It’s Just a Flesh Wound

“I’m a hot mess today.” That’s the first thing I said when I got in the car this morning. I’m having one of those mornings where you feel post-sick groggy, my hair wouldn’t do what I wanted it to and I’ve just discovered a hole in my shirt sleeve. As I sit here in Panera Bread with all of the sharply dressed business people I can’t help but feel like I’m just a mess in comparison. Not to mention I’m still sniffling which drives me insane and makes me feel as though I am drawing attention to my hot-mess self. To top it all off I stubbed my toe on the way out to the car this morning and it’s been throbbing since.

I. Am. A. Hot. Mess. (!!)

Since the post yesterday – reminiscing about my times at the Shelter Harbor Inn – I’ve been thinking even more about past experiences in the professional world of cooking. I’ve got many great “war stories” and a good deal of scars from my stint as a cook. I’m quite sure there are more to come too.

Have you ever stabbed your ankle bone? Well I have! Not that I’m particularly proud of any of these stories but (after the swelling and pain went away) they’re worth a chuckle now. The day I stabbed my ankle I working at Shelter Harbor Inn (which from here on out I will affectionately refer to as SHI). I was in the catering kitchen prepping some vegetables for a wedding which was a mere three hours away. It was in the summer and it was very, very warm. Sometimes for the sake of comfort I make some bad wardrobe choices. That day I wore some cut off pants that exposed my legs mid-shin down. It happened in the blink of an eye. I had the knife sitting on the cutting board and knocked it off with my arm. I watched it fall, frozen in horrified anticipation. (Side note: If you drop a knife you should jump back immediately. Obviously.) And it fell, tip first, into my ankle. I’m still not sure how in the world of physics it’s possible for it to have landed the way it did. But it stuck. In my ankle. I had to yank it out and go to the hospital to get stitches. To this day I’ve got a scar on my left ankle and a notch in the bone.

I do love a good scar story. I’ve got a few other scars from the edge of a knife but most have faded. Knife wounds seem to heal faster than burns. I’ve got two particularly painful burn stories for you.

At SHI, again, this time in the middle of an on-going wedding. It was a plated service and we were upstairs using the restaurant’s kitchen to get the food out. I was reducing a simple syrup – a combination of sugar and water – and sugar gets pretty darn hot. The problem with any kind of hot sugar is that it’s sticky. So I’m stirring away, most likely paying attention to a million other things, when it starts bubbling, pops and sticks to my wrist. Believe you me there was swearing a-plenty as I ran over to the sink to run water on it and cool it off. When something hot sticks to you it will motivate you to run! I’ve still, almost 8 years later, got the remnants of a scar on my right wrist from that one.

Another “good” scar story I’ve got was at a catering company here in North Carolina. It was actually the last catering company I’ve worked at since I moved here. Who knows – maybe the last one completely. But I digress.
I was making mashed potatoes by the boatload. I had a huge stock pot full of boiling water that I picked up to carry over to the prep sink to drain. It was way too full and the water was pretty close to the top. I should have used something to skim some water off the top but I was in a hurry (a danger in the kitchen) and grabbed it as-is. I was three fourths of the way to the kitchen when the water started to slosh. I should have been carrying it lower, too, but I had it chest-level in front of me. I watched, as if in slow motion, as the water sloshed up over the edge. I moved – but not fast enough – as the water sloshed out of the pot onto my chest. My left breast was steaming – and screaming – as the water burned through my layers. I ended up with a good second degree burn that time around and another scar.

I’ve got plenty of stories but I’ll leave you with an extension of my post yesterday – the butt dent. I was cooking at SHI in the restaurant. The catering kitchen was on the lower-level and I had to run downstairs to dry storage to get something. Someone had spilled some oil on the stairs and didn’t clean it up and (of course) I found it. Let me clarify – my foot found it and slipped out from under me. I landed on my butt – which was painful on the metal stair guard – and, step by step, on my butt, slid down the stairs. Just like in the movies. Each. Individual. Step.
All I can say is I’ve never EVER seen a bruise like that – and hope to never again – and to this day I have a   ________ straight line from the edge of that first stair etched into my arse. (The scar was more of a mental one that time.)

You would think with all of this injury there would be some kind of kitchen-avoidance happening but I still love to cook and I’d do it again in a heartbeat (maybe paying more attention the next time around). Some people view the kitchen-chef relationship as almost a masochistic one but I just like to think the outcome is worth the risk.

I’ll leave you with those wonderful visuals for now as I should be getting ready to head over to work. Until next time I hope you have a wonderful and injury-free day!           xo

Hello, I’m your Conscience.

Jiminy Cricket is sitting on my shoulder this morning and boy does he have a lot to say today.

