A Moveable Feast

Happiness is ...

... to find this on the Christmas market on the Champs-Elysees :

And a note on my previous post and the comments : Chee, Gloria, Mindy , Kelli & Olivier, Ulla, C, Lisa : I am very touched by your reactions, and your comments really lift me up. Thank you all for taking the time to write to me and for your encouragement ! Really touched.

And for those who think I am just complaining too much, I am sorry that they have obviously not understood the purpose of this blog and my history, neither me as a person. This is not a food blog, but a blog about an extreme professional transformation and the experiences and emotions that come with it. My decision to change profession was inspired 4 years ago by reading a similar blog by a woman who left IT to become a cook in Paris. Today she is back in IT, because it was too frustrating and not paid well enough. I will not be going that way, but at least I also want to show the reality, with the good sides and the bad sides of what it means to move to the restaurant business. Since 20 years my job has always been a key priority in my life, and naturally I expect it to be a source of happiness, maybe more than the average person does. So if I am not getting out of it what I am putting in and something  is not meeting my expectations, I am sharing it here, being well aware that the world is not perfect. If it is tiring you, don't read my blog. About myself : yes I am a very emotional person, easily overwhelmed by small things in the good sense (by a Leonard Cohen song in a Paris taxi at night) and in the bad sense as well (by a boss, that stops appreciating my efforts). And I am happy and thankful that this is the way I am.

For the situation in the restaurant, I have been thinking about the options. I will not talk to the patron, as I believe he is that type of person who won't understand or change, and I have made bad experiences in the past with criticizing bosses. But I talked to the chef about my frustration, in fact he came to ask why I have been so grumpy lately. He said they couldn't function without me at the moment, that there was a certain pressure on him and the patron because of the recent success of the restaurant, that was certainly also due to my contributions. This was very nice to hear. Since then I noticed a new major effort on his side to keep my spirits up, and we agreed on a plan to get me better training in the next year at his "hot" station, so that I will continue to make progress. I stopped giving 200% and am now down to 150%. Not adding 2-3 hours overtime per day anymore, stopped accepting the role of personal assistant of the patron into which he is sometimes pushing me, stopped shopping for ingredients that we don't have in stock, stopped behaving as if the restaurant staff was my family and the restaurant my own, take more emotional distance and a more professionaly focussed approach. All this is unfortunately reducing the fun, because I have always been happiest when I can get involved 200%. But at the moment it is the way to go to protect myself and get back on track for the next steps.

Oooops, I realize I deviated just a little bit from the subject of German sausages, also a great source of happiness, but there a things that have to be said.....

What to do with too many kumquats ?

Last week my favourite chef was on a well deserved vacation, and I had to deal once again with his replacement chef I don't like at all. Actually nobody in the team really likes him. A chef of the "old style", completely egoistic, ignorant and too much convinced of himself. Le patron keeps saying I need to get training at le chaud now soon, so that I can replace the chef next time. I know this has to be the next step if I want to make progress, at the same time I am scared that I won't be capable to fire out the number of main courses in a reasonnable time. Anyway, during that week, the replacement chef placed a couple of nonsense orders with our fruit and vegetable suppliers that nobody really needs, among them tons of kumquat.

First I told the chef on his return, that they need to use them as decoration element for the lunch menu desserts, but it didn't work. He suggested that I make a "confit", I said yes of course, without having a clue at all how to do it. But thank god there is the internet with all the recipes at hand I could possibly need.

And it turns out, that it is really easy to make kumquats confits (preserved kumquats) :

1) "Blanchir" - throw them 10 minutes in boiling water, then cool
2) "confire - step 1" - cook them 30 minutes in sirop (50:50)
3) let rest in the sirop 24 hours
4) "confire - step 2" - cook again 15 minutes in the sirop
5) dry - 15 minutes in the oven at low temperature (60 degrees Celsius)

Yesterday alone I had the impression that a third of the kumquats disappeared, just by my colleagues picking them each time they walked by... When I asked the chef during the afternoon mise en place, whether I can offer him a brownie, he addmitted : no merci, I already ate too many kumquats. No wonder, they turned out abolutely fantastic. A mixed but balanced taste of fruity, bitter, sweet, and sour.

