Napa Sugar

In the kitchen at Cooks County, or any commercial kitchen for that matter, ingredients must be labeled when they are stored. That's part health code, part convenience. Kitchens, the great cultural levelers, (perhaps best chronicled by George Orwell) usually contain language barriers, which can make the entire experience more interesting than any other place on earth, at the moment. Every now and then, I'll go into the walk-in and find "brocoley." Or "Water Crest."  Or "gabbage." The best one, which I didn't see but chef told me about was something labeled, "Potato Leek Beets". The contents; rhubarb. It's what someone hoped the rhubarb would be. And that's okay. I believe in hope. And, I believe in laughing.

Last night, I found "Napa Sugar," the work of another hope peddler. He could not know that today, Napa Sugar is my new phrase embodying a spirit of hope and levity. Falling out of a pose in yoga is my Napa Sugar, my opportunity to laugh and strive for improvement of my craft. Picking up my drawing pencils is a statement of hope, in this case, exactly like Napa Sugar in that I hope the thing I wrote on looks like what I just tried to make it. I like to take Napa Sugars along Venice Beach, my new home, to soak in all of the fun.

Taking a Napa Sugar before I knew what they were called, last weekend.

What's your Napa Sugar? Go find some this weekend and tell me when you find it!

Don't try this at home

I had but a minute to lament the death-by-overpreparing beautiful two-year avocados. That was last shift's lesson. Last night at Cooks County, I received a hard lesson in under-preparing.

Embrace the silence.

Roxana, one of the chef-owners, shares the station with me. Her side of the counter is pastry, I'm on the cold line, making appetizers and salads. While prepping our stations in moments of relative calm, conversation goes like this:

Chat chat chat what kind of yoga do you do? chat chat chat You need to get some more sleep, girl, and drink water... I love the huckleberry sauce you serve with the pop tart dessert! chat chat chat How long do you proof the spretzel dough? chat chat We need to make more mustard dipping sauce, but let's put it on the list for tomorrow.

Then:

Wham.

Oh. Shit. This is what I get for making fun of vegans. I've got 16 salads up and that's not counting the chicken liver and radish apps. One table ordered four radish plates? "Don't worry about new tickets, Chris, just clean up what you have." Dan, the other chef-owner calls over; Christianna, "Fire what you have." I sense that is code for "Hurry *%@$!^ up." I'm out of the avocados I over-prepped the other night. I'm out of grapefruit. 25 plates due five minutes ago and I'm segmenting grapefruits and avocados on the fly. Roxana, the owner who employs me, is working four of my tickets. Not her own. Mine. Joy of joys, they are called The Weeds, and I am in them.

After the tickets clear, I look out into the dining room. People are having fun. They're standing, waiting for tables on a Wednesday night. I get my station back in order, and watch the wave that hit me land on the hot line, then desserts. The steelhead salmon steaks searing on the wood-fired grill catch my eye from across the kitchen, glowing a beautiful orange. The whole line smells of mussels steaming in white wine and roasted tomatoes. Those plates go out, rustic but composed. Roxana, done with her charity work for the evening on my station, is back to plating her gorgeous desserts.

Pop tart with huckleberry sauce

Roxana says, "I haven't had a run like that in six years." Okay good. Context is good.
"I did not handle that well."
"It's fun, right?"

Yes, it is. For a restaurant that has been open just over two months, it is a good problem to have that most nights feel like Friday nights in the kitchen. Our reward for the night's work: there's one half of an avocado left, and Roxana and I split it. We're back to chatting while we break our stations down. Chat chat avocados are great for your skin! Don't let me forget to make the mustard dipping sauce tomorrow. Chat chat chat I think I'm going to bring my paring knife in for service tomorrow. It's better for segmenting.

"See you tomorrow night?"

Of course. I wouldn't miss this much fun for anything.

A New Year, A New Voice

View from my station.

Three months ago, a friend of mine opened a restaurant in West Hollywood, and I called to see if I could help out. She said yes, and, she’s letting me document the experience. For the thousands of ways food establishments close, there’s only one way to open. It involves 80-hour weeks, sleep-deprived decision-making, and if you can think it, you can worry about it, from napkin inventory to payroll taxes.

I work the cold line, nights. My worst fear is running out of food on a busy shift, especially while I’m still new on the line and both chef-owners are in the kitchen with me. Last week, I cut too many two-year avocados for my mise en place, and all night they sat there, decaying. No worries, we can just compost them and grab more. In two years. A well-designed plan you can’t execute might as well be no plan at all, in the kitchen, in business, in life. And sometimes, perhaps most times, logic won’t get you to that great plan. I heard it, the voice that said, “Those are too many avocados.” I didn’t listen, because I didn’t want to have to cut and season avocados on the fly with seven tickets up during service. I reasoned it would be a busy night, and it was, just not for the avocado salad. While I was prepping, my gut said, “Easy on the avocados, cowgirl!”

Sorry, kids.

Enter the new year. I feel like setting a resolution is creating a plan I can’t execute, but a conversation with my loving compadre opened my eyes to a new way of preparing for the year. “What are your posts contributing outside your community of foodies?” he asked. The question hit me simultaneously like a ton of bricks and an inspiration. This year, I have one thought in mind when I hit the post button, “What else am I contributing when I publish this?” If this remains a straightforward recipe blog, I’m denying the side of my brain interested in people’s stories, and our senses of place and culture. There will still be recipes, to be sure. But, I set an intention to write more stories and take more pictures of subjects that intersect with food (and are not just about it.) My gut is telling me that’s the sweet spot, so I’m going to start there this time, with some fun stories from a back kitchen in Los Angeles.