just keeping it simple...

It has been a busy few weeks, The last time I blogged was just before taking over my own section, nearly two weeks ago. Well the first few days were a bit hectic, no-one to show me around, no-one to tell what to put on each dish, but I used my skills and It gave me the long awaited boost to my confidence. After a few weeks I've got it down. Peeling potatoes and carrots, teaching my little apprentice about Confit de canard and Pommes Allumettes. It is really a big step forward and a nice chance to be away from some of the louder and more bulshy CDP's in the kitchen. Im enjoying it, settling down to the 70 hour weeks, crappy little room and little social life. Just simply having, a working holiday, the sun has been out sooo much that my tan is much better, those few precious hours that I do have off in the afternoons is a great chance to run down to the beach and enjoy a quick pint and catch a few rays.

My creativity is not yet being sparked, more often it is stifeld with a damp tea towl, often the suggestions I make to the chef are too complex or too far from his own experiences. It seems that I need to get to know the customers better, and have a better understanding of what they want to eat. Great more time for self improvement. So, I trundled on my day off, to London's top foodie destination, borough market, and on my walk around amongst the Japanese tourists, french school kids and office yummies grabbing a bite to eat. I asked myself why do people come here?? Is it to catch what a London market would have been like 100 years ago? - It seems as though it is a million miles away from real markets. Here, the products are all over priced and almost every stall is selling hamburgers, or fast food. It seems that everybody loves the prestige of going to borough market, its name stands for quality, yet on arrival the want to grab something to eat fast and get out, the burgers are great, good quality, but so overpriced, its all so MacDonald's!! MMM not really a foodie experiance. Can you believe what the brits eat?? A good meal has meat in it and is in between two slices of bread. Even when they are in a hotel on the isle of wight they seem to choose the strangest things. Last week we had a coach party in the hotel, they have a sit down meal every night with three or four choices for each course. On the main course they could choose from; Duck breast with schllott tarte tatin, roast carrots and carrot puree, Home braised ham hock with leeks and mash and mustard sauce or Fish and chips. And to our disbelief, 19 out of 26 chose fish and chips. It is all a little strange. I guess that is why you have to keep food simple.

I came up with lots of suggestions to help my chef with his children's menu. But when I mentioned some of the more wacky ideas I had had he was immediately not interested. We decided to keep it simple, mac and cheese, mini pizzas and plates of melon or fruit segments. Baby-cinos, sweet potato chips and the words organic or low calorie were left out, apparently the hotels clientele are not interested, the prefer more simple things. So what happens to these clients that can afford a £200 ++++ per night stay in a hotel?? do they not come from london? or do they change on there way down? The moment the get to the isle of wight they arnt worried about what they are eating, they are more interested in living the simple IOW experiance?? eating all there food with mash and veg?? and paying £19 for fish and chips??

It seems that the elusive chef client relationship, is something that takes time to develop. And is it the client that goes to the chef or the chef that has to go to his clientelle?? Im still asking myself the question is the IOW the right place to be... seems that cooking is deffinately the right thing to be doing. I rock the pots and rock the party!!

Pirate soup and posh beans on toast.

Its true I haven't had time to blog; the lack of internet access and the insane hours that I have been putting in have left me little time to blog also a little sore but I feel as though Im getting much fitter. Every thing seems to be going well in the kitchen, the oppressing silence of living on my own in a small (lets be honest CRAPPY!!) room have left me lots of time to think, about what I want to write, (see article written below, trying to capture the essence of the life of a chef de partie between 6 and 6:35). But it seems now that Im back on dryer land in greener pastures for a short break, I feel detatched from the kitchen, I have forgotten the things that I wanted to write when I left the kitchen angry or sad, even the things I wanted to write when I left elated! It seems everything is going well, the staff have become less nice and more real; the chefs as well. I have been yelled at for the little mistakes and even recieved a few sly, yet rewarding compliments. I have allready started to hate the four walls that surround me, but then who doesnt hate looking at the same thing all day?? Next week I am changing section, away from the meat and on to the garnish section, looks like I will be peeling veg for a week, I hope that does not bother me too much. I have watched the mistakes of the chefs and cryed over the number of customers ordering well-done meat. Finally, I have found a little thing, that can be improved, and maybe its something I can do. Let me set the scene;

Its wednesday in the kitchen; at lunch we cooked for thirty covers; in the afternoon anather thirty sandwiches, the evening is going to be busy a hundred odd covers booked in, and yet I have to cook High Tea for 20 kids aged 1 to 12. Lets be honest, this is the last thing I want to do, I dont have the time or the patience to make chicken nuggest and chips, and if I was a kid I would never have been given the coice of the kids menu, I would have eaten off the normal menu, like an adult. Yet in this nanny-fied land we live in the kids have to eat at 5 and they have a special menu. Well, what a pain in the ass!! and half way through it the owner of the hotel walks in and looks at me and says, "I bet you didnt expect to be doing this." I look down at the crappy white plates with chicken and chips and a cheese omlet with sliced tomato, and I think this is shit!! I smile and say "Not really, its not great is it."

So there it was, an invatation from the owner to make it better!! After a few days of watching the other chefs struggling with it, I have decided to start doing some research and to improve the quality of the foods that they give to the kids. It should be easy, armed with a bit of reaserch Im going back to discuss with my chef the options available Ill follow up next time with what was the outcome, any comments would be greatly appreciated.

A couple of articles on kids food; one from the SanFrancisco times, on hippster kiddy eats and what the customer wants; also here is one from restaurant - hospitality. com with some very interesting figures, Time outs guide to londons top eateries for posh kids nosh, and my rival named blog GASTROKIDS which seems to have a few ideas!!