Composing, with Salad

Again, six students, a really good number. We started with a brief lecture. Today, the central portion was salad, the dish the Garde Manger (pantry cook) would make in a functioning restaurant, so we reviewed the brigade system. The Chef de Cuisine, the big boss, the man, the guy or gal who gets famous as a TV chef and doesn't actually cook in their restaurants anymore. The Sous Chef, the assistant chef, the boss when the Chef is out, who really makes sure the cooking gets done. The Chef de Partie, the line cooks, the cooks who cook your food. The Pastry Chef, who does baking and answers directly to the Executive Chef. And the Garde Manger, the cold pantry cook. Let's not forget the Stages, the assistants, the up and comers.

There are three kinds of salads -- tossed, composed, and bound. Tossed is usually greenery tossed with dressing. Composed is a body ingredient, usually a protein, on top of a base of greenery, surrounded by garnishes. The bound salad is an ingredient or ingredients within a theme, bound together by mayo, jello, or the like.

First thing out, we got down to knife skills, getting the vegetable soup on and out of the way...

VEGETABLE SOUP

Yield: 1 gallon

Olive oil 4 tbsp
Chopped leaks, whites only 2 cups
Salt 1 heavy pinch
Garlic, minced 2 tbsp
Carrots, thin rounds 2 cups
Potatoes, large dice 2 cups
Green beans, ¾” pieces 2 cups
Vegetable stock 2 quarts
Tomato concasse* 4 cups
Corn kernels 2 ears
Ground black pepper ½ tsp
Parsley, chopped ¼ cup, packed
Lemon juice 1 to 2 tsp
Salt to taste

1. Heat oil in large rondeau or stockpot and add leeks and a pinch of salt.
2. Cover and sweat the vegetables until softened, stirring occasionally, 7-8 minutes.
3. Add garlic, carrots, potatoes and green beans and cook for 4-5 more minutes, stirring occasionally.
4. Add vegetable stock, BTB RTS*
5. Add tomato concasse, corn and pepper. Reduce heat to low, cover, and cook until vegetables are fork tender, approximately 25-30 minus.
6. Remove from heat, add parsley and lemon. Season to taste. Serve immediately
*Tomato Concasse: peeled, deseeded and chopped flesh of tomato BTB RTS: Bring To Boil, Return To Simmer

While that was happening, I had a student boil some eggs properly, a garnish for our composed salad...

PERFECT HARD BOILED EGGS

Yield: 6 eggs

Egg* 6 each

1. Place eggs in a single layer sauce pan, cover with cold water by 1” to 2” minimum
2. Bring to a boil, then turn off heat and cover for 15 minutes
3. Remove, shock in ice water, peel

* Eggs that are NOT fresh will peel easier, ideally a week old

After soup, I had everyone set up their stations to make mayo. I spent several days learning to make proper mayo in c-school. The trick is to move fast -- the faster you get an even stream of oil into your eggs, the faster you beat it with a whisk, the faster it'll come together and thicken without a lot of drama.

HERBED MAYONNAISE

Yield: 2 ½ cups mayonnaise

Egg 1 each
Egg yolk 1 each
Salt ½ tsp
Ground pepper ¼ tsp
Olive oil ½ cup
Vegetable oil 1 ½ cups
Lemon juice 2 to 3 tsp
Chopped fresh herbs ¼ cup
(Parsley, chives, dill, etc.)

1. Place egg, egg yolk, salt, and pepper in an anchored mixing bowl. Whisk until blended
2. Whisking constantly, drizzle in the oils, gradually increasing the amount added as the sauce thickens
3. As soon as the sauce is very thick, thin with 2 teaspoons of lemon juice, followed by the remaining oil.
4. Add herbs, whisk to combine.
5. Taste. Add more lemon juice, if necessary. Season to taste.

Funny, most of the kid's mayo came out a little bit thin, and I had to show them how to lay in some "elbow grease" to make it come back to life.

After cleaning, everyone got a mound of shrimp to shell and de-vein. Some shrimp still had their last meal in them, which lead to a bit of twittering about not having doo doo in our food. Once collected, dropped into lime-squirted boiling water for a few minutes then ice. Everyone chipped in on getting the garnishes together.

