Respect for Culture

I used to wonder why it is that restaurants had to be bound by one type of cuisine. Was it focus? Was your food simply going to be all over the place without the framework of one solid cuisine? Was it that the pantry was most economically efficient when kept within one canon of ingredients? Did it have to fit the ambiance of the restaurant, or did the ambiance have to fit the food?

Why does a restaurant have to be just French, or just Thai, or just Italian?

I was confused because I had already drawn two conclusions.

1) A successful restaurant needs a chef who is passionate about and can focus on a certain philosophy of food and its consequent preparation. That's how you create something memorable. If you have a driven and talented cook back there making the kind of food he himself/herself loves to eat, then the rest of the pieces seem to fall in to place. That's how you find those mom-and-pop ____ restaurants (insert Mexican, Korean, Spanish, Southern, BBQ, etc.) that just seem so damned good. There's heart in that. There's someone behind the stove who would like nothing more than to be surrounded by the food they grew up eating, love to eat and gain comfort from eating.

2) But the execution and all the details were indeed very important. Once you figured out what kind of food you were in love with, you did have to figure out how you were going to cook it. Are you planning on setting your customers up for a grand tour, 17-course tasting menu? Are you in to that kind of cooking? True, it garners the most respect (when executed properly), but it requires the best-staffed kitchen and the utmost discipline. Are you going to do clockwork (protein at 6 o'clock, veg at 10, starch at 2) a la carte plates spitfired out of your kitchen instead? Not that that should require any less craftsmanship or skill, but it is more flexible in timing and is better on the bottom-line. Tasting menus really allow you to exploit variety, and offer the full scope of your skills, whereas a la carte risks hit-or-missing far more. One is not better than the other, but they express one's "culinary soul" if you will, very differently.

But a conundrum emerges in that I like a lot of different kinds of cuisines, and even when eating within one kind, I like variety on the table, and then on the plate as well. Traditional restaurant theory didn't seem to match the way I liked to eat, and I felt it important that I cooked the food I loved to eat.

So I had beef with this somewhat unspoken rule that you had to stay within one cuisine. Fusion was a risk-laden venture at best, something I wanted to desperately avoid being called at least. But it just seemed unfairly confining to be required to have just a French kitchen, or a Chinese kitchen, or an Italian kitchen, etc.

As I mentioned before and I will die by the belief; I think a chef needs to cook the kind of food he himself likes to eat. Chef Jeff would always say, "I cook big, fat food because I'm a big, fat guy." And indeed, for such a high-ticket price, white-tablecloth restaurant, the portions were very generous. Our Mustard-Marinated, Roasted Amish Chicken entree was a full half chicken, two roasted plum tomato halves, a triangle of Parmigiano potato gratin, and a nice bunch of baby asparagus spears. Not to mention a healthy, 3-oz. ladle of brown shallot sauce. And although things didn't work out for him there, I like to think he made some good food in that place, and that people really appreciated his cooking, and could sense his heart in it.

So I've had to examine rather closely, how exactly do I like to eat?

Well, my number one thing is variety. Maybe my taste buds are fucked from smoking, or maybe my palate has the attention span of some upper class, soccer mom over-diagnosing ADD white kid, but I like to experience as many different flavors, textures and sights at dinner as possible. That's why I like to share entrees with my dining companions, and alternate bites of sausages at Hot Doug's, and I don't drown my rice with sauce when I eat Chinese food.

It's all about counterpoint. Thomas Keller said it best, he wants to capture the purest essence of a flavor for 2-3 bites. That way it's almost overpowering; it's so flavorful, but of a modest portion, so when you're done... all you can think is "Oooh, I just want one more bite of that," and then the next course comes and changes the whole game again. It's like bringing someone to the brink of orgasm over and over again; the anticipation, the tease makes the end result far more powerful, even if a bit painful at times.

I think the rice argument when eating Chinese sums that up pretty neatly. Our entrees at Pearl East, in true Chinese-American fashion, are dishes of chopstick-friendly proteins and vegetables sauteed in a flavorful, corn starch thickened sauce. A bowl of rice is served alongside and we humbly request that you enjoy. I would never be so pretentious as to "educate" a customer as to how to eat something, you should eat something however you damn well please. But it bothers me when I see the large majority of our customers dumping the bowl of rice in the entree, maybe even throwing in a few crunchy noodles, and then mixing the whole thing up. Every bite tastes the damn same then! Not to mention you destroy the fluffy nature of well-cooked rice. Rice lacks any significant flavor, but that's the point! You take a bite of the dish, it's very flavorful, then you take a bite of rice. Your palate is balanced and cleaned, and renewed to enjoy the next flavorful bite. It's why you sprinkle salt on watermelon, contrast heightens the experience. If you mix it all up, every bite is of the same flavor and textural note, and to me .. that is boring, and no way to eat. (Do me a favor and try it my way next time you order take-out, just dab a little sauce on the rice ... unless you're eating a curry. In that case, ladle on, Garth.)

So I take a lot of importance in variety. A menu should be designed to have many diverse aspects, and a dish should be designed to have contrasting yet complementary textures and flavors. Yet in spite of all this, I have come to realize that staying within a cuisine is rather important.

It would be strange to be munching on Southern fried chicken on one plate, and enjoying a a plate of bucatini alla amatriciana on the other. It might taste good regardless, but something just seems wrong about it. They don't belong together. They aren't Jasmine and Aladdin, finding love through adversity, and finding similarities in their differences. They actually don't belong together, and I forbid them to get married (the chicken and pasta, not Jasmine and Aladdin. I'm still hoping I meet a princess with a pet tiger, and to make exotic Mudbloods with her).

But I had to go further. Was it ignorance and narrowmindedness that prevented me from understanding this combination? Was I essentially being a culinary Republican, failing to see past my insecurities and fears to understand the bigger picture? The conclusion I came to was, no.

It came down to the word, "culture." A word even a child would throw around, but even an adult may not fully comprehend the scope of. I had to answer the question, what exactly was culture and why was it so important to food?

What was of great assistance was The Omnivore's Dilemma. Michael Pollan gets more scientific about it, talking about how a sizable chunk of our brain power is dedicated to figuring out what is safe and nutritious to eat and what is not, much like the rat, another successful omnivore. This is what has allowed both our species to dominate all corners of the planet, instead of being confined to a particular region and type of food (much like my maligned Spirit Animal, the panda, who has somehow turned "cuteness" in to a viable evolutionary strategy). But the key difference between us and rats was "culture," an ability to store and pass on information to subsequent generations. Rats still have to trial-and-error their food. They will learn fairly quickly that rat poison isn't good nom-noms, but they will still lose quite a few intrepid rodents. The information has to be earned the hard way. Humans will have figured out what is and isn't poison far quicker, and stored that information eternally. There is no better example of this than our complicated relationship with fungi, which are overwhelmingly inedible, but humans have figured out a select few, delicious species (and some hallucinogenic).

So this made me realize that a cuisine is not just a geographical phenomenon. It's a history of tried-and-true flavor combinations, a result of thousands of years of humans figuring out what can and can not be eaten, and humans figuring out how to eat what Mother Nature has offered us. There was a time when humans were forced to eat seasonally. There was a time when you couldn't have tomatoes whenever you wanted in Italy. Italians had to wait until the summer, winter offered a whole new range of ingredients and dishes. There was a time when we had to figure this all out for ourselves.

Which is why American food seems to lack so much focus and direction. There really isn't such a thing as "American" food because of such a heterogeneous ethnic make up and rapid expansion across the continent, there hasn't been a significant period of geographic and racial isolation to force people to figure out what the land offered them (unless we're talking about authentic Native American food... yeah white people, you messed that one up, you better hope you're not around for that karmic backlash).

So that's why you shouldn't mash together hamburgers and sushi, or pizza with traditional tacos. They don't belong together, and you irresponsibly making them hate fuck each other is a disrespect and a snub of the nose to thousands of years of culture and human endeavoring.

But that isn't to say that food and particular cuisines should not be explored and taken to new heights.

Curiosity is essential to human nature, after all. We would be nothing without our insatiable desire to create and discover. I'm just saying, you have to do it with some respect.

Bourdain said it best, it's not right for Guy Fieri to be making barbecue pork sushi rolls on his show. There are guys who are practicing the craft of barbecue and pit smoking as their life's work, in acknowledgment of what came before them. There are guys slaving over the proper ratio of short-grain rice to rice wine vinegar every morning, just so one day they earn the right to combine that rice with raw fish. It's goddamn disrespectful and irresponsible. He's creating a monster, an abomination, that may have a chance at being tasty, but not a chance at being tasteful.

