I seem to always start these entries with “it’s been so long since I have updated this”! I feel like I have left you hanging, not sneaking you the naughty taste of the cookies, after you have spent all afternoon bathing in scent of their baking.
Well the truth is, I have been eating all the cookies without you!
No, really, I have!
Cookies in London, Iceland and Paris!
But now it’s time to share. Today it’s London!
So as you know, I went to London, to ease the pain of being apart from Anthony whilst he was in Nice working. In fact, this unexpected, “something to do” week, ended up being a very liberating and purposeful time spent browsing the offers of a city that is struggling with it’s food image.
I have noticed, since I last stepped foot in London (in ’99), that things have indeed improved significantly on the food front. Prior to going there this time, I had been spoon-fed a range of ideals, opinions and suggestions from all the English buddies I work alongside at the Bakery. They proudly suggested their favourite tea-totalling spots, and creative hangouts.
Religiously I missioned my way around them all. Ottolenghi, Hummingbird Bakery, Acorn House, Wholefood Supermarket, Flatwhite, Chegworth Valley Farm Shop, and there are still a few I will get to next visit.
It was true, some of them were amazing takes on how to present the sustainable living model of using organic produce, but on the whole I felt sad. I don’t know if what I expected was a little warped (maybe I am spoilt in Tasmania!).
In France, the idea of organic has never really taken off, and England (as compared with France) is leading the way in that battle for sure, so I was excited to re-immerse myself in easy access sustainable products.
But after a week there, with all these labels singing ‘organic, sustainable’, in chain whole food supermarkets, it made me reassess the whole idea of why I choose organic produce (besides the obvious health and environmental benefits).
Why? Why do I, and others, feel so compelled to jump on the organic bandwagon as it passes? Just like everything else, it is a fad, and it will pass.
On the contrary, I realize, that this is one fad that is necessary now, and has got a happy, healthy ending for everyone in the world, and the more that jump on board, the better we will all be.
But how did we get here…? How did food become a marketable fashion, and why doesn’t France (of all the fashionable countries in the world) feel obliged to make a big deal of it like everyone else is?
Well, if my feeling of London was anything to go by, I am happy France is exactly where it’s at regarding their attitude to food. The English food scene, to me, felt like I am sure it would in a number of other big westernized cities around the world. I felt a bit like I was pulling a big doona up over my body, keeping me safe and comfortable on top, whilst underneath, I was lying on a cardboard box on the street. Kind of a false sense of security, that allows complacency in the end.
This complacency is a supreme trust that the multinational companies (who are making a fortune from the latest fads) are telling us the truth about the food we are eating. It is this complacency that has led us to diabolical situation we are in with industrial agriculture, the exact reason we are all thinking we should now eat organically grown. My question for you is, can we afford to be complacent anymore? Wasn’t it only 36 years ago (not even a human life time) we were being told DDT (a crop pesticide that was linked with asthma, diabetes and various types of cancer) was safe?
Don’t get me wrong there are many people and companies out there, who really are trying to do the right thing, and the good ones are the ones that educate you at the same time.
In London I found a few amazing restaurants and cafes, highlighting seasonal, and not just organic, but local food too. One restaurant I found serves nothing that isn’t farmed within the limits of the M25, the large freeway that encircles the city.
In it’s entirety though, every high street looked the same, chain stores, fashion or food, lining both sides of the street. In some ways I had been craving this lick of home, where I could understand everything and it was familiar, but a recent bout of clarity made me question whether I am actually understanding everything afterall!
If organics and sustainable agriculture becomes a chain, a product that we can package and label and create something familiar from, no matter where in the world you find it, then we might just have missed the point!
This is where, upon my return to France, it all fell into perspective for me.
Call me slow, ignorant, or just not seeing the positives due to a bout of familiarity homesickness, but I really hadn’t seen it before.
Paris, and from my (to date) limited travel in France, really has something special in the way of culture, and understanding of food and what it represents.
