The First Two Hours

I remember retail.

I remember for years and years I would walk in to work, punch in, check the schedule, and more often than not, meander over to get a cup of coffee. Sure, there was a chance that I would be on register first thing, but I would still have time to get that beverage, say hello. At various points in my career, thanks to a certain kind of boss, my day could even start with a meeting; arrive at work to be forced to sit down, chat and have a nice drink for 20 minutes? Sybaritic luxury!

Now, if I'm not starting work at least a couple minutes early, I feel like I'm behind.

Cooks work in a cascade. The time one thing can take directly effects when you get to the next thing, and when hell breaks loose? Well, we all understand trickle down theory. One shift can teach you that in just about any cooking environment. For example, if we need pies for Saturday, then on Tuesday I'm prepping dough because Wednesday I mix, Thursday I sheet out and cut, Friday the pies get made, and Saturday we bake. Yes, you could shave a day or maybe (maybe!) two off that time but for the best pies, that's our schedule. Five days. Sure, the actual time involved on Tuesday is minutes, nothing compared to Friday's time - and notice I didn't mention the fillings get made somewhere in there, too. I had just better notice on Tuesday we need pies on Saturday.

I work two cascades, my daily one for the laminated doughs, and the one for multiple day projects. The multiple days work happens between the daily, so I'll do my first turns for the croissant, and while that rests I'll do the pie dough, or cut puff pastry, or pull out the product for tomorrow, then I'll go back and do my next croissant turn, and so on. On a good day, I'll have completed my first turns as well as a few of my multiple day projects and be into my last turn in two hours.

Most days are pretty good. I look at the clock constantly, checking my progress. Each time I look, I have no idea what the time actually means. I know how many minutes a set of turns should take (Six, but if I get it down lower I am doing great!). I follow the patterns, thinking about where I can shave minutes, because that will give me just a little more time in case something comes up, a few more minutes just in case. The idea that a clock can tell me where I am in my workday just doesn't follow. Then, I pause, breathe, look at the clock and think, "Huh. That time already? Two hours? How did that happen?"

I know how it happened, of course. I was watching the clock the whole time.

Best market sign ever.

Perspective

The people working to put food out in the Washington, DC area right now? (I'm including servers and chefs, dishwashers, linehogs, bakers, baristas, bartenders, purveyors, hell even the delivery truck drivers. Especially delivery truck drivers.) Those are the people who seriously deserve respect and admiration. I mean, imagine you run a bakery, a good one, and on the average Tuesday you go through, say, 88 pounds of butter. Now imagine that your city's population is expected to quintuple almost overnight, stay that way for a few days and then return to normal. How much butter should you buy? How much product do you make? How do you make sure that your retail staff doesn't collapse with exhaustion before 9 am and still can manage a smile at 10? How do you deal with a dairy company that has every single one of its clients dealing with the same problems you have? How do you make sure your staff can even get to work?

I have images of prep cooks all over that city catching catnaps on sacks of flour. Servers who turn the corner and break out in sobs. Chefs standing at the pass reciting the Saint Crispen's Day speech from Henry V.

Ok maybe not, but it would be appropriate, "Then he will strip his sleeves and show his scars and say These wounds I had on Inauguration Day".

Take care out there, ok?

And if you're in the DC area as one of the many witnesses to tomorrow's inauguration? Tip well.
OK, Tip well anyway, but you know what I mean.

The Problems with Good Bread

1. It's time intensive.

2. Basic cost of goods is relatively cheap, and everyone knows it, so you can't charge enough to make much of a sustainable living off bread alone.

3. It has a very, very short shelf life. And you had better be able to come up with something to do with the leftovers when you have them.

4. The labor to make 15 loaves and 25 loves is similar, but you need to have something you can do with the other ten loaves, see #3.

5. Once you start feeding the bitch, you can't stop. It needs feeding at regular times, gets finicky about the day, the time, even the weather. And even if you are nice to it, there is no guarantee that your bread will be as nice today as it was yesterday. And if the bitch dies, it takes a while to get a new one going again. (Don't ask me what happened to the employee who threw away all the levain one morning.)

6. It requires special equipment. Not that a spiral mixer or a deck oven can't be used for other things, but for really good bread, that's thousands of extra dollars.

7. Every baker knows these things. They also know that there are wholesalers that they can just buy bread from and with everything else, it would just be so, so easy....

