Jenga

Enough of this being sick stuff, I'm pretty confidant that I'm all better now. I've got my appetite back and the smell of food doesn't sicken me. Now I can get back to enjoying my work.

First things first today, finish with the kabocha squash. I had finished slicing, peeling, and coring the squash yesterday, but we still had to preserve them in jars and that is exactly what David was in the middle of doing when I arrived for work today.

David is a quiet man for the most part, aside from passing remarks to fellow employees. Also, because of his experience in the industry, he is a hard man to impress. This is kinda disheartening because he does not dole out complements very often and it's nice to hear if you're doing something well.

As David was showing me what I needed to do with the slices of kabocha (clean up rough edges and layer them on top of one another in the jar), he said, "Good job on the squash yesterday. That's a job that most chefs don't like to do. It's very tedious work." I was ecstatic. David had recognized that I really am trying to do the best possible job that I can. It was validating. David then went on to tell me that the slices of kabocha need to be perfect because they would come right out of the jar and onto the plate, so they need to be able to pass the critical eye of the customers. He wants perfection? I'll give him perfection.

That is a picture of my perfectly layered jar of kabocha squash slices. It's a lot harder than it looks because not all the slices are even and everything shifts around from time to time, but I got it to work.

Right after I finished my first jar, David came by to check on how I was doing. I asked David if the jar was up to his standards, and he said that it was uber-perfect and that it looked liek a game of Jenga. David then went on to tell me, "I appreciate you precision, but they don't have to be that perfect. Don't lose your religion over it."

Finished preserved kabocha squash.

While working on the rest of the kabocha, Woody asked me if I had ever heard of botarga. I told him that I hadn't and he went on to tell me what it's the roe of fish that is cured (ours had been cured for 2 months on salt), then compressed in cheese cloth to extract all the moisture. What is left is a solid block that we would later use to grate on top of pasta and things like that.

We had some leftover brine after we had finished preserving the kabocha, so David decided that we would use the rest of the brine to preserve some yellow flay, which look a lot like bean sprouts. So, for the next couple of hours, I sliced off the ends of approximately 700 pieces of yellow flay. David added a few cloves of garlic and a few spicy peppers to the jars and after I stuffed them with the yellow flay, they were ready to be preserved.

Next, we got a shipment of mushrooms, so I had to unpack them, label them and find a place to store them in the walk-in. It wasn't a difficult job, but I was glad to do something other that lean over a cutting board for a while. The only difficult part was when I had to identify what type of mushrooms were in each box, but with a little help from Woody, it was smooth sailing.

David had created a potato plate for tonight's service (I never got to see the finished plate though), so I had to wash the dirt off all of the potatoes that would be used in the dish. David taught me a little trick though. He told me to fill a bowl with water, add a cup of vinegar, and let the potatoes soak in it for a while. It doesn't get every speck of dirt off, but it did get the majority of the dirt off, so I was thankful.

While I was working on the potatoes, David was making herb dumplings out of pesto, parmesan, and breadcrumbs, but he wasn't going to be able to finish before he had to leave for the day, so he passed the task off to me. It was pretty fun because I got to use a pastry bag to fill all these little silicone molds for the dumplings.

While the dumplings were in the oven, I went ahead and got my family meal (pictured above). There was the usual salad, a spicy macaroni and corn salad, amazing fried fish, and baked chicken with a walnut and olive crust. Now, I really don't like olives. I feel like the taste is too overpowering. But I decided that if anything was going to make me like olives, then that anything would come from this kitchen. I still don't like olives. Other than the olives, though, the meal was excellent as usual.

Back to the dumplings. I took the first batch out of the oven and they seemed a little under done when I tried to free them from the mold (The one that I tried to free from the mold broke). So I put them back in the oven for a couple more minutes, leaving the broken one for me to try. I mean, we can't serve a broken dumpling, so might as well taste it.

These dumplings were pretty amazing. they tasted like pesto, but had pockets of melted parmesan cheese in them that catch your taste buds by surprise. Excellent, excellent dumplings.

While waiting for the dumplings to finish in the oven, Aaron (our pastry chef) informed me that one of his good friends is a professor at Clemson. Small world. Turns out that his friend teaches neurobiology and stuff like that, so there is no chance that I could have had him, but it's still pretty cool.

The minute I finished with the dumplings, Jackson (one of the line cooks) gave me a bunch of leaves (three types to be exact) and told me that he needed the stems picked off of them, needs them washed, spun dry, and then needs them on the line. This would be my task for the rest of the evening. It doesn't sound like much work, but I assure you, going through each and every leaf and picking their stem off is quite time consuming.

I don't really know what I will be doing tomorrow, but I'm sure it will involve some receiving and storing of produce since Woody likes to go to the markets early saturday morning to order fresh and new ingredients.

Until next time,

Ben

326 hours left

Willpower

Today I had to will my way through a looong day of work.