Now the next question, what do we do with tons of kumquats confits, and I thought they would be nice on the "café gourmand" plate we have on the lunch menu, dipped in chocolate. "Sympa" was the chefs jugement, the typical French way, after "pas mal" (not bad), to characterize something outstandingly good.

 

the new desserts - from ideas to reality

We are now in the third week of the new menu, and my dessert ideas have turned into reality. Most of the ideas were only existing in my imagination and the moment I suggested them I didn't really have a clue how to produce or present them.

The charts (the first three ones are choices in the fixed price menu, so it is normal they sell more than the other ones):

#1 bestseller (32%) : 
Brownie & glace caramel beurre salé
Brownie with salted butter fudge ice cream

Originally they were supposed to be with piment d'Espelette, but the first day of production we didn't have piment in stock. Since then we decided to continue like this, and I put the spice in the caramel instead. Less expensive. The chef insists on icing sugar, which I don't agree for a brownie decoration, but then he is the chef... The ice-cream production doesn't match the sales, it is just too good and nobody in the team can resist to take "just a little spoon" from time to time.

#2 (22%) Trio de pannacotta 

We started of with green matcha tea, mango and pomegranate. But then almost no customer ate the green matcha tea one (which I thought was the best flavour), so we changed it to pistaccio after two weeks, now all glasses are empty when they leave the customer table. Le patron has bought the glasses and the ardoise plates especially for this dessert following my suggestions. The pannacotta production required a lot of finetuning attempts in terms of sugar and gelatine quantinty to get the right texture and balance. Each flavour needs a very different amount.

  

#3 (17%) Salade Salade d'orange au mascarpone de datte et gingembre
Orange salad with date and ginger mascarpone

Quite simple in production, I got the flavour combination as I wanted it, but I am not really 100% happy with the presentation. Le patron loves it though.

 

 

#4 (14%) Sablé de tatin de poires au réglisse & crème à l'amande
Licorice flavored pear shortbread tatin with almond cream

My favourite in terms of presentation. Each time I send it out we go "wow. c'est vraiement beau".

 

 

#5 (8%) Tuile d'ananas rôti à la coco & crémeux au rhum
Wafer with roasted pineapple and coconut with rum flavored cream

The show-off-what-I-can-do dessert. This is almost "gastronomique", and I am happy I found a very simple way to produce the cylinders. Everybody is impressed.

(would somebody with English/American mother tongue please comment whether "wafer" would be the right word for this cylinder tuile. Merci)

 

#6 (6%) Cocotte de Camembert au pain brioche et aux groseilles

Delicious and simple to produce. Brioche, camembert and cream, with redcurrant jelly. 15 minutes in the oven. Will run more if it gets colder I guess.

 

 

#7 (1%) Tokio-Brest with yuzu cream.

Failed production and presentation and demand. Remember I struggled already with my own idea in the beginning ? Which led to negtive vibes during the production, and I didn't really succeed. 

My approach with the word-play around Paris-Brest was also maybe a little too intellectual (chef thinks nobody understands) and we had only 5 orders in two weeks, so we changed it yesterday to a dacquoise (almond cake) with yuzu cream. I succeeded in a nice flavour and texture for the cream and the cake, the patron's wife loved it, so I have official blessing, now we will see if customers order...

Presentation - the difference a plate can make

With the introduction of the new menu, le patron has bought new plates, following my begging. To convince him I had shown him an article in Le Figaroscope, with photos from trendy restaurants that use black ardoise ("chalkboard ?") as plate. He asked, for what and how I would want to use them I replied that I see simply an "opportunity for evolution" with regards to his white plain square plates that he is using since 5 years. A couple of days later I got them. Here the two pictures of our new starter "trilogie de foie gras" (chef's idea and creation), three types of foie gras : terrine, pan-roasted and as creme brulée, combined with an apple-mandarine chutney. Which one looks nicer ?

The chef, instead of being as excited as me about this, was rather frustrated. He claims that he has asked for those types of plates since months, and never got them, and "because I am a woman" I just need to say what I want and le patron buys it the next day. While there might be a tiny little truth in this, I also believe that showing him an example in the Figaroscope had helped convince le patron. I didn't argue with the chef about le patron's motivation, but said "o.k. so if you believe I can get what I want from him, then in the future you just tell me what you want, and let me then ask the patron. Anything you need urgently ?". Chef's answer : "A new kitchen"....

