Work is fun.

First time doing "buffet" service. Mother's day Brunch... 214 people or so came into Uproot. We overprepared wayyyyy too much stuff. Shit everywhererere. But it was kinda cool to see so many people coming and going and being able to walk out onto the floor for a second or two during a meal service (cooks aren't really allowed///isn't really proper to do that).

Workin' the oven is pretty awesome. Lot of organization of ingredients to reheat and fish/quail fish/octopus to cook. Fun/quick plates. Tasty stuff. It's not just the "cooking" aspect that is enjoyable it's like the mass organization and speed of production // efficiency in physical movements and keeping shit clean while producing plate after plate. Time flies.

i love how my political incorrectness from elementary school into college fits perfectly into our kitchen banter. You're here to do a job, not to bitch and complain about "OMG THAT IS SO RACIST", "WOW, THATS NOT POLITICALLY CORRECT". Love it. It's like a sports team, without the usual faggotry of one or two rejects who can't take a racial slur or stereotype.

We had a lesbian, and black dude (CLARENCE), portuguese guy (DAVE), polish girl (MARTYNA), buncha italian/american whatever types/mexican dishwasher, Muslim roommate/front of the house guy (TORRES), etc etc. What a fucking mix.

Drinking. Working lunch in the morning. Probably manning two stations because of typical wednesday slowness. Meh. Good times.

Quarter of a century old. Kill me.

Two Months Later...

Wow, has it really been two months.
I'm too lazy to type anything nowadays. Lot of shit has happened.
1. Moved from Salad/Cold station to Oven station
2. Lost my license for 8 months
3. Moved into a new apartment in Piscataway!$@
4. Hitchhiking for rides everywhere. Or paying with blow jobs.

Watching copious amounts of How I Met Your Mother... 24, lost, community. Jeezuz. Southpark. Last few episodes weren't as funny, but still enjoyable.

Epic burn on my left forearm.

Chat Roulette is hilarious. Don't do it alone. Wear a condom.

It's been a month... but I'm typing/blogging again.

For the last month, I've spent most of my non-working time at a nearby bar/pizza sports bar the staff hangs out at. Pretty, friendly bartenders. Cheap drinks. Tasty pizza. This stop every night kept me from getting home before 2 am every morning... but that all changed last Tuesday night.

After a massive snowstorm two Wednesdays ago (Feb 10th), the Wed before Valentine's day, I worked 5 days in a row straight. Minimum of 12 hours a day and Valentine's day Sunday was about 14 hours. Finally on Tuesday I thought it would be a good idea to relax with all the staff and grab a few drinks and shots at the bar. Drinking went on as usual, but I was riding off of 4 hours of sleep every night for the past 3 - 4 nights... and I guess that is what really fucked me up. I stopped drinking around 1:15, but we stopped elsewhere. Didn't start driving until 2:00... but I wish I had never gotten into my car.

After driving 25 minutes, I eventually reached one of the only places on the side of the road that wasn't lined with mailboxes, trees, or guardrails. That's just the moment when I passed out for 10 seconds. I remember a faster car behind me and for some reason I blinked when I looked through my rear view mirror... and when my eyes opened, I went 40 yards into the snow and 20 yards away from the road.

Immediately got out of my car into the snow and for the next 15 minutes I dug with my frisbee around my front wheels... There was no way I was getting out of this one. So I called my parents at 2:45 in the morning, they rushed out of bed with shovels and triple A on the way... however, around that time, a police officer happened to drive by my scene... FML.

Was arrested, sat in a short sleeve shirt in a holding room and was interrogated and processed for 3 hours. Got home around 6:15 in the morning, slept for 3 hours and went back to work the next day. Car was towed/impounded. 400 bucks.

Court date is around march 2nd. great. Looking at a total of 4000+ including lawyer and all feeds and everything and maybe 1000 for car repairs.

Funny thing is, my parents weren't really mad. They were just glad I was alive... and hopefully that I learned a lot from the "Experience". I have. It just sucks now that I can't have more than a beer or two at a bar without my BAC going above the legal limit... oh well. That's permanent.

I was only about 10 minutes away from my house... but the road there followed the course of a river and is really dark and full of deer. If I hadn't gotten "caught" and passed out at the point I was at, I coulda went flying into a tree or the river. I guess that's kinda crazy. I was also lucky that the hill was UPhill and not DOWNhill... don't know where I would be if I were going down.