Usually in the mornings before work I wake up at about 7:45, take a shower, watch an hour of Saved by the Bell as i eat breakfast, 20 minutes of Sportscenter, leave by 9:20, and arrive at work between 9:40 and 9:50 depending on traffic, road construction, or in todays case, a grenade found at a school near Restaurant Eugene.

Today though, I was feeling so bad that I opted to rest instead of watch any sort of TV. I was still not feeling very well when I left for work this morning and was hoping that I would be well enough to get through at least part of the day.

I get to work (after another brief rest session in my car in the parking garage) and everyone asks how I'm felling. I tell them that I'm not 100%, but I'm going to try to make it through the day. As luck would have it, today wasn't very difficult at all.

I started out by peeling, coring, and slicing kabocha squash that was to be preserved.

This took a while because there were about 10 of these rather large squashes that I had to get through. Also, as I had three of the kabocha squashes left, I told David that I was going to take a break to talk with Jason about my HACCP project. David said, "A BREAK? Are you serious, a BREAK?" Then he cracked a smile to let me know that he was kidding. I'm still getting used to his sense of humor...

After my "break" to talk with Jason about my HACCP project, I got right back to work on the kibacha. While finishing up the last of the squash, Woody asked David if he could use me to make the crudite (there's supposed to be an accent over that "e") for tonight's service. David said that would be fine. So, now I had my second task before even finishing my first.

For those of you that don't know (or didn't click on the link), crudite is pretty much an appetizer of raw vegetables with a dipping sauce. A crudite is traditionally prepared with celery sticks, carrot sticks, bell pepper strips, broccoli, cauliflower, and asparagus spears, but our crudite was going to be composed of radishes, zucchini, cucumbers, and sugar snap peas, all prepped by yours truly.

By this time, David couldn't think of anything for me to do, so he put me on garlic peeling duty. I have come to find that the line cooks will always need garlic peeled, butter cubed, lemons cut, parsley picked, and lambs quarter picked.

Working in the kitchen today was exceptionally difficult because because of my having been sick, the smell of food had been making me nauseous. So, imagine my discomfort being in a place that is constantly producing the thing that makes me feel sick to my stomach. Alas, I pushed through it all because I knew that I had to get work done and because, frankly, I need the hours.

I would like to take this time to address the absence of pictures in this blog post. I did not realize how few pictures I had taken today until I uploaded them to my computer a little while ago....all three of them. I didn't even have a picture of family meal, which had been in most every post thus far. I know that a lot of people out there like to look at pictures of what I am doing in the kitchen, and personally, I think that they help me tell the stories.

However, there are reasons for the lack of photos in this post.
1) I usually work in the very back of the kitchen, facing the back wall, next to David. This situation affords me the opportunity to take lots of pictures of what I am working on. But recently, I have been working up front on the line, not making food for a service, but physically up front where the line is because the line cooks don't get to work until later in the day. This situation does not allow for many pictures to be taken because people are always walking through the kitchen and I don't want them to think, "Why is that intern always taking pictures of things? Weird."
B) There were a lot of things in the kitchen today that I'm sure some, if not most, people would not like to see. For example, today we received three pig halves. And I mean, these people just cut the pigs in half and brought them to us. Head still on, hooves still on, and even tail still on. Also, family meal today, while it did taste good, did not look appetizing at all. The had some sort of braised beef dish with cubes of meat floating in the liquid as the feature of the meal. All I wanted was some soup or something and that's the option they give me. So, I took a few pieces and reluctantly went back to my station next to the pigs.

When I got back, I asked Woody if there was anything for me to do and Gavin (one of the line cooks) perked up and said, "Oooh. I've got something for him to do." and he wasn't lying. Gavin wanted me to take these huge leaves of something and cut them from the core. Then I was to chiffonade (a knife cut for leafy vegetables and herbs that makes them look shredded) the leaves, put them into water, use the salad spinner to spin them dry, and finally give them back to Gavin. Then I was to use the salad spinner to dry three other buckets of various leafy vegetables and give them to Gavin. After that, Gavin wanted me to partially fill a bowl with water and transfer some mushrooms from their dirty water into a clean bowl of water. Finally, I was to pick a container of Lambs Quarter, put them into a bucket of water, spin them dry, and give them to Gavin. After all of this, it was nearly 6:00 (quittin' time) and I was ready to go home.