SHRIMP LOUIS

Yield: 4-6 servings

Shrimp 2 lbs
Salt to taste
Bibb or Boston lettuce 2 heads
Tomatoes, sliced 2 each
Eggs, hard cooked, quartered 4 each
Lemons, quartered 4 each
Black olives 8 each
Bell peppers, thin rounds 2 each

Herb Mayonnaise 2 ½ cup
Chili sauce 4 tbs
Grated onion 2 tbs
Parsley, chopped 2 tbs
Salt to taste
Pepper to taste
Heavy cream 1 _tbsp +/- to adjust thickness
Worcestershire sauce 2 tsp, or to taste
Tabasco a few drops, or to taste

1. Defrost, deshell and clean shrimp if necessary. Set up ice bath
2. Bring large pot of water flavored with salt and lime juice to a boil.
3. Cook shrimp until just pink, 1-2 minutes. Remove and shock in ice water. Drain, place in bowl, cover and refrigerate until service.
4. Combine mayonnaise → Tabasco. Stir until blended. Cover and refrigerate until service. If too thick after chilling, add more cream.
5. Arrange lettuce leaves to cover large serving plate. Place mound of shrimp in middle. Place tomatoes, quartered eggs, lemon wedges, olives and pepper slices decoratively around the shrimp.

After eating the soup and salad, I found a big jar of Hellman's mayo in the back and we did a taste test of it versus ours. Hellman's tasted MEGA salty, and strangely rubbery compared to ours.

Next week, a tossed Caesar salad with chicken, proper mac n' cheese, and chicken stock.

No, that's not ice cream....

Above is a picture of cold shmaltz, a.k.a. rendered chicken fat. A byproduct of making chicken stock, it floats to the top and, when refrigerated, solidifies, and is easy to remove. It's then reheated again over the stove; all non-fats evaporate and all non-fat solids burn and float to the bottom. Pour off the hot fat, refrigerate, and it's good for a year or so (if kept in the back of the fridge). And what better way to make some icky bitter greens magically delicious than adding a wallop of chicken fat...?

Today's class was about vegetable cookery, but really, how many vegetables can you really get into on 3 hours? First thing, we sat and I briefly lectured. What is cooking? Applying energy via heat to food to change its composition. There are only two classes of cooking: dry heat (baking, roasting, broiling, frying in all its forms) and moist heat (boiling, steaming, simmering). There is a bastard third, combination heat (braising, stewing, where something is browned in dry heat then moisture is added to finish).

Then we went quickly from abstract to solid, reviewing the recipes of the day...

“MASHED” POTATOES

Yield: 10 servings

Russet Potatoes 4 lbs
Butter, room temperature 6-8 oz
Milk, hot 12 fl.oz.
Heavy cream, hot 12 fl.oz.
Salt to taste
Ground black pepper to taste

1. Scrub, peel and cut potatoes into large pieces.
2. Boil or steam until tender.
3. Drain and dry over low heat or on a sheet pan in a 300˚ oven until no steam rises from them.
4. While hot, puree potatoes through a food mill or potato ricer into a heated bowl.
5. Add butter and mix into potatoes by hand or with the paddle or whip attachment of an electric mixer until just incorporated. Add milk, cream, salt, pepper by hand until smooth and light
6. Spoon potatoes onto heated plates or transfer to a piping bag and pipe into desired shapes.

The class started with knife skills. To save time, we didn't peel the potatoes; we just turned dirty round potatoes and rectangular skinless beauties into large dice. I already had a large pot of boiling water on, we dumped the potatoes in and I assigned a student to watch the potatoes, taste a cube for tenderness ,and call me when ready. I had the other students start the knife work for the next recipe -- while others drained the potatoes and pushed them through the food mill into a bowl heated from the ledge on top of the oven. I showed them the correct way to fold (with a rubber spatula, from 12 o'clock to 6 o'clock around the edge, then flip to the middle. Turn the bowl clockwise 90 degrees, repeat). Then came the butter and half-and-half...and finally the consistency was right. I had everyone taste; then I salted th dish and everyone tasted again and...what they tasted blew their minds. As I had promised, these were the best mashed potatoes they'd ever had!

