I miss the full experience of working daily in a busy restaurant kitchen. When that kitchen is the hub of activity in a hotel or resort then the experience is even more pronounced. From the moment that a chef walks into the hustle and bustle environment of the hotel kitchen, his or her senses are…
Tag: kitchen
THE SPORT OF COOKING
Is it too far fetched to consider professional cooking – a sport? Are there enough similarities to view how a restaurant line operates and interject many of the facets of a winning sporting teams development and performance? I think that the comparisons are obvious. [] TALENT Restaurant or team locker room – every successful performance…
ANYTHING WORTH DOING IS WORTH DOING WELL
What does it take to get ahead? Maybe the more appropriate question is what does it take to feel good about what you do? Self-Esteem is important, maybe one of the most important motivational tools available – tools that are always within your grasp, are personal, and truly beyond anyone else’s interference. The answer to…
THE LINE COOK COUNTERCULTURE
From that first job as a dishwasher in 1966 when I was 16 years old – I knew I was part of something interesting. Who knows what struck a chord – it might have been the pace, the banter between employees, the time spent helping out the breakfast cook during a rush, or even the…
LIFE IN THE KITCHEN – WHAT A LONG STRANGE TRIP IT’S BEEN
Quite often I have read posts from individual cooks who express a high level of dissatisfaction with their choice to work in kitchens. In some cases this dissatisfaction leans towards contempt – loads of anger pointed at the job and those who employ cooks in service of the guest. While many of the concerns expressed…
THE FALLACY OF RECIPES
Let me begin by setting the stage for this articles title: I do believe in the importance of recipes, but…. they are not the answer to consistently great cooking. Recipes fail in the following ways: Recipes do not factor in variances in the quality of raw materials based on freshness, maturity, the impact of soil…
THAT KITCHEN SENSE OF URGENCY
There are some things in life that can’t be taught. Only the experience of impending doom can push a person to dig deep and find solutions that they never thought were possible, discover skills that were never present before the challenge occurred, and either sink or swim under the pressure of creating order out of…
MORE LAWS OF THE KITCHEN
A while back I posted an article that pointed to the Unwritten Rules of the kitchen. It seemed to strike a chord with almost 100,000 views. Any list that tries to address how a complex environment like a kitchen works is destined to be incomplete, so I thought it was time to add another handful…
IS THE KITCHEN A COOK’S “SAFE PLACE”?
Look around the kitchen and pause to really assess what you see. The lifeblood of the kitchen is not found in stainless steel, contemporary equipment, or even the ingredients that fill cooler and storeroom shelves. The lifeblood of the kitchen is the people who stand tall in their hounds tooth pants and double-breasted white jackets.…
COOKING THROUGH THE SENSES – THE CHEF’S UNIQUE SKILL
We are familiar with the human senses and likely understand that they are all connected as individuals try to distinguish flavor and the experience of eating. As cooks we know that there are many more opportunities for people to distinguish smells than tastes, that texture impacts how our mouths separate the experience of one ingredient…
