nondescript paper bag.

Queens Restaurant Lady said her restaurant recently installed cameras in and around the dining room, and has noticed the front of house staff spending more time in the dining room and engaging the customers. Some discussion came of this, with Richard explaining that it perfectly legal for the owner of a public space to video monitor (and/or audio monitor) people with no expectation of privacy. Bathrooms, where it is expected to be private, is another topic.

Most of the rest of class was dedicated to a menu writing exercise. After reviewing the basics of a menu entry (temperature, method, main ingredient, part and modifier), Richard distributed bits of paper with a basic concept on it. Each table were to write four menu entries based on this concept, then the rest of class would guess the basic concept from only reading the menu items.

One table got "upscale feminine",  another "moderate masculine". We got "moderate/themer". There had to be a fish & mayo dish, a beef and onion dish, a chicken and mushroom dish, and a shrimp and herb dish. Here is what my table came up with, along with criticism from Richard and the class. Apologies to all the Italian Americans out there, it was based on the Outback Steakhouse attitude, but literally only 5 minutes to write the menu....

• Sleeping with the Fishes: Swordfish Milanese resting peacefully on a bed of greens and a side of garlic aoli. Does the target market understand what 'Milanese' means? Maybe make it make Italian with "polenta-breaded or something. Aoli is French, not Italian, perhaps "olive oil Mayonnaise" would work more. What kind of greens? "Greens" is just abstract.
  
• The Goodfella's Beef:  Braised Osso Bucco & Balsamic-Glazed Onions over Egg Noodles. What's the braising liquid? Italian wine like Chianti would make sense. Egg noodles not Italian - name the noodle, like parpadelle.
  
• Omerta Chicken: Chicken Rolatini Riddled with Ricotta and Mushrooms. Needs method -- baked or fried? Needs a sauce or liquid. 
  
• Wiseguy Scampi: Tough but Tender Shrimp sauteed with garlic butter and oregano with linguine

Richard noted that we were consistent in naming the dishes -- naming some but not others would be awkward, and the names clearly communicated the theme. No, I will not be opening a mob-themed restaurant anytime soon, though it makes me wonder what the menu at the 'Bada Bing' topless bar in NJ contains...

We finished the day with the basic menu food groups, and preconceived notions people bring to them. These are not the reality of these groups, just the baggage people bring to your spot and influence their view of your menu:

• Beef: filling, expensive (depending on cut)
  
• Veal: lighter, luxury, more expensive, smaller portion, cruel
  
• Pork: fatty, boring, cooked well done
  
• Poultry: boring, safe, easy to over cook, light, lean
  
• Lamb: gamey & complex, less digestible
  
• Game: interesting, variety, a talking point
  
• Offal: challenging, ethnic, variety
  
• Fish: healthy, lower in calories and fat, expensive, fresh
  
• Shellfish: expensive, fresh
  
• Vegetable: healthy, boring
  
• Pasta/grain: less expensive
  
• Dairy/Fruit: usually breakfast or lunch
  

Any good menu will need 7 food groups represented to offer a good variety.

Writing a Menu Entry (Carl Jr's Toilets NOT Bullet Proof)

The morning started with a review of food-related stories in the news. The NY Times featured a story about the French food critic Francois Simon, supposedly the model for the evil cartoon critic Anton Ego from Ratatouille, and how he cooked in a kitchen for a few days and allowed volunteers to critique his cooking (they were as vicious as he, unsurprisingly). In Park Slope, the Get Fresh Table & Market announced they would start table service for breakfast and brunch -- interesting, because they're initial concept was selling pre-portioned and processed ingredients in kits and the like to take home and cook yourself.

The 2nd Ave Deli, a favorite of mine and my father (and my friend Yana), is opening a new location on 1st Ave on the upper east side to be closer to the old folk clientele who complain that even their new location on 33rd and 3rd is too far. At least between 1st Ave and 3rd Ave, it averages out to 2nd! Richard closed the discussion with a few wacky stories, ending with a man who accidentally shot a toilet to pieces at a Carl Jr. in Utah as he was getting off the pot. It seemed he had a license to carry concealed, but not the common sense to keep the safety on while taking a crap!

