Old Pastry Chefs Never Die, They Just Make Less Dough

To know me is to.....zzzzzzzzzzz

MonkeyBlogging

Narcblog

Ok, really I'm not sure about this blogging thing. I mean,  I think the picture over there explains it all. I'm just another monkey. Plus there's the whole narcissistic thing about it. I've never been one to toot my own horn, as I've always preferred to blend into the woodwork, or in the case of my home, the bad paneling.

So why am I doing it? Ok, here's why:

• To let off "steam", but without intentionally offending people. So please note, if you're offended by anything in this blog, it's unintentional! Which makes me perpetually innocent.
• To entertain my repressed fantasy of being a humor columnist. All hail Dave Barry!
• To let folks who encounter all my various posts on food, pastry, cake decorating and baking forums, get some insight on the real me, and whether they should take my advice seriously. Yes, you should take my advice seriously, because although I spew a lot of crap, when it comes to my profession, I'm just a little too serious. Maybe "wound too tightly" as some people have put it. The words "anal-retentive" and "obsessive-compulsive" have all been words frequently used to describe me, along with other fun hyphenated words like "manic-depressive" and "passive-agressive".
  
• I've always wanted to be a monkey.

Now that I'm the mode of promoting myself, have you seen my website? Need help decorating or baking? Ask me a question! I answer them all. There are no stupid questions! Just stupid questioners!
I'm just kidding! Sort of. Since apparently, I am STILL talking about myself, here's some other trivia:

• I'm 44 years old, but I look 43.
• I'm a natural redhead, but I color my hair to cover the lice.
• I struggle with my weight, but never step on the scale (hey, it's just a number!) Does this blog make my writing look fat?
• I am half Dutch (mom's side) and from my dad's side, a quarter Swedish, and an eighth Scottish, and an eighth Irish. This explains the red hair, a preference for bland food and potatoes, and the inability to put up with crap. Yes, to me, mild salsa is WAY TOO SPICY!
  
• I have a thing about memorabilia that comes from the mid 40's to the 70's. Bad cookbooks. Any appliance with the word "Luxe" in it. Cocktail culture. If I could dress like June Cleaver every day, I would, but I need to get a waist first. And it's kind of hard to walk in the Northwest mud in high heels. Here's one of my favorite retro web sites! Lileks.com!
• I have one brilliant red-headed brother named Garth who runs his own business, Rubber Chicken Software. He got the brains in the family.....I got the......hey! What did I get?
• I will always be a pastry chef, even when I'm not a pastry chef. You can take the girl out of the kitchen, but you can't take the kitchen out of the girl!
  
• I have a thing about recycling and reusing things. I can't stand waste. I moderate a local group that's part of a nationwide movement, called Freecycle. My local group is called Jefferson County Freecycle. It's a great way to help the community and the environment and meet your neighbors!
• I have an awesome husband and a great stepson, although they still tease me about the time I tried to name all 7 continents and I thought one of them was Hawaii. Ok, shut UP! I don't know EVERYTHING ok? I can tell you everything about pastry, just don't ask me about continents. Or geography. Or math, or history, or physics. Or anything else that really matters and might help you win on Jeopardy.
• I really don't blab this much. Normally, I'm blending into the paneling.
  

School daze......!

Me, the cake, and my first mentor

My first big cake project

LWTC Pastry Graduation

This January it will have been 16 years since I've been out of pastry school. It actually seems like longer. I absolutely loved pastry school. I knew I had found my niche and that I really fit in, and that I enjoyed the work. I also realized I had a knack for it all.

I had a fantastic teacher, Darrell Abbey. He was very supportive and his positive way of teaching helped me blossom....especially since once I got a look at all that big bakery equipment, I was immediately intimidated and somewhat scared. Yeah, I was a wimp. When I was little I used to run screaming from road construction equipment like bulldozers, dump trucks and backhoes. Now a 60 qt. mixer and a rotating convection oven have nothing on me! Except I do admit I'm still a little squicked when I use an automatic slicer....that stinkin' rotating blade....it's just.....evil.

The first picture over there, is me and Darrell standing beside my first big cake project. I can't remember how I ended up with the task, but the bakery at our Technical College had to provide the cake to feed all the guests at our annual open house. There's a theme every year, and that year's them was nautical with the slogan, "Chart your course to success". I immediately sketched out a nautical design for the huge sheet cake, inspired by old nautical maps. I just happened to be in the cake decorating phase of my pastry class when the open house happened, and I was the only one who stepped up to the plate when my chef-instructor asked for ideas.