VEGETABLE STOCK

Yield: 1 gallon

Vegetable oil 2 fl.oz, or as needed
Mire Poix*, large dice 3 lb
Nonstarchy vegetables* 3 lb
Salt 2 tsp
Cold water 1 gal
Sachet d’Espices* 1

1. Heat oil in large rondeau or stock pot and add mirepoix, vegetables and salt.
2. Cover and sweat the vegetables 10 to 12 minutes, stirring occasionally.
3. Add water and salt. Simmer 15 minutes.
4. Add sachet, simmer 10 minutes.
5. Strain the stock. Degrease by skimming if necessary. Use immediately or cool rapidly and store for later use.

*Mire Poix: 2 parts onion, one part carrot, one part celery
Non-starchy vegetables like leeks, tomatoes, garlic, etc.
Sachet d’ Espices: Enclose the following in cheeseclothe, bound by kitchen twine
3 to 4 parsley stems,
1 sprig of thyme or 1 tsp dried thyme,
1 bay leaf,
1 tsp cracked peppercorns

In the lecture I told them about mire poix, the mix of vegetables that are sauteed first before adding other things to add a certain flavor. It's French, but every culture has a version, like Spanish Sofrito (onion, green pepper, garlic) and New Orlean's Holy Trinity (Onion, bell pepper, celery) and the idea of stock -- a flavorful liquid that can be cooked with that brings an intensity of flavor rather than a dilution of flavor. A lot of soup-chops, and another student assigned to turning the veg in the stock pot until soft. We made a sachet, covered in cold water, then we were off on the next recipe. (Next week, we're going to make vegetable soup with the stock...)

We made tomato concasse. How-to: Score the bottom of the tomato, drop in boiling water for about 30 seconds. Shock in ice water to prevent any serious cooking. Peel off skin, which now comes off easily. Cut into quarters and cut out all the jelly and seeds, so just bare solid tomato flesh is left. This can be used in stock and soup, without generating scum, papery skins or bits of seeds floating everywhere.

SWISS CHARD WITH CARAMELIZED ONIONS

Yield: 6 servings

Olive oil/Sesame oil/butter/ shmaltz 2 tbsp
Onions, thinly sliced 2 medium onions
Salt A pinch or two
Swiss chard, stems removed, 1” x 4” chiffonade 1 bunch
Kalamata olives, pitted, rough chop ½ cup
Salt to taste
Black pepper to taste

1. Bring a pot of well salted water to a boil
2. Heat large skillet over medium heat, add oil
3. Add onions, stir to coat with oil and salt
4. Continue to cook onions, making sure not to burn or brown. If they turn brown within 5 minutes, reduce heat. Cook 20-25 minutes until caramelized (a golden brown color). If they get to dry, add more fat.
5. When water is at a rolling boil, add Swiss chard. Cook to tender, 2-4 minutes
6. Shock chard in a bowl of ice water, drain and remove all excess water.
7. Stir chard into the onions, cook until excess moisture has evaporated and chard is heated through, 2-3 minutes
8. Toss with olives and salt to taste. Serve immediately.

Everyone sliced onions, then two students de-veined and made chiffonade of the chard. Chiffonade is rolling the leaf into a cigar-like shape and cutting it thin -- it results in more even, elegant cuts and prevents bruising of more delicate leaves. Four others got on the oven and I introduced them to the saute pan. Heat the pan first then add the oil. As I discussed in the lecture, one of the least healthy things you can do is eat scorched and burnt oil. Not only does it taste bad, it has all sort of cancer-causing substances. Heat the pan first, then add the oil. Test with a piece of onion, then go for it, constantly moving with tongs, paying attention to color, adjusting the heat if it's browning too fast or not fast enough.