Earlier in the day, James (one of the chefs and apparently the butcher for Holmen and Finch) told me that we would be getting the pig halves and a suckling pig in today and that he wanted me to help him with them.
Let me take a minute to introduce y'all to James. James, for some reason, likes to talk to me and give me advice. This is not unwelcome advice as he has been in the industry much longer than I have and I'll take any advice that I can get. Every once in a while, James will come over to the Restaurant Eugene kitchen for something and will sometimes end up near my station where we will chit chat. He asked me what I planned to do after I graduated from Clemson, to which I answered that I was planning to go to culinary school. James then decided to give me a bit of advice, "Don't waste your money on culinary school." This kinda shocked me. James said that Places don't put much importance on where you went to school, but rather look at your experience in other restaurants. I don't know if I want to accept his advice or not, but we'll see how everything pans (no pun intended) out as far as my future goes.
Anyways, I asked James what he wanted me to help him with, hoping that it would be something quick and easy to pass the time between then and 6:00. James told me that he wanted me to make a brine for the suckling pig and started listing all the ingredients that he wanted me to round up. This was not going to be a quick task.

At about the time that I realized that we didn't have any of the ingredients required for the four pounds of mirepoix (onion, carrot, and celery) that I was supposed to make for the brine, Holeman and Finch got a delivery of produce. When I asked James what I should do about not having the mirepoix, he told me that they have everything I need on the Holeman and Finch shelf in the bakery and that I should put all the new produce into cambros (large storage boxes) and take them to the bakery, put them in the walk-in, and come back with the ingredients for the mirepoix. At this point it was well after 6:00. James asked me if that was okay, I said, "Yeah, sure."
"Are you sure?"
"Well, I am supposed to leave at 6:00..."
"Well, this will build character then!"
And off I went to organize and store new produce for a restaurant that I wasn't even working at.

When I got to the bakery, I found the head baker and told him what I was supposed to do. He showed me the walk-in and gave me one rule. "You can't have anything sticking out off the shelves cause we have to be able to fit this rack (for dough) in front of it. Thus began my game of tetris with the Holeman and Finch shelf in the bakery walk-in refrigerator.

Eventually I got everything to fit on the shelf overcrowded with Holeman and Finch products, such as the pimento cheese...

...which I hear is very very good, so I took a picture for my friends who love it.

When I got back to to Restaurant Eugene, I told James (who was still breaking down pigs) that I got everything put away and he asked where my ingredients for the mirepoix were. I had forgotten them. I told James that I forgot the ingredients, but had everything else for the brine measured out. James told me that it was fine, thanked me for my help, and told me that I could go on home (Finally!). It was 7:00.

After a long day of work (9 hours), I am feeling a lot better.

Till next time,

Ben

334 hours left

Trying to get better

Well, today was disappointing.
I didn't feel very well last night and still didn't feel well this morning, but went to work with the hopes that I would feel better by the time I got there. That was not the case, I still did not feel well. I went to find David and he began to get me started on making another batch of kimchi, but when he asked how my weekend was and I answered with an unemphatic, "okay...", he inquired further and I admitted to having stomach issues. David asked me some questions concerning my symptoms and then asked if I thought that I would be able to work. After some internal deliberation, I told him that It would probably be best if I didn't work today, just to be on the safe side. He said that he completely agreed.

However, I asked if he thought it was okay for me to stick around and work on my HACCP plans because I had planned to meet with Jason at 11:00 anyways. Plus, then it wouldn't be a complete waste of a day. David said that that would be fine, so I got all my stuff together and waited in the bar area for Jason to get to work.

I was disappointed that I couldn't work today because I was ready to get back to work. Over my days off, I had purchased a new short-sleeved chef jacket, a new knife case, and new shoe inserts to help with my foot and back pain, and I wanted to try everything out! Now, I not only didn't feel well, but I also felt bad because I felt like I was making more work for everyone else. I know that it's best that I wasn't in the kitchen, but I still felt like I needed to do something to make the day easier for everyone.

Jason had a meeting to interview another guy at 11 and then I was supposed to meet with him after he was finished, so I had some time to kill before I could actually do anything. I noticed that Rob (the Director of Events) was in the dining room moving tables and chairs around. I told him that I wasn't going to be able to work in the kitchen today and asked if he needed any help. Rob told me that he was setting everything up for two large parties that we were hosting that night and that we needed to clear the tables of the silverware and dishes so that we could iron the tablecloths, so he could definitely use the help.

Rob then left briefly and turned the classical music up in the dining room. I thought, "Great. This will give us something to talk about." This past semester at Clemson, I had taken a music course where we studied everything from Gregorian chat to jazz, so we made small talk about the music. He told me that he loves to work to classical pieces and that his father used to play classical music for him to fall asleep to, so it's also a nostalgic thing for him. I asked Rob if he played any instruments and he said that he has a guitar that he strums about once every year. It was some very pleasant small talk while we cleared tables.

Rob, I must say, is the perfect for the Director of Events job. The Director of Events is the person that you talk to when you call to make reservations, the person that calls you back to confirm your reservations, and the person you talk to if you are planning an event at the restaurant. Because of this, the Director of Events should be charismatic and Rob is extremely charismatic. In the small percentage of calls that I witnessed, calls that could have lasted 5 minutes took 10 or even 15 minutes because these people wanted to talk to Rob and Rob wanted to talk to them.