But because I am American, I am not so easy to classify, and it's hard for me to identify with a certain kind of cuisine.

You read a chef's bio and nine times out of ten there's some mention of this chef, as a youth, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with his mother or grandmother, cooking good old Italian food, or good old Korean food.

Not only did I never really pick up a kitchen knife until I was well in to my teenage years, but it's difficult for to me to stick my childhood food in to one category. We ate all sorts of different things, it was usually a combination of my grandmother's old school cooking and something from the restaurant. Yes, I guess you could throw it under the blanket of "Chinese food," but it just doesn't deserve to be pigeon holed in my opinion.

Which is why Chinese-American food actually makes the most sense.

Though I am Chinese, I am, for better or worse, thoroughly American. Loud, at times obnoxious, big and preened, I reek of an upbringing in the Land of Plenty. I was exposed to a lifetime of ethnic and economic diversity, and that has forever changed my worldview where thankfully war and suffering has not. I grew up wanting for nothing, food was always on the table and in great portions, and it was old school Taiwanese food inflected with American newness. My grandmother actually has a lot of Japanese influence in her cooking, seeing as Taiwan was essentially a Japanese colony when she was growing up, and my favorite dish of hers was panko-breaded pork chops. But she knew that I loved ketchup, and she would lovingly marinate her pork in soy, garlic, rice wine and ketchup, and then pan-fry and drizzle some more ketchup on top. With a bowl of white rice, and stir-fried cabbage .. it is .. the best.

So things can certainly be taken in new directions, to great and dizzying heights. It just needs love, attention and respect to what has come before you.

Chinese-American food is in a bit of a rut. I won't give you the full treatise from Chop Suey: A Cultural History of Chinese-American Food by Andrew Coe, but know the basic storyline; Chinese people came over to build your railroads. They opened restaurants to feed the workers. White people also worked the railroads, and dabbled in these first Chinese restaurants. Nineteenth-century people were frighteningly close-minded. Chinese restaurateurs realized they could make business off the "round-eyes" by offering them food with flavors more familiar and comforting to them. Chinese-American food slowly evolved in to what it is today. It wouldn't be fair to compare it to authentic Chinese food, they are completely different entities, developed in completely different circumstances. But yet, all Chinese people cringe when Americans talk about how their favorite Chinese dish is "General Tso's Chicken" and that Panda Express is the best Chinese restaurant.

So do I believe it my mission to redeem Chinese-American food? Not really, but I see it as a niche for me to conveniently fill. There aren't too many Chinese boys out there, aspiring to be chefs and have deep, entrenching roots connected to Chinese-American cuisine. As much as I bash it, I do love that kind of food, and admit no shame in enjoying a severely Americanized dish of Sesame Chicken. But as is the overarching theme of this post, taking Chinese-American food to new heights must be done with respect and tact, even if, like a middle-aged stripper, the ole' girl has no respect for herself anymore.

I've only scratched the surface on this. I'm in no position to be creating my own dishes, or dreaming of designing my own menu. I am at the the most elementary levels of novicehood, and I'm sure my opinions and thoughts will change greatly as time goes on. But I know this much...

Yes, kitchens need to have a focus. For so many reasons, but if nothing else than out of respect for the culture of food, and the passion inspired by it.

And yes, we can simultaneously pay homage to thousands of years of humans feeding themselves while developing dishes for the new age.

But no, we can not rush it.

I will summarize with my number one enemy in the Chinese kitchen; corn starch. I hate corn starch. Corn starch thickened sauces don't emulsify well, they need ample oil as lubrication, which is why poorly-done Chinese food is often so greasy, they coagulate at room temperature and become completely unpalatable well before then, and it's a bullshit shortcut. I like that French cooks go the long route with carefully made stock, and patient reduction and clarification. The end result is unmistakably superior. The mouth feel of a properly made French sauce, and a quickly junked up Chinese sauce is night and day, a child could tell the difference.

I do love thickening a sauce with a beurre manie or blond roux though. Yes, dairy has no place in traditional Chinese food, we are a billion strong nation of lac-tards. But I believe there is a way to put them together.

And I also do love a pan-tossed pasta dish; freshly plated, sprinkled with Parmigiano-Reggiano, barely melted by the ambient heat of the fresh cooked noodles, accented with herbage and salty pancetta crisps.

So I will share with you the one creative endeavor I have attempted this year. A culmination of my culinary education thus far. And yes, I made it in our kitchen after we closed one night, because I was too embarrassed to let anyone see, in case it failed miserably.

Chow Fun with Andouille Sausage, Pea Pods, Bean Sprouts in a Sha-cha Sauce

The basic idea was this:

I love chow fun noodles, they're the thick-cut rice noodles. When fresh, they have a wonderfully pleasant chewiness, and a strong ability to carry sauce without being drowned or becoming too oily.

Sha-cha sauce is a traditional condiment used with huo guo, or hot pot. Most Chinese will mix the paste (made of dried shrimp, garlic, shallots and other goodies) with a raw egg, soy sauce, chili-garlic paste and some rice wine vinegar. It is a powerful and delicious sauce to complement the mild and passive flavors of hot pot ingredients.

The raw egg got me thinking; pasta carbonara, properly made, is fresh cooked pasta tossed with raw egg, bacon and cheese. The raw egg is just barely, barely cooked by the ambient heat, and the result is a creamy, heady dish of noodles punctuated by the bacon's saltiness.

So what if we combine chow fun noodles with the sha-cha sauce, but finished it in the style of a pasta carbonara? And to the lab we went...

I don't really know the inspiration behind the addition of andouille. It's such a garlicky sausage I figured it would pair nicely with the dominating garlic flavor of the sha-cha sauce, while offering the saltiness that pancetta normally would. Pea pods are pleasantly green and crunchy, as are bean sprouts. There needed to be some textural curiosities. Made sense to me...

So you bring the chow fun noodles to heat in light chicken stock, you blanch your peas and sprouts, you grill your sausage, rest and slice, and then you ready your sauce. Traditional chow fun noodles would be tossed in an oiled wok, on the heat so that the sauce was heated and absorbed thoroughly. I specifically wanted to avoid this because the intense heat of a wok ring burner would scramble my eggs.

And then we make the sauce; sha cha paste (I like a lot, like heaping tablespoons), soy, chili-garlic paste, rice wine vinegar and two raw eggs beaten together at the last moment. Quick taste test, add a pinch of scallion greens and here we go...

Season your wok with oil, drop in your hot noodles and vegetables, drop in your sliced andouille, kill the heat... moment of no return... kill the heat, drizzle in your raw egg, sha-cha mixture and start tossing immediately, you want the egg to heat evenly...

Barely runny, slightly eggy and creamy, put it on a hot plate... enjoy.

Well, there I was in an abandoned kitchen, messing around by myself. No witnesses to my mad scientist machinations but me. I was sheltered from any judging eyes. Break a pair of bamboo chopsticks, shave off the splinters and... take a cautionary bite.

I will use no adjectives, and simply say ... I allowed myself a small smile.

I found it harder to describe how my brain would work in the process of blending and developing cuisines, and instead found it easier to just show you how my brain worked. Like I said, there's a long, long way to go. There are a lot of things to consider, and a lot of pitfalls to avoid, but I will continue on the path with this quote as my torch...

"A sign of greatness is when everything that comes before you is obsolete, and everything that comes after you bears your mark." -Dave Chappelle

I make no claims that I am destined for greatness, but you can take comfort in knowing that I am always striving for it.

EP6

The Return

Chicago was something of a last hurrah. A sorely needed vacation before shit gets serious. A chance for me to return once more to the game of college ultimate. A game you would bleed and sweat for in the gym, a game you would endure cold and deluge for on a weekend you desperately needed to catch up on … life.

Ultimate has that unique ability to own your life without you really owing any obligation to the game. Sure, you would be letting down your teammates if you quit, but there isn’t exactly a scholarship for them to pull. Nobody's begging you to throw frisbees. Life would assuredly go on.

But yet I was there. Plugging away at a sport with barely any athletic promise to call my own, smoke-blackened lungs and a sports resume that consisted of lazy pick-up basketball and the very occasional "jog" (soft "j").

There’s a quote by Steve Martin to describe that kind of oblivious perseverance,

“Despite a lack of natural ability, I did have the one element necessary to all early creativity; naivete, that fabulous quality that keeps you from knowing just how unsuited you are for what you are about to do."