Dead chefs alive

Me and the chef are dead alive ("morts vivants") as he called it this week. We have both put lots of extra hours into making the transition to the new menu happen and we have reached our limit since yesterday. My legs hurt so much at night I can't sleep.

But then : most of the new menu items are a success, with one or two failures that either don't work or are not being ordered. The chef and I are are both relieved that we are not yet overbooked on Friday and Saturday nights, which allows us to still breathe during service. I walk up from time to time to have a chat with the chef, and let my commis handle the service.

Yesterday le patron brought out chairs for both of us from his office, so we could sit. Normally a "no-no" for any kind of kitchen staff. But my restaurant and patron are different. Those days I always carry a camera with me to capture the new starters and desserts, and I gave it to le patron to freeze this tough moment during Friday night dinner service with me and my favorite chef (indeed transformed into a phantom) working too hard.

the new desserts

During my job interview six months ago le patron had mentioned that their weakness was on the dessert side, a little bit neglected. And true, they were really not exciting. While I am usually not bragging about my achievements, I believe that I am not completely innocent for the recent reviews that we got on citivox (something like a French online Zagat)  that mention that it is a MUST to try the desserts because they are "à tomber" (to die for).

But even without those reviews I know they are good, because my desserts, especially the tiramisu, the cheesecake and the pistacchio cake keep disappearing from the fridge at a pace that exceeded the number of customer orders. The chef has a sweet tooth and le patron called himself "a sugar person" in an interview I found online about him. One night after dinner service I put a paper on the tiramisu indicating "ne pas toucher !" and wrapped them several times together, because I knew I wouldn't have enough for the next evening if le patron would eat again one or two. Since he found that paper he calls me "the Stasi"...

Anyway, this was a lot of bragging just to say that I have realized that dessert creation and preparation are my strength. For the menu planning meeting last week, le patron had brought zero proposals and the chef had three suggestions for desserts. Which on one side was flattering, as it shows how much they were counting on me, but still I was a little surprised about the missing creativity and effort on their side.

The chef's proposals :

1) assiette gourmande café 
variations of café flavoured desserts.

I liked the idea, but le patron killed it, as he said from experience this would not be selling well, and we should rather think about an "assiette autour du chocolat" for the future.
Cécile si tu lis ça, donne moi des idées ;)

2) Tuile d'ananas rôti à la coco & crémeux au rhum
Wafer with roasted pineapple and coconut with rum flavored cream

Accepted by all, the struggle will be to produce thin cylinder-shaped tuiles (wafers), that last a couple of days. I have been experimenting since a week and believe I found a solution.

3) I forgot the chef's third proposal...

My proposals :

1) Sablé de tatin de poires au réglisse & crème à l'amande
Licorice flavored pear shortbread tatin with almond cream

Accepted. In order to use pears I hesitated between a classic tarte bourdaloue, which had been my favorite in the Ferrandi pastry class and a tarte tatin with pears instead of apples. I decided to popose a kind of mix of the two, bringing the almonds of the tarte bourdaloue into a cream for the tatin. I have a rough idea about the presentation and the elements, but rather clueless yet about the almond cream. Tuesday I will try to mix almond paste / marzipan into whipped cream.

2) Brownie au piment d'Espelette & caramel beurre salé
Brownie with Espelette pepper and salted butter fudge ice cream

Accepted, at least temporarily. We needed a chocolate dessert on the menu and I had the idea to suggest an American classic, as the cheesecake in spring was running really well. But there are doubts this is "sophisticated" enough for dinner, the chef is not really excited. Mid term the plan is to move to a chocolate variation plate. With this dessert I have the least worries concerning production. The brownie is done, even though a little overcooked, but the next batch will be perfect. And the salted butter caramel ice cream is one of the best things I have ever produced. The chef asks every day for a portion, and so even though it is not on the menu yet, 50% of what I have pre-produced is already gone. The only thing to figure out is a nice presentation, I am thinking about cutting the brownie out with a circle rather than presenting a square.

3) Salade d'orange à la mousse de datte & gingembre
Orange salad with date and ginger mousse

Accepted. Flavors I wanted to combine for a while into a dessert, but I had to wait for the season. I have no recipe, and just an idea of the taste in my head. I will use mascarpone and mix the dates into a purée with the pacojet, adding a very light hint of ginger and maybe orange zest into the mascarpone. This will be true trial and error. Maybe quenelles for the presentation, next to a rosace of orange segments.