After helping Rob with the table setups, I still had a good amount of time on my hands as Jason was running late, so I flipped through an issue of The Atlantan Magazine. I read some interesting articles, but was drawn to the back of the magazine where they give brief reviews for local restaurants because I saw a review for Restaurant Eugene...

"Executive Chef Linton Hopkins embraces local farmers, growers, and producers, and bases his restaurant's menu on the organic ingredients they harvest daily. Small plate favorites includes chicken livers with grits and pickled peaches; skillet greens with sorghum gastrique; and lamb shoulder with glazed turnips and mint. Tasting menus, Sunday supper and Cheese Eugene are also wildly popular"

That's right, they were talking about the pickled peaches that I made!

By this time, the guy Jason was supposed to interview had shown up and had begun taking his food test (a test they administer to everyone to gauge where you are), but Jason still hadn't shown up. I decided to walk around and take a good look at the dining area.

I had often wondered where the names for Restaurant Eugene and Holeman and Finch Public House came from and I found a plaque on the wall that gave me a lot of answers. The plaque was about Eugene Holeman, Chef Hopkins' grandfather.

Eugene Holeman grew up on a farm near Memphis, Tennessee and was a chemist by trade but later became the President of the Tennessee Food and Drug Administration. When Chef Hopkins was a child, he would often go with his grandfather to inspect farms. It was on these trips to farms that he taught his grandson that food comes from someone - a person. Eugene would cook everything at home and often used ingredients and produce from his own garden. Chef Hopkins has said that his grandfathers homemade peach ice cream on a hot summer day is is fondest memory. Eugene Hopkins also taught his grandson that cooking goes hand-in hand with bringing food to the table. His combination of cooking and graciousness is what shaped the vision for Restaurant Eugene. After reading the plaque, it is easy to see that Chef Hopkins' grandfather was not only the inspiration for the name of Restaurant Eugene, but also the inspiration for the restaurant as a whole, as well as a monumental influence on Chef Hopkins both as a person and as a chef.

At this point, I had come to the realization that when Jason does arrive for work, he won't have enough time to conduct his interview and sit down with me to talk about the things I need for my HACCP plans, so I reluctantly headed home for the day to try to get better before 10am tomorrow.

Till next time,

Ben

0 hours worked today, so still 343 hours left

BLTs, Bankers, and Bombs

Today was my first Saturday of work and it was awesome. I want to go ahead and inform you all there there will not be as many pictures in this post because I was too busy doing stuff all day (and I didn't want people to think I was weird for taking pictures of everything that I did).

On Saturdays I am scheduled to work from noon until 8pm. I chose these hours because I would be able to be there and observe a service (usually when I leave at 6pm, they are just about to start the service for the night).

However, today, a group of bankers had bought out the entire restaurant for a party/gathering/meeting, so everything we did today was in preparation for the party. The first thing I did when I got into work today was make pasta dough. I have made pasta dough before, so it was pretty easy. However, Woody gave me some tips to be able to know when the pasta dough was finished. First tip was that the dough becomes glossy or slightly shiny and the second tip was that the dough should spring back to form when pressed out, both of these visual cues let you know that the gluten had developed in the dough.

The dough has to rest before we can roll it out, so we put the dough in the cryovac, vacuumed all the air out, and put the dough in the walk-in for a while.

While we were waiting for the the dough to rest, we got some deliveries of produce and since David is off on Saturdays, the task of sorting and storing fell to me. We got some purslane, wood sorrel, dandelion greens (yes, dandelion), wood nettles, tarragon with blossoms, licorice mint blossoms, and horseradish leaves from Indian Ridge Farms, which is a self sustainable farm in Georgia that uses many native american methods of farming. We also got some garlic, cabbage, and cucumbers from Burge Organic, and magenta spreen, mustard, cress, sorrel, edible mum, and onions from another farm.

A few posts ago I mentioned garlic scapes. Many people were not familiar with garlic scapes and asked me what they were. Well, this should help everyone out...

This is what garlic looks like. 99% of the time all we see are the bulbs of cloves because that is what is most often used in cooking. The garlic scape, however, is the green part between the bulb of garlic and the garlic flower, so it's pretty much the stem. Now you know.

Once I finished receiving all the new produce, the dough had rested long enough and Woody and I took the short half a block walk up to the H&F Bakery where they have a sheeter! All the previous times that I have made pasta, I have had to use a pasta machine, which can really be a pain. Having a sheeter, though, made rolling out the dough actually enjoyable. It was so cool. I didn't have to worry about cranking anything, or feeding the dough through, I just pressed a lever and away it went. Next thing you know, i had 15 sheets of pasta ready to go.

