One of the (many) reasons why the new restaurant is perfect for me is the expectation of the owners and the chef that I contribute to the menu. It is a total thrill to me. In the beginning it was :"Ulla, you can come up with proposals as well", now after 4 months it is simply "Ulla we need a new dessert by next week". The menu changes every 2-3 months, in order to offer mainly products that are in season an of course variety to customers. Sometimes single items will change if they don't sell well for example. My latest challenge was to propose a dessert that wouldn't cost a lot (ah oui la crise oblige), but still be in the spirit of the restaurant : the restaurant's "subtitle" is "cuisine d'ici et d'ailleurs" : cuisine from here and elsewhere. Next to ingredients that are in season, we use spices, aromatic oils, inspirations from Asian cuisine and often a little twist for the recipes. For example you would never find an ordinary creme brulée on the menu.
A few proposals I have made in the last months were produced just in my head, but most of them by inspiration from one of my 200 cookbooks, magazines or from brainstorming with friends. Two weeks ago, I met up with one of my blog readers and recent Ferrandi patisserie class graduate Gloria, and I asked her for some ideas for surprising but "feasible" desserts. One of the items she suggested was rice cooked in coconut milk. Later that day I browsed in new cookbooks in a bookstore and saw a picture of sweet sushi covered with apple slices. And there it popped up the new dessert : Sushi based on risotto rice cooked in coconut-milk and sugar, with slices of fruit that we have in the fridge already. Not expensive at all, and definitely original.
My strategy for most new proposals has been so far, that instead of talking about them, I prepare them at home in my "lab", and take them to the restaurant. I did the same with the sushi, and the chef and the owner were impressed immediately. So now it is a new dessert on the menu. I even convinced the owner to buy real chopsticks just for this dessert (not the ones on the photo). The "soy-sauce" is home made caramel of course.
The good longtime learning for me is that it makes such a difference, to prepare a new dessert at home versus thinking about how to organize the "mise en place" to be able to serve 30-50 customers per day with 7 starters and 7 desserts on the menu that I have to prepare and serve all by myself, just with the help of my dishwasher/commis. You have simply no time to prepare every starter and dessert every day, but only once to twice per week. You have to think about how to prepare the dish so that during service the plating takes a minimum time. For example I cannot start searching for 4 different fruit during the service and cut them in superthin slices, neither would I have the time to get the rice in shape during service. Then you need to avoid loss, and prepare the right amount, so that after two days you don't have to throw away everything, in case the orders were low. Especially touchy with everything that contains cream, milk and raw eggs (a nightmare with the tiramisu, but at the same time the owner's favourite item in my fridge so often disappearing by miracle).
The sushi are now on the menu since 3 days, and they are quite a bit of work to prepare, and as well time consuming to plate, and each time I get a ticket with an order for them I sigh, because it slows down the other orders, but then when I finished and sent up one order, I am totally excited. Thinking a couple of months back, what a change : that actually someone asks me to create a dish, that I manage to come up with something, produce it and make customers order, eat and enjoy it !
Now I am where I wanted to be and as far as I can be for the time being and all the pain and frustration during the last three years seem to be rewarded. I am getting definitely closer....