Bibimbop

There's a restaurant in the east village, 2nd avenue and 8th street to be exact. There is no immediately discernible name on the building, but it is unmistakably Asian, Japanese to be specific. Dark wood awnings and bright red lanterns stick out between Toy Tokyo and the random bar that neighbor it. Stepping through the door, onto the wide worn wooden floor that was green in a past life, I'm greeted almost immediately by heavily accented 'Hello!'s, coming from somewhere in the back of the long narrow room. The small tables are packed tightly, as most are in the city, and the walls are covered with generic Japanese prints and sheets of computer paper proclaiming the specials. I'm led directly to the sushi bar that takes up the back half of one wall, precisely the spot that I asked not to sit at. I take a menu, although I know exactly what it is that I came for. The menu is made up of the normal Japanese fare, sushi platters, miso soup, ginger-dressed iceberg lettuce salads. Things look up as you continue though, into Japanese entrees, tonkatsu, teriaki. But this is still not what I'm looking for. Japanese food is actually quite different than other oriental Asian cuisines. The flavors are simplified to the extreme and the highest emphasis is placed on presentation, not complexity of flavor. The true nature of this little eatery, however, is found on one page at the back, headed 'Korean'. This is what I'm looking for. The bibimbop. Rice, in an iron bowl so hot it's crisped and fried just by sitting there, topped with strips of beef, bean sprouts, carrots, and an egg broken over top. The heat of the bowl will cook it, although the creamy richness before it has completely coagulated adds a whole new dimension. A plate of condiments arrives, kimchee, pickled cucumbers, and raw bean sprouts, as well as a dish of bright red chili sauce. I begin to eat it just as I always do, mix a bit with my chopsticks, adding the chili sauce in small bits, cautiously, nibbling on the kimchee as I go, when I hear one of the sushi chefs talking in front of me. 'Spoon' he says. I insist that, no, I'm alright. I know how to use chopsticks fairly well, I don't need foreign implements. An elderly Asian woman appears at my side then, also insisting 'Spoon'. I could tell that she was not young, but, like so many Asians, she didn't seem old either. Merely older. She took the spoon she had brought, emptied my condiment plate, with the exception of the kimchee, into my hot rice bowl. Then she took a generous spoonful of the chili sauce and began stirring. All the while I sat and thanked her, in two languages, since she didn't appear to know too much English. I felt like a small child, in the best possible way, being introduced to a traditional dish, with great importance that I learn the correct way it is eaten. With my first bite of the newly mixed bibimbop I realized just how correct it can be. It was hot, countering the airconditioning on the 90 degree day, the spice had me reaching for my water glass after every bite, but I couldn't wish for less. The fiery sauce enlivened the rice and beef, giving them a life, awakening not only the food, but the eater as well.

many thanks to all

Thanks to everyone who called and left messages on my birthday. It was awesome to get out of work last night to a plethera of messages from well-wishers. I had a great birthday. Last weekend Steve took me to eat at Gramercy Tavern, which was really good food. Simple, straight-forward, and good. Yesterday, my actual birthday, Chef David Carmicheal (our pastry chef, television personality, and all-around greatest american ever or so I'm told) made me a cake in conjuction with a good luck cake for our maitre d' Raj, who is leaving us to work at Per Se. I also got to go into work late, which had nothing to do with my birthday,but it was nice anyway. So I talked to mom and dad and stopped in to see Steve real quick and he gave me the Historian (a new novel) to read. It's pretty good so far. The main abuse of birthday privilage allowed me first pick of beer as we cleaned up Saturday night. I got a very nice Brooklyn lager, so I was very happy. I took a cab up to Steve's place, where Brent was having a little bbq and Steve had saved me pretty much a little bit of everything, so I had a ton of food. Steak, hamburger, pork, potato and macaroni salad, etc. It was really nice to see Brent, Richie and Dana again, since the only one I've seen on a regular basis is Richie, who sometimes joins Steve and I for a movie.