Now that the pasta was taken care of, Jackson (one of the line cooks) told me he had a job for me. He wanted me to slice cherry tomatoes for the BLT appetizer that he was making for service. Little known fact: cutting a tomato with a regular knife can actually dull the blade, so it's best (and easier) to use a serrated knife. Even though I was using a serrated knife, the skin of the little tomatoes were still pretty tough to slice through and I couldn't put too much pressure on the tomatoes for fear of them bursting or having squished tomato slices. After a while I got the hang of it and could consistently get three slices from a medium cherry tomato. I can now add "super thin tomato slicer" to my list of skills.

Glorious finished BLT sandwich appetizer...

When Chef Hopkins tried one of them he said, "THAT could smoke a God!"....I don't know what that means, but I assume that it's a good thing?

Family meal today was macaroni noodles with an excellent tomato sauce (which had meatballs, but they were all gone by the time I got there) and roasted squash.

Like I mentioned earlier, a group of bankers had bough out the restaurant for the evening. Apparently these bankers were very important people because, according to everyone in the kitchen, "these guys have more security than Jimmy Carter" (who ate at Restaurant Eugene a week before I started). We only had one security guy in the kitchen (I would later see four of them standing outside as I left for the day), but he had the little earpiece and tiny microphone that he would occasionally whisper things into and everything. Along with the security detail, the bankers had a bomb squad complete with k-9 unit come through and check the restaurant and kitchen. I must say, the dog was very professional, he didn't beg for scraps or anything while he was searching the kitchen for bombs.

Next I got to cut the twine off of beef tenderloin that Woody was searing. What a great job. The smell was absolutely heavenly, there were juices running off of the pieces of meat that were making me salivate, and it looked....well....

After that we were pretty much ready for service, so there was cleaning anything and waiting around for service to start. It was pretty awesome to watch the four line cooks work so quickly and efficiently to get the appetizers out to the guests. There was nothing that I could do, so I just observed. Next there was some more waiting around for the all the guests to arrive and be seated. It was at this point that I was asked to help them assemble one of the dishes for service. My job was to place a small about of a cucumber salad on top of one of the dishes and set it on the counter for pick up. It was a small job, but the fact remains, I was on the line for a dinner service. This was one of my personal goals for the internship and I had already achieved it in a little over a week. Who knows how far I'll advance before my internship is over?

I have Sunday and Monday off from work to recoup and relax. But, after working in the kitchen for a week, there are still some things that I need to do for work on my days off. So, mission for my days off: 1) Buy a knife case so that it's easier to carry my knives. B) Get very comfortable shoe inserts so that my feet and back aren't killing me after work every day. And III) Buy a short sleeve chef coat because I want to be able to stand the heat in the kitchen so that I don't have to get out.

Till next time,

Ben

343 hours left

On my own

Yesterday, David told me that he would be taking today off so that he could do an event. David also said that I should think about coming into work an hour or so earlier that usual so that I could finish the pickled peaches. He said there are less people, it's cooler in the kitchen, and there's more room to work earlier in the mornings, so it would be a great time for me to finish breaking down the peaches and to complete the pickling and jarring process. Also, since he would not be there in the morning, Keron (the saucier) usually gets to work at 8am so he could answer any of my questions. I thought that this would be a great idea (plus, if I get there an hour early, I get to leave an hour early). I told Jason (one of the executive sous chefs) that I was planning to come in and leave an hour early just to make sure that it was okay. He said that it would be fine and that he would see me tomorrow.

I arrived to work this morning at 9am (a full hour before I normally report to work). No one was in the kitchen. David was gone for the day, Keron wasn't there for some reason, it was also Jason's day off, and Woody (the next in command under Jason) wasn't scheduled to report to work until 1:30pm. I was all alone. I didn't see another person in the kitchen until Jorje (the dishwasher) showed up at 10am.

Luckily I knew exactly what I need to do to finish the pickled peaches. I already had the pickling brine put together, I knew where the peaches were, and I had the recipe. So, first things first, I had to sterilize the jars caps that I would be putting the pickled peaches in.

Then, I had to finish pealing and pitting the peaches that I didn't get to the day before. Next, I had to bring the brine to a boil and let it cook for 20 minutes.

By the time I had done all of this, Aaron (one of the pastry chefs) had showed up. I felt like I should be doing something while waiting for the pickling brine to boil, and with no one that I usually help to go to, I asked Aaron if I could help him with anything. He said that there wasn't really much that I could do, but I could measure out the mis en place for a pate a choux that he would be making. At this point, Woody had shown up for work (apparently the schedule that had him coming in at 1:30 was wrong) and my brine had begun to boil.

The brine smelled amazing. It smelled slightly similar to a concoction that my mom puts on the stove around Christmas time for aromatics. Every time Woody would walk by the pot of brine, he would say, "Mmm. That smells great!"

20 minutes later and I was ready to actually start pickling peaches. I was to put the peaches in the brine and let them cook for 10 minutes.