I just played the game. I didn’t worry about my 40-yard dash, and forehand hucks (not yet anyway). I just played because I enjoyed it. Every time corpulence and smoking made me want to collapse on the Patten floor gym, the next day I would rise on the field stronger and faster. Athletic improvements come quickly and significantly when you start from zero. I was hooked, I had found love. What would I ever do without this game, for surely there could be no life worth living once this was over. I would cherish it, I would continue to strive, and every strong defensive play and goal thrown only further confirmed in my heart that me and ultimate were in it 'til the end; 'til death do us part.

But as is the case with young love, it is often foolish and unseeing. Things change, and events develop that you could never foresee coming. There would be a time where we were required to grow up, and make decisions in attempts to secure an abstract future. In short, I needed to find a career.

I never expected to find the restaurant business. I blamed it for costing me any semblance of a real family, and the freedom with which I ran about as a teenager nearly cost me any hope of a bright future. It was luck and luck alone that got me to where I am today, and I thank my personal gods of fortune every day.

I don’t think my mother would be as thankful for that. The most curious thing about her, being such a pragmatic woman, was that she was a believer. She believed that I was destined to be on a stage playing the cello. She believed in it so strongly that she spent nearly all of her adult life to give me a first-rate education in music, and a exquisite masterpiece of a cello I did not deserve. I squandered it. An acceptance letter in to Northwestern is the only thing I have to show for everything I put in to music. That would be the most important thing that ever happened to my life, but in the narrow spectrum of music … it was a failure.

I refuse to make the same mistake. Whereas I had little passion for the cello, the kitchen sings to me. While I felt suffocated in an orchestra (from the last seat, mind you) and desperately strained to let my individual sound be heard, I find some kind of strange enjoyment from being a very replaceable soldier in the kitchen. Obediently following orders and dicing carrots for the vision of the chef, slinging hot cast-iron pans to line his pockets and bolster his name makes sense to me.

I’ve taken a curious and winding road to the restaurant industry. Probably as confusing and convoluted as the preceding few paragraphs. I am reminded of this every time one of my mom’s customers asks me how I got into the family business. It cannot possibly be abbreviated if you want a coherent story. I have to talk about how I got from Juilliard to Northwestern, from cello to fooling around with ultimate, to selecting an East Asian History concentration and using that to land my first paid kitchen job. It doesn’t make much sense to me either. But I learned a lot of lessons on the road.

Frisbee taught me what it was like to love. To revel in the splendor of a thing and yet feel its occasional and fierce backlashes was crucial to my growth. It taught me how to endure pain, both physical and mental, and to resist temptation. Running suicides after smoking for seven years straight out sucks. Picking up smoking is and always will be my greatest regret. Not only will it pull the plug on my life quite prematurely, but it prevented me from ever achieving much of any greatness while I played the game. And for those of you who preach “just quit,” well I don’t want to hear it. You know nothing of resisting temptation until you have felt the alarm of nicotine deprivation, or until you’ve battled yourself from obesity to relative health.

And so these lessons have reappeared in the kitchen. No matter how much you like physical exercise, it’s never fun to be sprinting in a decaying gymnasium where the air is something like 100,000 PPM worth of dust and grime. And no matter how much you love cooking; skewering, steaming, shocking, cleaning, and shelling 100 lobster tails when you have five other dishes to get started, on a double shift as the chef begins his tirade and lecture is also … never that fun. Work will always be work. But when you’ve earned your first lay-out D because your engine is simply running on pure, unleaded determination, all of the pain tastes sweet. It was worth it. Likewise, when you’re rocking on eleven during a Saturday night service, motions smooth and plates clean, and you hit the window with your dishes three seconds early, steam wafting up in wispy clouds, and the chef gives you a nod with no eye-contact instead of his usual “Where the fuck are you!?” … all of it seemed worth it. Some kind of sadistic, self-administered pain seems to be my counterpoint to love. I cannot enjoy one without the other, and at peak business time I find myself thinking “I could dance all day to this tune.” You can endure anything as long as you can see how it will play in to your future, and as long as you find some kind of sick enjoyment in struggling at a craft.

But the music lessons reappear also. And I’m not referring to the hours spent listening to some pompous professor drone on about dictation and the tenets of harmony. I’m talking about the practical, school of hard knocks bullshit you learn from being in the world of classical music. There are a lot of talented people who are fighting for a very finite number of spots on top of the hill. There is very much a wrong way to do something. There is such a thing as a stiff price for failure. I had some strange talent that allowed me to remain at Juilliard when I most assuredly did not belong. That won’t be the case for cooking. It is far too competitive now for me to hope to coast on talent alone, talent which I sorely lack, by the way. I won’t let shortsightedness and laziness cost me what I deem to be my calling at the top of the mountain. I will climb, though I have started much farther behind than my peers.

And it all begins now. I admit, I missed writing. At times I felt that no one needed to hear me rant on and on about something for (now running on 3 pages, single spaced) such lengths of absurdity. But it helps me focus my thoughts, and what I’ve learned in the past few months has been unshared and chaotic without an audience for me to preach to. So I will return as best I can, and only hope that you are there to read.

Culinary school will start October 25, 2011. Fall will once again mean school, as opposed to a call to arms, all hands on deck approach to the holiday season. It will mean acclimating my brain to information reception in a classroom, instead of rapid-fire reactionary cooking. It will mean … fucking culinary school, something I have talked about for over four years but is finally becoming a reality.

There are a lot of things to get done until then. I can no longer be content to sit in the shadow of my mother and be nudged along like a seal pup in the water. It is time to be thrown from the nest, once again, to see if I can fly.

No doubt, I have learned a lot being buoyed along at Pearl East. This is an education few people my age could get elsewhere, knowing how and what it is like to be at the helm of the ship-of-a-million-parts that is a restaurant. I have a much better idea now of what it will take to do it myself. These will be the first drafts, a brief treatise on the philosophy of running a restaurant. Something for me to look back on so that I have tangible proof of how my brain worked in the infancy of my career. These will be rough drafts.

So next time, the theory of the kitchen. What it takes to get to the bottom line, that being … getting people to pay hard-earned money to eat your food, and making food worth eating.

Don’t call it a comeback.

EP6

Hiatus

I am taking a break. Hitting the pause button.

I don't know how long I'll take off. And yes, I say take off because I actually do spend a decent portion of my day thinking about writing. But nothing has really come together as of late. It could be 2 weeks. It could be much longer. Who knows? I just don't want to feel like I owe everyone a blog post, because that's when they start to deteriorate in quality. Not that you're dying by any means to hear me rant, curse and use big words to sound smart.

I apologize if this seems overly emo so to speak. No, I'm not having some kind of life crisis that demands my immediate attention. No, I'm not heartbroken or reflective, or waxing philosophical about my life choices and decisions. Nearly everything is the same, except I don't want to write right now. And as should be self-evident from this blog, if I don't feel completely committed or passionate about something, I can't and won't do it.

Stubborn, very much so. Petulant, definitely, a questionable strategy at best. And it's the very reason I didn't do well in school. I just didn't want to do it, you couldn't make me. But perhaps we, as humans, need to learn that our own nature is our problem, and that our only hope lies in exceeding the limits of our primitive minds. So maybe I need to learn that lesson. Maybe I need to learn how to push myself through to the other side, despite obstacles, personal and external.

I will leave you with something beautiful I heard recently.

Shelly and Carol are an older, Jewish, married couple. Shelly is an optometrist, and Carol is his wife; a stay-at-home mother, the benevolent matriarch of PTAs everywhere, and a very talented domestic baker. All four of their kids went to Northwestern undergrad, and all of them went on to become very successful people. If people think that Asian-Americans are model minorities, I think we would have very hard-pressed competition from the Jewish people. I know most people don't think of Jewish-Americans as minorities, but something about their culture in the spectrum of academic rigor and success is fascinating.

He still works, she still busies herself with many things. Charity, taking care of her 94-year old mother, the dogs, the cats, the home, the baking, etc. They are a wonderful couple, compassionate and kind, but genuinely so, unlike the smile-through-your-teeth obsequiousness we see so much of on Long Island. They have personality, they make mistakes, say stupid things occasionally, but yet remain graceful and vibrant. She carries a small LED flashlight, because ironically enough, Shelly has very bad vision. And she always tries to shine it on his menu while he's struggling to read, but he always waves her away. It's a completely endearing sight, seeing a couple married for 45 years still have these childish tiffs.

