Great Foie Gras, Decent Cocaine... By Jason King

There is often a huge divide between chefs, and the ones that enjoy their creations. Sure, a great cook or chef has the palate of a refined, traveled epicurean. They usually, however, lack the time and or funds to have acquired that the way the guest in the dining room has.

A man so familiar with well sourced, properly cooked foie gras, just from buying it in restaurants, is likely in a different social strata. This diner and the ones who cook exist in this odd duality.  The cook, who also knows good foie gras, doesn't remember where he left his car last night.

The made for TV set up, that show chefs going out on the town to another chef's spot, enjoying this royal treatment, is rare in real life. Most good chefs and cooks are cooking on the nights other good chefs and cooks are cooking. Hence the ability to go out and enjoy each other's fare is limited.

Then you factor in the cost of going to a good restaurant and enjoying dinner. Assuming the chef isn't your buddy, you and a friend could run up a 200 dollar tab so quick. Do that with any regularity and you have spent your rent and bills on dining out. That leaves very little for PBR or ramen noodles.

So when asked by a dinner guest recently where my favorite spots were in town, I stuttered. Don't say McDonald's drive thru, I thought. I spilled rhetoric about places I know about from an operational stand point or I because I know the chef, not because I had eaten there.

This is the dichotomy of our industry. Bankers and people on their anniversary date know more about the experience of what we do, than we do. Luckily I was able to give the curious guest some good places, I was just caught off guard.

The one pub I told him about, frequented by some service industry folk, has some awesome eats even late.

I told him the bartender can get him good blow too, once he knows you. He was a bit put off by that last tip.

Hunger Games... The "You Looked" challenge by Jason King

In the hot confines of a kitchen, even the surliest and seasoned cook, enjoys a distraction. I'm not talking about a hot young hostess, coming to the back for a drink cup either. I'm speaking of the jokes, games, and pranks that keep every kitchen on the lighter side of crazy.

I am going to assume for a moment, you the reader, have never worked in a kitchen. The most simple game some cooks play is the old, " you looked" game. Take the tip of ones index finger, and creating a circle, touch the tip of your thumb. Your three remaining fingers stay outstretched, the symbol for ok.

Place the finger configuration below the waist, this is really the only rule. Now ask someone near you any question... Like "Hey, did you prep more of these?" If the mark looks at the hand configuration, well, they looked.

Now a trained pro, would not look. With assassin like precision they would casually deflect the question, while thrusting their finger into and out of the index finger/thumb created circle. The originator's only hope then is to grab the targets finger. So three rules of play.

Then the game has variations of penalty ranging from a punch, to an insult, to whatever creative punishment the winner can sentence the violated to.

One kitchen I was in took the You Looked game serious. It was two bucks a look, finger poke, or catch. Three of us played the game with a level of dedication probably not seen since. One of us payed the most during the months we played: me.

The two bucks was collected and kept in the chef's office each night. The funds accumulated quick. A few I.O.U.'s here and there aside, by Christmas time we had over 800 dollars.

When we divided the pot, one participant bought a chef's knife, the other something else cool. I, however, didn't have that fiscal luxury.

At the time we cashed out, I was a little behind on bills, so I got a welcomed bonus to my weekly pay. Which I dutifully spent on either a past due notice or Jim Beam, I really can't recall.

To this day my eyes have an almost physical barrier to looking below the waist of a fellow cook.

Almost Famous by Jason King

A cook thrives under pressure. The kitchen is fast and hectic. Seconds are minutes, minutes are hours, and so on. A cook must thrive in these conditions, better yet, yearn for it. If they don't, they won't last long.

Most people assume if you work in a kitchen, you are a great and creative cook. Though some good cooks are, all good cooks are masters of chaos. A great grill cook can temp a steak with his eyes. Know it's ready because the timer in his head told him so.

I've known line cooks that can put out 150 dishes in a night. Each one exactly as the chef imagined, when he put it on the menu. That same cook, if left with eggs, heavy cream, sugar, and instructions to make a classic dish, may disappoint. Scrambled eggs topped with whipped cream, rather than creme brûlée could be the result.

A busy kitchen line is more a choreographed dance. Behind you. Oven door. Hot coming down. Sharp knife. Like a square dance call, every cook instinctively reacts. Every odd or seemingly insignificant object is right where that cook wants it.

A cook has a folded linen next to his sauté station for a reason. It takes the excess drip off his spinach before plating. Move that linen any where but there, you fuck up the dance.

Out of these disastrous dance halls come the stars. Most celebrity chefs, were at one time badass cooks. They were creative, dedicated, fast, with an insatiable passion for food. Now, they have millions of dollars, and a line of cookware available at Target stores.

At 24 years old, I wanted it all. I could cook, well. My dance moves were strong. I was a future celebrity chef... In my head.

I arrived at work one afternoon. My chef pulled me in the office to show me a special from an incredible restaurant in California. I was given instruction to recreate this before service. I was on this assignment like no other before.

I was able do put my line setup duties on the shoulder of another cook, while I rounded up the ingredients. I would not just recreate, I would create a dish that restaurant wished they had made. This was the kind of chance a young ambitious cook dreams of. After chef sees what I have created, my own line of potato peelers will be available at Target soon.