We moved on to a menu work shop. Richard distributed a random menu to each table, and then we brainstormed and presented what we felt we knew about the restaurant strictly by the menu. My table got Outback Steakhouse, a pretty extreme example. The top of the cover has a drawing of what looks like a bouquet of tombstones, with the tag "Home of the Bloomin' Onion". Friendly, casual, tongue-in-cheek, between the 'G'day Mates' and the kangaroo, no Australian cliche will be left behind. On the inside, between the "Aussie-tizers" and the hand written typeface with a lot of exclamation points, this is clearly a "fun" child-friendly and child-like theme restaurant, with Crocodile Dundee as a key cultural touchstone. And yes, they will throw whatever you want 'on the barbie'. Ick.

After the break, we got into the nuts and bolts of writing a menu entry. A menu is the primary marketing tool of a restaurant, among other things -- and more often than not, there are no pictures, just written descriptions. To paraphrase an old saw, writing about aromas and taste is a bit like dancing about architecture.

Richard busted out some dos and don'ts. DO: Provide variety in method, ingredients and flavors. DON'T: use subjective terms (like a "USDA Prime" steak vs. a "tender steak"), mix and match within one menu item -- it's low rent and renders the item nebulous.

Richard gave the example of Burger King introducing "Extra Crispy Fries" a few years ago -- a massive flop. How crispy is extra crispy? Better to call the product "twice-fried fries" or something, promising a method rather than a final subject experience.

Any menu item can be built from a selection of five basic elements:

• Temperature: the most optional, as many times people can assume
• Method of Cooking: always, unless understood. A cake is not a 'baked cake', but if a piece of fish is deep fried, you better say it.
• Main Ingredient: Introduce early on to establish value. "Grilled Shrimp with Pasta" is high value, but if the dish is a mound of pasta with some grilled shrimp on top, "Pasta with Grilled Shrimp" will less likely make the client feel ripped off.
• Part: "Chicken Breast Panini" adds value to what is considered cheap meat. "Chicken Scrap Stew" does not.
• Modifier: What makes the dish special, especially needed for classic dishes.

There are two kinds of modifiers:

• Complimentary Modifier: Goes along with the natural property of the main ingredient. ex. white fish with lemon -- both are simple & clean.
• Offset Modifier: Contrasts with the main ingredient. Ex. Duck L'Orange -- duck is gamy and fatty, the orange is fresh, sweet and acidic.

Richard further expounded on the different elements, showing how some words mean the same thing but sound more expensive. Chicken Breast vs. Breast of Chicken. Pan-fried vs. Sauteed. Chicken with Mushrooms vs. Organic Farm Raised Humanely Treated Hen with wild oyster mushrooms and truffles.

Class closed with a lecture from career services and the resources available to the student body. Monday is a holiday, people, so we'll continue next Wednesday. See ya!

Field Investigation Recap / Introduction to the Menu

The day started with each group getting up in front of the class and discussing the restaurants were were assigned to investigate. To recap, we were split into five small groups and sent out at the end of last class to check out local Italian eateries in the Chelsea area of Manhattan.

The content of the discussion centered around the three tenants of the concept statement: Design, Service, Food. From determining what these three elements were about, we took educated guesses about what these places did to be competitive; Chelsea has a LOAD of Italian eateries, multiple spots on each block. Here is a quick breakdown of what we looked at, and in italics how it differentiates themselves.

• Da Umberto -- high end prices, clubby, hard to notice. Quiet date spot
• Olive Garden -- illusion of a bargain, family-friendly, familiar to commuters and tourists. Safe & unchallenging
• Le Zie -- Ugly decor. Inexpensive. Interesting, fresh menu. For locals
• Il Bastardo -- Modern with nice traditional touches. Space to socialize & drink. Not-so-quiet date spot
• Bar Baresco -- Very wine oriented, lots of small plates. Sit for a snack and a drink

My team covered the last one. The presentation in class was a bit of a practice in public speaking, and I ended up speaking for us. Since we were there when it was closed, my wife and I had lunch there yesterday. The food was good, but we were offered wine and opportunities multiple times -- at one point my wife mentioned her pregnancy to politely get the waiter to back down. That caught the attention of the class, a few murmured congratulations. Huh. There is something to this public speaking thing. After that little pregnancy-aside, they seemed more alert to my comments about the design of the bathrooms (individual rooms with mirrors on three walls for checking yourself out), the large backroom (which according to the waiter, used to be a disco back in the day) and the slightly loud Euro-disco music in the dining room (which would of probably evoked a stronger negative reaction from an older clientele.)