8. Everyone wants it. Why is this a liability? If you make enough to fill the need, it tends to be a dedicate your life to it or let it go choice. In this industry, which do you think works best for most small bakeries?

Scary list for a bread geek like me.

Find a bakery. If they make their own bread - and I said "make" not "bake" - start buying it. This is an affordable luxury even just once a week, and I don't think I need to list all the reasons why good bread is better than the preserved flour sponges that sell at the big chains. It's better than the "artisanal bread" from those same grocery chains because you know who made it, and can ask all the necessary questions, like, "Has this been frozen?". If the baker looks affronted at the thought, buy the bread.

I mean, look at the crust on this. I make good bread, but this? Totally worth $3.50.

Man, when was the last time I plated something?

There is no such thing as a pastry job that covers all the possibilities. Not even an instructor can do that. So with each position, you get some of one kind of pastry work, none of another. Bread bakers don't make much ice cream. Chocolatiers don't do many pies.

Right now, I don't plate anything.

I miss it.

I haven't composed a dessert, I realize, since I moved here. There has been no swirling of sauces, no quenelles. My garnishes have served a savory function only.

I really, really miss it.

I realized I missed it when I found myself composing a plated trio of desserts for an upcoming potluck. Thankfully, the hostess is a friend and coworker, who understood my odd excitement when I started blathering ideas at her. Of course, I know this is only the beginning. There is a small part of my brain that plots imaginary cocktail and dessert parties, sighs wistfully at the photos of blogging line cooks and will only be satisfied when I add a few more recipes to my notebook. So, I'll do all that, at home, because it is the only place I have for plated desserts.

The worst part is knowing that maybe, just maybe, in my career this may be my only plated dessert outlet. And you have no idea how much it hurts to say that.

I love my work. There are very few parts of it that I look at and say "No, I'm not interested in that." (For example, I am so over cupcakes, thanks, and have been since I was, oh, five.) To say that any option that I do like is closed to me? Bittersweet thoughts.

(chocolate cake, salted macadamia caramel sauce, thai coffee ice cream, cocoa nib tuile)

2009

Why are marshmallows and cocoa so good together?

Is it something in the added creaminess without the addition of cream? A textural element? Nostalgia?

The cocoa was a gift, given generously by someone in my chosen (rather than birth) family. It's not handmade, the marshmallows came from who knows where, but it is all worth savoring anyway. In fact, it's delicious.

Happy Holidays.

The weather outside is frightful...

It's pretty much the worst thing that could happen.

Imagine you are a small business owner in troubled economic times. You are doing ok, you're holding your head up above water and it's the busiest time of the year. Then during the busiest week, the money maker, the big cheese, the work until you drop time, the snow starts falling. And falling. And falling.

And the city shuts down. For days.

So what does this mean to me, lowly employee? It means that bread is still a living product. It means my detrempes are still active, the starters still need feeding. It means, in a nutshell, that I am still going to work. It means that if (when) I get the call saying, "well, you know how you said you could..." I'm already in boots getting ready for my walk.

We go in to work, however we can get there. We work a long day, but not as long as it should be, and we're vaguely grateful for the break, bittersweet. We are grateful for the work; we're decidedly less stir crazy than most of our customers, and many of our significant others. It's nice to have a purposeful way to fill the hours. There is also that tiny voice that tells us how lucky we are to be working at all. The gift for my labors was an extra day off. I'm not sure what to do with myself.

Holidays are always rough in this business. I think I'd rather have it the other end of the spectrum, though. Of course, I know that next December, when I'm completely in the weeds, I'll look back and dream of a white Christmas.

Share or Horde?

It baffles me that sometimes people, in this day and age, won't share recipes. I mean, really, is there a recipe for anything that can't be found in some fashion online? No, it may not be your Uncle Edgar's secret recipe for dumplings, but still, the dumplings are there. And why not make it YOUR recipe for dumplings?

I think Jeffrey Steingarten, in one of his essays (gratins, maybe?) talked about an endless quest to perfect a recipe. He tweaked and puzzled and got one that he could make and make again and it was perfect. And it turned out to be nothing like the original recipe. So really, what difference does the original recipe make?