They are regular customers, but I got to know them better when they invited us to a wine tasting dinner. Shelly's passion is wine, he has collected over 30,000 bottles, spent a great deal of his fortune on the study and appreciation of it. But they rarely drink it, only opening a bottle for special occasions, or many bottles for such a dinner as this. So they are clearly starting to get a little drunk throughout this 5-course meal.

Me, my liver was hardened in the fires of 912 Hamlin. My mother takes dainty sips of everything just to try the pairing, but otherwise passes me a full glass to finish for her. I can drink 4-5 glasses of wine and be just fine, but I will get a bit more talkative.

Tony is across the table from me. He is so obviously Sicilian with his gesticulation, dark sun-kissed skin, and crow's feet. He even says "Fuggedaboutit!" like any bad extra with a speaking line in any number of mob films. He was a contractor, and did a lot of work for Shelly in the past. They remain good friends, and he tells me about the gardenia tree.

In Shelly's house, there exists a room. A huge, canopied, vaulted room to house a tree. A gardenia tree. I have to say, I know almost nothing about flowers, but I have never forgotten the smell of gardenia flowers. They're sweet, but not cloying, and delicately fragrant. They are also notoriously difficult to keep alive, as they prefer quite tropical climates. The only way to keep one alive and blooming here in New York, would be to build exactly such a room.

Tony knows, because he built the room. It was originally only partially housed in a sort of patio. But Shelly's daughter was coming home to intensively focus on her dissertation. She was going to need a war room to assault her Ph.D. The tree was taking up the room she wanted, someone was going to have to move.

Shelly, unable to decide between his daughter and his beloved arboreal companion, did what any good man would do; give them both what they want.

He had Tony build a room and painstakingly move the tree.

As Tony is telling me this part of the story he very loudly exclaims, "He built a ROOM! A fuckin' ROOM for this tree!"

And it is quite a room. Automated greenhouse windows, sprinkler systems, an array of UV lights with sophisticated controls, precise climate control. It is a nursing home for a tree.

During the winter months, which we are currently experiencing, the tree does not bloom. It is during this stage for which it is most difficult to keep alive. Very often, even with careful control, the tree will simply not spring back to life. So Shelly, every morning, at 5 AM will begin to tend to it. Checking its vital signs (as all doctors would), watering, carefully snipping and grooming.

It has remained alive for many decades now, and comes back to bloom every spring. And when it does, every morning he will bring his wife, Carol, a gardenia blossom. For however many months until autumn shuts down the tree's natural cycles, Shelly will bring his wife a flower in bed, and she will wear it in her hair for the day. Every year since the tree has bloomed.

Okay, so I suppose I lied earlier when I said I wasn't feeling philosophical. But it's hard not to see the merits of passion, focus and dedication in anything. Even if all you end up with is an ephemeral flower, there is something beautiful to that human experience. Our very short-lived human experience.

So even if I all ever end up doing in life is cooking, feeding people, perhaps there is merit to that.

Or maybe, as Mike Rowe would say, I should just get back to work.

Til' then.

EP6

Mastery

2011.

I've never been one for New Year's resolutions, but it is a convenient time for restaurant employees to refresh their spirits. The holiday rush is over, business will slow down and you will have time to think things over, get some rest, and refocus upon your goals.

We are no exception. The holiday season has been rough. The kitchen is a bit under rested and haggard. They've been doing just about the same 12-hour shifts, but the intensity and speed required of them was far more demanding. Doing prep, cooking to order, cleaning the kitchen with barely a moment's rest for 2-3 weeks can topple even the most vigorous cooks. They, as a line, are slowing down and becoming more irritable by the day. They need an opportunity to chill.

And the restaurant is just ... tired. Forgive me, I understand this is a bizarre concept to many people, but I kind of see restaurants as living entities. If I had my own restaurant right now I would consider closing on Monday, just to give the ole girl a day to rest. The effects of everyday wear-and-tear start to appear in strange places. Kitchen doors start denting and chipping from where waiters push through hundreds of times a night. Your shelves start falling apart from having stacks of heavy menus thrown at them every time someone is seated. Your dishwasher hose starts unraveling, the water starts losing a little pressure, there isn't time during a busy dinner rush to be ginger with the damn thing. Restaurants, like our bodies, start to deteriorate with constant use and abuse. Treat them well.

But I will admit, that aside from the physical aspect of rest, I have a number of goals to refocus upon. I just don't want to call them New's Year Resolutions. Applying that silly moniker to something often means it doesn't get done. If you're going to do something, then do it. When you set a start date, you only set a date for you to delay. If you want to change your life, do something about it now, don't wait for the sun to come round.

Just wait for your restaurant to be less busy ...duh.

I'm talking about mastery. The human body is a pitifully stupid vessel, slow to learn and clumsy without constant physical attention. But magically, like some kind of high, memory-specific specific heat, when we learn something we are also very slow to forget it.

I think that is the case for nigh any physical skill. There's proficiency and then there's mastery, but the latter is for life, you never lose it. Sure, I can make vegetable dumplings that almost resemble my mentor's, but he can do it with graceful ease and machine-like efficiency. Is the dough cold, is it too elastic today, or is it not elastic enough? Doesn't matter, it always looks and feels the same in his hands. Me? If our dough is not elastic enough it starts tearing. But if it's too elastic the filling starts slipping out. He recognizes my extreme level of novicehood, and takes care to make beginner-friendly dough, but dim sum is a finicky thing.

That's why even if you have revolutionary food ideas, or are an extremely creative and charismatic character, BUT you happen to be a mediocre cook ... you have no hopes of leading a real restaurant kitchen. Why should the cooks respect you? How can you begin to execute upon all your lofty ideas? You have to always consider that in the kitchen, one of the most primitive places left in our modern world of intellectual drudgery, you must lead by example. If you plan a menu, and let's say you're crazy enough to put consomme on it, and one of your cooks is about to botch it, do you have the intimate understanding of how consomme works to stop him? To fix it and teach him why he was about to fuck that up? Because if you can't, then not only do you risk fucking up all your dishes, but your kitchen crew, even if it isn't a mercenary band of hack cooks and lifers, will never grow and evolve in to something better.

Mastery means an intimate understanding of how something works, and an effortless ability to execute it to perfection. It means doing something so much that it is instinct and reflex, rather than premeditated thought. Even if you don't know the exact science behind something, you can tell by the feel, the smell, the sound and the sight of it. Does Luo Shi-fu know that the crystalline molecular structure of pork fat breaks up gluten, and that's why his pastry crust is so deliciously flaky? No. But as soon as he puts his hands to it he knows if it's right or not. If it pinches away cleanly, or pulls like a wad of gum under your sneaker, he knows to adjust accordingly with more flour or more fat. He's made it countless times in his life. Doesn't matter how you know it, you just know.

How many skills can you claim to have such aptitude with? My guess is not many. To be fair, we haven't had much time. In your mid-twenties you've probably just mastered how to masturbate without getting caught by your roommates, as that is one of the more demotic activities of our generation. But science tells us you need to be doing something for 10,000 hours before you can call yourself a master of it. If we do some basic math (shut it, I can still kind of add), we're talking about 5 years at 40 hours a week? If we're being literal. In all practicality it probably takes 7-10 years to really become an expert at something.

That's why I'm concerned. One of my hobbies is reading up on the country's most well-respected restaurants, and then finding out all the information I can about the chef in charge. Where they went to school, where they worked, for how long, what countries, what kind of women or men they choose to marry, where they chose to locate, what their food philosophy is, what their favorite sandwich is. The information, shockingly enough, is out there (terrifying to be famous, eh?). Out of all the "useless" information I've compiled, you want to know what the lowest common denominator of success is?

Starting early. Seventeen, fifteen, maybe even nine years old you started putting in time in a real restaurant kitchen. Grant Achatz worked in his family's restaurant starting at 13, washing dishes while standing on a vegetable crate to reach the sink. Peeling potatoes, plating house salads, grilling hamburgers, real menial stuff. But yet Thomas Keller identified him as one of the most technically proficient and artistically creative cooks he's ever had. True, he is exceptional, and may have gone on to great success regardless, but not without earning the respect of the kitchen.

There exists an anecdote about Achatz's time as the Executive Chef of Trio. Michael Ruhlman pulled aside a line cook for a brief interview, and what was the most outstanding quality about Chef Grant Achatz?

"If you're slowing down on the line, look like you're lost, he'll just come in ... and just ... work it. Work your station better than you could on your best day, work it at a level you didn't know was possible."