4) Bali-Brest (mango, coconut), Tokio-Brest (yuzu) or Capri-Brest (lemon)

Tokio-Brest accepted. This is the toughest one. I thought about playing with the very classic Paris-Brest dessert and changing the cream filling flavor as well as the name accordingly, and came up with three different alternatives. The most "tendance" (trendy) ingredient in Paris is Yuzu, a Japanese citrus fruit, so I thought to use it in a dessert. The patron picked the Tokio-Brest among my three suggestions. A day later I found out that a liter of Yuzu juice costs about 50 Euros, so I have no clue now how to make a dessert that is less expensive to produce than the selling price. Either there will be no taste of Yuzu in this dessert or we will lose money. Outch...

5) Trio de pannacotta (flavors I suggested : yuzu, green matcha tea, chestnut, café, chocolate, cranberry)

Accepted. The three flavours / colors will be : Green matcha tea, mango, pomegranate. No difficulty at all for production. After the decision for this had been taken I asked le patron for new verrines specifically for this dessert, although I had no confidence that in the current situation any investment would be made... But surprise : Saturday la patron went to Metro and returned with 80 verrines exactly as I wanted them. Unbelievable.

6) Pomme au four ou Apfelstrudel vertical

Rejected. The chef thought that it would be too complicated to organize the mise en place for the pomme au four, and also it is a little early in terms of season. My Apfelstrudel idea was very similar to Chef's 2nd poposal, as I also wanted to present the roasted apples in a cylinder tuile (wafer). So somehow it will be implemented, but with ananas instead of apples...

7) Cocotte de Camembert aux groseilles

I thought it was time to introduce a nice cheese plate, since more and more customers ask for the lunch cheese platter during dinner service. The chef agreed. We both thought about melted Camembert (well he's from Normandy...), and I had found a recipe where the Camembert is served on dark bread in a Cocotte, then melted in the oven, with redcurrant marmelade as final touch.

8) +9) +10) I had three more ideas on my list, but after 7 had already been chosen, I didn't mention the remaining three in the meeting. They were : "Verre de trois gelees mangue-orange-yaourt, clafoutis de noisettes aux quetches toties, verrine de perles de Japon (tapioca) au lait de coco".

That was the exciting part. Now comes the difficult one : Transitioning the old menu to the new one within two days, Tuesday and Wednesday. In order to ensure a smooth start I decided to spend my day "off" today again on organization planning for the new "mise en place", final recipe research and trial and error in my kitchen.

good looking of calf and crab in the gasoline

For the summer season menu our waiter had asked me whether I could help him translate our menu on a metro ride back after service (we usually take the same train home). I explained to him that this cannot be done within 10 minutes, but requires a little more research on my side. So I spent 2 hours on a weekend, validated by my American friend Cathleen, to come up with a good English menu. I also explained to le patron that such an endavour requires a little "investment" and mentioned the extra time I had spent with this.

Apparently this time for the fall menue, le patron wanted to avoid that I spend again a lot of my free time, and he handed me yesterday the new menu translated into English, and asked whether I could just double-check whether everything was o.k. I was happy about his "progress" and especially since le patron has lived two years in the US and two in the UK, and is rather fluent in English (well relatively speaking...at least for a French...) I trusted that little finetuning would be necessary.

I pull out the paper at home, and can't believe what I read. Here the "best of" :

mignon de veau -> good looking of calf

tuile gourmande de sarrasin -> greedy tile of buckwheat

chair de crabe a l'essence de basilic tropical -> flesh of crab in the gasoline of tropical basil

Cocotte de camembert a la groseille -> stinks of Camembert cheese in the currant

oeuf mollet croustillant -> the egg calf being crusty

Simply hysterical. This is so good, it could be published in a book. Obvious what he had done, no ?. The next morning I told the patron that I had had a really good laugh with his translations, and that using a computer might not be the method, and does not really help me save time. "Ah oui, I used the computer for some phrases, but didn't really double-check...." he replied. Ah bon... ?

