Last week my wife was at a work dinner so I decided to take my daughters out to a nice restaurant where I knew the chef and they could get a peak at a working kitchen. The girls are 8 and 10 years old, typically good eaters and were thrilled to meet Chef Chris Van Ness at Carmines Creole, a New Orleans styled restaurant in Bryn Mawr, PA.

I met Chef Chris at a cooking class arranged by Carole Blum, the founder of Take Five, a couple of months ago and we instantly hit it off and started talking food and the restaurant industry. Chris is a graduate of The Art Institute in New York City and a wealth of food knowledge. You can imagine who asked the most questions in our cooking class.

By the way, this was not one of those cooking classes where you sit and watch the action. You walk into the restaurant on a night when they are closed to the public, are handed an apron and recipe and told to go prepare it. With 8 to 10 couples hustling around trying to figure out where to start and what to do next, it is very entertaining to watch.

Unlike Chef Gordon Ramsay from Hell’s Kitchen, Chef Chris is as calm as a cucumber. When the rest of us were trying to figure out how to form a roux or prevent a sauce from breaking, Chris walked around offering tips and showing us techniques that only a professional with years of experience would know.

When I asked him how he could remain so calm with all these amateurs in his kitchen firing questions at him and requesting his help, he said, “This is nothing when compared to a Friday or Saturday night when you might put out 200 to 250 meals in 3 to 4 hours!” Ok, I’m impressed.

Back to the Girls

We arrived and walked into the kitchen from the alley next to the restaurant. Chris was first to say hello and introduce himself to my girls. The rest of the staff must have been a little surprised to see these two little girls in the kitchen especially my youngest who has cerebral palsy and walks with crutches.

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Here is the last part of the day for Chef Jenni and I hoped you have enjoyed what a day in her life as a pastry chef is like. You can see it is not easy but I can tell you from speaking with Jenni, she loves her work. I guess you would have to if you plan on doing this for a living. This has been a great description of just one professional cook’s experiences and I hope to bring you more in the future.

Again, if you like what you read and are thinking of going to baking and pastry school, be sure to check out my culinary arts school resource center. And be sure to read my interview with Chef Jenni here.

1:40pm:

Rum caramel. Get the sugar going. Go see Larry at the bar and hit him up for Myer’s Dark Rum—just 2-3 ounces. Keep an eye on that sugar. “Order in ugly ends X3.” “3 ugly ends, heard. One more order of ends all day, chef!” “Heard!” Throw those 18 ends in the oven. Check your sugar. Still okay.

Order in: pig tails! Pig tails, heard. Drop the pig tails. Set up your plate. Check the ends. Check the sugar. Ends go to the window. Check the pig tails. Check the sugar. It’s getting close. Turn it down and rescue the pig tails from the fryer. Powdered sugar, and off it goes. Check the sugar. It’s starting to turn. Let it go. Let it go. Let it go. Stir and let it go. When it starts to sting your eyes, it’s just about there. Let it go. There!

Off with the heat and in goes the cream. Jump back—it splatters and spits and steams like Vesuvius! Add some salt. Stir and stir. Once it has calmed down a bit, add the rum and stand back again. Let it cook for a minute and let cool. Go pour layer 3 on that semifreddo so it will be freddo by service! Label and refrigerate that caramel. Order in: ugly ends! Ugly ends, heard; 86 ugly ends. 86 ends, heard!

2:05pm:

Timer goes off for financiers. Take them out. Mignardise time. What’ll we make today? How about mango pate de fruits? Get out your puree, pectin, sugar, citric acid and corn syrup. Here we go. Where’s that candy thermometer? Oh, the bar needs sour mix? Lucia, could you make the sour mix? Where was I? Get that silpat ready for the pate de fruits. It takes forever to get to 107 degrees C! “Order in: chocolate caramel ice cream!” “Ice cream, heard.” Turn down the induction burner. 3 scoops in a cold bowl. Croquant as a garnish. To the window. Back to the pate de fruits. Turn up the heat. Stir and stir. Done! Pour and let set.

2:40pm:

Set up the biscuits for Lucia to bake for dinner service. 4 trays of 48. Work in the walk-in where it’s cold. Put the panned biscuits back on the speed rack, and back out into the hot kitchen.

3:00pm:

How are we looking? Ice cream base? I’m on it. 48 yolks. 1 gallon of milk, plus a bunch of cream for good measure. Sugar, salt and vanilla. Heat. Temper into yolks. Cook to 160 degrees. Strain and flavor. Portion, label and freeze.

3:30pm:

Line individual tart pans for Alsace tarts for garde manger. Freeze so they can be baked off. How many today? 16! 16, heard. Thank goodness I froze some brisee on Saturday. I’ll have to make some more tomorrow. Put it on the list.

3:45pm:

How’s it all looking for dinner service? You’ve got 16 orders of pretzels all day, 48 orders of biscuits. Brulees are done. Financiers are done. We’re good on cinnamon rolls, triple chocolate and chocolate peanut butter terrine. Don’t cut that triple chocolate until service time since I just did the last layer at around 2:00. Pig tails are fine. You’ve got what you need for sundaes if anyone wants one and you’re fine for root beer floats. Do you need me to do anything else to make your service life easier? You’re good; okay.