So that's why I'm quite concerned. Why did I waste all this time? I could have been a master of Chinese cuisine by now, a cleaver more like an extension of my hand, a fiery wok just another beast I have tamed, but no... I had this career epiphany a bit too late, even though this restaurant was always here for me.

I'll have to try my best. But I have to say at 24... I'm feeling old for the game. So that's why I need to start now, with my good friend, and always quotable Allen Iverson...

We talkin' 'bout practice.

Unfortunately I'm very bad at practice. Here's kind of a pitiful self-admittance, but my ability to read music is disturbingly inadequate. Most classical musicians spend years studying music theory and solfege, honing their aural skills so that when a piece of music is set before them, they can methodically dissect it and translate it to their instrument. The very best and most practiced of them can do it instantly. We call this sight reading, and I've had the pleasure of knowing a few exceptionally skilled musicians who can sight read something with 99% technical accuracy on the first run.

To earn that level of skill takes years of hard work, and hours of practice every day. It makes sense that all these Juilliard Prep kids go to such good colleges because they're already determined, overachieving douches from their dogmatic dedication to music. You simply can't survive in that place without a nose-to-the-grindstone attitude.

Unless you're me.

To give you an idea of how piss-poor my music theory fundamentals are, I failed Juilliard's basic theory class three times. That means by my senior year, when I was 17, I was taking classes with 9-year old's. I mean I can read music. I can read different clefs, I know all the lingo, and all the different markings. But it doesn't make sense to me. A sheet of music might as well be a giant hash of black dots and I-talian mumbo jumbo to me. That is until I hear it. See, I got "lucky." I was blessed with a very good ear, so when I hear something I can play it. I don't know why, it's just always been that way, and the counterpoint is also true that when I see it, I am utterly lost.

I was blessed with an ability to take shortcuts.

My cello teacher from high school, Andrey, used to be kind of confused by my ability to sight read. He'd often put all the classic cello concertos in front of me, old workhorses like Dvorak, Elgar, Haydn D Major, and scratch his head at why I could play it without having ever really practiced it. Then he figured it out...

He put a contemporary piece in front of me. A cello sonata, not 50-years old, scarcely played by anyone in its existence. I had never heard it before. He simply said, "Go." Couldn't do it. He sat back in his chair, like an evil Russian mastermind (which he kind of was) and smiled contentedly,

"So ... you actually can't sight read."

The point of this long-winded tangent is this.

I got lucky with cello. I survived and at times thrived in an environment I shouldn't have because I was blessed with some natural ability that compensated for my lack of work ethic. That will not be the case this time, God has not been so kind as to give me two gifts.

I will have to earn my stripes, and earn my restaurant the hard way, and because I started so late I'm going to have to ramp up the intensity. I'm going to have to cram, if you will, cram in what could have been a decade's worth of cooking and restaurants, in to one year. Well, at this point, maybe less than that.

Do I think it's possible? Yes. There's practice, and then there's purposeful, focused practice. Even I can tell the difference. You learn much faster when you have the intent to do so, and are mindful and aware of what's going on around you. Even if you did start working in a kitchen before you started shaving, I doubt you paid the same kind of fervent attention I am about to throughout these next few months. So don't sleep, I'm quickly catching up.

But that means doing everything. I need to master how to serve. I can carry a tray over my shoulder, but I can sense nervousness from our customers as I teeter and totter to the dishwasher. Will I ever open a restaurant where they use old school over-the-shoulder trays? My best guess is no, but it can't hurt to have the skill. It will add to an overall sense of mastery if I can achieve it.

I need to become more proficient at dim sum making, and especially more proficient at working the line in a Chinese kitchen. I'll never be able to attain the level of mastery that Luo Shi-fu has, that would take decades, but I'm going to have do my best. Will I ever use dim sum again? My guess is seldom, but again ... it could have an untold influence later in life. Will I ever use the Chinese style of stir fry, the Chinese cooks' equivalent of sword-and-board, the wok-and-spoon? Can't say. Though there is something to be appreciated about it's efficiency in time and heat transfer, and any knowledge of a cooking technique is good knowledge in my book.

I need to learn a myriad little things that make restaurants tick; balancing account books, haggling with purveyors and suppliers, finding a good liquor license lawyer, food cost, employee management, scheduling waiters, etc. etc. ohmygodwhatamigettingmyselfinto, etc. It seems like an insurmountable task, a never-ending pile of information, but that's exactly what I like about it.

I need to be constantly stimulated. I have a very short attention span, and I don't like being bored. I will notify you immediately if you are boring me. So that's what makes this profession kind of fitting for me. There is quite literally no end in sight for the amount I need to learn. This will be an eternal education for me. But I like that. I like to learn something new every day.

For truly, this is a career worthy and possible only through a lifetime's passion.

EP6

Courage Under Fire

I have a complicated relationship with luck.

On the one hand, I believe a man controls his own luck. That with enough preparation and skill, the effects of chance are well accounted for. But then again, as I continue to work in this field I find there are just some things you can never really control. Frustrating as that is for the obsessive-compulsive perfectionist, sometimes you have to let loose and roll with the punches. The more you tense up and try to fight it, the more damage it ends up doing.

Christmas Day in Long Island for a Chinese restaurant might as well be defending the storming of Omaha Beach. In an area so heavily populated with Jewish people, you as the Chinese restaurant owner, being the only place open for miles is going to make things crazy.

So what kind of preparation do we do for this epic day?

Well the kitchen is doing prep all week, of course. The tables, linens, glassware, and waiters are optimized for maximum efficiency. And other than setting a floor plan, and timing the tables throughout the night ... that's about all you can hope for.

But oh wait, your busboy doesn't show up. That means bringing tea and noodles, filling water glasses, cleaning utensils, clearing tables, keeping the bar stocked with ice, and a plethora of other jobs are now on everyone else's shoulders. Most notably, mine. He was fired once before for drinking on the job, and my best assumption is that he is in an alcohol induced coma somewhere. Time to soldier up.

I mean, what else do you do? Hunker down in the corner and cry? The waiters' quality of service is now affected across the board. On such a busy night, every extra action is going to have magnified effects down the line. They need me more than ever tonight, illness be damned.

So service carries on. The waiters are under noticeable stress from the extra workload, and though I'm pretty fast, I still have other jobs to do. Dorothy is slammed on the phones, people are calling constantly, seeking tables and/or modifying their reservations. Not to mention there are a whole bunch of people wanting take out and delivery, and the kitchen has reached its threshold. Chinese food is fast, we have some damned good cooks, but there is a limit for every restaurant. We have just hit ours.

See, the maddening pace of a Saturday night is great when it's in control. You only got three hours of sleep, and you're coming off a drinking binge? It's all good, the adrenaline will push you through the night.

But a Saturday night that is out of control, and beyond your restaurant's abilities ... that's not good. It saps your will to work, it stresses you out, it makes time slow down and every ticket that comes through the printer makes your heart sink. When will this onslaught end?

True, there are ways to prepare for this. Don't overbook, make sure your staff and supplies are prepared. But as you can see, some unforeseen events can occur.

So I'm going through this night thinking it's a disaster. We overbooked, there are VIPs coming in ON Christmas Day without a reservation, and we have to accommodate them. And the kitchen is taxed. They've been rocking nonstop since noon and they're showing signs of fatigue. Even Xiao Di, our most tireless and consistent cook is faltering. Plates are getting messy, timing is off, and dishes just aren't coming out fast enough. The waiters fire dishes a few minutes later, because they have to spend extra time doing what the busboy would normally do, and every step of a dinner is pushed back an extra few minutes. That means our 4:00 seating which was expected to get up at around 5:30, is now looking more like 6:00. That in turn pushes all over reservations back even further, and the crowd is gathering in the front. We don't really have a lounge for customers to wait comfortably in, we have a bar and a front desk. As the crowd gets squeezed closer together, and waiters are navigating their way through the mass to get drinks, the overbearing feeling of impatience and frustration is infecting the dining room. Not to mention, the new waiter, Ken, is fucking up everything.

This is about as bad as bad nights get. Every time I go to the front to help expedite a take out, I am pulled aside by an annoyed customer to tell me how much I suck, how I should have warned them that take out was going to take longer than an hour. Okay, true, it's more like an hour and a half. I miscalculated. I'm sorry. I didn't see this shit coming. But what the fuck do you want me to do about it now? I'm trying my best, and as you can see, you're not the only person who wants Chinese food tonight. Do you go to Rockefeller Center on Christmas Eve and wonder "Why the fuck are there so many people here?"