I have one recipe that I won't share. One. And I won't share it because the chef who gave it to me is someone that I respect, and he specifically asked me not to share it. I also won't flat out copy a recipe exactly from a book and post that as my own, but that relates more to my opinion of copyrights, and why it was unfair that Sam Clemens was broke so often. Otherwise, there is too much of a teacher in my blood to horde.

Chocolate Moelleux for Diane.

100 g dark chocolate (this is the meat of the thing so a good dark chocolate is in order. I prefer a 70-75% bar for deeper flavor)

70g butter (you don't have a kitchen scale? But, um, why not? Ok, 5 tablespoons)

45 g (4 Tablespoons) all purpose flour

13 g (1 Tablespoon) cornstarch

60 g (3 Tablespoons) agave syrup

a pinch of salt

2 eggs

flavoring (see gilding the lily)

1. Preheat the oven to 350. This may take longer than anything else depending on your oven, so yeah, do this first. Spray four small tart rings or one 9" tart ring (or pie pan) with pan spray and place on a sheet pan. Love the pan spray. Fear it not. It is your friend.

2. Melt together the butter and the chocolate over a double boiler, or, if you are like me, a metal bowl set over a pot of simmering water. stir together every once in a while as it melts.

3. In another, larger bowl, whisk together everything else possibly including any appropriate lily gilding. This is really tough, eh?

4. When the butter and chocolate are completely melted but not hot, whisk chocolate mixture into the egg mixture. The batter will thicken up as the chocolate cools. Spread the batter into the prepared tart rings.

5. Into the oven it goes. Now is the time to not get distracted. Before, not so bad. Now, well, this cooks up in about 10 minutes, maybe less depending on your pan, so if you hear the cat making the incoming hairball noise? Pretend it is just CNN and ignore it for a few minutes. You are cooking this until the edges feel set to the touch, but don't wait for the middle to set completely. It's going to be fudgy.

6. Let it cool in the pan. If you can. I mean, it's good while still warm. So it can be kinda hard to wait. It depends on what is happening next. If what is happening next is fancying it up, and serving for company, go ahead and do that after it has cooled a bit. If it is just an immediate chocolate fix, I recommend a nice cuppa (Earl Grey is also stellar with dark chocolate) to go with it while it is still warm. Do you have any idea how hard it is to write out recipes? Man I need another piece now...

Gilding the lily

Ok, I'm better now. The beautiful thing about this recipe is that you can do a gazillion things to it to suit your menu. Easy rustic? Mix in some chopped roasted nuts like hazelnuts, and serve with your favorite ice cream variant. Tropical? Try a sauce of passion fruit and mango nectars and serve with starfruit and lychee. Classic? A dash of grand marnier in the batter, and some candied orange zest and ganache on top. Seriously versatile. And then there is the Chocolate Mint version here, where I flavored the batter with a bit of mint extract, and topped it with ganache and some crushed sugar free peppermint candies.

Holiday Spirits for Bakers

No, no, I'm not talking about alcohol, although I do have an idea for a Christmas punch recipe that would kick. In every job, there is that same meeting every year. "This is it don't screw it up we make all our money now and you like getting a paycheck, right?"

Something to that effect.

It's the most wonderful time of the year; where clients get even more crazy and the work gets even more hectic. Suddenly you look up and see you have stood on your feet for something like 13 hours and didn't even notice even though you have been checking timers in twenty minute intervals at least forty times. Online shopping is the only thing that is saving you from disinheritance if you remember to shop at all. Your house appears to be festively decorated with fake snow, but you know that's just flour you've brought home with you.

Embrace the spirit.

I look at it this way; eventually, the endorphins will save me. I can dread it, prepare for a month of misery and exhaustion, or I can make chemistry work for me. I will come home and bake cookies after spending all day baking cookies. I will fill the house with the scents of the season - citrus, cinnamon, clove. I will think of new ideas for festiving up our regular products while churning out what I need to. I will NOT sing carols to my coworkers every day because they have limits, and I don't know who owns a gun. I will, however, try and remember pleases and thank yous because after 15 hours that can go a long way.

I will probably crochet up a few festive hats. sorry.

And then, when all is said and done, I'll rest, and let my brain do it's thing, flooding me with chemicals that will make me say, "Hey, that wasn't so bad. It was actually kind of fun. How long until next holiday season?"

And then I will duck so nothing that got thrown at me will hit me in the face.