Today I continued my exploration of NYC brunches with Emily and Nan as we went to Cowgirl in the West Village (Greenwich Village). It was pretty good, and afterwards we went boutique window shopping until I had to meet up with Steve to see an early showing of Batman, which totally rocked by the way. Super awesome, Christian Bale is amazing and I'm really pushing for Cilian Murphey (Scarecrow) to play Winston. And now I am going to read some of my new book. thanks again to everyone!

Beats fad diets anytime

I've been told several times in the last two weeks that I've lost weight, and generally quite a bit of it. I've been told by two Mexican (or Ecuadorian) runners (the guys who take food out), Richie, and Steve. Rachel (the extern who just left) and I were talking about it actually. She had just recently weighed herself and found that she had actually only lost one pound since she had last weighed herself just after Christmas. And since I don't have a scale and haven't had one for a couple of years, I have only a vague idea of what I actually weight. This would be a perfect example of not caring about numbers, I don't have a clue what they are. What I do know is that my pants are quite loose and people have commented. I guess that's what happens when you eat two meals a day if you're lucky and run up and down stairs constantly.

We're really starting to feel the summer kick in. We were just named the top seafood and top power lunch restaurant in the city by citysearch.com, which while not a sign of any sort of prestige at all, does bring business and is a sign of who our clientelle are. Our lunches are very busy, 100+ covers. Our dinners are dead, 80- covers. That may not seem like a large difference, but lunch is from noon to 2:30 and dinner is from 5:30-10:30. So it's super spread out and very slow and boring. Especially for me, since my dish takes about 2 minutes to plate and put out. Literally. I've timed it. This extra time has allowed me to hang out with MK (we had three Melissa's until last week when the pastry sous-chef left. Now we just have Melissa K and Melissa Rodriguez, or M-Rod) and M-Rod, who are our pm sauce and fish cooks. MK has been showing me all of her sauces, how they're made and garnished. It's really interesting, but there are so many that I can't hardly remember any of it. Also, it's so amazingly hot over in their corner that after 5 minutes we literally have sweat dripping off of us. And sweat dripping down one's back is an exteremely unpleasant feeling. My corner in the opposite side of the kitchen is substantially cooler, although we have yet to measure it. we're guessing that it's about 20 degrees cooler, around 80 maybe, while the sauce corner is at least 110 degrees. And very humid, since it's right next to the dish machine. So I'm pretty much a sweaty, stinky mess when I get out of work. Be glad you're not here with me. At least for that part of it.

Public Transportation

Well, the L train is down again. At least late nights and weekends, which is pretty much exactly half of the times that I need it. At least I can count on it to get me to work on time in the mornings (knock on wood!) I'm just going to be taking a taxi home for the next couple of nights and hopefully it will be back to normal next week. Don't even ask me how much that's costing me (Steve said he'd pay for it so I didn't have to deal with the hour long commute at midnight).

Work has been going so well, I can hardly believe it. We've been getting out early enough (11:30ish) and I've been keeping on top of everything so I don't have to go in until 10:30 or so. Tuesday, however, was another story. Because of the long weekend, all two days of it, we couldn't prep anything on Saturday for the next week, like we normally do. It just wouldn't keep well enough for two days. So tons of food got tossed and we were greeted early Tuesday morning with absolutely nothing. I essentially had to work a double since I had to get all of my soup and garnish ready for lunch service as well as dinner. It's run as a normal soup for lunch. And the warmer weather means that people actually want chilled soups, so I have to make a good amount of it.

I believe we have a party on Saturday for Henry Ford's 25th birthday. Another cook and I were trying to figure out if it was actually a decendent of Henry Ford's or just a cruel joke someone is playing on us. Since the contact name was Edsel Ford and the phone number had a Detroit area code, I am assuming that it actually is the Ford family. Whom-ever names their child after an early car model, however, should be shot.

I would like to take a moment and thank Kate and Julie for commenting. I love hearing from everyone and anyone! And Kate, your email totally made my day. I loved it!

