While I was working on the pickled watermelon rinds, David was working on making mulberry jam with some frozen mulberries that he found in the bakery freezer. I never knew, or rather never thought, that mulberries were an actual fruit. But now that we were using them for something, I couldn't get the "Pop Goes the Weasel" nursery rhyme out of my head.
David had to leave to get more jars for us to put the jam and the pickled watermelon rind in, so he left me to attend to the jam and finish slicing the watermelon rind while he was gone.
It didn't take long to finish the watermelon rind and get the brine together (which had to boil and simmer for 15 minutes before adding the rind). While I was waiting for the brine to boil, I was able to peel, slice, and fry the shallots that we would need for the night's service.
While I was doing all of these things, Chef Hopkins was in the kitchen working on some things of his own when he went up to the chalkboard and wrote, "Fat Acid Salt Aromatics" (FASA) and drew a box around them. Chef Hopkins then preceded to tell me, and anyone else that crossed his path, that those four things are the four elements that every cook should be thinking about before sending food out to a customer. We buy the best ingredients that we can and those four elements should work together to highlight the ingredients. For example, we could take thin slices of carrots add some orange juice (acid), a nice sea salt (salt), and some basil (aromatic) and make an excellent salad. Without the acid, salt, or aromatic, the dish would be bland.
As I was going to get something, I passed by Chef Hopkins who asked, "Ben, what all do you have going on today?" I answered him with, "Well, I have to finish off these pickled watermelon rinds. I'm keeping an eye on this mulberry jam for David and will probably help him with it once he gets back. Then I have to make the pimento cheese fritters, then bread and finish the pimento cheese fritters. Oh, and I have to make breadcrumbs." "Good. Busy day. Breadcrumbs are important. Fasa."
A short while later David showed up with the new jars right as the pickled watermelon rinds were ready to be jarred. So, I jarred the pickled rinds and processed them.
Now that I was finished with the watermelon rind, I could get to the things that I had on my agenda for the day, like making breadcrumbs.
I found some breadcrumbs that someone had cryovaced a few days ago in the walk-in and decided to use them first. Because they breadcrumbs had been vacuum packed, they were pressed into a solid block, so I had to use a food processor to cut them down to a manageable size again. Much to my surprise and delight, these breadcrumbs had already been put through the tamis (I know, I know. I spelled it wrong in previous posts), so they were much easier to force back through the tamis and took no time at all.
Now that I had breadcrumbs, I started on shaping the pimento cheese fritters. Not much to report here other than wile I was working on the fritters, Chef came back to my station to use the cryovac and mentioned that the last time he used that machine, he was cryovacing the same thing (5 different potatoes in 5 different fats with 5 different herbs) and I was working on the pimento cheese fritters. Talk about deja vu.
While waiting on the fritters to firm up so that I could bread them, I peeled some potatoes for david who would be using them to make his German potato salad for the line to use for service. While doing this, Woody asked me to cube butter and cut lemons for the line after I was finished with the potatoes and pimento cheese fritters.
Before I knew it it was time for family meal.
After family meal, it was back to the fritters. It didn't take long to finish the fritters (even after having to move to 2 different stations) and I was finished with breading and reshaping them in less than an hour. On to cubing butter and cutting lemons.
I had to cube the butter and cut the lemons on the line because Jackson needed my previous station to break down fish and James was at my usual station breaking down lamb. This wouldn't be a problem except that they had the heating coils on to keep the food hot and I was trying to cut butter. But this just meant that I needed to work fast and in batches which isn't too difficult.
While I was cutting the lemons, Judith (one of the restaurant office ladies) noticed that I didn't have a Restaurant Eugene hat on. She asked me if they had given me a hat and I told her that they hadn't. Judith looked at Woody and said, "I think he deserves a hat." Woody said, "Yeah, a souvenir." So, hopefully I'll be getting an official Restaurant Eugene hat sometime in the near future.
Before I left, Jason asked me what time I was scheduled to come in tomorrow. I told him that I am supposed to come in at noon. Jason told me that I should go to the farmers market that Chef Hopkins and his wife (Gina, who also works in the restaurant office) helped found. I told him that I would try to make it there before work, so maybe I'll have some cool farmers market stuff to talk about in my next post.
Till next time,
Ben
203 hours left
Wonder if your watermelon rind pickles are as good as my cousin Lucille's were when I was a kid--a childhood favorite food memory.
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