For interest, I had each one use a different fat -- olive oil, butter, sesame oil, and chicken fat that I brought in from home. The butter took noticeably longer, due to the water content in this fat -- the others were all lipid, but butter is actually a mishmash of fat, proteins, sugars and water. I had them taste, looking for the sweet flavor. Unfortunately we didn't have time to go the full caramel, but they were good.

The chard was blanched and shocked, dropped into boiling water for 3 minutes, then drained and dropped in an ice bath. I explained blanching -- and how, in this case, doing so cooks the leaf and removes tge bitter elements. The shock of the ice stops the cooking abruptly, and locks in the bright green color. Squeezed out, it was tossed in the pan with the onions with some chopped olives, then seasoned.

After cleaning, we sat down to eat and it was a lot of fun eating each of the chards with the potatoes. Everyone was gaga over the potatoes and took some home, but no one liked the chards enough to take any home. To my taste, it tasted more like caramelized onions and olives which had greens in it as an afterthought, but STILL they didn't dig it. They did agree that chicken fat tasted the best, but not enough to finish the plate. You can bring a horse to water....and you can make a healthy vegetable extremely unhealthy, but a teen still won't dig it!

Next week, salads, which will be matched with sauteing of tender cuts of meat. And that damn vegetable soup. Soup n' salad!

First time teaching, nobody died or stabbed anyone!

Today went by in a flash. Woke up to a good fishy breakfast with sable I got from Russ & Daughter's yesterday. I spent the morning writing my first lesson plan and revising two recipes to fit the content of what I was teaching. By the time my momma-in-law came to take over Baby Birdie, I was getting nervous.

I shoved down a piece of rugellah then rode the bike through 50mph winds to a far corner of Brooklyn -- reminded me of the day in my cross-country trip riding through Kansas -- except those winds were steady across a plain, and I had to ride 50 miles through it, not 3.

I arrived early and helped the supervisor load in today's produce, which he got at a discount from a local market based on a list I gave him a few days earlier. A kid volunteer (not in the program) washed the bowls and utensils for me while I set up and checked things, then showed the kid how to use a wet stone to sharpen a knife. Soon, the kids arrived, I sat them down in the dining room, got them in aprons, and off we went.

The class went by in a quick fashion -- I had piled a little too much into our agenda, which meant constant activity....which, based on the feedback from the kids at the end of the class, was probably their favorite part of the whole thing.

We started with a lecture about food and kitchen safety: the definitions of physical, chemical, and bacterial contamination; and how touching a keyboard, a door knob, your face, your hair, or your ownbutt were all ways to get sickness into the food. So maniacal handwashing it was. The kids wanted to get into the thick of it, not hear a lecture, so I kept this lecture mercifully short.

Into the kitchen, basics of kitchen safety -- announcing yourself when passing behind someone, sharps, hots, how a hot pan should exist on a stove top (handle in, towel on handle if handle is hot). Everyone washed their hands and I noticed a bunch of dirty paper towels on the counter and floor. I had to channel Chef M, my mod 1 instructor, and barked, "I don't care you dropped the towels, but someone has to pick them up RIGHT NOW." And just stared at everyone until it happened. That's about as hard as I had to get.

First I demo'd a smoothie -- the basic flow of the class from here until they get comfy is: Me, doing a demo; then everyone mimics me. The curriculum had a horrible smoothie recipe involving juice and ice, thus I substituted my own:

FRUIT SMOOTHIE

Yield: 1 pint

Banana, ripe one
Mixed fruit* 1 cup
Greek yogurt ¼ cup
Whole milk ½ cup
Vanilla bean, scraped ½ bean
Salt to taste

1. Peel banana, break into 2”pieces and drop into blender
2. Drop fruit into blender
3. Add yogurt, milk, and vanilla to blender
4. Return lid to the blender jar and puree the fruit and liquid until very smooth
5. Season to taste
6. Serve immediately

*Use frozen fruit. If using fresh fruit, freeze the recipe’s ½ cup milk in ice cube tray

I had them all taste the smoothie before salt and after salt, and right there I saw I blew most of their minds. I think I won their trust at that point. All the kids used different combos of fruit; each smoothie came out differently. Using only two blenders for 9 kids, this took some time and cooperation, but I quickly got the idlers on dish and cleaning duty. Everyone was happy with their smoothies and when the supervisor came down, he said that compared to last cycle, these smoothies were vastly superior! I don't know if he was blowing air up my butt, but I'll take it!