On a more positive note, I've been allowed to cook on the hot side of the kitchen some more. On a non-busy Tuesday or Wednesday I popped out like 15 orders of Gnocci and an order or two of scallops. Quite fun to make. On the cold side... Veggies I use for my salads are turning out really well every time now. Mostly sous vide beets and stuff for salad that are turning out perfectly cooked--tender, not mushy or have any crunch to it at all, but then again, beets have a lot of leeway... parsnips, on the other hand, don't but my parsnips aren't getting mushy.

and I've been attempting to take over more of the baking / pastry side for the sake of the Sous Chef. My souffles are rising higher and are more "uniform"... making brownie batters... made my first carrot cake batter. Oil/Egg base... Mine didn't turn out quite as well as the Sous Chef's... but hey, it was my first time and I thought I was at the right point at each step. Ho well.

Fully completed making a Foie Gras torchon today. 3 step process. woo... Good times.

Glad to have a day off tomorrow and that I got home before 4 in the morning on a Sat night for the first time in 3 months. Now maybe I can cook for my family for once...

Pictures!
soon?

Valentine's Day Steak Tartare! (well, this was the day after. Just a little first course)

From 2010-02-19 Uproot

Baby beet salad. Goat cheese mousse, honey/lemon dressing. Fun

From 2010-02-19 Uproot

Spermy Scallop Crudo (delicious).

From 2010-02-19 Uproot

Mass plating from our Minus 8 Wine Vinegar dinner.

From 2010-01-23 Minus 8 Dinner

More pics here!

2010-01-23 Minus 8 Dinner

FUCKEN Eh?!

Oh CANADA!

I barely have had any "time" to post anything of "value". I love quotation marks. But. Yeah.

I really need to write up about my trip to Santa Monica for Lei Out 2010. I have like 50% of my 200 photos uploaded to Facebook. Fucking time consuming.

I also have to write about what's going on in the kitchen and how we're hosting a Minus 8 Vinegar dinner next Tuesday. Google Minus 8 Vinegar. It's some badass shit.

http://blog.nj.com/artful_diner/2010/01/minus_8_dinner_at_uproot_resta.html

Yeah...
I made it home tonight, again.

IT's my 7th day in a ROW of heavy consumption. Kinda bad, but I'm not hindered by it at work. Going until Sunday and then going dry til May/Alumni Day at UCLA. Epic?

I hit 100 MPH today on RT 287. I was pretty proud.

From Random January 2010

I also got the opportunity to work the Hot Appetizers lastnight. fucking amazing. I got to cook off scallops, boar belly, gnocci, etc. Fucking loved it. Not many orders, not too busy, but got some valuable info about working a station near the stove. Fucking awesome. Sizzling scallops and shit. EVerythings hot as fuck and you use your hands to cook. Love it. But whateva, salads and desserts are pretty badass too.

Can't believe it's already Thursday. Freaking 7 hours at home to sleep, don't see any of my family, wake up go to work, after work, go to Avelinos, then go home tipsy. rinse/repeat. Time fliesssss

Woooo

Tired!

On your feet for 10 - 11 hours a day 5 - 6 days a week is pretty rough. But it wouldn't be that bad if I weren't coughing up SARs and shit all over the place.
I think I'm starting to feel better though, less coughing, less fatigue, less running to the damn sink every time I cough to wash my freaking hands. I think sleeping more and drinking less will be helpful. Yes.

It's crazy to be working on Christmas Eve and on New Years Eve. These days used to be holidays... all of my friends back together in our little town... drinking and playing board games in my house on the eve... but not anymore. Now I'm a slave to all the people who are partying and celebrating on those days. But it's not bad being surrounded by the staff at Uproot. Lotta laughs, lotta randomness, lotta good food, and often times, a lot of stress. Hopefully, in a few more weeks, I can prep all my cold appetizer ingredients faster and do all the dessert prep... and execute plates faster (more timely) and with more fluidity... and ramble and ramble. Thinly slicing shit to order is pretty badass, but also really time consuming. 30 or so slices of 3 - 4 different root vegetables for one of our signature salads... or slicing off a few pieces of pear/apple/blood orange... still slow, but getting faster. It's not like I can throw 3 different orders into a bowl and say that they are "cooking"... everything has to be done by hand one at a time.