Summer is here

Memorial day is upon us, which means a two-day weekend for me (yeah!) and extrememly slow weekends for the restaurant. All of the rich people in NYC go to the Hamptons on the weekends in the summer, so we are slow. Weekdays should pick up, they tell me, but weekends will be basically non-existent, and parties scarce. sounds good to me, but it does take a bit away from the experience a little. I'll just have to suplement my daily work with more special projects and recipes then. and today I even got to sleep in.

I don't know what my plans are for the weekend yet. Steve and I were invited to the Jersey Shore to a friend of his' parents house, but I don't think we're going. I'd rather rest up. but no big plans. Just relaxing and enjoying.

Michelin is coming to NYC!

We had quite a couple of exciting days already this week. We've had inspectors from the Michelin Guide NYC come both days, the first unannounced (supposedly annonnymous) and then again today to speak with Chef and tour the kitchen. Last night we got hit really badly (were super busy), so the added stress of having to put out a table of perfect plates was not completely welcome for the hot line people. And then today, they came towards the end of lunch service, so we all had to stop whatever it was that we were doing to clean everything. The kitchen was spotless when they went through. If you are wondering what all this is about, and I assure you it is a huge deal, check out the press release at http://www.michelinman.com/difference/releases/pressrelease02232005a.html. This is a vert important development, bigger than the New York Times food critic, maybe even. This is historic, revolutionary. This is a step towards acceptance of American cuisine and culinary tradition and abilities. Because, feel what you'd like about the French, in the culinary world, they are the best. It's like a non-Italian pope. They exist, and more commonly now, but they're still very rare.

Is nothing happening?

Well, it appears that I will be posting about once a week, as I really don't have enough to say to write more than that. Unless you would like to see a daily prep list, which really doesn't change ever. And that is really all that I do. This week, I have worked, again had to abandon a project which was pretty much completed because I had done something wrong, and sat for hours in the 14th street subway station waiting for the L to take me to Brooklyn.

The work I did, I'm not going to lie, was actually quite tedious. I had to take artichokes, fennel, carrots, hericot verts (French green beans), wax beans, celery and hen of the woods mushrooms, cut them into nice, perfect little shapes (which I did wonderfully, even the chef's noted this), blanch them, and then Chef Scott was going to further cook them in an aromatic broth. However, I failed to blanch them to the extent that was necessary. I was blanching for color only, since I assumed (wrongly) that they would be fully cooked later. I was supposed to fully cook them in the blanching process. But since I haven't been in the kitchen long, I had never made it before, and it really was only a optional extra thing that I was doing pretty much for my own benefit, the chefs were not mad at me, they just wanted to make sure that I knew how vegetables were expected to be cooked (fully) and that I would not be able to run the special tonight, but would have to wait for next week to try it again. I'll let you know how it turns out as well as some more special dishes I try.

also, everyone should comment more. Or email me. Let me know what's going on. And get everyone who is not reading/commenting on here to do so, post haste.

Must see tv

Ahh. It's Sunday again, the day of rest. I'm off very soon to meet Emily and Nan at Cafeteria, a little restaurant that was pretty trendy a couple of years ago (you can see it on an old episode of Sex and the City) for brunch. And then I'll probably come back home and take a nap until Steve gets out of work.

Friday night was rather interesting. Shania Twain had dinner in our wine cellar, and I spoke (extremely briefly) with Donald Trump on the phone. I believe they were filming an episode of the Apprentice, as there were cameras all over the wine cellar and I had to be extremely quiet when I walked to the locker room.

The highlight of my Friday night, however, was not Shania or Donald, but getting to actually walk into Daniel (pronounced with a strong french accent). All three of our chefs (Chef Neil, the executive chef, our chef de cuisine, Scott, and sous chef Levi) came from Daniel and I had to go return a rather large silver platter that we had borrowed. I only walked through the lounge/bar to the front desk, but the atmosphere was amazing. The predominately warm red palette, the warm slightly floral scent that greets you at the front door, it was all very gentle, amazingly sophisticated, elegent, but not ostentatious or oppressive. My new life goal is to someday eat there. At a small not terrible table in the back. I was giddy.

