Falling apart...

...literally. If I ever get any followers that don't know me I should point out at this time that I'm a line cook at Tilth. The job, and the industry in general, is tough on the body. A year and half into this madness and I'm feeling weathered. I received a couple of cuts and burns('tis but a scratch) while in school and working. I was hoping that once school ended that the extra time off would give my body time to heal. Somehow the opposite has happened and the wheels are coming off.

About a month ago I got an amazing opportunity to do a stage at the Modernist Cuisine test kitchen. The prep work I was doing would be served to one of the dozens of Michelin star chefs that were rolling into the kitchen every few days as the book had just been released. I started the morning by cleaning snails. In a half hour my dream of opening a frog/snail ranch with friend Steve S. had dwindled along with my appetite. My next job after getting the snails readied was to slice onions, for employee lunch, on a mandoline.

 Staring into the teeth of the wicked beast

The mandoline, for those that don't know, is a blade on a plank. Slide the food over the plank and a slice of the food falls out the bottom. No, it's not a an annoying musical instrument as some have guessed, perhaps most disappointingly one of whom works in food service. The mandoline is a great tool to get uniform slices and julienne cuts. It's the best tool cooks both fear and respect. This fateful morning, I forgot to fear it. I simply went about my business sliding the onion back and forth when suddenly, well I don't really remember. I looked down and I was bleeding from my right pinky finger. I looked at it and figured I had cut off a little piece. No big deal, I'd just go over the sink, rinse it off and apply some pressure. I looked at it through the running water and thought, "that's not looking too good." Calmly, so as not to alarm the chefs, I walked over to my friend Aaron and asked where the first aid kit was. We walked over and he pulled out a band-aid.  I lifted the paper towel, he looked at me, then the pinky, then back at me. In restrospect I wish I could've come up with "we're going to need a bigger boat" on the spot. I'll attribute my lack of cleverness at the time to blood loss.

Flash forward a couple of hours. I'm out of the hospital, hand numbed and bandaged. It was slightly embarrassing showing back up to the kitchen to collect my knives and fill out have the nice lady fill out an accident report. I had spent most of my day at the hospital instead of cooking with amazing chefs.

Had I cut my left hand, I would've gone to work the next day. Cutting my right hand meant I was out of the rotation for a couple of days. Upon my return to work I was greeted with the nickname "Stubs".  This was very exciting to me because it meant they we're starting to accept me as one of them. Sadly it didn't stick and I still get called Christian every now and then.

I am happy to report that my pinky is getting better. I don't hit the return key with it still but I can bend it and grip with it. Great news right? It would be if I didn't just get a bunion(not part of the Allium family) on my right foot. Groan and sigh. It's not all about the food, sometimes it's all about me.

Walk there, waddle back.

Woke up this morning to find out that Jill decided to play hookey from work. Facebook had revealed to her that Skillet would be parked behind Theo Chocolate in Fremont. We've both had Skillet before, I was fortunate enough to meet Chef Joshua Henderson during a field trip in culinary school. He showed us around their truck, the commissary kitchen they were cooking out of and we got to taste all the food that day. A great trip all around and one of the reasons we decided to hire Skillet to cater our wedding.

Today we met up with a friend of ours, local artist Jonathan Wakuda Fischer. The boy had never eaten at Skillet so I knew it would be fun to see his expressions as he took his first few bites. He got the burger which is their signature food topped with their signature condiment, bacon jam! Upon picking up the burger, he was slightly worried it would fall apart, something I can't stand when eating a burger.  If it doesn't stay together, I'm not getting all the ingredients in each bite, which makes me sad. Don't make me sad, it's not pretty. To Jon's delight the burger stayed together and I could hear the content as he took his first few bites.  Not in words at first, but the sentiment was there. I took a bite of Jill's burger, the magic was still there.

While Jon and Jill ate their burgers, I let my eyes and camera delight in the beauty that was my braised duck leg special. It came with a nice side of veggies and a kale caesar salad. I picked it up by the end of the drumstick and was happy the thigh didn't come crashing down. Despite what some might think, you can over-braise meat. Not this duck leg, the meat came off the bone with little effort and the skin was not chewy or soggy. Sprinkled liberally on top of the leg was some chopped fennel fronds and sage. The giant pieces of sage were a bit much and I ended up picked them off. Had they been fried, it would've been perfect.

Full of food and sun, we fed some ducks a couple pieces of fries and without thinking waddled away. I hope the ducks didn't take too much offense.