Second part of today's class was an introduction to the menu. As mentioned earlier, one of our texts is called Management by Menu, whose pretense is that all planning, design and strategy in starting and running a food service operation is determined first by the menu. Richard proposed the question: What does a menu tell you about a restaurant.

• kind of food served
• level of dining
• clientele targeted
• service level (depending on how simple or complex dishes are determines the amount of training both front and back of house staff need, as well as how much staff)
• preview of the atmosphere and decor
• beverage selection
• operation information
• expectations of how much time the client will spend (a snack joint is a quicker turn around than a fixed menu with 6 courses)
• determines your equipment (a grilled steak will require a steak and....a grill)
• food & beverage cost
• space needed (expensive restaurants tend to give more wiggle room to each diner than a fast casual, which will pack 'em in)

A well designed menu is a key to success, in both it's content and graphic design. Richard quickly sketched two menus on the board. One was the proportion of an 8 1/2 by 11 piece of paper, the other was long and thin. The first had two dense columns of squiggles, the later a few small bunches of squiggles punctuated by spaces between them. From these basic sketches, we could infer that the first was from a lower-end place that could accommodate snackers and drinkers to a diner with a broad appetite, while the later was probably on the higher-end, demanding more of a commitment from the client in terms of time and money.

The class ended with another round of the mission statement workshop. Jazzman was absent, Pastry still hasn't written one, so we reviewed Northfork's statement again first, the coffee and gelato cafe in Long Island's Northfork. We bounced around the idea of the clientele's expectations -- if they are up there going to wineries, well, that's not kid friendly. Perhaps take the concept of the winery and transpose the coffee and gelato product on it? A flight of small tasting cups of coffee, matched with a flight of small tastes of gelato?

Then we got into mine, the first time it underwent the scrutiny of my fellow students, who seemed to dig it. While defending it and explaining it more thoroughly to Northfork, she said she started getting hungry for pizza -- I guess that's a compliment to me, that my enthusiasm got her motor running. Richard joined us and chimed in on my concept, giving some pointed (but always kindly) advice and pointers. I won't go into it here, but he did hint that opening a restaurant to create a reputation to market a pizza product on might be the way to go. I'm not surprised, as opening a restaurant is the whole gist of the program. However, there must be a way to make a reputation in pizza in ways other than just opening a storefront....maybe hooking up with a celebrity chef? Partnering with a known restaurant? Associating with another brand? His comments made me think, and will revise and add notes for tomorrow's class.

Introduction to the Menu / Mission Statement Workshop (Baresco, you're on notice!)

Richard started the day with 'Odds & Ends', where students speak of their restaurant experiences from the past weekend, through the filter of what we study. Russian Pam Anderson seems to go out a lot, late at night, with her husband -- they hit up Spice Market and Fig & Olive on different nights, both in the Meat Packing district. Other than being surprised by the lack of business they were doing on weekend nights around midnight, she was primarily annoyed by the 'small plates' of F&O being too much food -- no one likes to over-order.

The Ramen Kid described waiting for 2 hours to get a seat at a hot ramen bar, and drank a lot of sake in their bar while waiting. The advantage of hype -- people are not only happy to wait for a table, they spend on high-profit booze and the line itself becomes a sort of advertisement for others.

Whitey Sushi Cook described a dinner at a high-end sushi joint that offered nothing by way of dessert -- that annoyed Richard, as it's such an apparent way of pulling in a chunk of cash easily, particularly when the restaurant is not busy and you don't need to vacate the table. I chimed in, as I went to Korean BBQ with my friend K this past weekend -- I never get dessert at Asian joints, but she was in the need for a sweet and ended up getting the ONE thing they had for dessert -- red bean ice cream. It was good, but still. They were in a big hurry to get us out of there, there was a line.