I know, I can hear you say – “of course” that’s what it’s famous for. Well, yes, but when I got here, with all my grandiose dreams of Parisian life, and the food etc etc. It was indeed amazing, but not as amazing as I really believed it would be (they eat a lot of hot chips and steak here – hardly culinary brilliance!). But I had been over criticizing this place.
I think, for a while there, I was actually convinced that Paris (and that’s the only place in France I can talk about with conviction) wasn’t much more of a foodie location than say, Melbourne. I mean I know Australia is only the young cousin of Europe, but I thought we had done a pretty good job of catching up.
Now I have realized, and this is the revelation you’ve been waiting for, is that culture matters more in food than any of the labels we, in the western world, can stick on an over packaged item.
If you travel all over the world, and the organic produce (packaged or not) looks the same from one place to the next, you have to start to question why?
Culture isn’t that transportable actually. An engrained belief or learning is hard to teach without looking like your preaching (hence all the religious battles in the world). So even though Australia seems to have caught up, maybe we shouldn’t have been focusing on catching up, but just creating our own local food culture.
This is where my analogy of the comfy doona on the cardboard box comes in.
After all these years of food abuse in industrial agriculture, where we have been wringing the life out of something like corn, until it resembles nothing like a corn cob, we have made organics fashionable, and people are starting to support such produce.
As an aside, did you know that dextrose and high-fructose syrup– that random word you see on the ingredients list of all manner of processed foods – is actually some form of corn, which arguably acts as pure fat in your body upon consumption!
I am happy that we are all starting to get it, and support organics, because every time you choose that over processed piece of meat from the meat case, you are only confirming that the marketing department of the industrial agriculture company is doing a good job.
I have often wondered why they don’t put a picture on the label of the real cow that is in the plastic wrapper before you, instead of happy cow standing in the sun in the paddock? I guess the 3-foot of shit it’s standing in doesn’t look that appetizing when you are about to chow down on the steak. It goes to show though, they too aren’t proud of what their doing!
Why is it though, that the majority of us didn’t get it, until the marketing departments told us to. Of course there were the crusading few that started the demand, and the big, money making, enterprises saw that there was a buck in it, but why isn’t eating well something we want to do naturally, like the French?
The French have all manner of pastries and temptations that they could be wrapping their mouths around every lunchtime, but they don’t. Mega-mart type stores are a relatively new invention over here. I can also honestly say, that I could count on one hand the number of people I see drinking soft drinks as a beverage of choice, sparkling water is the go for most.
So if we continue this phase of labeling something sustainable, organic and that means healthy and good for the earth, without actually LEARNING the truth for ourselves, how are we ever going to break the cycle of just believing what we are told?
Choosing healthy options, and treating treats as just that, is a lesson that is engrained in you in France, according to Mirelle Guilliano, the author of “Why French Women Don’t Get Fat”. I work with a few women in their 50s and 60s, who are living proof of that school of thought. Their resistance to treats, although they are working in a bakery surrounded by buttery goodness, is remarkable and something I can say I am not gifted at. Yet I grew up with all the fresh produce one could want, in an environment conducive to exercise and healthy living, so how did I miss out on the sweets “shut-off valve”?
Well maybe it’s about hands-on learning? Being responsible for your food choices, knowing your farmer and where a carrot comes from, and that they shouldn’t all look the same!
Give a kid a choice in the battle for a healthy body, and, be honest, what would you have chosen as a kid – crudités of carrot with home-made hummus, or a Uncle Toby’s muesli bar?
Me, I would have gone for the muesli bar, because it’s muesli, healthy and sweeter than the carrot. Until I was old enough to find out for myself, I had no idea that these well-marketed bars of health, were in fact, full of sugar, and marginally better for you than a Tim Tam. I don’t even know if my mum knew, but that is fine, because the TV tells us they are good for us, and we believed them. It’s hard not to catch on to something being rammed down your throat at a precisely selected TV time slot or on a convenient banner space right outside school. That was how WE (as a general city dwelling population in Australia) learnt about food.
