Fiat Lux
There’s an old saying that “only a poor craftsman blames his tools”. And it’s true. That said, having decent tools absolutely matters. Case in point: these two photos of roasted tomatoes.
Last summer:
This summer:
The D40 and a decent lens have absolutely helped me take better photos. I know I’m at best an enthusiastic amateur with a minimal grasp of what I’m doing, but at least now I can say a little more of what I want to say with my camera.
This piece comes from chef Shuna Fish Lydon’s blog Eggbeater, written by a working chef about the workings of a restaurant kitchen, but if you look past the jargon of the chef you’ll find the advice is relevant to any team that has to produce, on time and under pressure.
The Weeds.
It’s an expression for line cooks by line cooks, but it is also something much larger. A euphemism. It’s an in-the-moment, during service expression.
But it can also refer to your whole career.
The Weeds
can take a whole department. A station. A restaurant. A person and their career.
On The Line the weeds will usually let you out of its stranglehold after the last table is out.
But if you’re really stubborn, The Weeds might have a lesson for you that takes a week, or five years.When I train cooks I say the same thing over and over.
There are no cowboys on islands in kitchens. If you can be smart and honest enough to see The Weeds getting near, and you can ask for support before The Weeds claim you altogether, I and we can help you push through. But if we don’t know you need help until you’re drowning, not only is it too late to help you, it’s too late to save the food from merely being banged-out. And I don’t know about you but I have more pride in my food than to allow it to be banged-out.
Go, read the rest, share it, bookmark it.
Hat tip, Ruhlman.
I was puttering around on Facebook this morning, and it occurred to me that I might want to set up a Fan page for one of my favorite food writers, Michael Ruhlman. So I did (you may need to be on Facebook to see that link).
There’s not much content there yet other than a brief blurb, photo, and link to his site, but I’ll work on it as I have time. Please feel free to join and add stuff if you’re so inclined!
I’ve done occasional posts on food and cooking here, but recently, as I was reading Bill Buford’s Heat, I was struck by a phrase and though, “wow, that would make a great domain name.”
Being a geek, I registered it. And since my new web host allows me to run multiple domains off the same account, I set up a small food & recipe blog to go with the name. I’ve set it up the way I want it, and gotten a couple of posts up. It’s ready for the world now.
Benvenuto, Profumo Profondo.
A couple of friends have expressed some interest in occasionally contributing recipes, but I expect it will be mostly me, and be relatively low traffic. We’ll see how it goes.
Scott is working on a post detailing the whole process, so I’m not going to steal his thunder. It should be up tonight or tomorrow. Here’s a sneak peak, though:
As I slowly made my way through my much-neglected feed reader this morning, an offhand link from Ruhlman’s blog caught my eye: a short interview with Alton Brown to help promote “The Next Iron Chef”. It’s a fun read.
Along with The Barefoot Contessa, Alton’s one of the few people still watchable on the Food Network. I loved his two “Feasting on Asphalt” specials. His goofiness can occasionally be a little annoying, but given how FN has eviscerated nearly all their real cooking shows, I suppose it’s the price he has to pay to keep “Good Eats” on the air.
At any rate, “The Next Iron Chef” has been added to the TiVo. I really hope it doesn’t suck.
Scott and I watched the Tuscany episode of “No Reservations” last night and got into a discussion of some possible options for homemade pasta this weekend. If we do haul the much-neglected pasta machine out of the closet today I may get a blog post out of it.