After a bit of fiddle faddle tasting each other's smoothies, I went over knife safety -- how to hold, how to pass, how to carry, how to cut, then demo'd a simple salsa cruda.

SALSA CRUDA

Yield: 2 quarts

Tomatoes, chopped 2 ½ pounds
Jalapenos, minced 8 ounces
Garlic, minced 2 cloves
Yellow onions, diced 12 ounces
Cilantro, minced 1 ounce
Red wine vinegar 1 fluid ounce
Tomato juice 8 fluid ounces
Salt to taste

1. Mix the tomatoes, jalapenos, onions, cilantro, red wine vinegar and tomato juice.
2. Season to taste

This was a bit tricky to demo because though I requested one we had no scale. Salsa being a forgiving recipe, I eyeballed everything -- it was really about the knife skills anyway. By then we only had an hour left, so I put the hammer down. Two kids to dice tomatoes , 2 kids to dice onions, 2 kids to mince jalapenos, 2 kids to mince garlic, one kid to mine cilantro. I went around and corrected each as they went and approved each batch before being put into the communal bowl. I added tomato juice, red wine vinegar, salt and poof! Two gallons of fresh salsa.

After cleaning, I got the kids out into the dining room for chips n' salsa, as well as a cheese plate of 10 different cheeses, everything from Parmesan and mozz and cheddar to morbier, camembert and tallegio. Had them eat it both with french bread and a crisp, sweet apple. A few of the kid's minds were blown once again. Got a lot of compliments from both the kids and the supervisor, who popped in from time to time to see what was happening. Good times.

The kitchen is clean but a bit lacking in equipment. Though tighter in space than my culinary school kitchen it's a heck of a lot more space than any kitchen I've worked in. All the kids were pretty psyched to be there, and still seemed psyched by the end of class. Everyone helped with the clean-up, and a few just started sweeping and cleaning surfaces even though I didn't specifically ask any one to do those tasks. After the kids split, the supervisor and I finished putting the room away. Then we talked about how the first day went. He seemed really happy -- he was around at the end for the tasting, and was really pleased to see all the kids asking me questions, getting involved eating the cheeses, and sticking around even though we were 20 minutes after the ending time.

Next week, vegetable cookery, maybe some sweet fruit cookery too...

Taking Stock

Today I went to the school I'll be teaching to interview some of the students who applied to the program, take inventory of the kitchen and meet with the head of the school to sign contracts. The kids, almost all female, have little cooking experience outside the home but all seemed genuinely curious about the hows of cooking. One said she never had eaten seafood in her life, because her mom never cooks it. When asked if there is anything they would never eat, one student said there is a lot of things she does not eat, but that's probably because "I never had a chance to try them." Her self-awareness and sharp sense of 'why' surprised me. A lot of kids just think they don't like things because they fear the new and unknown, but this girl already took the mental leap without me coaching her.

The kitchen supply closet was a bit of a mess, with some odd things -- enough apple corers to have two to a student, but no lids to any pot. Whisks enough to double fist any whip cream, but lacking in a functional food processor. Looking at the small production kitchen, I wonder how I'm going to set up 10 kids into mise stations to work with knives.

The director of the school was very kind, taking the time to tell me about the philosophy of their approach to the community they serve. This coming week I'm getting finger printed (all employees of the NYC Department of Education has to be on file), and Wednesday is the first session. I see safety practices, knife skills, chunky salsa, smoothies and massive mashed potatoes in our future....

Ending/Beginning

I never really wrote about graduation from the Culinary Management program for two reasons, really. 1) The excitement of having a new baby was just too much and 2) graduation just didn't feel very exciting. The ceremony was very nice, but uneventful. But, fortunately, the blog is not ended on this off note, for starting in a couple of weeks, I am going back to culinary school....this time, on the other end: teaching!