I can’t say unquestionably that city dwelling French children learn more about their food sources and consequently better habits, than Australian kids, but from what I have read of Guiliano, and from discussions with other not-fat French women, culture prevents them from listening too hard to the marketing campaigns!
The mega marts are creeping in, but oh so slowly. Their sugary promotions are tempting but the French are doing a fabulous job of resisting them. Yes there is McDonalds and Starbucks, but they aren’t EVERYWHERE you look. Even the billboard advertising in the metro system is mostly for art exhibitions and fashion, than emblazoned with Coca Cola and the like.
So, it’s great to go and buy some organic produce from your local whole foods store or organic market, but I urge you, to not just do it because you were told to in a marketing campaign. Take it on to learn about the people that got your food to your table. Question the storeowner as to why the organic meat is a little more expensive than the non-organic stuff. Why is better to try a different grain than the stock standard wheat for your cake or bread? Why buy local milk?
Don’t feel overwhelmed, just start to question a few of the marketing campaigns that made you choose that packet mix (full of dextrose!) and pre-packed meat with a faceless farmer. You might even start to enjoy the process of getting to know Farmer Joe! Let alone work out why your child has an attention and hyperactivity problem!
In the meantime, bon appétit!
Kath
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
The Borough Market outing and consequent feast!
we started at 9am, and it finished at 12am. A feast of fresh local produce, and a Croatian Brodet (fish stew) for the troops!
Ottolenghi - Notting Hill
Ottolenghi, Notting Hill.
I particularly like how the barista can interact with the customers through his own little window and the customers are all dining as a family (doesn't suit everyone though!)
The display of food is something I really like, as it is creating visual interest through different levels, and colour.
Monday, August 11, 2008
Fooding in London
Been a while between posts, i know. But I really only can write when inspired.
Of late we have been in organisation mode, gearing up for a trip to Iceland.
I know - i can hear everyone saying, why would you go to Iceland when the whole of Europe is on your doorstep. Well - cos you wouldn't go there, that's why. Why not! Something to talk about - looks incredible, and now we are REALLY excited to go there.
But Anth has been sent to Nice for work (poor Anth -tough break huh>!)
So we have had to postpone the sojourn to the icey continent for a week. So i the meantime I am off to London on a research adventure.
I have all the advice of the Bakery's pommy pastry chefs, waitstaff and of course, the Bakery's namesake leading lady herself hot tips...and I am off.
In 7 days I intend to eat, drink and be generally over indulged to discover what it is that makes a place feel homely. No matter where you hail form in the world, I wanna know how you feel at home. So I plan to check out all the places that are apparently on the same wavelength as me:
1/ The Acorn house
2/ Providores
3/ Wholefoods
4/ Ottolhengi
5/ Borough Street Markets
6/ Leila's Shop (particularly looking forward to this one! - looks VERY me on the internet).
7/ Food Hall
8/ Petersham Nurseries
9/ Flat White
10/ The Anchor and Hope
Check in as the week passes for my reviews and discoveries, and how I think this will inspire my own pending food venture...
Stay tuned...
Of late we have been in organisation mode, gearing up for a trip to Iceland.
I know - i can hear everyone saying, why would you go to Iceland when the whole of Europe is on your doorstep. Well - cos you wouldn't go there, that's why. Why not! Something to talk about - looks incredible, and now we are REALLY excited to go there.
But Anth has been sent to Nice for work (poor Anth -tough break huh>!)
So we have had to postpone the sojourn to the icey continent for a week. So i the meantime I am off to London on a research adventure.
I have all the advice of the Bakery's pommy pastry chefs, waitstaff and of course, the Bakery's namesake leading lady herself hot tips...and I am off.
In 7 days I intend to eat, drink and be generally over indulged to discover what it is that makes a place feel homely. No matter where you hail form in the world, I wanna know how you feel at home. So I plan to check out all the places that are apparently on the same wavelength as me:
1/ The Acorn house
2/ Providores
3/ Wholefoods
4/ Ottolhengi
5/ Borough Street Markets
6/ Leila's Shop (particularly looking forward to this one! - looks VERY me on the internet).