But you can't show weakness. As primitive as it sounds, it's an animal-dominance kind of game. Once you show that you're stressed beyond your capabilities, or that you no longer have control of the situation ... you are fucked. They lose all faith in your establishment, they get nervous that it's never going to turn out right, and they start freaking as a result.

You have to stay calm. You have to assure them that everything is going to be all right.

I roam the floor filling water glasses, taking orders, answering questions and doing some menial fetch tasks. Oh she needs a tea cup, oh her wine glass is dirty (lipstick is the bane of all dishwashers ... especially that bright red, waterproof bullshit that makes you look like a clown whore), oh I need an extra napkin, etc. Things that would really throw an extra wrench in an already hampered waiter's life, force them to make an extra trip to the kitchen, I will do. And really ... I'm looking for as many smiling faces as I can .. because my morale is pretty low.

It's a dangerous balance. You need to overbook a little bit because there are always inevitable cancellations. And plus you want to make money. I mean at the end of the day, that's why we're here. This is our livelihood. We want to max out our restaurant as much as possible.

But yes, we did push it a little too far this time. We're not accustomed to this level of volume, so we haven't quite mastered this art of overbooking. It's something that Daniel Boulud once called his curmudgeonly maitre'd, Bruno Jamais, a master of ... getting just the right amount of reservations over the tipping point. (Does that count as ending with a preposition? I'm going to say no.)

It's a fine line between calculated chaos and just pure mayhem. Busy restaurants toe that line a lot in the pursuit of money and customers. Every customer is a long term investment in my opinion. If someone is unhappy with their appetizer, the short-term loss of sending them something else, no questions asked, is greatly outweighed by the long-term gain of a loyal customer. So what, you lose $7.00 profit on a botched set of dumplings. If you make a fuss about it, that's all that customer is going to remember. If you graciously send them something else, apologize and ensure they get something they will really enjoy... well, then you have a customer who will return every few months, maybe every few weeks until they move or die.

But there isn't much time for theorizing, always tons of shit to do. I spend a lot of my night sorting through the dirty utensils. Dirty forks/knives/etc. are thrown in to a bucket with bleach and soap. They are then dumped on to a tray, organized and washed. The organizing part is a pain in the ass. It takes at least five to seven minutes to put dinner forks, appetizer forks, teaspoons, soup spoons, tongs, serving spoons, dinner knives and steak knives in to their appropriate slots. That may not sound like a lot, and it's even manageable on a busy Saturday night. But being that there is no bus boy, the waiters can't afford to take that time. Five minutes away from the dining room on this kind of night is a goddamned eternity. So roll up your sleeves, young man. Time to get dirty.

Tonight, we could make a killing just on volume, but it's really about getting the word out. Loyal customers are bringing family members, friends who are now isolated to our Chinese restaurant. Maybe they usually go to some place a bit closer to them, but now they've been put on man defense with us. It's up to us to knock it out of the park so next time they say "FUCK that cheap take-out hash job, I'm going to Pearl. It's fucking worth it." (Note: I realize most people don't get amped up about food the way most men get amped up about football so I just used my voice there out of convenience)

So that's also why I'm so nervous and stressed. In the past, at the end of the day, Va Pensiero and Blu/Futami were not my restaurants. Sure, I always try to work with the attitude "Treat it like it's yours and one day it will be" (Except Blu ... fuck that place. A lot.), but this restaurant actually is mine. I have no plans on it, and certainly don't desire it, but there is a very real possibility I would have to take the reins on this beast one day. My mother's success depends on my capabilities. I'm invested, I care, hence I'm nervous. If we pushed it too far today, if we overstretched our capacities and fucked up... how much lost business is that?

Moment of truth, the slow and steady progression of customers out the door. It will start at a slow trickle around 8:30, but most everyone will be rushing out by 10:00 to get home and decompress.

First customers we have time to really talk to and show out the door are pissed. See, unhappy customers are very quick to get pissy at me, or Joanne or any of the waiters. But when they talk to my mom they usually aren't so quick to anger. They show the respect, and my mother is trying to fix everything anyway. I don't know what they're upset about, something about special treatment and their waiter, but they won't tell us who their waiter was (though we narrowed it down to two) and they won't exactly say what they're pissed about. They're rambling, being unintelligible and vague. Very constructive criticism. All we can assume is that they're ticked the table next to them got free ice cream. Well, free ice cream is for VIPs, and that couple next to you is our bartender's parents. Yes, they get special treatment. Most restaurants aren't egalitarian when they dole out favors like that, that's the breaks. Anyway, my mom wants to make it up to her, tells her next time she comes in she'll take care of her personally. But this woman won't hear it and her husband is dragging her out the door.

"I drive 150 miles to come eat here, and I come all the time, I can't believe you would treat me this way. I don't want to argue with you, I'm just not coming back. Merry Christmas."

You can imagine the tone with which "Merry Christmas" was said. It wasn't the kind of tone benevolent grandparents use when spoiling their grandchildren with gifts. It's the kind of tone you get from your ex-wife when she takes your dog and house on Christmas Eve, leaving you with just enough Tylenol to off yourself, and just enough cash to get drunk and not be a pussy about it.

Fuck.

That's bad. First seriously PO'ed customer is making me really upset. Was it that bad tonight?

So I take a breather by the front desk and await a couple large parties exiting. They are drunk. Like, you-shouldn't-be-this-sloppy-at-your-age-drunk-but-hey-fuck-it-it's-Christmas-drunk. They are all laughs. I'm not sure if this is a good gauge of our performance tonight. They're so sloshed that their already poor ability to distinguish between Asians is now rendering them capable of only seeing big, yellow blurs. They sure are merry though.

The thank you's are exchanged, the "I'm bringing all my friends!" are exclaimed, and the hugs and coats are doled out. Okay, maybe not the best litmus test but I'll take it. Like I said, I need some morale here... I'm fading, and the nasty cold I've gotten from post-traumatic-drinking-disorder has really made this night difficult.

The night goes on, the rhythm is smooth, I actually have time to catch a few glimpses of the Nuggets-Thunder game (I bus tables for three straight hours and this is what you do for me, Kobe? What the fuck!?) and more customers peddle out.

Well, they're not as sloshed as the previous group but they sure as hell are happy. Can this be? Did we pull this shit off actually? I have to observe more, this could be a fluke...

Nearly every customer that rolls out has a smile on their face, thanks us profusely despite having had to wait longer and suffer through less-than-stellar service, and graciously tips for coat check. I apologize to the customers I know a bit better about tonight being crazy, and a lot of them shake my hand and say "To be honest, I thought it was going to be busier."

You mean, you don't hate us for trying to pack this bitch up? It doesn't seem like we're just trying to maximize our profit? Because we're not, we're just trying to make everyone happy. You mean you really like us?

Damn, I really love the Jewish people. Now if y'all just weren't so exclusive about who you date, maybe we could talk a bit more. I mean I don't blame you, there are decades of bias in American media against the Asian male, and you simply aren't exposed to our culture because we are at every turn made as exotic and threatening as possible, and...

Sorry, off-topic. That's for a whole 'nother blog.

So the customers seem pretty happy! But there's only one way to be sure...

I start closing out tickets. Whenever you pay with a credit card and add tip to the credit card, someone has to manually input that in to a computer. On a night like this where we've served over 450 customers (not including lunch), this means a lot of fucking dinners charged. But it's good because tips are indicative of a lot of things, not the least of which is quality of service.

I found out Greg, the sushi chef at Futami, was secretly judging all of us by our tips. He let it slip once when we were having a cigarette that, let's call him Frank, had shitty tips, was a shitty waiter. And I quickly asked, "Oh, so you know how we do on tips now? What do you think?" He brushed me off with a "Yeah, yeah, yeah you doing good."

Anyhow, tips can say a lot. On a bill over $200.00 getting 16-18% means you were fucking phenomenal. On a bill less than $40.00, getting 16-18% usually means they're a little on the cheap side. For the most part, bills in between should be very close to 20%, or you're doing it wrong.

Here we go, moment of truth...

Hey! These tips are good! Okay, we're getting around 6:00 PM. This is where shit hit the fan for us. Okay, they dip a little bit, but nothing atrocious or indicative of a grievous failure on our part. Seven PM, nine PM, big parties, deuces, fast-dining couples and lingering parties... everyone is pretty fucking happy!

You don't tip well unless the whole experience was pretty good. Even if your service was phenomenal, if the food sucked, usually the tip takes a little hit. So considering the situation, this is good news for us.