The carpentry class supplied me a door to mount the cake on, and I had to run it between two tables just to get around it and decorate it. I piped out the entire cake freehand including the ship. Darrell sort of couldn't get over it. He told me I was going to go a long way. I was 28 years old at the time and finally figured out what my ''bliss" was.

So anyway, there's bliss, and there's money. I followed my bliss. I'm still waiting for the money. It's ok though, one doesn't have to be rich to be happy, but it would be nice not having to worry about paying the bills!

The second picture, of course is me, posing with my project. I don't quite look that good anymore. Too many cake scrap snacks since then if you know what I mean.
 
The third picture is my graduation day (I'm holding a plaque that was presented to me by Darrell). He thought I was a special enough student that I warranted a plaque....I think I was the first and only student who received one to be honest.....and I'm honored. I'm standing with my classmates who were truly the best. We had such fun together.....I wonder where they all are now???

Those were the days.

The story of "Chef Peon".

The infamous mug; now a pencil holder.

On almost every website I participate in, I go by the moniker, "chefpeon". A lot of people wonder why. Well, there is a story behind it, but I also use "chefpeon" on websites because it's such a unique name, and no one has already taken it.

I admit the name sounds a little self deprecating....but it's not.....it's more of a reminder to myself to be humble, and keep things in perspective.

When I was first out of pastry school, like many culinary grads, I sort of thought I was better than I was. I kind of had this "hot shot" attitude and felt that perhaps I was too good to start at the "bottom". My first job was in an upscale cake shop. I was very lucky to get hired there, and I really tried hard to get the job because I really admired the talent of the head cake designer and pastry chef. I wanted to learn all his techniques. I had this idea that we would be working side-by-side together and I would be happily decorating cakes and sharing the spotlight. Well, OF COURSE everyone has to start at the bottom, even culinary grads! I was a little miffed when I found out my first tasks would be covering cake boards, washing dishes, mixing buttercream, making fillings, crumb coating cakes, and basically doing all the "grunt" work. Well, of course I did all that quite willingly, because to be honest I willing willing to lick the chef's shoes if that's what it took to keep the job. But I couldn't help being a little snip, and when I was given yet another poopy task, I commented, "Yep, just pile it on me, the resident peon......! Just call me Chef Peon!" Well, that kind of irked the chef and he said "Cut it OUT....you are NOT a peon! The work you do is important." Of course, he was right, but I was still kinda mad that I wasn't actually decorating cakes. Every once in a while, just to be annoying, or to tease the chef, I'd say stuff like, "Chef Peon reporting for duty, SIR!" and I'd stand and salute. It's a wonder he put up with me!

One day, I was out shopping and I came across a coffee mug, that simply said, in very small letters, "peon". HAD to buy it. The next day, I stood in front of the chef's work table, with my new cup, full of coffee, and just sipped at it, til he looked up and saw the mug. At that point, he realized that even though I was annoying, I did also have a sense of humor. From then on, we struck up a great relationship, and worked well together, and I finally got to decorate some cakes, starting from easy up to advanced work. He taught me a lot, and he's been the most important mentor in my career.

I kept the name Chef Peon because it reminds me of those fun times, and also because no matter how experienced you are and how much you THINK you know....there is ALWAYS more to learn. In a lot of ways, I'm still a peon, not in a self deprecating sense, but in a sense that no one knows everything. Chef Peon reminds me to have humility, to admit when I'm wrong, and that I can always learn from others. And, last but not least, I STILL have to do my own dishes!!!! 

Right wing food science.

Tinky Winky

Well, thanks to a wacky conservative "news" site known as the World Net Daily, we now know one
of the main causes of homosexuality.....soy.
I don't subscribe to this load of crap at all and neither do my breast-fed-junk-food-addicted gay friends.
I post the link to this story strictly for laughs.
A devil food is turning our kids into homosexuals.

Sushi for pastry chefs!!

Sweet sushi

One of my main attractions to food is that, to me, it's an art medium. I have always admired the beauty of sushi, but never really wanted to get my hands on slimy roe or smelly fish. Or touch the wasabi, then accidentally rub my eyes. Try rubbing your eyes after chopping up some jalapenos. No wait, don't.

Anyway, thanks to the internet and some imaginative wacky people, I have found a way to do sushi and still smell sweet! Click here for some  sushi desserts!

It could be worse.