7/ Food Hall
8/ Petersham Nurseries
9/ Flat White
10/ The Anchor and Hope
Check in as the week passes for my reviews and discoveries, and how I think this will inspire my own pending food venture...
Stay tuned...
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Laduree; morning tea fit for Marie Antoinette (not a real Queen!)
Oh, and I must tell you, I went on another café espionage journey on Saturday, with my sister and her boyfriend…Anth and I took them to Laduree for Jo’s birthday.
Oh it was so Frenchy, and fabulous. I felt like Marie Antoinette with all her extravagant sweets and goodness.
Imagine gold gilded walls and cornices, walls adorned with antique mirrors smuggled straight from some overlooked and underused chateau, that featured somewhere in the complex French history of monarchy’s and republics. Burgundy carpet, that sucked the noise of the anticipating crowd in the macaroon queue in the small store adjoined. We felt well proper in our summer frocks, afternoon tea-ing it up!
We all ordered eggs to start with, with some fabulous tea and coffee (didn’t catch the name of the tea, but I have had better so I didn’t bother!). The eggs took longer than necessary so the LOVELY waiter gave us 4 macaroons (their specialty) free.
The eggs were crap. The scrambled eggs were superbly crap. It really is amazing how easy it is for everyone to do really shit scrambled eggs – but it is like anything in life, patience makes the effort worthwhile. I wish they had learnt that at Laduree, because even though we waited a long time for the eggs, they weren’t taking the time to cook them, for sure!
But the pastries were great. I don’t know if it is unFrench to heat pastries, but they would have tasted better, in my opinion, heated…especially the pain au pistache et chocolat, and the pain au chocolat. But the viennoise abricot et pistache was amazing. It was so good but not too sweet as it was balanced by the slight tartness of the apricots. Overall it was a great place to visit, but apparently Pierre Hermes’s macaroons are better. So the next guest gets to come there with me!
homely yearnings
(these kids made me miss home and all the little cousins!)
Funny how until you have a friend like you do at home (you know the ones, that you can whinge and whine to, tell them your deepest darkest secrets without judgment – that kind of thing)…well until you have one like that in a new place, you don’t feel like you’re at home.
Why is it, when you set off on a voyage across the otherside of the world, to discover the differences and the sweetness of something completely foreign, all you do is search out the things that make you feel like you are at home. I wonder if there is a foreign tolerance meter in our brain. Where everything is uber cool for the first 2 months, until the novelty wears off, and the bits that used to be exciting are just the things that you bitch and moan about but without the person that reminds you of home to bitch and moan to! So all in all everyone at home, if you think its WAY cooler over here than it is there, you might stop and think that all we are trying to do is recreate something of what we had there….
HHMMMM that sounds shit even to me! In fact I don’t even like admitting that aloud!
Truth be know, and I am going to defend myself now! I actually love many things about living over here. For example today, when I was swimming in the local very short pool, with my head fair up someone else’s backside, because everyone crams into the pool in the few hours a day when the lazy French deicide it is an appropriate non meal time to open a pool?! (still wondering how they choose these times myself!)
Anyways, I was in the pool, and I was in the lane they call “nager rapide”. You don’t have to understand French to work out that means FAST swimmers. An aside: another cultural difference I have uncovered (in a city that has been difficult to discover the cultural differences compared to Tokyo and Australia), the cultural difference being that fast swimmers in France are the learners in Australia…thanks to the many beaches we have access to I think.
That’s something I do feel good about; I might not be a size 10 stuffing 3 rounds of pancakes down my throat like some women can here, but I can certainly swim faster than them!