A month or two ago, I interviewed at a public high school in Brooklyn looking for a teacher to head up a weekly culinary program for a group of 10-15 students. Starting in early October and going for 12 weeks, the curriculum will be based on CCAP materials, but I will have a free hand to structure the class in terms of content, recipes, pace and style. We'll be starting with knife skills, safety, and tastings of staples (funky cheeses, anyone?) and tackle some projects, like a big Thanksgiving meal for a large group of community members.

Next week, we'll be interviewing kids who applied for the program, and classes kick off the following week. I'll be blogging the classes here, and as I prepare lessons, I suspect I'll be referring to my notes in this blog to help get things together.

Today, I was at the school to drum up a little interest to increase our applicant pool. I manned a table in the cafeteria, and presented two trays of brownies for sampling. One were some seriously crappy brownies bought from the supermarket, the other made the night before in my kitchen riffed off this recipe (forget the walnuts, replace extract with the scrapings of the real thing, fold minimally instead of mix in the flour and let the batter rest to absorb the flour and prevent gluten formation.) The kids were happy to see brownies, as the lunch served looked both relatively healthy and like the kind that is more prepared and shipped in rather than cook-cooked. I laid out a little chart (above) listing the ingredients of each brownie, and showed how despite using a lot of expensive, organic ingredients, the homemade were STILL less expensive than the packaged, industrial stuff.

The overwhelming consensus were the homemade were really good and Lil Debbie's really whatever, but I guess I set the bar pretty low. This was my first opportunity to talk to the kids at the school, and it was a lot of fun vibing off their bubbling energy and some of their enthusiasm for the program (and my brownies, he he.) I guess I initially had some trepidation about interacting with the kids -- I ain't hep n' happenin' with whatever these young whippersnappers are "down with" nowadays, but it all seemed pretty natural and smooth. Will this be a "To Sir, With Love" minus the accents situation, or perhaps "Lean on Me" minus the redemption?

I remember in c-school, we had a few hours with a 'career advisor', and we went around the room announcing what we wanted to do with our futures. I think I said something like, "Cook superior pizza, have my own place eventually." I think it was Dora the Explorer, easily the worst cook in the class, the dirtiest working, who barely spoke English (she spoke Portuguese, which meant even the Spanish speakers couldn't really communicate with her), she actually said that she wanted to teach culinary. Yes, there was some eye rolling. Who would go to c-school just so they could teach? He he he. I guess I should eat my eye-rolling about now. I have a new baby, I can't do the 70+ hours a week for little pay that I was doing at L's restaurant, at least until the baby is a bit older. For now, I think this will be a good outlet to keep a finger in a working kitchen, keep my skills sharp, and heaven forbid, maybe learn a bit from these kids I'll be shepherding.

On a final note, here is one bit for those who've followed for a while. This is a video that was part of my PowerPoint presentation for my final project in management. It really didn't have much to do with my project, but I had been telling Louis stories all year, and this was an opportunity for a bit of entertainment to close out the class.

Customer Complaint Resolution / Student Presentations / Bubbly Tasting

Our next to last class started with a brief Odds n' Ends. Everyone spent the weekend working on their final projects, or are in the midst of working on them. Richard told a story of a friend who had a catered event on his boat in Nantucket this past weekend. His caterer canceled less than a week out before the event because one of the caterer's employees quit to work for this friend in some non-food capacity. The friend scurried and found another caterer hungry for work, and as it turns out the caterer did an excellent job, and now this friend has gotten this new caterer a ton of work, and the old caterer's name has been dragged through the mud in a wide circle of friends. Be careful who you choose to punish.

When a customer complains, they are saying, "I would like to purchase again. What are you going to do to fix this?" So when a customer does not complain, they just pay the bill and leave an ordinary tip, they have given up on the company and it is unlikely they will return. A non-complainer's rate of return has been measured at under 10%, but a complainer whose issue is NOT resolved has a rate of return of about 40%. Complaining is cathartic, straight up. And when a complaint is quickly resolved, rate of return shoots up to around 90%.

