Today’s inspiration from a busy lifestyle: Mise en place. In French it means “put in place.” In the professional kitchen it refers to all the product a cook needs to wash, cut, chop, portion or cook ahead of time to be able to prepare your meal in a half hour or less. At home it … Continue reading
Valentine’s Day is both one of the best and worst days of the year for restaurants. It’s a great day for business, but is probably one of the most difficult days of the year. The dining room and the kitchen gets deuced to death. A 100 seat dining room filled with parties of two is … Continue reading
The clams were sandy. The more I ate the more grit I chomped. The spaghetti was a little salty, but edible. Wait. Nope. The more I ate, the saltier it got and the thirstier I got. Spaghetti with clams seems simple, but clams are very sandy and very briny. So they need to be scrubbed … Continue reading
Now what’s next for me? Well, there’s always Chicago. For those of you who didn’t know, I flew out to Chicago last June to compete on a Food Network show and won the opportunity to take a position in the Windy City (http://blog.foodnetwork.com/fn-dish/2013/09/chef-wanted-tavernita-update/). So why am I still in New York? While I was in … Continue reading
After only three days of planning, I’ve just had to call all my cooks and tell them the re-launch is off. It seemed like we were moving forward at a clip until the owner called me yesterday to say that he had decided to sell instead of re-launch. It’s really too bad. He had a … Continue reading
Now that my cooks have seen the kitchen and the space, they are are really stoked to get in there and start making some food. But first things first. What we are talking about here is re-launching a restaurant. It might be new to me, but not new to the neighborhood, and I’ve watched enough … Continue reading
Well here she is, my new home away from home. One fryer, a flat top grill, an open flame grill, a six burner range and oven, and a salamander to serve a 50-seat restaurant. That’s all folks. Yesterday I brought my sous chefs over for a meet ‘n’ greet with the owner. We went over … Continue reading