Almost fell asleep 10 times on the drive back home... can barely think straight. Wish I had more coherent and cohesive thoughts to put up here... but yeah. fuck it.


Fail.

Call me if you are in Monty and want to hang out with a few Monty people... My house should be free and I will buy some booze tomorrow. =\. Frank/Chris/Charles/OBrien/Fuller?

When Life Brings You 10 Lbs. of Lobster...

Make something with it?

After a nice week at Uproot, I borrowed the Chef's copy of "On the Line", a book of Chef Eric Ripert's of Le Bernardin (One of the best seafood restaurants in NYC?). My Dad told me yesterday about how he came across a nice 10 pound pack of wild lobster tail from some far away place and suggested I boil or steam them for dinner tonight. My reply? "Umm... No? Leave that to me".

My family would usually just steam or boil lobster until they were "red" and we would eat it just like that. Maybe a little black vinegar with julienned ginger... but no other seasonings. It still tasted delicious... but then again, you can't fuck lobster up THAT badly (unless you cook it until it becomes condom-textured).

Well, I have to cook for experimentation purposes and artistic/creative purposes so I drew some inspiration from Eric Ripert's book and attempted to prepare Lobster two different ways.

1. Warm Lobster Timbale in a Champagne Nage
2. Roasted Lobster with Wilted Romaine, Butternut Squash, Candied Ginger, and Port and Tamarind Reduction. and and and and.

Anyway, I took a quick skim at the ingredients and the methods of preparing each dish and thought both would be "doable" within a few hours. The only time consuming part of both dishes was allowing the stock/sauces/boiling liquid to reduce and extract flavors. Not much prep work at all for either of these recipes.

So, I started off by reducing a crapload of chicken stock. Canned. Sauteed some Carrot/Celery before adding the stock to give it a bit more flavor...

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Chopped up a buncha random stuff, celery/carrot/fennel/garlic and added some black pepper corns and shit to a buncha cold water.

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Then added a good amount of Champagne and Champagne vinegar

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Then Sandy was acting up and I had to put her in her place. SIDDOWN BITCH!

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Sliced some butternut squash rounds... roasted off for a little bit in the oven. Used a cup to cut nice rounds out of them (Need to buy ring molds).

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

I really was tempted to make a butternut squash soup and put like some leftover prosciutto and stuff into it and into this awesome squash vessel. (Buttnutt squash with the seeds removed). Such a cool hat as well.

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Felt like making some potatoes for my little brother and some steak. (Yeah, boring kid) so got some small red/white tossed in extra virg, s/p/paprika. Roasted off for some time (I don't time things, they got soft, without being burnt). Pulled them out and smashed them, added a pat of butter on top of each one and threw some thyme leaves on them and finished them in the oven. Delicious

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Tossed some pearl onions/cherry tomatoes in too along w/ garlic confit and it was a tasty looking family potato dish.

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Cooked some lobster tails off in the stock (after it was simmering for about 2 hours) and tossed in herbies (basil/thyme/cilantro). Strained some cooking liquid off to the side to reduce for the "Timbale" dish.

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Candied some Ginger. Didn't turn out quite as well as I had planned or envisioned. I didn't have a nice long piece of ginger to julienne or make thin pieces out of. Flat little rectangles. bleh. Tasty though.

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Steaks for daniel

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Lobster timbale... red onion/carrot/celery which were lightly/quickly sauteed and seasoned, sliced some cooked/boiled lobster tails and finished in the oven with a little shallot/tarragon/butter.
I stacked them in a cup (lack of ring mold) and turned it upside down. Not too bad. Not too good either.

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Finished plate. Mixed some reduced boiling liquid with a bit of champagne, failed to strain it but provided a very tasty broth at the bottom. Topped with some candied ginger.

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Whole lobster tail with red wine/port reduction with wilted endive and butternut squash rounds (hidden??)

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Steak for daniel with tarragon cream jus

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

I need to buy some fucking white plates. Getting bored of this black japanese style shit.

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Had an inkling for some drinkling and bought this. Tasty shit.

From 2009-12-14 Lobsterfest

Ah, and to start a new exciting week at Uproot again 5 hours from now!

Random Link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksXm-2om490
Thanks Sierra.

This WoW kid used his Magical Blanket of Disrobing and unfortunately, the item is cursed. He lost control of his body for a few minutes.