That's why I like stats. They're clean, objective, free of context. Sure, a QB may have two interceptions that weren't his fault, tipped throws, but the fact remains he had two interceptions and that means something. (And no, Jenga, stats didn't work so well for you... just because you had 20/15 assists/goals throughout a tournament doesn't mean what you think it does because NUT didn't have the manpower to record all your turnovers ... if this were ESPN, your efficiency rating would be highly suspect ... ahem).

So everything went better than expected. I guess that's the nature of life. I can't help but have a sentimental/philosophical moment. It's Christmas night, one of the most harrowing Christmases I've ever had, and there's a distinct feeling of relief as the restaurant empties out. We tried to control all radicals, but there's always an element of chance. You can sway luck to your side a little but ... just a little. We may have made some missteps tonight, but there were big families here and they chose to celebrate with us. There's something warming about that. And even though this is not how most people spend their Christmases, I am nonetheless with my mother. This is our family, this is our life, what choice do we have? We work, and through work are fulfilled.

So you have to let go a little bit. All that stressing and freaking was probably necessary to try and do a good job. It's indicative of the fact that we care. But it usually goes at least a little rewarded, if your heart is in to it. Yet another fine thing I will have to learn to balance. Preparing for the unexpected, but reacting to it when it finally comes with calm and poise, rather than panic.

Here we are. Christmas. Life lessons doled out at an emotionally charged, and mystical time of year.

There will always be major speed bumps in life. I never expected to lose my father overnight. I never thought that two of my high school classmates wouldn't make it to twenty-four. I never thought I would drop the cello to become a cook. I don't know what's coming for me, even with culinary school looming on the horizon. I just hug my grandmother every day, because you just never know.

If things turn out really shitty, don't be too hard on yourself. Then again, if things turn out great ... don't be too proud of yourself either. Keep your head down, stay healthy, hug your loved ones, and have a Happy New Year.

EP6

Run the Point

I have done something which reminds me why I have come home.

I ran a restaurant. By myself. On a weekend.

See, while I've been home working the front at nights it was always under my mother's wing. She points out the VIP customers, I meet and greet, and I fill in where necessary. Busboys are slammed? I clear and set tables. Waiters can't keep up? I take a few orders, crumb and clear a few tables. Phones are relentless? I take take-outs and deliveries. It's that simple. I'm auxiliary help.

It's a wide but comprehensive education, and while I am not mastering anything very quickly, I am getting a feel for the unexpected mishaps a restaurant constantly suffers from. I think the rest of the staff appreciates that they have someone on the bench who can come in when shit goes fugazi, and can respond with some adequacy.

But running the restaurant by myself? That's a different ball game.

My mother performs two indispensable functions. She makes dinners for VIP customers, and she watches nearly every dish come out of the kitchen. She knows her own menu, and her cook's capabilities ice cold. The slightest error is caught and the kitchen's potential is maximized in her presence. She knows how to read people and figure out what they like to eat, and how to develop a menu both unique and deeply satisfying.

I can't really do that. Yet. I don't know Chinese food all that well, and if Thanksgiving was any indicator, I still cook Italian food a helluva lot better than Chinese.

But here I was, Friday night, and my mother calls in sick, which is an incredibly rare occurrence. She's been feeling off for the past two months, and the various cocktails of medications the doctors prescribe her give her unpredictable side effects. I have had to fill in on a few weekday nights, but weekends are a whole 'nother creature. We live for, and thrive on them, and they are caged beasts ready to spring and wreak havoc on any unprepared manager's head.

"You sure you can handle it?," my mother questions.
"Shit yeah, homie! Let's DO this" I reply.

(So it might have went more like "Uhh.. yes.. ?")

I show up to the restaurant, and the other two managers are there but they have very specific roles. One host and does the seating, the other takes the phones and manages the register. The rest of it is on my mother's shoulders, and now mine.

The waiter captain, William (only the front of house staff have American names) asks, "Ni mama zai na li?" (Where's your mom?)
"Ta jin tian wan shang bu lai. Ta bu tai shu fu." (She's not coming tonight. She doesn't feel very well.)
"Hao. Ni xian zai shi lao ban." (Okay. Now you're the boss.)

In other words, run the point.

I write it out in Chinese because "lao ban" is the title reserved for the boss, a title that has never been bestowed upon me. Some of them jokingly call me "xiao ye," which means "little master," but "lao ban" is a very serious word to address the person in command. It is a bit disorienting to be called that. I don't know if I have earned their respect by helping them out over the past few months, but suddenly all eyes are on me.

Okay, first things first, organize your command post.

The books are not loaded, only about 100 before walk ins and it's only 5:15. Lots of deuces, so we'll have to save the banquette where the tables for two are lined up. I note a few VIP names and save them respective tables. Otherwise I am expecting about 160 before this night is over. To be honest, I don't like the reservation system. It creates inequalities. Some customers get special treatment, and some don't. It's a fact of life, and it creates situations where you piss off potential new customers who are walk ins, and you could piss off loyal customers who are now expecting special treatment every visit. The experiences can be scarring, and in the future, for any restaurant I may own I plan to do it much the way Momofuku does. It doesn't matter who you are, you walk in and wait just like everybody else, no reservations, no exceptions. Not to be a poser, but I like their system. It's cleanly egalitarian. David Chang's mother famously had to wait a year before she landed a table at Momofuku Ko.

Okay, so the seating should go fairly smooth, the clusterfuck doesn't begin until we have 150-160 on the books and are expecting 70-80 walk ins. Let's look at the phones.

You can get a feel for what the take-out/delivery situation will be like from lunch. If it's shitty weather, people are huddling inside with their families to eat Chinese food and watch movies. Tonight is one of the first bitterly cold nights of the year, after an unusually warm November. Lunch take-out was already pretty busy, I'm guessing dinner will be much the same because people are not wanting to go out. Dorothy will be manning the phones by herself for the most part, but I don't expect a sudden rush just because that's not really how Friday works. The sudden rush is a Sunday thing, where families eat together more regularly, around 5:30-6:30 PM. Friday is more relaxed, people tend to be doing other things like watching their kids' basketball games, chilling at home, or maybe even having some marital coitus while their kids are at sleepovers (Dry land is a myth!).

So all in all I am expecting a fairly smooth night with the traffic coming in increments.

Now step number two, scratching all your expectations and preparing for the inevitable unexpected. Cliche, yes, but true.

First wrench in the plan, a deuce whom I don't recognize shows up for their reservation twenty minutes late.

Of course we want to honor your reservation, but you're making things hard on us if you show up late. The best route is to call. That way we know you're en route and not a cancellation. But if you just show up at 6:50 for your 6:30 reservation, then the other 6:30s and 6:45s get to sit first because we're not leaving an empty table there for the other diners to wonder about. Especially if we don't know you. Sorry, that's the breaks.

But we do have a plan, and tables should be freeing up incrementally starting around 7:00 PM. It's a time difference of a few minutes. When they do get in, there's a table eating dessert, so in about ten minutes they'll have a table. I'll have to forget the later reservations I planned for for now and get these two seated immediately. Then the body language starts...

First there's the crossed arms and resentful sit-down. I can tell this woman is high maintenance. Her husband is the shy, quiet type who gets slapped around by his wife and is obediently standing there hoping for the storm to clear. She's huffing and puffing, arms and legs crossed with her foot bouncing up and down while she impatiently scans the dining room, and tries to lock eye contact with me or the hostess. I'm not an idiot, I know you're annoyed, okay? I'm working on it.

The table eating dessert is lingering longer than I would have predicted, and what was once a ten minute wait is now becoming fifteen to twenty minutes. It's nearing 7:00 PM, and if this is a first date table I'm in big trouble because they'll be flirting well in to the night. Thankfully, these guys look like a couple that has regressed in to not having anymore sex, so I can only assume they are a middle-aged couple who got married too soon and are avoiding the kids. Those tend to move along pretty quickly.

Then I make the mistake of making eye contact with Pissed Off Customer #1.

"You know this is rude and ridiculous. I come here all the time and spend a lot of money here. I have low blood sugar, and I need to eat at a certain time!"

Alright, first off, I know being hypoglycemic is a real thing, but there is no statement you could make that would further confirm you are a little bitch than saying "I have low blood sugar."

You want a chocolate? They're free and they're sitting right in front of you. If you come here all the time, then it hasn't been in the past three months or I'd at least recognize your annoying face. So you're not that good of a customer. Secondly, if you know anything about us you know that we are busy as fuck on weekends. Make an earlier reservation, or better yet, SHOW UP ON TIME for the one you made.

