Contamination...

It's officially too hot to temper chocolate in my kitchen. I was hoping to start blogging about my exciting escapades in understanding chocolate better, but after a good half hour of trying to let my tempered chocolate set up to do some basic curls or cigarettes, I gave up, scraped up the gooey mess off of my counter, wrapped up the chocolate in a bowl (and went to town on the spatula - delicious). Maybe tomorrow I'll attempt another daring adventure.

At any rate, let's talk about some major issues that have transpired recently. I was timid at first about even mentioning this because I wouldn't want this to reflect a negative light on my business - but the truth of the matter is things like this happen. It's never intentional despite how safe and clean we always are - but the focus of this blog is contamination.

Contamination basically refers to the presence of harmful chemicals and microorganisms which can cause illness to the guest or customer. While there is never a time I've seen in my shop when a toxic material has been anywhere near food - and gratefully, everyone is very keen on washing their hands constantly to avoid spreading germs/viruses/bacteria.

But the one thing I've noticed we have to continually keep our eye on is allergies - if someone is allergic to nuts, dairy or needs desserts that are gluten-free. Recently a guest couldn't have corn in any product. Now, I don't know if you've ever checked the labels on... well, nearly anything, but corn (or a byproduct of it) is in many many things.
See? The corn even says so. This new menu we just rolled out has corn ice cream that is paired with a brown butter cornmeal pecan cake - so that's obvious. But what about the high fructose corn syrup or cornstarch that is lurking in delicious looking treats? Sometimes those are a little more tricky and we almost had a run in with serving something that did, in fact, have both corn starch and corn syrup in the ingredients. Luckily we caught it in plenty of time and served another delicious treat in it's place.

The main problem we had recently was with one of the newer ice creams in our restaurant. We got two guest complaints that they found.....(wait for it).....glass in their ice cream. Glass?! How in the hell does that even happen?!! At the time, I was horrified, but my face went white once I realized it was one of the ice creams I has made and I was bound a determined to find out what happened and why. After calling Mothra and Clara (Mothras assistant) and explaining the situation, I did a little investigation and found some small pieces of glass on the floor of the freezer. We were able to piece together some of the glass and realized that it was a bottle for a type of club soda that the hotel carries. It turns out someone (we still don't know who) must've put a bottle in the freezer to make it cold, it exploded and they tried to clean it up the best they could without anyone knowing it. Well - as a result, we had two guests (incredibly understanding considering the circumstance) with a valid negative impression on the restaurant, nearly 16 quarts of back stocks of various home-made ice creams thrown out because they has the potential of being contaminated with shards of glass, as well as melting, straining and re-spinning every other ice cream we had in the freezer to be on the safe side. We also had a department meeting about the situation and it was made crystal clear that glass was never to be in the freezer. Also, when working with glasses for various dessert projects, protective sheets should be used between layers (if the product is being stacked on racks, etc) and anything glass should be stored on the bottom of shelves in the cooler.
Again, this is a situation that is extremely rare and is never intentional, but it happens. Unfortunately, it did - but I think it was a good wake-up call for everyone to be more conscientious about how to make sure it never happens again.

In unrelated news, this past weekend we did a wedding cake that was a near disaster. It was a pain to put together and decorate - to the point, we had to make the guests wait about 10-15 minutes to open the door to the reception because we didn't have the cake ready to display. Then, while we were setting up a giant sweet table for the reception later on, a large piece of the buttercream frosting literally fell off of the cake because the room was so hot with all of the guests. (And yes, it was before the bride and groom had cut into it) It was such an awful experience - I'm almost timid to put up pictures of what it looked like. Maybe for the next entry... We'll be having a wedding cake this weekend and 3 next weekend - so there will be a themed blog on the cakes coming up. Until then!

New Menu Accomplished

It has been a rollercoaster over the past week or so. After the sobering experience that I had written about in my previous entry, I went on vacation. The timing couldn't have been more perfect... it gave me time to reflect on all the things that Mothra had said, relive the experiences I had and learn from them and try to move past it. Truth be told, it was difficult. I had a pit in my stomach the entire week I was off because I was dreading coming back. But as the saying goes, the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. When the time came for vacation to be over, I had a clear resolution to do my best in every project, to not take things so personal, to remember each experience is a learning tool, and finally, to respect Mothra's experience and authority, but not give her that much control over my emotion. And the first day back from vacation actually went very well. The menu was in it's absolute final stages, namely back-up supply of essential components, garnishes and prepping what could be done as the following day would be the first day of the new dessert menu in service.