So I was in the fast lane, and this guy says to me, (as he panted at one end of the lane, clearly having a break, and I made a move to cut in front of him)…
"les gens rapides doivent attendent les gens lents”, naturally I said “I don’t understand!”, and he said in English “the fast people have to wait for the slow people”…now this is the moment that someone, who is constantly stuck and divided by a language barrier, come into their own…I responded, with a little more nonchalance than is usual for me as I had had a hard day at work “why, that doesn’t make any sense, if I am faster, I should go before you, why would I wait for you, and swim with my head up your bum…” It is moments like these when you know that they can't understand a word you said, as you said it fast, with a purposefully thick accent. Promptly I swam off ahead of him, while he still panted at the end of the pool, going nowhere, trying to work out what the “bleep” I just said!
I might be going round giving Aussies a bad name of arrogance, but I am living in the land of it, so it was probably just a usual response here!
So, after my 60 laps of the tiny pool, I ventured on my next excursion of the day…meeting a complete French stranger for wine…. as you do.
A few weeks back, a lovely woman came into the bakery. Turns out she is Turkish, but was raised in Paris. After I fumbled in my terrible French to serve her, with a big order of food that she had for a Vogue photography shoot (she is the assistant photographer), she asked me if I was studying the language (I guess it was a polite way of her telling me that she knew I wasn’t!). We exchanged numbers, and tonight, finally, we met for a language exchange. I always find these difficult, for many reasons:
1/ I can never speak as well in Frecnh as they can in English
2/ we aren’t forced to study another language at school, and therefore the little bit of study I have done is relatively shit, which brings me back to problem number one, plus being embarrassed that Australians are such ocean bound islanders that really don’t think much about the rest of the world!!
So I always speak about 10 minutes of French to the remaining 2 hours in English!
Great for her, crap for me…but I got a bonus today that I didn’t expect…. we were totally on the same wavelength, have a similar career/ studies at Uni / family and star sign…AND we both can talk the leg off a chair…many of you wont believe this, but I have actually found my match! She talked for 2.5 hours to my 40 mins I reckon, and it was great. I realized, I actually don’t have any problems (except for not having a French bank account and therefore a bunch of cheques but no money), and it was SOOOOO nice to listen to her problems, which she really let me in on. Like I said, I found a little bit of home I was really missing…relating with someone…like really relating. She was naturally apologetic that she had told me all this stuff about her family, but it was so nice to be a part of something, and to help someone. I felt normal again and flew over the big hill home, with a little smile on my face, which grew larger when the girl from our local beer place waved to me with a bog laugh. I was part of a community…a French community! HAHAAA I could leave now, and my mission would be accomplished.
NICE.
So on the cooking front. It’s going ok. I am learning a lot more about people and personality management than anything else. Not really cooking…except at home. Made a cute banana bread the other day, and laid an entire banana straight down the middle, which makes it super cute to cut. Great idea I thought, and that’s a keeper for the café. Especially when I told the pastry chef about it, and she thought it was a great idea too (wouldn’t be surprised if that one turns up in the bakery!)
I did get told by the main kitchen chef the other day, that maybe I would get to go in on Mondays, (the prep day when the bakery is closed), and I would be in charge of making one thing – like curry sauce or something, and she would guide me through it, from the beginning to end. IO would be in charge of creating that, for 1-2 hours and then I could still have the rest of my day off, but I get to learn from her at the same time.
I am also noticing that I am picking up really handy little things everyday. Like when the counter looks great, and when it looks average. It is all about colour, and the look of the vegetables. For example, today we had 8 salads, as usual, but among them, there was a rice salad, cabbage waldorf, cous cous, and pasta salad. The others were roast and fresh vegetable with life and colour. But you can probably see what I thought the problem there was…1/ there was too many carbohydrates, and 2/ the presentation of these grainy salads can sometimes look drab and lackluster…and the cabbage waldorf tastes great, but looks like shit, soggy and limp. I am not saying I know a better salad, just that I noticed it was this type of thing that makes a counter look average instead of amazing. I think there also needs to be more discussion between the pastry kitchen and the main kitchen, to see what colours and flavours are coming out between the two as well. As the days where the counter really sings, are the days when the pastry kitchen chooses fruits of synchronizing colour to the vegetables in the salads.