4:00pm:

Check off what we need for The List for tomorrow.

All right, then. I am out. Have a lovely evening, all!

Interview with Chef Martin Laprise

For those of you who are thinking of opening and running your own restaurant some day will enjoy this bit of advice from Chef Martin Laprise, author of My Daughter Wants to Be A Chef.

Chef Laprise is one of those chefs who has seen it all. He has been employed in 24 of the 39 venues a professional chef can expect to work as described in his book. It is a great read if you or your child is thinking of attending culinary arts school.

Martin, now a professional caterer and personal cooking instructor in Canada participated in my Novice2Pro chef interview that can be seen at Interview with Chef Martin Laprise. This is another great interview for prospective young chefs thinking of cooking school.

At the end of my interview with Chef Martin, I asked him if he had any comments or advice related to managing a restaurant and here is his informative reply.

If you are going to have a restaurant one day, do your homework first. Here’s some advice I passed on to a friend of mine last month about running a successful restaurant.

1. Train and coach your staff well so when you its your day off they still perform accordingly. NO RESTAURATOR can do it alone.
2. Although this is your own unique concept, as soon as you open your restaurant, create your business as if someone else would take over one day. Think like a franchise.  That way when you want to slowdown and have a life with your child, you have a system and rules for everything. OR if you want to sell the business and travel the world, it’s easier once you have system in place. Think TURN KEY.
3. Empower all your employees to make decisions and not rely on you every times. Do not discourage them if they screw up, try to explain to them the best you can.
4. Reward your cooks by letting them create a special of the day and/or create an item for the new menu. Everyone likes to be part of things. A cook who feels part of something will stay longer. Ask for their opinions once in while so they will feel important and happy to work for you.
5. The schedule is the BEST tool you have in the kitchen or in the front. It’s a great reward to give a flexible schedule to your staff so that they can have a life or a hubby. Employees are there to help you realize your goal. Figure out what is best for everyone.  4 days a week for 10 hours for someone may not be suitable for someone else. Talk to everyone and make the schedule that best fits everyone’s needs. Example; young cooks like to party, where old cook like to be with their spouse on special occasions. ADJUST!
6. You are now a restaurant owner, wow, BUT don’t forget to think about when you were an employee and how it made you feel when the boss did not listen to any of your advices. Listen to your staff; NO REALLY listen to all of your staff, including dishwashers. They see things that you don’t. You only have two hands and two eyes! Create a system and environment that promote opinion sharing. Like a meal between lunch and dinner service with all the staff so everyone can talk about ideas and how to improve. This will create a great TEAM environment and cost very little long term. 
7.  The front of the house servers will benefit from having educational wine tasting once in while and enjoy the experience AND stay longer.
8. Don’t make one person work 60 hours a week when you can hire one and half workers instead. I know that the labor market is toughf, but it can be done. People that are over worked don’t perform well and may cost you some future clients. You ultimately control who works and how much! Even if someone wants to work overtime, don’t do it. For cost and for the employee.
9. Follow up is the most important action in any business. Example; when you say to an employee I will talk to you tomorrow, talk about it the very next day. When you say we will talk about a raise in two months, don’t avoid it. Make sure to have a talk two months to the day even if it is to say I can’t talk right now for X or Y reasons
10. If you give direction to any employees, you absolutely need to follow up to see if it was done right or done at all. If an employee who knows that you don’t follow up is more likely to screw up.
11. Customer service is extremely important. If you know that a table has waited a bit too long, send a glass of something to the table. A few dollars is much cheaper than a bad review from a client. Find a drink or food that is your signature to offer when things get busy. 
12.  All recipes, food or drink, should be written down and standard every time. 
13.  Since you are in the middle of wine country, if I were you, I would do wine tasting once a month. Something like the second Wednesday of each month. Stick with it and one day it will be packed. Have wine maker as guest! 
14. Press releases are simple. Tell your story about how you got there and you should get free press. Don’t ever sell your restaurant, sell you journey to media.
15. Press releases are very powerful! Wait until you are ready to handle lots of people. Make sure to send it to all media nationwide, not just local media.
16. Don’t cut down on quality ever and dessert is extremely important, as this is the last thing the client sees before the bad news/the bill.
17. No matter how much I like to cook duck, if the local market does not want to eat duck I have to accept that I will cook something else to make a living.
18. Hire people for who they are, not what they know. You can teach someone to be a better cook or server, BUT you can’t teach someone to be a better well adjusted human being. Choose people for their personality and teach them what you want.
19. Reward your employees for doing a good job.
20. Support your small community by giving out dinners to charity, you will get free press for it and feel good too.
21. An employee will never have the same commitment as you, period… This is your life, and it’s only a job for your best employee. Eventually, to make someone assistant manager is a smart move that will allow you to have a life of your own. 

If you are interested in reading more about running your own restaurant, I have found 3 ebooks on the subject that might be helpful. I have not read these ebooks yet because I am not thinking of opening my own restaurant but they might be something to check out if you are.

Top Secrets to Successful Restaurant Operations

Restaurant Management Toolkit 

How to Improve Dining Room Service 

and then there is this Restaurant News Service you can subscribe to called Restaurant News