The final step in the new menu was to arrange a tasting meeting with the restaurant staff. Up until this point, the desserts had be tasted over and over by myself, until I thought it was good enough for Mothra. Then once Mothra gave her suggestions (tweaking this and that), and she felt the product was ready, we'd have a tasting with our executive chef. If the dessert met his approval, then we were in the clear for the new menu production to begin. Now, after all was said and done, I arranged 3 different tastings for the restaurant staff (one tasting for the morning shift and one for the evening shift) and another tasting for the bar staff. What I did, essentially, is plate each of the desserts up as though they were going to be served. Once all of the staff was present for the tasting, I would explain each of the desserts in detail.
What ingredients are in it. What allergies could be affected by it. (nuts, dairy, eggs, etc.) What desserts would be best to sell for more experienced palates and what would be best for kids. My personal favorites. What the garnishes are. And other things of that nature. And of course, the staff has questions along the way and they all taste the desserts so they know exactly what they are selling to the customers. Truth be told, all of the tastings were very well received and the staff loved it. And as a result, the desserts have been selling better than usual over the past week.

What a relief to have this menu up and running. But, it is time to start thinking about the fall menu... so the process begins again. I find comfort in the fact that I've learned a tremendous amount over the past few months, so I am actually excited to start this process again.

Here are a few pictures from the experimental stages at work. I wanted to include these just to give you an idea of how we exactly we played around with different flavors:

This is the very beginning stages of the brown butter pecan cornmeal cake - we thought peaches were going to be the main fruit on top, so this experiment was to try the cake with whole pecans, chopped pecans, or no pecans at all, as well as trying the peaches whole, sliced or cut in pieces. This led to our next experiment...

This is 2nd experiment of the brown butter cornmeal pecan cake - it is divided in to 8 sections. The top half has small pecan pieces underneath the fruit and the bottom half has large pecan pieces underneath the fruit. This was mainly to test for the feel and consistency of each bite in the mouth. (Was larger better? No. We actually scrapped the nuts altogether in the end.) The fruit we tested was plums (which didn't make the cut because... well, we know why), peaches (which didn't end up happening because we ended up putting a peach pie on the menu and needed variety ) and blackberries, one fresh column, one cooked column. The blackberries ended up being the winner because it was incredibly delicious - Plain and simple. We did decide that the berries needed to be cooked though because the fresh berries didn't mesh well with the cake and the overall texture we were trying to achieve.


This is Mothras final attempt to keep my dream of the plum tart alive - I gave her my test sample (the 9709) and she gave a few suggestions on what to experiment with. On here we have on tart with cheesecake filling and plums, one with almond cream and cheesecake (which looked and tasted awful) and another one similar to that with chopped nuts, and one with almond cream and cooked plums on top. A worthy test, but nothing that produced something we wanted to pursue further.

All in all a very interesting process to be a part of. It's really fascinating to me that you can change the whole dessert by adding one ingredient or changing the form of an ingredient you already have. It makes the possibilities nearly endless - and that makes it all pretty exciting.

Finally, I do have great news. A few weeks ago, I was nominated for employee of the month and this past week, I won the overall award. Included with my certificate and a gift card was the nomination form that was sent in. I was nominated by Mothra, and here is what she had to say:

"Nik is a key player in the pastry shop and has been instrumental in executing our wedding cakes. These wedding cakes are a vital part of a special celebration and are long remembered in minds and photographs. The success of these cakes are vital to our success (as a hotel) on the day of the event and any failure would not soon be forgotten.
Since his very first week in our kitchen, Nik was colled on to build and decorate wedding cakes. With his exceptional abilities, he has focused his efforts in giving our brides and grooms the most beautiful and delicious cakes possible. Nik is detail oriented and cares deeply about putting his best work forward. In addition, during his time with us he has always been eager to take on additional responsibilities including setting the tastings and meeting with brides and grooms. What's more he has played a key role in the design and displays of our sweet tables. His work has been noticed by our meeting planner(s) and he is even been asked for by name to help with future displays. When I need to count on someone to have a special eye for flower arrangements or displays - I know I can count on him doing an excellent job. No matter how hurries, he always remains upbeat and positive and has proven himself to be an excellent team player. We are truly proud that he is a member of our pastry team."