Street food showdown #1

Bored and restless I decided to walk into Fremont and poke around. This lasted all of 5 minutes when I realized my stomach was making death threats in the form of muffled cries and gargles. Simultaneously I looked up and saw a beacon of hope in the form of a hand molded pie. Pie is the name, very original, and they make both sweet and savory pies. I'm not huge on the sweets so I went over the savory list and picked out a classic, English beef pie. I don't like eating what I consider street food inside the establishments, mostly because they are boring but also because I was alone and didn't feel like reading The Stranger.

Pie in hand in box I was headed home when I realized I would want/need more food. Just around the corner from Pie, in an alleyway, is a russian dumpling place called Pel'Meni. They serve two things; Potato filled dumplings and beef filled dumplings. I went with the combo and got the works which consists of a mild vinegar hot sauce, curry-like seasoning, sour cream and a slice of pumpernickel bread.

The Pie
I really like the crust on these guys. Flaky and light but not so much so that it falls apart in your hand. That would make for some messy street food. The beef filling was very good with a lot of onion flavor. I just wish it was a little saltier. The filling was a good consistency, not runny with juices so as to get your hand sticky, but not dry either. The only disappointment came in the form of some bitter burnt pieces of onion on top.

The Dumplings
The beef dumplings are delicious. They pop in your mouth with nice saltiness and good spiced flavor. The vinegar sauce and seasoning gives it a nice kick and the sour cream adds a nice fatty mouth feel to give the flavor more time on the palate.  The potato dumplings are the opposite.  No flavor and certainly not enough salt.  They fall flat in the mouth and no amount of sauces could help out these poor souls.  If I had to do it again, I would go all meat.  If I were a vegetarian, I would skip it all together.

If I had to choose, I'd go back to Pie and try some different pies.  Some of them might not be as good as the one I had but the diversity keeps you going back for more.  If I had to choose again AND I was slightly inebriated, which I usually am when trying to make these decisions, I'd get some meat dumplings and get sloppy in the alleyway.  It's not all about the food, sometimes you just gotta go with your base instinct.

Scratch is crack for chickens

In case you have no interest in reading my blog posts or reading anything in general, I will also post distractions such as this video of my chickens eating scratch.  Family fun for the bird-brain in all of us.  Enjoy my mini dinosaurs!

It's not all about the food

Last night I headed over to the soft opening of 'Roxy's Back Door' with some friends. I'm not sure if that's the name of the bar but our bartender Skip did make a couple of 'Backdoor Surprise' cocktails for the ladies so I'm assuming there's a connection. That and the fact that the back door of Roxy's Diner leads to the bar.

I wasn't alone in being quite surprised by the bar itself. It's almost classy and I mean that in a good way. If it were any classier it would be pretentious. This place has just the right atmosphere to make you feel like you can walk in unshaven and wearing flannel, or wearing a three piece suit and pocket watch. Either way, you wouldn't feel out of place.

A second surprise came in the form of the food at the Back Door. When I first moved to Seattle from New York about 6 years ago, I wasn't keen on eating pizza or deli food. I had my fill after having worked at a deli and eating pizza every other day. I was also scared that the pizza in Seattle would be horrible in comparison. I'm happy to say it doesn't have to be, not with all the great cooks in this city. When I first went, Roxy's Diner didn't disappoint. Over the years however, it seemed the quality of the food went down as the demand to get a seat on a Sunday morning went up. I'm happy to say that the pork chop I ordered was great. A little pink in the middle, just the way I like my piggy. The sweet potato latke was a nice touch. It added that fun sweetness that works so well with salty pork. The portion size was perfect, I didn't feel stuffed, just satisfied. By the end I was gnawing on the bone to my girlfriend's dismay. I tried a bite of her lamb burger and I was less impressed but I have a problem with ciabatta bread. Something about the huge holes makes me angry, like I'm not getting the same dough density value for my money that I would out of a nice brioche bun. That said I think the rustic ciabatta works better with the likes of lamb and feta.

The night was winding down for us, mostly because we had been cut off from free cocktails. It seemed they caught on to one of my friends getting his two free cocktails from three different bartenders. Before leaving we spoke with the owner about his new venture. On the subject of opening a bar to add onto his deli, he said "it's not all about the food." He's right of course, it's not. It's about the experience and the atmosphere as well. If you can't enjoy the intangibles and the overall experience then it doesn't come together. Luckily for him, they got the food right too.