 

My first brownie

This week looks better. The dishwasher has been repaired. Le patron has also spent all Saturday trying to repair the drains himself. So far so good, no more swimming pool. Also I havn't seen any more animals. And I am back to my normal evening shift only. In addition le chef has found his sense of humour back and keeps joking around and teasing me. This is more fun. Remains le patron "to fix". I asked him how he really was, and while he was searching for a diplomatic answer I said : "your pause is already too long for a positive reply." And he admitted that the business situation really stressed him. He used the phrase "Ca passe ou ca casse" (it will work or break), which makes me now a little worried too.

So far I had confidence, assuming that le patron has enough money to pay his former associate, but now it seems there might even be a small chance that if he doesn't get the credit, that the restaurant has to be sold. I don't even want to think about that scenario. Yesterday evening we had only 9 covers. That was the absolute minimum record since I work there. It was one of the warmest days of summer, and I assume everybody wanted to eat out on sidewalk restaurants with outside seating possibility. I would have opted for the same. While I enjoyed a quiet evening in my kitchen, trying recipes for the new menu, and preparing some more mise en place for the week in advance, this will of course not help le patron's mood.

One of my dessert proposals that was accepted for the new dinner menu next week is "Brownies au piment d'Espelette avec glace au caramel beurre salé" (brownies with pepper form southwest France and salted caramel ice-cream). For all my new starters and desserts I had planned to look up recipies and do trial & error sessions during the week, as we don't start before next Wednesday with the change. Now what I did not know, is that le patron has also put this dessert on the new lunch menu, which starts... today. Usually the lunch menu and the dinner menu are very different, but some ingredients and recipes are leveraged.

So le chef asks me at 6 p.m. : "Did you bring your brownie recipie ? I want you to make them tonight for tomorrow's lunch service" Me : "No, I was going to do some research over the weekend, and by the way I have never made brownies before". Chef : "Can't you call some of your American friends to get a recipe ?" Me : "<silence>". If I ever was going to make a super-urgent call to friends it is because I am in deep trouble, but not to ask for a brownie-recipe NOW. I didn't explain to the chef my concept of friendship, but instead I asked to use le patron's computer to search for a good recipe on the internet. I thought a reliable source would be chocolate & zucchini . And indeed I found a recipe, simply assuming it was a good one.

We had no nuts at all in stock, so first thing I had to go shopping to get some, 10 minutes before we expected the first customers for dinner, a bit crazy. But as we had so few customers yesterday it was no issue to delegate the service completey to my commis and then dedicate the rest of the evening to brownie-making.

I believe they turned out quite well, but only today I will taste them. I am a bit anxious that I baked them a little too long or too hot by following the instructions litteraly instead of adjusting temperature and time to our professional convection oven, and therfore they might be too dry inside. But I know for a first trial they will be o.k. It was about time that I get to learn to make some decadent dessert !!!

La rentrée

literally translated : "the return", which fits the situation better than the actual meaning "back to school". Happy New Year to the French ! Well, calendars run from September to July and not from January to December here. After a month of no activity, the country wakes up and everything starts as if it was a new beginning. The official back to school day in Paris was last Thursday and since then things are getting back to normal.

The picture below by the way is my godchild Amelie on the way to her first day of school in Germany a month ago. Also a big event, to which I travelled, but not driving the life of a whole country as it is the case here.

 

La rentrée to the restaurant has been a little rough. We returned and many things were broken and not set up correctly, so the only words the otherwise so well behaved chef kept repeating was "putain de merde". First the drains didn't work, so we had to deal with flood in the basement five times a day. Then the dishwashing mashine created a blackout each time we switched it on, the first night the customers sat several times in the dark, then I pulled the plugs and decided that everything would have to be washed mannually, which created more inondations. So my dishwasher-commis instead of being able to help me with the mise en place and the plating during service, did nothing but washing and cleaning "la piscine" (the swimming pool" as I started to call my flooded basement area. This doubled my workload and of course the speed at which I had to work. Fortunately we were only running at 30-40 covers per night, so it was still manageble. With the targetted 50-70 covers per night I would not have survived...