Worn out shoes

I just got home about 15 minutes ago, promptly took a very speedy shower, and am now getting ready for bed. I can't really just keep talking about how many hours I'm working throughout this entire blog, so I will try not to. But since all I do is work, it's kinda hard. Tomorrow shouldn't really be that bad however, even though it is a Friday. I don't have any parties to do at all, and the prep that I do have isn't really all that bad. I'm rather annoyed with myself as I totally wasted about an hour and a half's work today. I prepped a double batch of celery soup, thinking to cook it tomorrow. Then I was a bit ahead of schedule, so I cooked it tonight. I didn't have that much time. So, I only finished a bit more than half of it, and when I went to quart it up tonight after service, it tasted like nothing. I have no idea what happened, but it was way too thin and tasted like water. So I just threw it out completely and now have to redo it tomorrow morning. Atleast I don't need it until dinner service, so I don't have to go in at like 8am or anything.

there's a boxcar waiting...

One week in and I'm doing well. Granted, I pretty much slept all day today, and took a nap. So, I guess that's not saying much. The night crew went out last night to a little unmarked bar downtown. It was pretty cool, but I didn't get home until about 4am. Hence all of the sleeping. But it was definitely fun. And very educational. I've never hung-out with cooks like this before. Or ever really, unless Kevin, who's really a literary type guy, and Maria count. But this was totally on another level. They were discussing the politics of the James Beard Awards (the cooking industry's Oscars) and the dynamics of restaurants like Daniel and Le Bernardin.

This weekend at work was really interesting because Chef Neil (the executive chef) gave Rachel the weekend off, so I was totally on my own. But I did it, with no real mishaps even. And now the station is all mine. No help, no real guidance. It's all up to me. I decide when I come in, what I do and how much of it I make. I just have to have everything ready for service and can't run out of anything. It's better to err on the side of caution here, as money is like water. It's almost a bit surreal.

Hopefully I'll get more done on my day off from now on so I'll have more to write. Today all I did was sleep, go to lunch with Emily and her roommate Emily, nap, and see Kingdom of Heaven with Steve and Richie. And in case anyone is wondering, Kingdom of heaven is fine. Go see it if you'd like, but it's not a must see by any means. But Orlando Bloom is pretty good looking. And see if you can figure out who plays the King of Jerusalem (the guy in the mask). It's pretty cool.

I'll try to keep up with this a bit better, but I did warn you it would be a fairly sporatic blog.

Strawberries and Balsamic

I think I may have came close to having a panic attack today. I got off the subway at Lexington and 53rd, and for a split second wondered what it would be like to just walk away from everything. anything just to not have to begin something new and in all probability hopelessly challenging. But I continued on, one block north, and 2 long avenue blocks west. And when I got to Oceana, I didn't hesitate. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the other extern, who had just started when I went at the end of January to trail, remembered me. Her name is Rachel. Yes, yet another Rachel in my life. Not that I'm complaining. Rachel was very nice, giving me pointers on how to get along well and not get yelled at while she trained me on the station that I will soon be taking over.

I will be in charge of the Amuse Buche station. That's pronounced: aah-mooos boo-sh. Basically, in pretty much all very fine restaurants, there is an option called a tasting menu. There may even be more than one, say an all pasta or all vegetarian. These consist of several courses, with smaller portions to make up for the greater number of dishes. The menu is pre-set, meaning that you don't choose an appetizer and then an entree and then dessert, you just choose the whole menu. At many of these restaurants, the chef sends out a little something before you even order, something to awaken and tease your tastebuds. Everyone gets the exact same thing, it costs nothing and is not found on any menu. This is the amuse buche. This is what I do.

Oh, and my previous estimate of my hours is fairly off. Today I got to work at 11:30 and we were fairly slow, so we left at about 11pm. Tomorrow, I'm getting to work at 11 and will probably not get out until midnight. Rachel said that she would often get in at 10:30 or earlier in the beginning to make sure she got all of her prep done before service. That's pretty much our only factor to consider when deciding when to come in. As long as we are completely ready for service on time, we can come in whenever.

