The Innocent - Shameless plug edition

Yeah, yeah, yeah...I skipped a week.  So Piss off!

Sorry, I've been watching a lot of Gordon Ramsay lately.  Hell's Kitchen, Kitchen Nightmares, and The F Word are some of our favorite T.V. shows.  Kitchen Nightmares in particular offers a real look at some of the problems that restaurants have to deal with (beyond the made-for-TV drama) when it comes to employees, menu, supply, and effort.  It seems (in the TV world, at least) that most troubled eateries could be helped out by adaptability, quality control, and elbow grease.  The fact that 8 out of 10 new restaurants close within the first two years of operation proves that it's not a business for the faint of heart or lazy.
My great friend Bryon runs Alaska Gourmet Subs, one of the highest-rated and most popular small operations in Anchorage, AK.  With a staff of only seven, he has invested his LIFE into this little shop morning till night, 7 days a week, for the last 6 years.  This guy is my measure of what it takes to make a successful operation - dedication, customer service, and economy.  It doesn't hurt that he makes the best soups in Alaska. 

So as some of the new students that I became more familiar with over the course of the Grande Buffet have been passed the link to The Innocent, I considered looking back at previous posts to see if I had made any off-hand comments that might offend but decided that I've kept it pretty real and haven't called anyone names, so they get it just as everyone else did.  You'll take it and like it!

Chef Chad has been our classroom instructor for the third rotation, providing guidance and information on a variety of mostly non-cooking related subjects like culinary mathematics, stress management, interviewing, and plating theory.  Who knew that that there were theories on plating?  Strong lines, soft lines, interlocking swirls, height to portion ratios, and table-view perspective.  By comparison Chef Klaus gave us the standard European plate:  main item toward the diner, starch on the left, veg on the right.  It's all about your style.
And Chef Chad hates that little parsley sprig that so many kitchens put on every plate.  I agree, a parsley sprig is a useless addition whose little bit of green really doesn't matter.  Let's keep the orange wedge, though, it's tasty. 

The class currently going through Chef Masa's Garde Manger spent a little of their own coin to bring in and prepare a large lobster that was beautifully plated (at least by height to portion interlocking strong line table view swirl standards).  Chef Masa is a cool guy, and I'm looking forward to getting into the Garde next week to get back to kitchen work. 

C.H.E.F.S. Hawaii stands for "Catering, Healthy Eating, Food Solutions" and is a terrific non-profit organization founded by Sandy and some of her friends that is geared toward providing healthy alternatives to those entities that use meals and/or food projects for fund raising.  There is no shortage here on O'ahu of side-of-the-road fundraisers offering Krispy Kreme Donuts in exchange for donations to their cause, and while I am a big fan of K.K.D., obviously they are not for everyone.  Or anyone, nutritionally.   C.H.E.F.S. Hawaii is going the route of providing healthy, balanced food for use in fundraising events by offering up expertise in food preparation and nutrition provided through donations, solicitation, and some volunteer preparation from within the food service industry.  I think it's an amazing service to offer to the community and whatever help I can give in the way of volunteer effort, I will.  So check them out when you have a little time:  http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/CHEFS-Hawaii/252868141419872?sk=info Well, the sad realization that not only would I NOT be the next Food Network Star, but would not even get a first call back, was tempered a little by finding out last week that Sandy did indeed get called back for a follow-up video interview for the producers in New York.  She now has to wait a few weeks before finding out if she gets to move on while they finish up open auditions in Austin, TX.  I'm really not surprised, as she is very bright, personable, and attractive...pretty much made for TV, and her show idea plays right into her education and skills.  How can a chubby old dude have a chance?  Guess I'll have to wait until they hold auditions for The Next Chunky Going Fishing and Beer Drinking Star.  Of course then I'd have to compete with those catfish-groping hillbillies, so maybe I should just give up on my TV dreams.  "Sometimes I go about in pity for myself, and all the while, a great wind carries me across the sky." - Old Ojibwe Saying

Or maybe he's a magician...

Well, here it is the Labor Day weekend and with plenty of  blogfodder rolling around in my brainbox I suppose it's time to push out another issue of the most talked-about and socially influential blog on the interweb.  The Grand Buffet, new schoolmates, our third rotation, a potential Food Network Star is born, and The Bee Gees may or may not get mentioned so read on!