I spoke of my recent experience at Batali's Otto -- the cold temp, the distracted waitress, the over-cheesed and poorly-made pizza. The professor said that underlined the fact that most people don't know what good food is -- places with a name like Batali can get away with sub-standard food because people just assume it must be good because of the media cloud. Richard went on a bit about the design of the restaurant -- the front is a very elegant bar...that is almost all standing room. They can pack in a lot of people for those high-profit drinks. Looking from the bar, you see a long dining room, with tables to the left and right, all spaced pleasantly with lots of room to move. However, when you pass through, there is the main dining room, with its smaller tables, chairs that bump up next to your neighbors, and waiters who must serve from only one spot at the table because theres no space to get in there.

Our introduction to the menu was not what I expected. It started with a simple question:

Why do people go out to eat?

Here is what the class threw out, in no particular order:

• Do not have to/want to/able to/no time to cook
• Special occasion
• Socialize
• Convenience
• To be served
• Entertainment (or as some restaurant reviewer once coined, "Dine-utainment")
• No equipment (Pepe's in New Haven has a coal-burning oven, I do not)
• At work
• For a business meeting
• Travelling/touring
• Exploring a different cuisine
• Killing time
• Get out of the apartment
• To be in a warm/cool room
• Seems like it's cheaper (though even with the cheapest places, it's usually not if you really know how to cook.)

And two things that the professor pointed out that we did not mention:

• Hungry
• Nutrition

If your going to try to meet the needs of your clients, your concept should focus on the first list. If you think your client is coming to your restaurant mainly because they are hungry and seek nutrition, you're most likely going to be derailed by everything else that goes into how one chooses a restaurant....

And the next question was:

Why do you choose one restaurant over another?

• Convenience
• Cost/value
• Location
• Consistency/reliability
• Perks/promotions
• Food quality/quantity
• Service & staff
• Ambiance & decor
• Recommendation
• Beverage selection
• Sanitation
• Habit
• See & be seen
• Entertainment value

All these factors serve to make a restaurant competitive. Richard again pointed out that food is just one of many factors -- in most cases, it's not the factor that makes you competitive. In fact, it's more likely to hold you back. When thinking of a strategy for long term competitiveness, certain things will serve you better than others. Being cheap is not particularly effective, as shown by the fast food price wars started by Wendy's then mimicked by all the chains. Burger King's flame-broiling over McDonalds, now there is a factor that would be neither cheap nor easy for a competitor to take over. As is Lombardi's coal-burning pizza oven.

Next up was more Mission Statement Workshop. We each introduced our statement at the table and chose which one to pick apart. Both Jazzman and Pastry didn't write one: dudes, why are you spending your time and money here if you're not going to do the work? Chicagoette had semi-formed statement about a Mexican-themed home style restaurant, and I presented my statement about my pizza product, but took it off the table as not being a restaurant (and felt a bit egotistical to put it forward, as no one else seemed to want to lead the table.) Lenin-Pisser had switched seats with Northfork, a blonde lady with a mission statement about a coffee/gelato cafe attached to an (already existing) artisinal coffee roaster on the Northfork of Long Island. That makes me a little excited because B 'n me have been spending vacation time on the Northfork since we met, so maybe forging a new connection with it could be really cool.

Professor opened up talk to pick apart the other groups. Russian Pam Anderson had an idea for a Mediterranean wine bar in the west village, which sounded like a strong concept but her grammar was lacking a bit. Whitey Sushi Cook had an idea for a sake-smoking bar, which Richard pretty much shot down from the start as being illegal in NYC, where the statement said it was to be. The smoking restaurants that were grandfathered in after the smoking ban will be losing their smoking rights soon, and the legal trickery needed to open a smoking restaurant makes it nearly impossible now.