Two hours later, I presented my dish. Chef turned the small radio on the line to sports talk radio, and took my dish out toward the lobby. The station's show, it turned out, was being aired in the lobby of our hotel.

Chef tells me to listen. The show's host presents my dish to the star forward of our NBA team.
"One of the chefs prepared this for you..."

He takes a bite. "Hmm, that's pretty good." This NBA player sounded about as excited as if he'd just found a dollar. Chef looks at me as if I was the recipient of some great present. "That's it?!" I ask.

I worked two hours, to hear some guy act like he just took a bite out of a decent burger. Does he know who I might be one day?

In case you hadn't noticed, my peelers aren't on store shelves yet. Maybe the lackluster reaction to that dish is why. Though likely not.

I hold no resentment to my lack of fame. It was an honor just to get so close to almost famous.

Did you count the fennel? By Jason King

Sometimes you miss the big picture because of the details involved. The forest goes unseen, as you focus on the tiny sapling or tree.

In the kitchen, we may be a little rough around the edges. Had most kitchen lifers been born 150 years ago, we'd have sought a living via robbing trains, or some other fringe occupation.

As willing as the industry is to give a chance to anyone, it's not for everyone. Sure we don't get paid like doctors or lawyers, but people like those are our clientele. Our mistakes are magnified if we ruin a couple's anniversary night out, a business lunch, or wine dinner.

At the hotel I worked at in the early 2000's, we transitioned to a new executive chef after I started. He was the behemoth company's Chef of the World in 2002. He was brought to our property as a liaison to the new culinary school opening a few blocks away.

He was good. He knew it. I knew it. He told me too, in case I hadn't  noticed. A few days in, and with a captive audience, he confidently demanded a large chefs knife and a button mushroom. He performed a super precise fluting of the mushroom cap.

An old school, but none the less impressive, garnish technique. Usually done with a paring knife, he did it with a 10 inch French chefs knife... "We get it bro, you're good."

As on point as every cook and chef were in the kitchen, prior to the new exec's arrival. Most were taking it up a notch. New chef was eager to prove he was all he had said to upper management as well.

The crescendo was to peak, at a mid-week wine dinner. My job was to cook crusted lamb chops. Some other cooks were on sauces or starch. Our chef de cuisine and the exec were in the wheel house, doing final plating. The sous chef had braised some wonderful baby fennel bulbs.

Let's revisit mistakes in the kitchen real quick. We have to bat as close to 1,000 as possible. You can't fix some things on the fly. Braising or slow cooking are one of those things. When a main ingredient is time, there is no substitute.

Back to the wine dinner. Our sous chef was on braised baby fennel. Our food and beverage director watches everyone's move, flanked by the general manager. As each of my racks of lamb are split, revealing a succulent medium rare, I breathe a sigh of relief.

Then I notice the pan they are retrieving the fennel bulbs is nearly empty. There isn't another either. Perhaps the sous has another pan. The exec calls to the sous for the next pan of fennel.

I brace for the shrapnel about to fly.

The sous informs the kitchen that there isn't another. He had lost sight of the forest: the wine dinner as a whole. During this blindness he hadn't actually counted the bulbs of fennel.

Upon hearing this the exec angrily asked... "Did you count the fennel?"
He asked five more times, before screaming... "Did you count the FUCKING fennel!!!?"

Though part of me was cool knowing I had not dropped the ball, I did feel bad for my boy.
From that day forward, going into any crazy dinner or event, I replay that statement chef angrily screamed... And I count the fucking fennel.

Employee Meal by Jason King

It's amazing how many recipients of the prestigious GED certificate have an affinity for foie gras -- myself included.

There are men on probation -- people you would cross the street to avoid -- who can spot over poached lobster tail a mile away.

I know people whose experience include surviving the state penitentiary and who also know delicate uses of saffron that would amaze even the palate of Persian royalty.

There are two types of people who know and love great food: The ones who buy it often enough to know what it's supposed to be, and the ones who cook it.

On a particular menu several years ago, a stuffed filet mignon called for a six ounce cut. Our purchaser, at this fancy hotel, had ordered only eight ounce precut filets. The executive chef told us to just cut two ounces off, we'd find a use for the scrap.

By the end of the night, those 2 pounds of tenderloin scrap had seen biblical additions. The reach-in cooler borrowed a page from the Biblical tale of the loaves and the fishes.

Amazingly, a half pound of foie gras, a few Maine butter-poached lobster claws and some dank Gruyere cheese had appeared along with the beef. Thank you, Jesus! (Jesus was on salads -- we wouldn't have gotten the cheese with out him.)

What does a crew of ruffians do with $100 worth of the finest ingredients? Make an expensive fucking pizza. So the Benjamin Franklin Pie was born.

Creme fraiche laid the base, as we piled on the our nights wage worth of succulent toppings. Medallions of filet, lobster, and foie gras covered this abuse of an employee meal.

We took it from the oven, finished it with some herbs and dug in. My partner in crime and I agreed: It was a little rich.