What is one piece of advice you would give to others who are just starting out in the culinary industry?
While the “I” is important (after all, it is the “I” who must get up in the morning and go into action), all-important is the “we.” When starting out in a new role, be “game”: be enthusiastic, cheerful, positive, and willing to help everywhere. Read the profession’s greats; learn the history. Culinary schools too often indulge tardy students with late class starts; that teaches a bad habit: arrive at work fifteen minutes early, well-groomed, in a clean, pressed uniform (yes, pressed, even if no one else does that). Don’t leave until chef tells you to. Never say “no” unless it’s immediately followed by “problem”: “no problem!” When my French executive chef during my externship told me (in his thick accent) “Jeff, you do not have to say ‘Oui Chef,’” I replied, “Oui Chef!” He smiled.
Forget yourself and be a member of the team. Be a cleaning maniac: if there’s time to lean, there’s time to clean. Ask questions, use what you’re told, admit mistakes, and describe what you’ve learned; Chef knows you screwed up and is looking for your interest in and dedication to learning. (And don’t repeat the mistakes.) Your job is to unselfishly make Chef a success; think about that: if Chef is a success, the food and service have triumphed. Chef’s success will become your success. Not all chefs make this an easy task, but no matter: it’s your job; figure it out, watch, listen, ask, think. Volunteer; be the cook who always goes the extra mile; football great and Navy veteran Roger Staubach said, “There is never a traffic jam on the extra mile.”
Now, beyond the beginning cook: I have seen more than one example of opportunities to form culinary teams and develop leaders (future chefs) that is “left on the table.” Chefs that don’t help cooks understand the end state – what it is they are preparing and how the youngster’s work contributes to the end state, talking too fast in indistinct and imprecise language that breeds misunderstanding and mistakes, assuming the new cook knows what Chef wants – leaving the youngster “alone and unafraid,” about to obliquely cut a bowl of fresh-off-the-farm carrots Chef wanted julienned. Praise in public and admonish in private (where possible); involve young cooks in work that develops their skills – let them try to make the beef Wellington, for Pete’s sake! In the military, from day one, we consciously develop youngsters to be leaders, we don’t leave it to hope and convenience. In a terrible and violent moment, a private may have to step in where the corporal or sergeant was, and lead the squad. A chef is a “chief”; chiefs develop new chiefs. Is your assistant being trained – really trained – to step in when you take sick and run the operation?
Why did you want to become a Chef?
According to the profession’s traditional rules, by which I abide, I may never be a “chef.” I will seek opportunities, such as having my own supper club. I will continue my culinary education: I am in private lessons with a French saucier whom I met while doing my externship at the residence of the French ambassador to the U.S. Sauces especially interest me, an influence of my incomparable Stratford University Chef Instructor, Hugh Cossard, Maitre Rotisseur, La Chaine des Rotisseures. Chef Cossard a former French Alpine infantry regiment noncommissioned officer, selflessly gives his students his heart and soul, and is an inspiration. Every cook and every chef reflects the craft and art of his or her masters, and I will strive always to justly reflect Chef Cossard’s brilliance. (Chef will forgive me: not all is French! I intend to go to a five-day New York pizza school.) A few years ago, I learned cassoulet in France. I was just awarded the Wine & Spirit Education Trust Level 3 certification, a sommelier certification recognized by the UK government; now I will work on my Court of Master Sommeliers “certified sommelier” certification. Being in the kitchen means making people happy; it means serving people with a gift from my own hands (and from healthful ingredients) that itself is the gift of learning at the hands of chefs and home cooks who cherish the traditions, gems, and wisdom of generations.
What is the most exciting or rewarding aspect of your work?
Cooking, I get excited bringing forth from ingredients – in an organized and disciplined manner learned from chefs, and which connects me to rich cultures and generations of cooks – good food for someone to eat.
What have you gained by being an ACF member?
I had a blast at the 2021 ACF convention in Orlando, meeting some of the nation’s best culinarians! I gave up asking people to stop calling me “chef.” Everyone was so welcoming and helpful, and the demonstrations and sessions were superb; I’m registered for 2022. ACF’s certifications are among its most valuable benefits. I may well be on the verge of helping one chef with a cookbook. And I am working to form a military culinarian community within ACF – I met in Memphis over ribs (at Rendezvous – dry rub) just recently with a retired Army senior culinary leader for just that purpose.
What did you learn from your first culinary catastrophe?
I have had so many, I can’t recall the first one. I learn more from the flops than the triumphs. I still can’t make a proper omelet – you know, by whacking your wrist and turning the critter onto the plate without a spatula. So important is an understanding of chemistry! McGee’s book is essential. In culinary school, I began to learn how ingredients combine with and react to each other. I will never forget how surprised I was to realize that on adding flour to meat cooking in its fat... that I was making a roux: I had assumed that one had to make a separate roux of butter and flour. Fascinating! Can you believe that, in private lessons a few years ago, before culinary school, I asked my incredulous instructor if a consommé raft can be fried and eaten...?!
What’s the strangest or most interesting meal you have ever prepared?
In 1988, I was an Army captain, assigned to the United Nations Truce Supervision Organization – the UN’s military “blue beret” peacekeepers (we received the Nobel Peace Prize that year!) At our station on the Sea of Galilee, supporting Golan Heights outposts, we had about ten nationalities of officers and spouses. One evening I did a Texas night, where I made fajitas (I had been stationed in Texas, where I learned BBQ). There were no tortillas in northern Israel. Pita bread, sliced along the rim, yielded two “tortillas.” I bought skirt steak at a West Bank Arab butcher in Nazareth (describing what I needed was in itself an adventure). I mixed up my own fajita seasoning (one ingredient not scarce in the Middle East: spices). The fajitas went over big! We washed them down with Dutch beer.
What is your signature dish?
I actually have a fave: cassoulet; I spent five days south of Bordeaux, with American ex-pat Kate Hill, learning this signature southwest French dish. I brought back a real locally made cassoule pot. I use Tarbais beans (not great northern), and a local (German) butcher makes sausage to my “specs.” A key to good cassoulet is lots of fatty, gelatinous components, which will, after hours in the oven, produce an amazing crust. I confit my duck. Many recipes call for a crust made of panko. There is zero panko in real cassoulet. And – it now being autumn – it’s cassoulet season!
If you celebrate Thanksgiving, what is your favorite Thanksgiving pastime?
I grew up in New England, and can trace our family to the Mayflower. Thanksgiving is a holy day of thanks; turkey is sacrosanct. This year, I will give thanks over a deep-fried turkey at the Florida family table of an Army buddy who was also my University of Massachusetts fraternity brother – he went Airborne Ranger infantry and I went into tanks. We were both in Desert Storm. He is now fighting cancer. I will give thanks for him.