Then, I had to jar the peaches and fill them with the brine.

After jarring all the peaches and cleaning up my station, I had to process the jars of pickled peaches in a steam oven at 212 degrees for 10 minutes. However, because the jars were so large, I could only fit a few jars in the seam oven at a time, and it took about 40 minutes.
Finished pickled peaches

Now that I had finally finished pickling peaches, Woody gave me a sack of sugar snap peas and said that he needed 100 of them cut for service tonight, but he wanted them cut a certain way. Like this...

While this may look like the sugar snap peas are just cut in half, they're not. Sugar snap peas have a thread that run down one of the sides and I had to cut along that thread so that the peas would stay in the pod without one of the sides. The problem, however, was not cutting the pods so that the peas stayed in the pod, but rather finding pods with big enough peas to use.

I was about half way through with the sugar snap peas when it was time for family meal (pictured at the top of the post). I quickly fixed myself a plate of cauliflower, grilled spicy chicken and bread with the benedictine spread. That's right folks, I made something that was used for family meal. It actually worked perfectly with the meal because the spicy grilled chicken was really spicy, and the benedictine spread (made with cucumbers and cream cheese) was refreshing enough to cancel the heat from the chicken.

I was rushing to finish cutting the sugar snap peas because it was getting close to 5pm (when I was supposed to leave work) and one of the chefs from Holeman & Finch needed my workbench to prep for tonight's service. I ended up finishing with the peas before 5pm, but Gavin (one of the line cooks) had asked me to organize the walk-in to make it easier for everyone during service. I got to work on consolidating produce and moving items around for easier access and for more space. Lastly I had to sweep and scrub the floor of the walk-in to make sure that it was clean.

As I was scrubbing the floor of the walk-in, Chef Hopkins walked in, grabbed one of the goblets that we keep chilled to serve ice cream in, and started pouring himself a chalice of milk.

Before taking his first sip, he looked at me and asked, "Do you like milk?" All I could think to say was, "Ummm, yes." What an odd way to start a conversation. Chef Hopkins then followed that question with, "Have you ever done anything with dairy?" This I knew how to answer. I told him that was was in a dairy processing class two semesters ago that worked with milks, cheeses, and ice creams, and that I actually work at the '55 Exchange (Chemson's ice cream shop) where I have made my own flavor. I thought that all this information might impress the chef, but then he asked, "Do you have anything to do with Clemson Bleu Cheese? It's really good bleu cheese." Unfortunately I had to tell him that I don't make the cheese and went back to scrubbing the floor as he left with his goblet of milk.

After finishing organizing and scrubbing the walk-in, I was free to leave. It was 6pm. I showed up to work an hour early, no one else showed up until I am usually scheduled to get there, and I stayed an hour later. It really wasn't that bad though. I had fun, learned a lot of stuff today, and wasn't as worn out as I usually am at that time in my day.

Till next time,

Ben

351 hours left

99 Bottles of Peaches on the Wall, 99 Bottles of Peaches...

A funny thing happened on the way to Restaurant Eugene today. I take a back way to the restaurant that dead ends into Peachtree street to avoid getting caught in rush hour on 85 south. As I was turning left onto Peachtree street, I made eye contact with a driver that was stopped on Peachtree street waiting for a green light. He looked like a surfer dude with longish blonde hair, very tan, black Oakleys, was driving a Range Rover, and was drinking from a teacup! The teacup is what held my attention on this guy in the other lane. Then he proceeded to raise his cup and give me a head nod. I nearly cracked up. A guy in a Range Rover, on Peachtree, drinking from a teacup practically just said "Cheers!" to me. Oh Buckhead.

I had one job at work today and one job only. Remember those peaches from a few posts back? Well, I would be using them to make pickled peaches. That was all I had to do today....I still didn't finish.

We had 75 lbs of peaches and wanted to use all 75 pounds, so I had to figure out what factor I needed to multiply the recipe by. After a lot of math, I figured that we would have to multiply the recipe by 18. Now, I had to gather my mis en place: 33.5 lbs (yes pounds) of sugar, 8 quarts of apple cider vinegar, 33.5 cinnamon sticks, 18 tbsp whole cloves, 32 bayleaves, 18 tbsp mustard seeds, and 241 peppercorns (yeah, 241 individual peppercorns).
If you want to know, this is what 241 peppercorns looks like...

I came to the realization that we did not have enough cinnamon sticks for the recipe in the kitchen, so I was sent on a mission to go get the rest of the cinnamon sticks that I needed from the Holeman & Finch Bread Co. (not to be confused with Holeman & Finch Public House).