The food I'm making is pretty cool. They just changed the amuse buche station last week, I guess, so it's still in the early stages. I'm pretty pumped about that though because while that means that no one has done this before and therefore can't help me by telling me the best way to do things, it will give me the opportunity to imput some of my own ideas and thoughts into how the whole process works. Basically, I'm making a chilled cucumber and celery soup. It may sound weird, but we really only serve a shot-glass full of it, and it's actually quite cool and refreshing. I think it'll really be great on those oppressively hot summer days. I'm also making a tomato raite (don't ask me how to pronounce it, I'm still not sure). This is basically a sort of chutney, made with yogurt, tomato, daikon (a sweet chinese radish, all white), jalapenos (although it's really not hot), cilantro, mint (maybe Grandma Woods can make this with Grandpa's bumper mint crops) and cumin. It's really quite tasty. Also very refreshing.

In addition to those everyday dishes, I also have to do any hor'd oeurves for any parties that we may have. And we seem to have a lot of them. So, I'm responsible for about 4-5 different dishes or components a day. Which is why I have to work so much.

Well, I'm sure I won't be writing quite this much everyday. But hopefully now everyone has an idea of what it is that I'm doing out here. Oh, and check out the website if you'd like to learn more about Oceana at http://www.oceanarestaurant.com.

My love to everybody! Thanks so much for the comments, I love reading them, and if someone could get a copy of these to Grandma Woods, that would really rock, as I don't know if she is able to check her email.

Sara

Only two days left...

I spent pretty much all of today shopping for and then cooking what I hope will be enough food to last me for at least a month. I'm freezing it, by the way. No need to fear food poisoning here. I'm a trained professional. Actually, I only got about half way through what I wanted to make, so I'll have to continue on Sunday.

For all of you who are so anxious about the celebrity sightings, I saw Whoopie Goldberg yesterday coming out of a little Italian meat shop down on Bleeker street where I had stopped for some bread and to chat with a friend of Steve's at a fish shop there. Interesting I guess. I have no real impression of her except that she's pretty much exactly what I expected and looks exactly the same. Soon after this, while trying to avoid butt-head Jake (Jodi's ex-boyfriend) who was in town on tour and wanted to go out and party, Richie and I went with a friend of his to the Grey Dog coffee shop, where Richie used to work. Now if you want to see celebrities, this is the place to go. Not that I've ever seen anyone here, but whatever. Apparently others have seen the Olsens and various other downtowners like Kate Hudson and Drew Barrymore. The only person I see with regularity is the bald guy in the neighborhood with an amazingly huge white bulldog. And he's not famous at all. But he does have a nice dog.

I'm trying to fill up the rest of my time off here hanging out with various friends and doing last minute housekeeping chores that I won't have time for later. Like buying books. Last night, after having a couple of (free) glasses of a very nice cabernet sauvignon at the grey dog with Richie, I made the horrible mistake of going to the Strand bookstore. Strand has quite an extensive selection of bargain books, and the best thing is that they not only have the classics and remaindered books that no one else wants, but they even have new books for cheap. So I bought three.

And one last final thing. I don't know if anyone's read this or not (I'm assuming not), but they've just confirmed sightings of the ivory billed woodpecker in Alabama. Before last year, the last confirmed sighting of an ivory billed woodpecker was in 1944. They were assumed to be extinct. So this is quite miraculous and I'm very excited about it. But then again, I'm a nerd.

Totally moved in...finally.

I decided that this would be the easiest way to keep in touch with everyone. Especially once I start work on Monday. I'll be working about 12 hours a day, 12 noon until midnight, six days a week. So, needless to say, that doesn't leave much time to call everyone. I'm pretty excited to start working though. All of this time off is really not as great as it sounds. At least not all of the time. Although I have gotten quite a bit done. I've read several books, all of the literary type, and I'm about half way through knitting a bag for my yoga mat. I've spent an afternoon sitting in the sun in Central Park and have spent way too much time wandering around.

Since I spent most of yesterday cleaning my apartment, I think I'll go spend today at Barnes and Noble reading in the cafe. I'll try to keep up with this as often as possible and I'm planning to post some pictures of my apartment tonight.