tartare

So Busy Lately

Just got back from a week of vacation, where I did the things I never have the time for. For me, it was rereading David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest and listening to Game Theory's "Lolita Nation" straight through without interruption.

But the moment I returned, I became very busy. I am going to try and get some entries in (at least with greater frequency than I've had of late), but I am working on a fairly exciting project that is taking most of my time up. Once it is fully baked, details will follow.

Clearing Out The Tumbleweeds

It's been a while since I have had the time to post. With the last insane-end-of-year-rush catering gig now in the past, I have some time again. Tons to write about, but in the mean time, here are some slides:

Nothing more homey than homemade cherry pie (not a pastry cook by trade, though the tart Michigan cherries we picked up this summer covered a multitude of sins, such as my crooked lattice work).

Classics: Potatoes Anna. I had to make these recently for a work engagement and I wanted to have them for Thanksgiving with C and my dad. How can you go wrong with potatoes and lots of butter, salt , pepper, and heat? I am stilling looking for the right pan for this, but on the whole, I was happy with the color on these.

More classic cuisine: Spinach Timbales. Love these things and made them for Christmas Eve dinner at my mother-in-law's house.

Mmm...and of course, home-baked bread, cooling outside. We could not put bread outside to cool when we lived in downtown Boston.

Also from Thanksgiving, my asparagus/avocado mousse with fried leeks and reduced balsamic vinegar. This is a small plate/tapas/bar food item; you can eat it like chips and dip.

The Summer of Tomato Amuses Ends

I had a whole lot of fun playing with food this summer, but I had to yank out the tomato plants yesterday. They're all done. So I thought I'd post some pics of what I was able to do out of our garden this year.

Here are some pics of some of the more successful items. This was a tomato filet/watermelon dish:

We enjoyed having nasturtiums around and I see greater varieties of edible flowers in future gardens.

Quick Hits

I am in the midst of exam week, so I have a bunch of entries to finish once Wednesday passes.
In the pipeline:

• System for Creativity: The Elements of Taste
• Food Blogs: A few links to some recent discoveries
• Sausage Adventure: In which we match a food grinder and some hog casings and really let the sparks fly.
• Beef Bacon: It's not just for pork anymore.  (Actually, since my good friend Don told me he was venturing into bacon fabrication, I had to dig into Ruhlman's excellent Charcuterie cookbook and notes from Garde Manger class.  Perhaps a lamb bacon, too?  We'll see)

Grant Achatz Diagnosed With Cancer

Sad news posted yesterday by Grant Achatz on eGullet and reported in today's New York Times Diner's Journal:

Grant Achatz, the chef of Alinea in Chicago, released this statement through his publicist: “I wanted to personally report that I have been very recently diagnosed with an advanced stage of squamous cell carcinoma of the mouth. I have consulted several prominent physicians and will likely begin aggressive treatment within the next few weeks. I remain, and will remain, actively and optimistically engaged in operations at Alinea to the largest extent possible. Alinea will continue to perform at the level people have come to expect from us — I insist on that. I have received amazing support from friends, family, and everyone who has thus far been told of the disease, and I look forward to a full, cancer-free, recovery.”

What a random and cruel universe we live in. Cancer on the tongue. What can you possibly say to that except "Fight it hard". And if anyone would have the drive and initiative to do so, I imagine it would be Chef Achatz.

New Domain Name Activated

Sometime within the next 4 - 24 hours, the domain name "www.tartare.org" should resolve to this weblog. Very excited about that. Please let me know if you experience any difficulties.

UPDATE: The new domain is now active. Please update your bookmarks.