The new menu up and running, then this? I don't think I have any room for complaints.

Stumbling Block

It has been a rough couple of days. I'm not writing this entry as an attempt to feel pity or to vent, but simply because I feel I need to write it down so I can grow from it... maybe reflect on it later - who knows.

Last Saturday, I was able to sit down with Mothra and discuss the menu writing process and my experience with it. I told her the honest truth by saying I worked incredibly hard on it at work and in my free time but it is incredibly difficult for me. She said that she has intentionally been staying out of the way so I can try to gain as much experience as I can with this process, but she felt she finally had to step in and take over. She said that this is something I need to master - but that it would take some time. Following that, she told me that there was a great opportunity for leadership in the pastry department at a new hotel that is opening in the city though she told me that she would not give me a recommendation for it because she doesn't feel I'm ready. I'm not sure if the shock was apparent on my face, but regardless, she kept on by saying that one of my best attributes is also one of my major downfalls in this career - and that is I try to make everyone happy. I was told that I don't have an opinion about many things and that if there is something I don't like, I have a problem saying it. She also said that if she put a couple of items in front of me, she doubts that I would be able to identify what would be the most popular. Part of me knows Mothra told me all of this so I could know that these things are an issue and that I need to work on them, but at the same time, it was said in such a way that didn't feel remotely encouraging - in fact, I felt small and humiliated.
I left her office telling myself that I needed to work harder, but the motivation to do it just wasn't there. I can't explain it but it was such a blow to my ego to be putting my all into this job and especially this menu-writing project just to be told that my efforts are not good enough.
The next day, Mothra was off, so I was able to work independently on getting various tasks and projects accomplished, but there seemed to be a cloud over my head that made me feel like I wasn't doing enough or what I was doing wasn't good enough. I think that is the problem with having a negative perspective - as I write this, I can look back on retrospect and know that I did do my best and that it was good, but at the time I just couldn't see it.
As a result, yesterday was painful. I came into work tired because I was stressing about this entire menu process and all the things that Mothra had said to me, and I was simply off all day. Add to the fact that Mothra and I were to present the new menu items to our executive chef that day, the tension was higher than usual. I got yelled at - repeatedly. To the point that I worked for a solid half hour with tears streaming down my face... and the negative emotions I felt simply made the situation worse because I couldn't think straight. So if she asked me to get a garnish for a certain dessert, I grabbed the wrong one. Or I misplaced something and spent extra time to find it. Or she asked me to do a simple task and it didn't end up happening correctly. Problems just seemed to be stacking - and on a 12-hour day where this is happening continually, I simply didn't have anything left in me by the end.
The entire bus ride home, I questioned whether I should be doing what I'm doing. Is it worth it? Are the long hours and the belittlement that I was feeling something that I really wanted to continue to put up with? Furthermore, do I really want to be like Mothra?? She has told me on more than one occasion that if I want to be a leader, that I need change my quiet personality and become more outspoken. Do I really need to change who I am to make it in this industry? And so I wrestled with this all night and went to bed seriously doubting myself, my experience, my education and most of all, my career. What would I do if I didn't do pastry?

Truth is, there is only a handful of things that I can think of that would make me as happy as I feel doing what I do - but this is what I want to be doing. Granted, it has only been one day since my self-proclaimed "worst-day-of-my-professional-career", but pastry is my love. It's my passion. And even though I got side-tracked because I have weaknesses to overcome (and a tougher skin to develop), I know that I am on the right track to becoming a successful pastry chef. Maybe it'll just take a little longer than anticipated so I can refine these skills. And maybe I don't need the strange humiliatingly belittling/incredibly supportive personality of Mothra, but I'm going to make it. That is the bottom line.

Regardless, let me put it on record that Mothra is, hands down, my biggest fan and my worst enemy - and I still have a lot to learn.