Everyday, I pick up a little hint here or there about pastry handling (my favourite pastime – making pastry). I learnt a recipe for a grated pastry base that comes out looking a bit rustic, and can be spread with anything like cream cheese, or the like.
The pastry chef also explained how when you are using the food processor to develop the dough, don’t over work it, so that there are still nice big lumps of butter in the mixture, for our famous tartes. But the pieces of butter shouldn’t be like chunk, still thick, but more like wafers, so thin. This makes the wonderful texture of our pastry in the tartes, that doesn’t feel like a mountain of pastry sitting in your guts, but tastes like it!
Funny how until you have a friend like you do at home (you know the ones, that you can whinge and whine to, tell them your deepest darkest secrets without judgment – that kind of thing)…well until you have one like that in a new place, you don’t feel like you’re at home.
Why is it, when you set off on a voyage across the otherside of the world, to discover the differences and the sweetness of something completely foreign, all you do is search out the things that make you feel like you are at home. I wonder if there is a foreign tolerance meter in our brain. Where everything is uber cool for the first 2 months, until the novelty wears off, and the bits that used to be exciting are just the things that you bitch and moan about but without the person that reminds you of home to bitch and moan to! So all in all everyone at home, if you think its WAY cooler over here than it is there, you might stop and think that all we are trying to do is recreate something of what we had there….
HHMMMM that sounds shit even to me! In fact I don’t even like admitting that aloud!
Truth be know, and I am going to defend myself now! I actually love many things about living over here. For example today, when I was swimming in the local very short pool, with my head fair up someone else’s backside, because everyone crams into the pool in the few hours a day when the lazy French deicide it is an appropriate non meal time to open a pool?! (still wondering how they choose these times myself!)
Anyways, I was in the pool, and I was in the lane they call “nager rapide”. You don’t have to understand French to work out that means FAST swimmers. An aside: another cultural difference I have uncovered (in a city that has been difficult to discover the cultural differences compared to Tokyo and Australia), the cultural difference being that fast swimmers in France are the learners in Australia…thanks to the many beaches we have access to I think.
That’s something I do feel good about; I might not be a size 10 stuffing 3 rounds of pancakes down my throat like some women can here, but I can certainly swim faster than them!
So I was in the fast lane, and this guy says to me, (as he panted at one end of the lane, clearly having a break, and I made a move to cut in front of him)…
"les gens rapides doivent attendent les gens lents”, naturally I said “I don’t understand!”, and he said in English “the fast people have to wait for the slow people”…now this is the moment that someone, who is constantly stuck and divided by a language barrier, come into their own…I responded, with a little more nonchalance than is usual for me as I had had a hard day at work “why, that doesn’t make any sense, if I am faster, I should go before you, why would I wait for you, and swim with my head up your bum…” It is moments like these when you know that they can't understand a word you said, as you said it fast, with a purposefully thick accent. Promptly I swam off ahead of him, while he still panted at the end of the pool, going nowhere, trying to work out what the “bleep” I just said!
I might be going round giving Aussies a bad name of arrogance, but I am living in the land of it, so it was probably just a usual response here!
So, after my 60 laps of the tiny pool, I ventured on my next excursion of the day…meeting a complete French stranger for wine…. as you do.
A few weeks back, a lovely woman came into the bakery. Turns out she is Turkish, but was raised in Paris. After I fumbled in my terrible French to serve her, with a big order of food that she had for a Vogue photography shoot (she is the assistant photographer), she asked me if I was studying the language (I guess it was a polite way of her telling me that she knew I wasn’t!). We exchanged numbers, and tonight, finally, we met for a language exchange. I always find these difficult, for many reasons:
1/ I can never speak as well in Frecnh as they can in English
2/ we aren’t forced to study another language at school, and therefore the little bit of study I have done is relatively shit, which brings me back to problem number one, plus being embarrassed that Australians are such ocean bound islanders that really don’t think much about the rest of the world!!