In the future of this blog, I'm afraid you'll see plenty of whining on my part. But I hope to keep it on the positive side by being entertaining in my whine-fest. We folks who were crazy enough to think careers in the food industry would be "fun and cool" have plenty to whine about......why? Because we get to deal with the general public. We probably get the widest cross-section of people because everyone needs to eat. Which also means we get to experience the most strange and bizarre things you could ever read about. I have plenty of my own stories, but check out these two blogs......
I serve idiots.
and....
Waiterrant

These are both a collection of ongoing stories from my compadres who man the front lines, or "front of the house" as we in the biz like to say. I haven't yet found a blog from a fellow "back of the house-er". Maybe mine will be the first one. Or not. I mean I haven't scoured the whole internet. It will be my "tales from the back of the house".

Even though I've had some crazy experiences, and it can get brutal back in a hot busy kitchen, I STILL wouldn't want to put up with what the front of the house puts up with. I'd rather slice my finger off with a chef's knife.

I'm not a chef, but I play one on TV!

As a professional chef, I'm constantly battling misconceptions about my profession from the general public. I'm always willing to educate Joe Consumer about food and/or the food profession, because I have plenty to say. I also have plenty of "beefs" Ha!
Pardon the pun.

What's my beef today? Well, that would be the "food personality" phenomenon known as Rachael Ray. Never mind the hard working certified, professional, talented, innovative, "done their time in the trenches" chefs that have come and gone and had mild success on the Food Network and other channels, like Anthony Bourdain, Mario Batali, Sara Moulton, Jacques Torres, et al. The Food Network and other "TV Heads" aren't necessarily concerned with "food talent", but "TV Talent". You could be the worlds greatest chef, but if you had an "unmarketable personality" (whatever that is) or are a wee bit homely looking it wouldn't make a bit of difference....they'll pass you by in favor of people like......Ms. Ray. She has what it takes to make it in TV.....a bubbly-til-it-makes-you-gag personality, good looks, and most importantly, the savvy to know how to put some cheese on a Triscuit and make the average American think it's a great new idea.

Sadly, the average American doesn't really have the time to cook anymore, and public knowledge of cooking basics is becoming harder to find. Today's kids are taught cooking basics by busy parents who rely almost entirely on the microwave. Ask a kid to make some mac 'n cheese and he'll look for the convenience pack in the pantry to nuke for 3 minutes. Saute? Braise? Poach? Chiffonade? Julienne? All these terms are foreign to more and more people. I thought food shows were to educate folks about the fun and beauty of cooking, not to reinforce the "mac in the microwave" lifestyle that is ruining our health today. The "food dumbing down" of Americans will not do them any favors in the long run. Rachael has become the new whore for Nabisco...what better way to promote convenience foods and 30 Minute Meals than to team up with the company that makes them? It's a marriage made in heaven.

There's an article in Slate, called In Defense of Rachael Ray but that "defense" is lame at best. Rachael Ray is simply a "manufactured" and marketed celebrity, similar to Milli Vanilli, N'Sync, Backstreet Boys, Britney Spears, and the Spice Girls....oh wait, let's not forget the newest marketable sensation.....The Pussycat Dolls. I see REAL musicians....talented, with so much more to offer the public, playing for pennies in the streets. I see them playing the bar circuit because they haven't kissed the right butts or been in exactly the right place at the right time, or because they don't fit a "genre" or an "image". They get passed by, and who suffers? The public. Luckily though, the internet has made it far easier for people to find these great talents....they can share their music with a wide global audience  and get the exposure they deserve.....the sad thing is, where's the money they deserve too?

It's a similar thing for us food professionals. It's really hard for us to sit and watch people like Rachael Ray telling the public about the miracle of going out and buying ice cream and Hershey's Syrup and then coming home and dumping said sauce on ice cream. She's getting paid BIG MONEY to shill.....even worse, she's referred to as a "chef".

PLEASE!!!

We chefs work our freakin' BUTTS OFF. We're making the sauce....we're making the ice cream. We get paid SHIT.
We are the ones who possess skill and talent, but the nature of the food industry does not allow us hardly even a living wage because people are willing to pay only so much for food. Restaurants can only charge what the market will bear. It's hard enough to keep a restaurant afloat......food workers can't ask for, and don't get high wages because labor is one of the highest expenses in the restaurant business anyway. Restaurateurs operate on very slim margins generally. It's a tough business. Mostly, we are a prideful bunch. We do what we do, because we were foolish enough to follow our bliss rather than to follow the almighty dollar. We have a passion for our work and defend it vociferously.

How would the medical association feel if the dude who played "House" on FOX had a medical advice show?
It would be a sham. It is similar to how I feel as a chef, to see manufactured celebrities dishing out cooking advice because they are pretty and bubbly rather than being skilled and educated in their craft. It's a sham.

If anything, there should be disclaimers on any media appearance of Rachael Ray stressing that she is NOT a chef, because it REALLY insults those of us who are.

Boycott Rachael Ray.