I asked the professor for his view on the effect of the smoking ban in bars and restaurants in NYC, and he said it was exactly as predicted: there was a small dip in customers briefly, but soon came back stronger than before and stayed that way. Proof positive that the bottom line is that there are more non-smokers who like to go out than smokers, but non-smoker's behavior don't make smokers want to stay home or leave early.

We spent the last half-hour broken up into random groups and were then sent out to explore some assigned Italian restaurants in the neighborhood. On Wednesday we'll reconvene with notes, and write concept statements for them. Problem is, at 11am on a frigid Monday, any restaurant that doesn't do a breakfast service is very closed. Bar Baresco looks very nice from the outside, with nice modern leather-backed seats, but I'll just have to hit it up tomorrow for a meal with the wifey. Bar Baresco, look out, I'm comin' to student-review you!

The Critical Path (Sherpa & His Hot Dog Mountain)

Richard opened the class with "In the News," in which the class will bring in food-related bits from the media and chew them over. Since none of us were prepared, Richard expounded on bits that caught his eye -- much of it from the dining section of Wednesday's NY Times. Squirrel in British cuisine, City Wine's concept of a wine bar that partners with a winery (to allow customers to 'make' their own wine and store casks in the basement), crushing drop in private parties for the big Meatpacking district restaurants, Bruni's review of a restaurant. Richard is open in his dislike for what many food blogs call "the Bruni," because he feels Bruni's critiques are a bit over-the-top. From a restaurant trade magazine, an article about corporate chains looking to incorporate rice as a central starch in new dishes because it's cheap.

The one article that caught my ear was about a hot dog vendor who recently won a bid on a location in front of the Metropolitan museum. He is going to pay $360 grand a year for the right to sell hot dogs on the northern end. That means he needs to generate about $1000 a day just to pay for the license. With a $2 hot dog, we guess his average sale will be $3. On a 10 hour day, he'll need to make 657 sales a day 7 days a week to cover that nut. That's 66 sales an hour. More than 1 sale per minute. A cart can't possible hold that much inventory, so someone has to be hired to restock multiple times a day. And perhaps another person to cover some shifts on the cart. To just break even. And let's not mention the other hot dog cart a few feet away who is sharing the corner because it's run by a veteran, who by law does not need to have a license!

The bulk of the day was dedicated to reviewing 'the Critical Path,' the framework that will be explored over the next six months. Here are the bare bones of it:

• Market Research: all about the needs and wants of the client. Who there are, how they communicate.
• Mission & Concept: Goals and key elements. What your business is going to do and how it's going to do it.
• Site Selection: Many variables are determined by the where. Rent, size of location, traffic patterns, competition -- all will determine whats served and for how much.
• Revenue Projections: Sales = # of seats x turns x average check (turn means how many times the tables are turned over for new customers over the length of a time period.) This can be worked out with a mix of assumptions and observations of similar places.

Financial Analysis: This is made up of a number of critical statements

• Capital Budget: start up costs. Research & Development, construction, equipment.
• Working Capital: salaries, inventories, money to cover expenses until break-even.
• Investment: Capital Budget + Working Capital. What you gotta get to get going! Hi there, rich person! Want to take a risk?
• Income Statement: a.k.a. Profit & Loss statement. Sales - costs = profit(or loss). Costs from actual material, labor, operating expenses (napkins, flowers), fixed & occupancy (insurance, rent, etc.)
• Break Even Analysis: at what level of sales does profit and loss equal each other? Higher the break even point, the higher the risk to the investor. The hot dog vendor in front of the Met has a ridiculously high break-even point.
• Cash Flow Statement: the timing of when the money comes in and when it goes out. The profit and loss statement is about what was gained or lost in a specific amount of time, while the cash flow statement is just about the money -- you can buy enough eggplant for three months, and the P&L will reflect that, but the cash flow will just say you just spent a lot of eggplant money in one day. A cash flow statement is, at it's simplest, the most recent accounting of your checkbook.
• Balance Sheets: Assets - Liability = Owner Equity. Everything the biz is worth - everything owed & all the debt = everything you actually own. Like the P&L, but a comprehensive look at the whole thing. The other statements kind of dwell in the past or project the future, this is the one that says where you are right now.
• R.O.I.: Return on Investment = Profit / investment. If you make $50G profit in one year, and Mr. Investor gave you $500 grand, 50/500,000 = .1 or 10% R.O.I. It'll take Mr Investor 10 years to recoup before seeing a profit on his money. A while ago that was considered low. Today, people may be happy with that.