But I have to stifle my anger. I'm being a classic obstinate and indignant young male. This is part of the business. Dealing with all sorts of people, including the ones seemingly set out on making your life harder. That's the problem with this restaurant-diner relationship, the diner often doesn't understand where you're coming from.

We finally get her seated and dinner goes underway. I make sure to keep an eye on her to pick up any distress or dissatisfaction. I think eating something has calmed her down. I ask her how dinner is and she is relatively satisfied now that she is full on Crispy Honey Chicken with Three Nuts (the whitest dish on our menu).

Thankfully, that is my only speed bump for the night. The rest goes rather smoothly. A few regulars come in who are accustomed to having my mother order dinner for them. That duty is now upon me, and I admit, something that is extremely important I learn. Reading people's tastes, capacities for food, and budget limits without asking is a rather difficult thing to do. I try my best.

Esther is an old family friend. She took me out to BLT Market just after I had gotten my cast off my then-broken ankle. I had just decided I wanted to make a career as a cook, and BLT Market was the first time I had fine dining with my eyes open. It was fantastic. But other than the food, the most memorable thing from that night is that her husband eats... nothing. I mean takes no enjoyment from the consumption of food, whatsoever. He ordered a dry aged filet mignon that was rested on a baguette crouton soaked in beef jus, garnished with a deconstructed bearnaise sauce and served with crisp arugula. He asked ONLY for the beef and bread. He didn't want anything else. I, and the wait staff, were thoroughly flabbergasted.

So, though I am happy to see Esther (especially since she likes to tell me how handsome I am... heehee), I am a bit concerned to see her husband again. What the fuck is he gonna eat?

Her sister, her brother-in-law and mother are also in tow. They say they eat anything, and from the looks of Esther's husband sulking in the corner, I know he is ready to eat nothing. I order "te bie dian xin," which translates to "special" dim sum. My mentor, Luo Shi-fu, makes some incredibly beautiful and delicate dumplings with assorted ingredients. They're a good starter because they are eye-catching, there's a lot of variety, and they're not too filling. I also order four crispy rice paper shrimp rolls. Those are pretty much impossible to dislike. Crispy, lightly fried shrimp wrapped in rice paper, sauced with a sweet Grand Marnier mayonnaise. It's always a crowd pleaser.

Now, this fucking guy, Arthur, the man who doesn't like to eat. I suggest an egg roll and a Japanese ginger salad, i.e. more Americanized food. To my surprise he agrees. Here goes nothin'...

William serves beautifully. The swan dumplings (note: shrimp dumplings shaped like swans, not dumplings filled with swan... I hear swan has a terrible taste and texture) are arranged on a rocky, white bridge, carved out of a turnip. The bridge has a green "river" flowing under it made from gelatin, and is adorned with river stones. The expected "oooh's" and "ahhh's" and camera phones are produced. Then the plates are composed and served; a swan dumpling, a scallop dumpling garnished with red bell pepper, a roast duck and snow cabbage purse, and a crispy shrimp roll just lightly glazed with a bit of the Grand Marnier sauce.

And for Arthur, an egg roll and a salad. His sad plate matches his sad face.

I make a well-timed return to check on their progress. The key is to catch a customer not in conversation, and just as they're finishing their bite, so as to not interrupt, or to force them to hurry and swallow their food to talk to you. I think "How is everything?" is a very empty question because Danny Meyer told me so. So I always ask something more specific like "What do you think of the dim sum?"

They agree it is delicious. There are "mmmm's" and thumbs up's, and then I turn to Arthur. He is neutrally munching on his egg roll, and determinedly stabbing at his salad with a dinner fork. He gives a nod, and I take that as a huge success.

I order entrees for them; a large Cantonese-style lobster (Ah Gau's specialty, he has truly mastered this dish), braised snow pea leaves, Ginger-Scallion Barbecued Shrimp, Filet Mignon with Black Pepper Sauce, a Yang Chow Fried Rice and, you guessed it, Crispy Honey Chicken with Three Nuts for Arthur. They are again very satisfied.

I am riding high.

I am buzzing, I am digging this.

The restaurant and all its employees feel like an extension of my body. When something goes wrong, I step in to focus and make it right. I watch some plates go out of the window. Xiao Di is an excellent cook and I never have to worry about his seasoning, but his plating can get sloppy when he's rushed. I wipe a few plates for him, and make sure they don't die in the window and are sent out post-haste.

Suddenly, I'm being asked questions. "What should I do for these customers?" They waited a very long time for their appetizers (the app station is very tricky because there are so many different kinds of apps... Michael is good, but things can jam up here and there). Send them some ice cream on the house. That's our panacea for wronged customers.

"We have a table of eight coming, last minute call-in, what should we do?"

Gotta always know what your tables look like. F6 is finishing entrees, it'll be about 20-30 minutes. We'll put F6 and F7 together. It'll be kind of an awkward shape, but round enough to promote good family conversation. Tell them 8:45, we can seat them.

"Xiao lao ban, A6 is cold, but A2 is hot, what now?" Turn on the mid room auxiliary heater, and I'll turn on the front room fan. Keep the tea pot full on A6, and keep the water glasses filled on A2. Go to the thermostat and pretend like you're changing it. It'll be normal for everyone in about 15 minutes.

Whoo! I don't know, but this feeling of control, this feeling of being at the helm is exhilarating!

Unfortunately, I'm not dressed for the job. I'm wearing a waiter's uniform, so people are a bit confused by this clearly-American, big Chinese dude wandering around asking questions. Some of them recognize the facial similarities between my mother and I, so they draw the obvious conclusion. This is generally my biggest problem; everybody knows who I am, because embarrassingly enough my mother talks about me all the time, but I don't know anyone.

I've come to learn at least 30-40 faces that show up regularly, but there are a few old Jewish women that are just part of a big blur to me. They don't come often enough and don't have any distinguishing features. And they come in the door and excitedly say, "Hello, Eric! How are you?" Cue hug and kiss on the cheek.

And I always have to give an evasive, "...Hiiii!! ... Good to see you!" until Joanne checks their reservation in the computer and I'm like, "OH, fucking ball sacks, it's Mrs. Chotan! Come on, Eric!"

I have a lovely chat with her and her seemingly mute husband (Is that what Jewish women do to Jewish men?), and she comments that the restaurant seems to be running smoothly. She writes a note to bring to my mother, wishing her to feel better, and she winks at me and says "I put in a good word about you."

The night ends and I close the restaurant myself. It's a strange feeling. Chef Grant Achatz talked about how he would take that time while he was alone in his own restaurant to reflect on all he had done, and where he would go, that it was an eerily soul reflecting moment. I have to agree.

The lights are off, I'm alone in the restaurant. My reflection dances off the smoked mirrors, and this place that has seen hundreds of thousands of people come through and eat is now completely silent, save for the hum of the bar refrigerators.

What a strange feeling. My mother must get this at least once in a while. This place is just a pretty exoskeleton until it is filled with her passion and her customers. The fancy wall paper, and carefully sought-after antiques are just exactly that ... ornamental. This place is mine, and I make it what it is, and it feeds my family and the people I love, she must think to herself. I mean at least occasionally. It's a powerful feeling.

It's powerful. It's deep. Hopefully not waxing too existential, but you get my point.

Just more reasons to love the business.

But I can't be impatient. Too many chefs, convinced of their own greatness, jump the gun on opening their own restaurant. They are tired of working for others, they want to make their own name, and be their own boss.

For those who make it, and really succeed ... those are the supremely talented and lucky ones. Michael Symon fears sometimes he opened Lola too early, that he should have worked at The French Laundry while it was in its Keller Prime. But here he is running a ground breaking, city-revitalizing restaurant.

There are so disappointingly few of the Michael Symon's though. The more common story is the young man driven in to the dirt, unprepared for the onslaught that is the modern restaurant. I love watching Gordon Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares and figuring out how many of those places are still open after he's done his work. The point is, Gordon can't save your restaurant. It's a gimmick for him to scream at people more and make the everyman laugh about it. The path to bankruptcy and boarding up the windows is a sharply inclined one. Once going downhill, it is very difficult to stop that momentum, and to climb back up.

So though this feeling is exhilarating, I must learn to tame it. Savor it, but do not desire it yet. I have a long way to go before opening up my own restaurant. Sure, it's fun to think of my future restaurant's name, its decor, its opening menu. But those must remain fantasies until I am ready. When that is, I can't say, I just know it isn't anytime soon.

Slow and steady wins the race.

There is no axiom more appropriate for our way of life.

EP6