Then we had various types of animals that had found a new home and reproduced during the closing week. I won't go into details, otherwise none of my friends and readers will come to the restaurant any more. Just watch Ratatouille and Starship Troopers simultaneously to get the point. This has been fixed in the meantime with various traps and tons of poisening spray. Among the other minor issues was the failure of the lights in the basement, so that I use now a little reading lamp to have light for plating. Sometimes also the food elevator broke, so that we had to carry plates via the back stairs upstairs to the restaurant level. Also besides the restaurant falling apart, and the frustrated chef, "le patron" is more than stressed, as his business partner, my former 2nd patron has left the partnership and wants to be paid his share, but the credit  hasn't been yet approved by the bank. Obviously this would trouble any entrepreneur, so his mind is somewhere else, and he is not focussed as usual on the details and operations of the restaurant.

I can continue : the guy who usually runs the starters and desserts for lunch service got married and is on 2 weeks vacation, and sent a family member to replace him. His cousin speaks hardly French, doesn't really work clean and fast, and is a reasonnably good dishwasher but not a qualified commis. This should have been predictable, but le patron thought it could work, the chef did not. So two days after la rentrée the chef called me at home to beg me to work also during lunch service and to start working at 10 a.m.; instead of 4 p.m. And I can't say no to anything the chef asks me... But after one day of 15 hours without break, I came in totally crushed the next day and asked the chef and le patron if they realize what they have asked to an old woman like me. I was sooooo tired and could hardly open my eyes. The patron then said that they would find a solution, and it would be o.k. if I could only come in at noon. The chef was not happy, but it was a better compromise. While le patron was very flexible, he couldn't resist to tease me later, and asked how I imagine to run a restaurant, if I am so tired after just one day working two shifts. I didn't even try to argue, because he was right. For me this was an important lesson. I might actually not have the physical energy neither desire to run a restaurant for lunch and dinner service on my own. What's the point to be tired all the time. But I believe I will find a formula that fits, either limited opening days / hours, limited number of seats, cheap employees, a business associate, etc. etc.. Something to plan well, before making the big step.

I continue with "la rentrée" : During my (wonderful wonderful) cycling vacation in Bavaria I had not given a single thought to the new Fall menu. The meeting had been set up for September 8 for implementation as of September 15, that would give me 2 weeks from the reopening day. But surprise, on Thursday last week, the chef announced that the menu planning meeting would be on the following Tuesday, September 1st. That left me with 3 days to come up with 7 starters and 7 desserts, which meant weekend "recreation" was cancelled, and I worked all weekend over my cookbooks and magazines, feeling very much reminded of those many days preparing presentations for HP a little late under time presssure. So all of last Sunday and Monday I established my proposals, and while a little upset about the missing weekend fun, I was rather happy with my results. At the end 3 out of the new 7 starters and 6 out of the new 7 desserts will be from my list. To be discovered in a future post.

Today was my first full real day off after those intense two weeks, and the fact that I only woke up at 11:30 a.m. speaks for itself. My legs and feet still hurt and I spent my day reading (NOT a cookbook) sitting in sidewalk cafés and restaurants in the September sun. Next week will be much better, I will be back to my normal working hours, and it seems there will be no more "piscine" in my kitchen.

short summer break

Paris is a desert in August, only some tourists in the streets. Therfore most restaurants close the whole month, but there is one exception. 

Our restaurant is running so well, that le patron only closes for one week, which does not leave much time for recovery. I am doing o.k. because of a very human work schedule, 3 p.m. to midnight, 5 days a week, but le chef, who is running lunch and dinner service, is very tired. He has once talked about quitting to be able to take a longer vacation, I hope he was just joking, as he is the major reason why I am happy where I am now, and the restaurant wouldn't be the same without him.

One week off doesn't allow for an exotic trip, and mid August doesn't inspire me to go diving in Egypt at 50 degrees C, or joining millions of French at the mediterranean or in la Provence. So I decided to go "back to the roots" and spend a week cycling in Bavaria (where I was born) between Munich and the Alps. I am looking forward to a beautiful landscape, the view from Germany's highest mountain (which I will NOT climb by bicycle), and lots of rewarding Biergarten (with huge glasses of beer and 100% diet-free food) for a daily distance of 40-50km.

The return on August 24th will be hard. I try not to think about it yet, it makes me tired already. Right now we are running about 25-40 covers per night, from September on, the "high season" starts and it will be more 50 covers during the week and about 70 on the weekends, which means 2-3 services per night (we have only 35 seats). I will need a lot of energy for those months until the end of the year...