All these numbers can be fudged, especially early on when it's based on projections and assumptions. The best numbers are accurate, truthful, and salable to investors.

The second half of the class was dedicated to the mission statement. The statements gotta say:

• what you are
• how well you do what you do
• who your clients are
• where you and your clients are
• which needs of your client your meeting

AND

• do it in one or two sentences.

Oy! It is from the mission statement that the next step develops from: the concept is directed by the mission to determine 1) design & decor, 2) service and 3) food & beverage product.

So the class broke into four groups. We each threw out a concept, chose one for the group then attempted to write a mission statement through brain storming. I was sitting with Jazzman, Lenin-pisser, Chicagoette and Pastry. Both Chicagoette and Jazzman mumbled something about a family-style casual restaurant of indeterminate cuisine, Pastry mumbled something about a bakery of no specific style, and Lenin-Pisser spoke of a Georgian wine bar with live jazz and small plates. I announced my pizza concept which I sketched out last night, but I dismissed it as not being a restaurant and not ideal for this exercise. So we went with Lenin-Pisser.

What: a wine bar with live jazz that serves wine from the Georgian region of the once Soviet Union and small plates of fusion Georgian food. How well: very well! We were a bit stumped on this one. Who: younger couples, adventurous singletons, expats, jazz fans, evening crowd. Where: someplace urban with a good 24 hour residential/commercial mix. Like the Village or he L.E.S. Needs being met: Georgian food outside of the Brooklyn enclave. Limited non-tourist jazz option on the Lower East Side.

By committee, this is the sentence we produced. English is Lenin-Pisser's third language.

Georgian Wine & Jazz introduces an elegant mix of Georgian small plates, fine Georgian wines and live jazz to adventurers in the Lower East Side.

Richard tore it apart, but kindly with good humor -- I remember cringing whenever Chef Al would give criticism, it was always so harsh. Anyway, where to begin? The names doesn't say 'what' exactly. Perhaps adding 'Lounge' or 'Cafe' will be more descriptive. Adventurers on the Lower East Side do NOT look for elegance, they look for excitement, fun. What kind of jazz? Really loud in-your-face stuff that's the center of attention, or quiet background stuff good for conversation? IS this more of a bar where the food is secondary and in service of the wine, or do people come here to eat, with focused wine-drinking just at the bar? Just because the LES doesn't have a Georgian wine-jazz bar doesn't necessarily mean it needs one. Is this concept appealing to the customers on the LES or to you? Georgian theme and jazz seem to be eclectic -- it doesn't seem to make sense together, but the vision of the proprietor seems to make it make sense. This doesn't seem to be eclectic, it just doesn't make sense.

I guess a mission statement made by an uninterested committee in 5 minutes will never be that great, but it's the process. For Monday, we all have to deliver 4 to 8 sentences. One to two sentences each on a mission statement and the three factors of a concept.

Introduction to Culinary Management (Ritz ain't just crackers!)

Hi! Welcome back! Today, I started the culinary management program at the same school where I completed the culinary arts program. I found this blog a crucial element in helping me absorb the massive amount of information and experiences during that time, and hope to pull it off again.

I externed at a very well-regarded pizzeria in Brooklyn to finish my culinary degree, and continued on as an employee for while afterwards. (You can read about it, as well as my continuing adventures in home cooking and eating at Learning to Feed.) The time I spent slamming dough, baking desserts, and finishing pizzas for a paying clientele brought home the point that food ain't just about the food. It's about where the food is served. And how.

The management program will focus on that other stuff, in addition to the food. It's all related and intertwined. But enough blather, let's get to the meat of the matter: me blogging about my experience!