So I always speak about 10 minutes of French to the remaining 2 hours in English!
Great for her, crap for me…but I got a bonus today that I didn’t expect…. we were totally on the same wavelength, have a similar career/ studies at Uni / family and star sign…AND we both can talk the leg off a chair…many of you wont believe this, but I have actually found my match! She talked for 2.5 hours to my 40 mins I reckon, and it was great. I realized, I actually don’t have any problems (except for not having a French bank account and therefore a bunch of cheques but no money), and it was SOOOOO nice to listen to her problems, which she really let me in on. Like I said, I found a little bit of home I was really missing…relating with someone…like really relating. She was naturally apologetic that she had told me all this stuff about her family, but it was so nice to be a part of something, and to help someone. I felt normal again and flew over the big hill home, with a little smile on my face, which grew larger when the girl from our local beer place waved to me with a bog laugh. I was part of a community…a French community! HAHAAA I could leave now, and my mission would be accomplished.
NICE.
So on the cooking front. It’s going ok. I am learning a lot more about people and personality management than anything else. Not really cooking…except at home. Made a cute banana bread the other day, and laid an entire banana straight down the middle, which makes it super cute to cut. Great idea I thought, and that’s a keeper for the café. Especially when I told the pastry chef about it, and she thought it was a great idea too (wouldn’t be surprised if that one turns up in the bakery!)
I did get told by the main kitchen chef the other day, that maybe I would get to go in on Mondays, (the prep day when the bakery is closed), and I would be in charge of making one thing – like curry sauce or something, and she would guide me through it, from the beginning to end. IO would be in charge of creating that, for 1-2 hours and then I could still have the rest of my day off, but I get to learn from her at the same time.
I am also noticing that I am picking up really handy little things everyday. Like when the counter looks great, and when it looks average. It is all about colour, and the look of the vegetables. For example, today we had 8 salads, as usual, but among them, there was a rice salad, cabbage waldorf, cous cous, and pasta salad. The others were roast and fresh vegetable with life and colour. But you can probably see what I thought the problem there was…1/ there was too many carbohydrates, and 2/ the presentation of these grainy salads can sometimes look drab and lackluster…and the cabbage waldorf tastes great, but looks like shit, soggy and limp. I am not saying I know a better salad, just that I noticed it was this type of thing that makes a counter look average instead of amazing. I think there also needs to be more discussion between the pastry kitchen and the main kitchen, to see what colours and flavours are coming out between the two as well. As the days where the counter really sings, are the days when the pastry kitchen chooses fruits of synchronizing colour to the vegetables in the salads.
Everyday, I pick up a little hint here or there about pastry handling (my favourite pastime – making pastry). I learnt a recipe for a grated pastry base that comes out looking a bit rustic, and can be spread with anything like cream cheese, or the like.
The pastry chef also explained how when you are using the food processor to develop the dough, don’t over work it, so that there are still nice big lumps of butter in the mixture, for our famous tartes. But the pieces of butter shouldn’t be like chunk, still thick, but more like wafers, so thin. This makes the wonderful texture of our pastry in the tartes, that doesn’t feel like a mountain of pastry sitting in your guts, but tastes like it!
four burner magic
2 chefs hovering over the four burner convection stove doing 150 covers on a weekend...nothing short of a miracle!
Sunday, July 13, 2008
Thursday, July 3, 2008
the unannounced unofficial assistant manager (or as the staff see it: waitress on a power trip!)