Our second Grand Buffet has come and gone, and the Asian Fusion theme means we had the opportunity to deal with huge amounts of ginger, soy sauce, raw fish, sushi rice, seaweed, and risotto.  Risotto?  Yeah, to make risotto look Asian, you cook up a HUGE batch of mushroom risotto, then spread it out on a sheet pan, chill, and cut out little cylinders that you roll in fumikaki seasoning (so they look like little sushi rolls, get it?) and Viola!, Asian themed risotto.  The teaching point of this dish was that it's really not that tough to take a delicious mushroom risotto and turn it into a cold lump of mildly tasty goo.  Here's where it takes a fun turn:

 There is a bean ingredient called natto that is very popular in Japan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natt%C5%8D).  Most of the attendees at the buffet are of Japanese decent, so Robin, our narrator each evening, asked "who likes natto?" and announced the dish we called Not Your Usual Natto to applause and cheers from the crowd...then explained that there was no natto, but cold mushroom risotto, the disappointment on the customers' faces was priceless. 

And would it kill them to have the students who are doing the work come down for a quick bow and introduction, you know, a little validation of their efforts?

The daytime classes were asked to work upstairs in the Garde Manger and we offered up a lot of pretty and tasty food over the four nights of the buffet that most of the patrons seemed to enjoy.  Sushi rolls, sashimi bowls, panna cotta, fruit trays, light salads, asian slaw, caprese, and the infamous Not Natto Risotto to name a few.  It was fun working with the few students (4) left in the class ahead of us who will graduate this month.  We also got to know most of the new class and they seem like a cool and pretty talented group with great enthusiasm.  They came into the Grand Buffet in exactly the same position our class did seven months ago, having done only three weeks in the cold kitchen and handled it very well, including making some really good snacks and lunches for the kitchen crew.  Chef Masa was our fearless leader for the week, and kept things rolling despite a lot of confused looks from the crew and repeated pronunciation interpretation.  On a side note, a couple of the new students seemed a little pushy with Chef Masa, who is very easy-going in his running of the kitchen...I am curious to see how that will go over in their next phase with Chef Klaus.

There was an open call audition for The Next Food Network Star in Honolulu this week and I was talked into giving it a shot.  After all, there seems to be a shortage of stout older gents on most of the TV shows out there now.  It was an interesting experience, with about 200 people showing up at the Sheridan Waikiki.  I was number 81 and waited for about 3 hours for my 90 second interview.  They say it takes all kinds, and the turnout at this audition proved that, with men, women, older, younger, thick, thin, with gimmick and without.   I noticed, and pointed out to Sandy (who had signed in just ahead of me at number 78), a man dressed in purple velvet pants and bedazzled vest who was obviously going for the "zany offbeat" shtick or was perhaps a magician.  After I came back from a break, This guy was just offering her a chance to be a showgirl for his magic act.  I'm almost psychic, sometimes.  Her pitch of "Food as Fuel" was inspired,  I thought, and she would be a great choice for a spot on the show. 

Wendy and I had a very nice Labor Day weekend.  We did a little motorcycle riding around the Leeward side of the island, went to the movies, and had an awesome evening with friends at what they called a "Shrimp Boil".  I would call it a "Shrimp and lobster and clams and sausages and artichokes and potatoes boil with lots of good wine, great conversation, and excellent dessert."  The discussions ranged from food to Korea to "Happy Days" to Fort Bliss, TX to whether the BeeGees had any songs before the disco era.  And then back to "Happy Days" and Pinky Tuscadero, on to vintage tee-shirts, over to the benefits and pains of Crossfit Training, and for some reason back to "Happy Days".  A great time. 

So here it comes, our third and last rotation through the kitchen phases of our course.  Three months of learning, refining, improving.  I'll keep you posted.

Who would have guessed?

Not Natto would NOT be popular?  Yeah, I pretty much got that one, too.

Chef Masa is a dancing fool.  And there's proof.

Manhandling huge pans of risotto is a good forearm workout.

Sandy's favorite thing to do on Labor Day?  Go run a marathon on Kaua'i.  Congrats, by the way!

I can't roll sushi worth a sh*t.

A hundred times every day I remind myself that my inner and outer life depend on the labors of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in the same measure as I have received and am still receiving.
~ Albert Einstein