I walked the half a block from Restaurant Eugene to the bakery and told one of the bakers, "I'm from Retaurant Eugene and I need some cinnamon sticks." He gave me a confused look and asked, "Did y'all order any at the restaurant?" "I don't know, they just said that y'all might have some cinnamon sticks that I could use." This exchange of confusion went on for a good five minutes before I told them that I was making a pickling brine and ran out of cinnamon sticks and suddenly the baker laughed and said, "OH! Cinnamon sticks!" I thought, "Yeah. What do you think I've been talking about this whole time?"

He got a big jar of cinnamon sticks for me and explained the confusion. The bakery operates separately from the restaurants, so the restaurants have to place orders to the bakery if they want bread. That's why he was asking if we had ordered any from the restaurant. Then he explained that he thought I was talking about cinnamon sticks...

(This is just the end of the cinnamon stick. It was soo good that I didn't get a chance to take a picture before everyone had taken a piece)
...and not cinnamon sticks...

Now that I had the pickling brine together, I started on the 75 lbs of peaches. The recipe did not say if the peaches should be pitted or not, so we went ahead and pitted them because it would be easier to fit them in the jar later. I would later find out from Chef Hopkins that the peaches were supposed to be whole (which would have saved me loads of time) because the pit gives them a slight almond flavor. I peeled and cut peaches for the rest of the day and still have about 30 left to do tomorrow morning at work.

When preforming a repetitive task, you have plenty of time to think, talk to people, and get songs stuck, then unstuck, then a new song stuck in your head. At one point, I got to talking to Woody (one of the executive sous chefs) and he started talking about these oysters (Sewansecott)that they had just received and how they were the best oysters he had ever eaten. Woody then quickly darted into the walk-in, grabbed a couple oysters and shucked one for me to try.

In my experience, one of the best ways to tell if you are accepted in the kitchen is if someone offers you some food to try. I was offered food to try on multiple occasions today.

One of the other occasions (as I was still peeling and cutting peaches) was when one of the chefs from Holeman & Finch was using our mixer and asked if I new anything about hydrocolloids (I didn't). He explained that by using hydrocolloids with a viscus liquid sugar for flavor, you can make a vegan whipped cream. When water is added to the hydrocolloid, they act like egg whites. After this informative explanation, he was finished making a honey marshmallow cream with the hydrocolloid and offered me some to try. It was pretty amazing.

While lost in thought, I was thinking about how these peaches would eventually be jarred and set up on a shelf as a functional decoration for the restaurants...shelves are on a wall...jars are kinda like bottles...99 bottles of peaches on the wall, 99 bottles of peaches...
Right as I finished this thought, David popped up next to me, started singing 99 bottles of beer on the wall, and told me that whenever he has to do something like I was doing, that song always pops into his head. I laughed and told him that I was literally just thinking about that song!

Unfortunately, while performing a repetitive task, you can also get careless. I wasn't paying very much attention to what I was doing with the peaches until I peeled a piece of my finger off.

For those of you that don't know, fingers like to bleed a lot, so I quickly tried to bandage it up so that I could keep working. I was trying to hide the fact that I was tending to a wound from Chef Hopkins when he caught me in the act and said, "NICE! First cut in this kitchen?" I sheepishly said yes. Little did I know that it wouldn't be my last cut in that kitchen...
As I was reaching for the peeler to peel the skin off the peaches, one of my other fingers grazed the blade of my knife which was safely on the cutting board. Luckily, I didn't get cut too deep, but it still bled like there was no tomorrow. In a matter of hours, I had gone from having no injuries to having two cuts and I haven't even been working for a whole week yet.

Family meal today (pictured at the top of the post) was chicken with rice and beans, salad, and bread pudding. Not the best family meal that has been served, but it featured the best dish served so far, bread pudding. I have no idea what they did to make this bread pudding (in the top left of the plate), but it was absolutely incredible. Beyond describable. There are no words to explain what it tasted like, just amazing. I could eat only this bread pudding for the rest of my life and be a happy guy. I let Gavin (one of the line cooks who did not go get family meal) try a piece. His eyes bugged out and all he said was, "Wow." Nuff said.

I was getting close to finishing with the peaches, but only had a little less than an hour before I had to leave for the day when Gavin asked me to cut some lemons and butter for him for the service tonight. I figured that I could do that real quick and still maybe finish the peaches before I had to leave. Then we got a late delivery of some produce and since David was not there to store it, the job fell to me. I realized that I was not going to have time to finish the peaches, so I put a top on the cambro (large container) that the cut peaches were in, found a container for the uncut peaches, labeled them and found a place in the walk-in for them. I did the same for the late delivery of produce. By that time I only had five minutes left, so I cleaned anything and everything that I could find for the next five minutes, gathered my things, made sure that nobody needed anything before I left, and made my way home for the evening.