Class started with an introduction from the Director of Student Affairs, going over rules and regulations, the bureaucracy of being in school, blah blah blah. We're introduced to Richard V., our instructor for the entire length of the course -- in culinary, we were taught in succession by 5 different chefs, but in management it's all about Richard. He's a very well-coiffed man with neatly trimmed Frank Zapppa-like facial hair. My wife and I actually took a multi-week wine course with him, where I found him to be extremely well-spoken, enthusiastic and engaging, so hopefully I lucked out....hopefully it wasn't just the alcohol.

We started with a reading of Ruth Reichl's New York Times Review of Aquamarine under the topic of, "What's Wrong Here?" It's a restaurant with a hoity toity name directly on the Hudson River, which would invite expectations of a river view, a romantic quiet dining, seafood, and upscale surroundings. In reality there were very few windows onto the Hudson, a big bar and loud live music, a menu made up of very little seafood and plastic chairs. After all of that, it didn't help that the food was inconsistent and not very original or special. Suffice to say, that restaurant isn't with us anymore. Somewhere along the line, the concept became unfocused.

Richard introduced us to the theory of the client, the mission statement, and the overall concept of the restaurant. The client dictates what your business should be, as you can't have a business without them. When you figure out who your client is, you need to ask, "What is the client not getting?" and go from there. The mission statement is the statement of intent that kind of defines what your going to do, and the overall concept involves the key elements that will satisfy the client.

As laid out in Reichl's review, there are three elements to a concept for a restaurant: design & decor, service, and food & beverage. It is very rare that you can succeed with one and totally ignore the other two. Going to a restaurant is not just about food, but all the bells and whistles that convinces you to pay $28.95 for a piece of meat you can cook at home for $4.85 and a little homemade stock. The concept is the thread that ties it all together. The concept of Aquamarine seemed to suggest upscale seafood with a relaxing grand river view, but between the walled-off view, the noise, and the jumbled menu, the concept lost its cohesiveness.

Tomorrow, we've been asked to come in with the idea of a concept. The jist of the course is to end with a fully developed business plan based on this concept. I have a kernel of an idea, so I guess thats the kernel of my trade secret! Let me just say...it's about pizza. Strangely enough, for those of you who've been reading me a while.

We got a handful of books, including this year's Zagats guides. Tonight I read the first few chapters of "Management by Menu", basically a text that covers all aspects of managing a food business from the idea that all angles are reflected in the menu. Concept, costs, everything is there in the menu. The first 50 pages of the book is the history of food service, from one-celled amoebas absorbing nutrients through cell walls to the modern fastfood concept like Wendy's and McDonald's...I guess the more things change, the more they stay the same, he he.

Interesting factoid: In the brief history of culinaria we were taught in the cooking program, a central figure was Georges August Escoffier, who invented the brigade system of organizing kitchen workers in 1800s France, catapulting the cuisine to head of the class. What was not mentioned was the front of house man who was perhaps equally important in making Escoffier's restaurants legendary -- Cesar Ritz, from whose name the notion of 'ritzy' comes from.

We had a little game of introducing the person next to you to the class. I introduced Roundhead, who was also in my culinary class. Roundhead (who I shall now nickname Jazzman) was a fellow student in culinary, a young, quiet and competant cook. Hes a NYC native of Dominican heritage, so he grew up bilingual, a distinct advantage in the restaurant world.

There is about 26 of us. There are two Russians, one who proudly said he peed on a statue of Lenin when the Soviet Union dissolved. There is a Slovak who looks like Ricky Martin, an older British woman who once dressed as Bugs Bunny for a job, a woman whose been working at a restaurant for 17 years and wants to expand. One kid, a young looking Robert DeNiro type with pointy eyebrows and a mole just-so, spoke of his family's Italian restaurant in Long Island, and how he has aspirations of opening a national pizza chain. There's another guy who looks like Big Pussy from the Sopranos. Maybe half the class is very young, under 25, most in my age range with a few with a few more years of experience under their belts.

Class will be Mon, Wed and Thursday mornings, so this blog will updated three times a week. It'll be fully tagged out for easy referencing to the left. Thanks again for joining me, I welcome your secret snooping or your blatant comments!