“Why are you eating a bagel? Bathing suit season will be here before you know it!”
“Did you really need to eat that brownie last night before you went to bed?” (To which I answered “Yes!” emphatically.)
“You really need to eat some low-fat, low-sodium soup for lunch today.”

Frankly that little guy is starting to get on my nerves. He always pops up when I’m really enjoying something wonderful and says, “You probably shouldn’t…” Yesterday I threatened him with a fly swatter. I know, it’s totally wrong, but he’s really bugging me. (No pun intended.)

I’m learning on my path to enlightenment that this whole self-discipline thing comes with a keen sense of guilt and I don’t know if I signed up for that.

Speaking of guilt I stayed home from work yesterday in an attempt to get better faster. I’ve been doing the tango with this stupid cold/flu/whatever the last three days and it’s been kicking my butt! Saturday I spent the entire day on the couch – I don’t think I got up more than once. Oh how I hate to be ill! Sunday it went from my throat and fever to a chest cold and then Monday it moved into my stomach (and we’ll just leave it at that).

I’m heading into work today with a case of the sniffles (which is incredibly annoying) and by the end of the day I’m sure I’ll have developed a hell of a cough. I’ve been taking almost 3 times the recommended dose of Vitamin C and I’m hoping that plus Alka Seltzer cold will kick this thing into submission.

All day yesterday I was thinking of the Inn. So I thought I’d share a bit of my culinary history with you. 

Back story: I used to work at this wonderful place called the Shelter Harbor Inn when I lived in Rhode Island.  It’s a wonderful little place to stay with its paddle tennis court, croquet and putting green and hot tub. It’s right near the beach and incredibly cozy. Not to mention that while you’re there you can get some pretty delicious food.

I worked for the Caterer there. His name is Jeff Houston and he is primarily responsible for pointing me in the right direction in the Culinary world. He taught me a lot of really great things about cooking. He’s a remarkable teacher. It’s funny when I think back to the very beginning of my cooking career. I remember my first meeting with Jeff and how he asked me how I got started cooking, what I was interested in doing with my life and if I could read a recipe. My answers were pretty simple: My grandmother got me started, I had no idea and yes I could read a recipe. It was cold and late (after school) and that was that. I had my first real job. I started working weekends and in the summer I was full time. I helped by doing a lot of prep at first and got my feet wet.

I’m sitting here laughing as the memories are flooding in. I remember the first time I was presented with an entire, unadulterated pineapple. I was supposed to “break it down”. I was terrified. (I’m going to say “I” a lot in this post I’m afraid because this is mostly about me.) I remember standing there in the catering “kitchen” with a very large chef’s knife in my hand, whole cutting pineapple on the cutting board and just staring at it. Fortunately Jordan,  a guy that worked in the restaurant upstairs, came downstairs and saw me standing there horrified. He saved me from that evil pineapple and taught me – very slowly and thoroughly – how to take the damn thing apart piece by piece, wasting nothing, until there was a pile of uniform chunks on the board. I doubt he’d remember it but to this day I can even smell the pineapple and see the look on his amused face. I doubt I’ll ever forget it.

In that kitchen I learned the importance of a kitchen-timer with an alarm. I learned how quickly pine nuts will burn when you toast them on the stove top or in the oven. I learned how to combat an oil-spill with a box of salt until you have time to clean it up and how much it hurts when you slip and fall down the stairs on your butt – step by step. (To this day I still have a stair-mark on my butt. No kidding.) I learned how expensive very aged Balsamic vinegar is and (to my horror) that you only need to use a drop. ((Oops!))

I learned that when you’re traveling by car you always carry a wedding cake in your lap because you’ll have a stroke by the time you get where you’re going if you don’t. I learned that you should always have matches, a rag, salt and pepper and toothpicks with you wherever you go. I learned the importance of checklists and that no matter how often you check it you will have always forgotten something. I learned that you should never wear open toed shoes, that it’s painful when you get stabbed in the ankle by a chef’s knife and need stitches and that burns – no matter how bad – should be taken care of immediately. I learned multi-tasking and time management. I learned about passion and the importance of taking care of your staff. I learned how to run the show – something I was thrown into pretty quickly as my first real “day” there Jeff was sick and I had to get it done alone. (Which to this day I still believe was a test to see if I could hack it.) I learned about my abilities. I learned about who I was and that what I loved was to cook good food and make people happy.

The wealth of knowledge I gained from working at that Inn is incredibly rich and deep. I don’t know how far I would have gotten in my career without that experience. I owe a lot to the chefs I had the pleasure of working with: Jeff, Brian, Becky, Ed, Tara, Ray, Rose, Taylor, Jordan, Mark and even the dish washer Al. They all taught me what it means to be great – how to cook well and how to present it to people as something I can be proud of. They helped me to develop not only my palate but my instincts in the kitchen.

I’ll always cherish my memories of the Inn and I look forward to a day when I can go home for a visit.  xo