Till next time,

Ben

360 hours left

You've been ruined by Paula Deen's version of a biscuit

I surprisingly had a much better day than I was expecting. As my brother can verify, this morning I was not feeling well at all and was not really looking forward to the physical demands of my internship (I'm on my feet for 8 hours straight without a break, and when you're tall and constantly leaning over a table, your back starts to hurt as well). Also, a friend of ours was shooting a commercial at our house for the day and I wanted to stick around and watch (which my brother had the pleasure of doing). Don't get me wrong though, I love my internship....I just don't like the pain that comes with it.

So, I arrive to work and despite still not feeling well, I respond to everyones, "Good morning. How are you?" with a, "Fine. How are you?" This morning though, Chef Hopkins was in the building (he and I hadn't been there at the same time since my first day of work) and as I was about to head to the back of the kitchen, he says that he wants to speak to me. I felt like I was being called to the principal's office.

We went out into the actual restaurant and sat at one of the tables near the bar. That is when Chef Hopkins gave me my first real assignment. I am to come up with HACCP (hazard analysis critical control point) notebooks for the Cryovac and Low Temperature Cooking recipes. So, in addition to what I do in the kitchen every day, I have to meet with Jason and Woody (the executive sous chefs) to find out what recipes I need to make a HACCP plan for, research state and federal laws for these recipes, and make booklets for each method.

Back in the kitchen, I had planned to finish up the Lambs Quarter from the previous few days, but David informed me that today was a special day and the line would not need Lambs Quarter. Today, we were hosting an Author Dinner. People had paid $105 to come to the restaurant, get this author to sign their book and tell them how important they are, and to eat the food that we prepared for them. This is much easier than a regular service because all the customers are getting the same thing.

David showed me the recipe that we would be making today, "Benedictine Spread". It's essentially a cucumber cream cheese spread. I started prepping the ingredients while David began making the family meal for the day (pictured at the top of the post). I peeled and seeded the cucumbers

and then grated them over a strainer to remove all the water from the cucumber.

The cucumber had to drain for a couple hours, so I got to chopping the onions for the spread. While chopping the onions, I couldn't help but think of the Flight of the Conchords song "I'm not crying" where a recently broken-up with guy gives reasons for his tears, one of which being "I'm not crying, I've just been cutting onions....I'm makin' a lasagna.....for one". If there was a device that could take all of the songs that pop into my head over the course of my shift and put them into a playlist, it would be one crazy playlist varying from Disney songs to classic rock to rap.

Back to the spread. We combined the drained cucumbers and finely diced onions with fresh whipped cream cheese to make the spread.

I figured that this would be some sort of appetizer on a cracker or as a dip or something. I was kinda right, it was going to be an appetizer, but we would be making them into bite-sized sandwiches. We were to make a sandwich with the spread and butter the outsides of the bread so that they could toast it on the griddle at Holeman & Finch.

From this stage, we cut the crust of the sandwiches off (which was a tasty snack for me, David, and whoever happened by that wanted some), cut each sandwich into three strips, and put them in the fridge to chill so that the spread wouldn't melt when they're toasted on the griddle. Because of all of this, I didn't think that I was going to get to see the finished product before I had to leave for the day. Luckily though, I snapped a quick picture of a batch on the cooling rack before I headed out.

Now that we were done with our contribution to the Author Dinner (and now that David had left for the day), my new task was to break down a new delivery of fennel for storage and to peel garlic for the line. After finishing the fennel and having 15 cloves of garlic left to peel, it was only 5:30, so I was going to have time to fill. Right as I thought this, Chef Hopkins called me over to another station. He said, "Ben, when your finished, I want you to fill these torte shells for tonight's dinner." I gladly accepted the task and rushed to finish peeling garlic.

Chef Hopkins showed me how he wanted me to fill the torte shells that the pastry chefs (that's right, we have two of them) had worked all day to make. "I cannot express to you the importance of delicacy while doing this." The pressure was on. There was no margin or error. If I broke one torte shell, we would not have enough for everyone at the dinner. I had to spoon a delicious cheese/bacon/herb mixture into the shell and spread it on the bottom, and I can truthfully and gladly tell you that not a single one broke!. Can you tell which ones were done by an award winning chef and which ones were done by an intern?

Eventually Chef Hopkins poked his head around the corner to check on my progress and said, and I quote, "Excellent!"
Now for the finishing touches. I had to place sliced tomatoes on top of the torte. Chef Hopkins told me to be generous with the tomatoes because the tortes would be baked again and the tomatoes would shrink.

unfortunately, I wouldn't be able to see the finished product or even start on the second batch of empty torte shells before I had to leave for the day, but I'm sure that they were exquisite.

As I was working on the tortes, Chef Hopkins was moving around the kitchen, checking everything to make sure that it was perfect. He was checking some biscuits that the pastry chefs had made and were skeptical of. "These are great! Just what I was looking for. These are store-in-a-tent, travel-in-a-boat-across-the-ocean biscuits. Real biscuits. You've been ruined by Paula Deen's version of a biscuit." I couldn't agree more chef.

Till next time,

Ben

368 hours left