How to become a Chef

Here's how you do it.
1) Go to any cooking school
2) Work for a month here and a month there for really GOOD chef's who've paid their dues
3) Don't learn how to cook. Forget learning how to make mashed potatoes correctly, make wasabi mashed potatoes.
4) Don't read anything about food or cooking except glossy magazines
5) Carry around evey little kitchen gadget and 20 dull knives in a big briefcase
6) Land a executive chef's job and freak out when you have to think on the fly. Then yell at everybody for your own inabilities.

Isn't it enough we have to have the public insult our intelligence on a daily basis without having to deal with these young , little twerps that see a chef on t.v and discover their true calling? I discovered mine when I was about 7 or 8. For some reason I always liked arranging cheese and crackers for the family. I then made strudel dough from a book and stretched it across our kitchen table. I didn't do anything with it as my friends came over and we had to go blow some shit up, but nonetheless it was so thin you could see through it. In hindsight, I guess I was destined for this profession. Years of sacrifice, verbal abuse, ungodly hours and reading...reading...reading..working...working...working...and Voila! Here I am! Broke because I have principles. Anyway, my point is I don't ever recall saying" I wanna be a chef!" I just took jobs because restaurant jobs were easy to get. Washing dishes, then doing a little veg. prep AND washing dishes. Helping the cooks and washing THEIR fucking dishes. Eventually making some salads...helping the busboys break the rungs out of the chairs so they would collapse under the customer. Slowly...verrrrry slowly working my way up. I don't ever recall thinking I was too good for whatever job I was doing. I was learning tons but didn't realize it. It was just work to me. I remembered every single thing I had to do.
Nowadays try teaching some snot how to cook. They don't want to learn how to cook. They want to learn how to make money and have people tell them how great they are. Then you're assigned a couple of student helpers who follow you around, keeping you from smoking cigarettes and scouting for potential chef groupies. One kid who was particularly annoying just came right out and asked...."What's the fastest way to get to where you are?"
I wanted to shove his head in the toilet. "There's no fast way to get anywhere good" I told him.
He kept on.."Does it take a long time to become a chef?"..."I was thinking..like..when I get out of school, I could like.. get a job in a restaurant." It made me think. You just got a lecture from a bunch of chefs on how we got where we are and you didn't even listen. And this is the future of cooking. It the same as writing, painting, designing clothes ...ANYTHING . You have to want to do it more than anything else in your life. If it doesn't consume you ..GET OUT QUICK! If you think making fresh pasta and cleaning 30 lbs of fish is boring and gross. Quit. Please.We don't want you. Don't insult us and don't ruin your own lives. Most of all don't insult us, or we'll ruin your lives worse than you could ever hope to. If you have no passion about anything ...if someone asks you what really gets you fired up and you can't answer, you're a worthless human being to me.
What's wrong with this generation of "artists" who don't believe in the most important part of the learning process. The sacrifice. Wanna train to be a chef AND have a life ? Go screw yourself.
I hate and am actually kind of scared where cooking is headed. I feel like a dinosaur most days. Mostly though I get worried that I'm gonna stroke out from some asshole that's too important to learn to cook properly. If you roll your eyes when I show you how to make gnochi guess what, next you'll be taking out the trash because my dishwasher is a lot more valuable than you. I'm not really a screamer anymore but I'm not so sure this is a good thing.

The Weirdest Cookbook Ever


OK the is a real cookbook from a Scandinavian Chef, The dirty little bugger. It's kinda like some obsessive part of me that is drawn to trying these recipes. Even better would be trying to convince Kurt or Sheryl that this could in fact be a running bull on the menu or as a special.....

The Autumn wind comes blowing in....

The Autumn wind comes blowing in, just another botched line from an old blue eyes song but ol so fitting. As I sit to ponder another seasons passing I can't help but wonder what will happen when we do turn the corner of fall as I feel almost certain that this Autumn will be a decent one I take a breath in remembering Oct. 3rd will mark a one year bitter sweet anniversary that Divine Dinning has tightened they're belt as I am starting to see progressive changes that are for the best interest of the company I pray that our very own Greater Grand Strand will find its way to morph into whatever shape it is trying to take on,it just makes me a lttle sad because of the inner struggles of grassroots politics and the effects it has on the area Chefs.

Live Cooking

Thursday night mid-rush my first attempt at video action I might rethink the camera being used. What is hard to grasp from the video is how intensely quite it was for how busy we were and I'm not really sure if anyone even noticed me filming



Note just before Delane started freaking out I so hate I missed that one it was classic!!!!!

Fennel Pollen

Fennel Pollen is collected from wild fennel. Flowers are picked at full bloom, and then dried and screened to assure the sweetest and best flavor possible. Often referred to as the Spice of Angels, Fennel Pollen makes any ordinary dish extraordinary.

We have a dish of mussels at the restaurant I am currently at(The Divine Fish House), kind of a take on the classic Billy B, which requires fennel pollen I feel that the addition of the Pollen lifts the dish to a new level and quite possibly lends to the integrity of the plate.