The non-complainers are the bane of restaurants, and leaving out comment-cards for the customer to voluntarily fill out is not a very strong solution. An owner who sits by dishwashing waiting for full plates to come back so they can approach those particular customers will only go so far. There needs to be management on the floor looking at everything at all times, looking at faces and looking at tables. This may not be a reasonable expectation of a small restaurant on a tight budget, but someone keeping their eyes on a dining room, who is smart enough to react, is a hallmark of a successful restaurant.

An angry customer needs to be handled correctly, appealing to the emotional need to be taken seriously and taken care of. These steps are a framework to defusing a customer on the edge:

• Listen effectively
• Empathize and apologize if necessary
• Determine problem
• Propose solutions and reach closure
• Follow through FAST
• Do something extra

The ultimate objective is to make the customer come back. But on the other hand, there are situations where the customer is a liar. Guytano told a story of a group of 4 who came in on Mother's Day and claimed to have a reservation, though there was no record of it -- they might of called the wrong store. They had to be worked in, and catered to, checked in on -- like the restaurant is doing them a really great service.

We did some role playing, with one playing the host, the other the complaining customer. It definitely takes some fluid thinking to stick to the customer resolution framework while dealing with wound-up, questionably sane members of the public.

One role play was illuminating. A customer calls to make a same-day reservation for a large party, under the gun from his employer. One of the slower students played the reservationist, and her solution when confronted with the insistent customer on the phone was to....pass him off to the manager. And I thought the last 9 months we were here in these classes was studying culinary....MANAGEMENT. The solution, after listening, apologizing, and stating that it's not possible was to what Richard called a "Holiday Inn". Holiday Inn's policy was to never have a 'no vacancy' sign. If a customer came in and there was no space, the Holiday Inn would call other hotels and find a space for the customer. Even though the customer did not spend money on the Holiday Inn, it was an opportunity to leave a good impression and offer something for when they are back to spend money. The reservationist could of made a reservation fro them at another place, and offered a round of drinks or something when the next time the customer does come in.

Next up we went through three student presentations of their business plans (which means we have 15 or so to get through on Wednesday, including mine), and then we tasted a number of sparkling wines. Nothing particular jumped out at me, the Spanish cava was ok, the Italian Prosecco fresh, the French champagne musty.

In the News / Business Plan Review / Sequence of Service / Other Reds

Like with the last few days of the school year every year up through high school, the last few days just feel...wistful, breezy, the last few grains popping through the hourglass. With Culinary Arts, we were jamming on our final buffet, with each student focused on pulling off three heur d'eurves. Now, we're just banging on about a template for a business plan for which much of the research will be made up, as there is not enough time to really get the information.

In the News was abbreviated, but dedicated mostly to pizza. Like last week's Bruni monologue on the state of the pie, this week brought a huge article in New York Magazine. The interview with Una Pizza Neapolitana's Anthony Mangieri made me want to just punch him in the face -- he's everything that is wrong with NYC pizza today. One thing that I really didn't like about NYMag's coverage is that it didn't really address where NYC pizza is going. Clearly, we're in a trend bubble and by this time next year many of the pizzeria's that have opened in the past 12 months will be closed.

Next up, Richard dedicated his time to reviewing the parts of the business plan template -- presentations start Monday. When mine is complete, all will be posted here.

Sequence of Service: basically what it takes to be a waiter or waitress. Up until now, I thought I could easily slip into this role with out experience. Now that we saw a training video for service staff at the Palm chain of steak houses....I definitely could be a server at a restaurant that doesn't suck as hard as the dickwads who are supposed to act like retarded monkeys towards the guests like at the Palm. I like service that is restrained and direct, clear and unobtrusive. At the Palm, they're all buddy buddy touchy feely, ick. SHUT THE F UP, I'M HERE TO ENJOY MY FRIENDS, NOT YOUR SMARMY ACTING!!

Still, there is a lot of detail work that goes into being a good server at a good place. Respect.

The class ended with a tasting of eight red wines, all of which tasted a bit like musty alchy vinegar, except for a barolo, that tasted like musty oaky alchy vinegar.