Things I Have Learned (some of which were in a restaurant kitchen)

Since I changed career paths, went to cooking school and am now working in a restaurant, people will invariably tell me "OH MY GOD! I have told my friends/wife/husband/partner/family so many times that I would love to just chuck it all and go to cooking school!"
A few thoughts on this:
1) Have a stretch goal in mind. "Going to cooking school" in and of itself will get you two plus years down the road. You may thoroughly enjoy the experience, but it would help if you had another, more specific goal in mind, such as "and then I want nothing more than to work in a white tablecloth restaurant" or "and then I would like to be a research cook and work at a flavorings company". For the sake of clarity, let me restate: Cooking school in the U.S. will only get you two years (4-8 if you slack hard enough) down the road. Know why you would be doing this and what it would add up to.

2) Trail (or "stage") in at least two restaurants (if not more). If you have never worked in a restaurant kitchen, then please absorb this: NOT SEXY. I don't mean the work isn't fulfilling or that you won't learn all sorts of stuff. I don't mean you won't work with some really interesting folks who care about the same stuff you do and who will influence you. I don't mean that you won't share ideas like genetic material, as your chef passes on to you what he or she learned from the chef who worked for the chef who -- you get the idea.

What I do mean is that, especially for the beginning cook, you may make pastry cream over a very hot double-boiler, every day or so, receiving a massive steam bath, sweating like a sumo wrestler all the while. In addition to your station (mine is garde manger or pantry as it also called, which is the typical starting position in a kitchen) you may make fresh bread, hundreds of rolls and numerous loaves...every day, or that you may have to do any other number of tasks...repetitively.

All the better that you trail first, so that if this be madness, you can quickly get it out of your head. Or you may find that you wish you had done it a lot earlier, as I did. Find out first by approaching a chef you respect (and/or may be a patron of). Tell them that you would love to trail (or, again, "stage", for you francophiles). You will be pleasantly surprised to find that many or most of them will be quite happy to allow you to trail. Take advantage of this. Whether you ever decide to go to cooking school and beyond or not, it may well be a peak experience and will change the way you see restaurants. When you trail, the chef, the sous or perhaps even the whole kitchen will toss you tidbits to taste. They will explain things to you (such as the difference between Grades A and B foie gras). You may get quizzed ("Do you know why I am doing this?") You may very well prepare dishes that paying customers will eat. Drink deeply of this experience. If it leaves your stomach upset, it is wrong for you. If you find it intoxicating, you may have found your home.

Tartare: A Bit Raw, A Bit Sophisticated

It seems like a few months ago, but it really has been a year since I was rushing about, attending to the care and feeding of software schedules, budgets, and my Blackberry. I had enjoyed a really good run in corporate America, working for a brand-name, Boston-based, pre-eminent provider of financial services.  I had worked through the rushed early years of the commercial phase of the Internet and had also worked at an internet consulting firm. There were times where it was some of the hardest work on Earth and times where I couldn't believe I was getting paid to do something that I enjoyed so much. I had met some truly amazing, smart and talented folks and had learned first-hand the nature of high-performing teams.

But, while I was working, things, as they inevitably seem to do, changed. Software development today is so different than the world I fell in love with: in the days where one of my co-workers exchanged emails with Marc Andreessen for support; before there was any structure and a whole lot of possibilities; where I once worked a 36-hour "day" to hit a schedule deadline; and where my whole team was aligned together with the same goals and matching energy. Now, internet and web development is an IT function; a rigid, certainly necessary, but arid place that requires less and less of the creativity and excitement that made me fall for it in the first place.  And so, I left it to cook.

I had talked about it for a long enough time, years in fact. And I will talk about it more, here, on this blog. (In the mean time you can take a peak at this: I was profiled by the Cincinnati Enquirer in a piece about non-traditional students at my culinary school, the Midwest Culinary Institute).

So, welcome to Tartare, where hopefully, you will find a fresh perspective on cooking and a bit about changing direction in life and just like tartare, perhaps a perspective that is not only a bit sophisticated, but raw at the same time.  I had considered writing about the experience as it happened, but it seemed best to actually immerse myself in the process without having to worry about crafting a narrative.  I think I can speak with more perspective now.