I am in the hilarious but proud position at The Bakery, of being "assistant manager"... I put this in " " because I think really all it means is that I am the one that takes the blame when things aren't right...then I try to delegate to make things right...which is often met with resistance from the staff because there is only so much one human being can do...and given that we turn the 36 seat restaurant over 3 times a day on the weekend, and rotate between 3 kitchens with four dockets for each order.... our limitations are stretched at the best of times...so then I try and do it all myself! Which is funny too, cos that is actually the WORST thing I could do, as it only causes more dramas; like forgetting orders...then we are back to square one! but I still love it....because this is why I am here...to learn. How is the quality kept so high in such a busy place, how do the cooks cope with 20 orders of eggs on a four burner electric stove... and how do you remain calm and loving to a customer when you know they have waited in line for 30 minutes to get a table, waited to order for 15 minutes once they are at the table, and then have to break them the news that all the fantastic salads we serve have sold out by 2pm, cos the place is so unbelievably popular!
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
the start is a grand place to start
I have given in to peer pressure and I am publishing some of my musings on food, world travel, cultural funnies, and documenting my very personal, but purposeful career change into food.
For years I have worked in TV, radio and marketing in the arts. Different programs/jobs gave me varying degrees of satisfaction, but like many food passionados out there, the one thing that I hold dear, and look forward to everyday, was cooking dinner with a glass of wine in my hand and some chilled out music in the background. If work was sucky that day, then dinner would be extra special!
Cooking eases me, soothes me, and I have to admit, I really LOVE people's expressions when they eat, especially if i cooked it! HAA! So something you will learn about me quickly is I am honest! I like it when people like my food! - there I said it!
So my husband and I have lived all around Australia, and now Paris (via Tokyo for 7 months). One thing, no matter where we stopped in our van around Australia, or villages of Japan or France, one thing I find myself seeking out every time, is the food...markets, restaurants, cafes, cooking schools, wholesale stores...I frequent these places like a normal tourist would a museum.
I also like to write...details...i love them.
When I get home I plan to make a great big "Carnet de Voyage" with all the little scraps, tickets, food packaging, photos... and if i could... the 'smells' of the places we visited.
THEN...with all that inspiration in one place, I will strip back the unnecessary stuff, to find the essence of a foodstore that will be my first tangible foray into the food industry...first of my own -that is!
So right now...you meet me in Paris...I kept a lot of writing from Tokyo, which, as this blog develops, you might be privy too...but this blog is primarily to document my discovery of my new life...the one where I say to people, "I am in the food industry" rather than, "i worked in TV then Arts, but I really love food and one day I want to blah blah blah"...right now you are watching me...like a little worker bee, gathering the pollen that I need to make one great big pot of sweet hunny when I get back home...
I hope you enjoy the journey...
For years I have worked in TV, radio and marketing in the arts. Different programs/jobs gave me varying degrees of satisfaction, but like many food passionados out there, the one thing that I hold dear, and look forward to everyday, was cooking dinner with a glass of wine in my hand and some chilled out music in the background. If work was sucky that day, then dinner would be extra special!
Cooking eases me, soothes me, and I have to admit, I really LOVE people's expressions when they eat, especially if i cooked it! HAA! So something you will learn about me quickly is I am honest! I like it when people like my food! - there I said it!
So my husband and I have lived all around Australia, and now Paris (via Tokyo for 7 months). One thing, no matter where we stopped in our van around Australia, or villages of Japan or France, one thing I find myself seeking out every time, is the food...markets, restaurants, cafes, cooking schools, wholesale stores...I frequent these places like a normal tourist would a museum.
I also like to write...details...i love them.
When I get home I plan to make a great big "Carnet de Voyage" with all the little scraps, tickets, food packaging, photos... and if i could... the 'smells' of the places we visited.
THEN...with all that inspiration in one place, I will strip back the unnecessary stuff, to find the essence of a foodstore that will be my first tangible foray into the food industry...first of my own -that is!
So right now...you meet me in Paris...I kept a lot of writing from Tokyo, which, as this blog develops, you might be privy too...but this blog is primarily to document my discovery of my new life...the one where I say to people, "I am in the food industry" rather than, "i worked in TV then Arts, but I really love food and one day I want to blah blah blah"...right now you are watching me...like a little worker bee, gathering the pollen that I need to make one great big pot of sweet hunny when I get back home...
I hope you enjoy the journey...
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