Who Writes Cookbooks?
Copyright Catcher78 all rights reserved
Author's notes: This is a story about a man's fall into madness and recovery. It's a work of fiction. Not a lot of sex. There are redemptive moments. It is my story and not for reuse or copying.
I was irritated and realized that was stupid of me. I cater, just the cooking and although booze is a big part of those events, I can't compete with box stores. Being irritated made me focus on what I was doing. I had been asked to put together a cookbook. Eleni Asarkelian who is a fixer for events, agent to people important demanded that I do this. I had catered several events for her, including a wedding, an anniversary and a Mardi Gras event.
Armenian, Greek and Russian cuisines, respectively. Turned out her oldest daughter Sara works for a regional publisher in Seattle and her mother had assured her I was the real deal in terms of my food. So I was preparing several entrees for testing and photography, as you can't just get a bunch of recipes online and give them to the editor. You have to test them and get people to try them and rate them, which is where I found myself this evening.
I thought the idea of me and a cookbook was off, because I've never had a restaurant, but I've done stuff all over the Northwest and did stuff for some very rich software people which was the connection with Eleni and Sara. Eleni is a whirlwind, a publicist, but really a fixer. You have a mess and she fixes it. She said she'd get it published and the money to publicize it, so here I was.
I asked how and she said, "Don't ask."
I thought the book could sell because I knew cookbooks and food, but I was going to go broke before I finished trying the recipes out and getting approval from my panel of judges. I couldn't be catering while I did this, but I was trying to run between the raindrops and make it all work.
It was kind of hard as Sara, who is of Armenian descent, kept stressing that the book and the recipes had to be approachable. That was code for ten ingredients and five minute camera time. The theme was West Coast Fusion, North American and Central American and Southern American meets Asian influences. My first thought was the concept was too big, too broad to carry out in a one hundred and fifty pages.
The approachable thing was what made it difficult. I was heavily influenced by Dianna Kennedy when I started and Rick Bayless in Chicago is so good that he blows me away and the local restaurant scene was packed with prep cooks and line chefs from Central and South America and I drink with them after their shifts specifically to talk about traditional stuff, while I grew up with Japanese and Chinese kids in Seattle, which meant seafood.
Sara says to me, "Can't you use stock from the store? That's on the shelf, in those paper boxes?"
"Sure, but it won't be as good. How not as good, is a function of how important the stock is in a specific recipe."
"What do you mean?"
"Well if it is bouillabaisse, it is out of the question. If I'm braising beef shank where the beef and marrow will assert itself, I could get away with it, as long as it was unsalted."
"Well, "She said, "Time is money and if you waste a day making stock you'll go broke!"
"If I don't, I get no repeat customers. There is a balance point and my stuff is focused on food that was poor food a hundred years ago and time is what makes it better."
"Great recipe creation is art, with your senses as your palate. Recipes for home are much different for a commercial kitchen, catering or restaurant are more complex. I constantly think of combinations that make things work from technique to texture to visual impact to taste and aroma. Bayless is so knowledgeable and the range of regional Mexican food is just astounding. It would be easy to do roasted cricket tacos and they would be good, but nobody is ready for it. Line cooking in a restaurant requires a chef to make things repeatable for a cook thirty or forty times a night. That is different than catering where it's a big group."
"Who is Bayless, she said?
"The best Mexican food chef in the United States. Not burritos and rice and beans. So much more and so good. Anyway his palate is the equivalent of Van Gogh's when Van Gogh did Fields of Flowers at Arles and the extraordinary color he captured. Fresh, hyper fresh ingredients are key, but so are layers of flavor involving time and timing. I had this cartoon image in my head of a plate of sashimi laid out with avocado slices and squeeze bottle applied sauces of mole, tomatillo and aioli in a fan shape. Artful in a Warhol wannabe way, but shitty food, even if the ingredients were perfect or not great food and certainly not honoring the source, fishermen or really the original cultures. The real fusion thing for me was both cross cultural, but also looking to contrast long cooking techniques with quick as well as uncooked, often same ingredients or similar. Slow roasted pork in fire roasted tomatoes on a salad of shredded jicama, uncooked sweet onion rings, avocado and drizzled with a cheap industrial balsamic vinegar reduced to a syrup was an example. Incredible bread must be part of it, too."
"Great speech, "She looked at the camera guy, "Did you get that?
"Yes I did", he said.
I said, "This is how it goes. I'm doing prep work through plating, testing and photo shoot."
"Alright Bill, can you tell me something about your approach?"
"So I feel that there are interesting similarities between regional Mexican and Chilean cooking and Northwest Native American cuisine as well as differences that make fun counterpoints, so that was my game plan that I was working in my mind as I started this. Today I had two of my favorites going, but I thought that both were great but the tasting of them together was not an additive event. So I was sort prima donnying it, by insisting that it be done sequentially and not concurrently. I insisted that it be broke up with bread and wine. The first was a salmon filet seared off in a very hot skillet and finished in an oven, seven to eight minutes top. Plating meant putting a blackberry-mint coulis, with the salmon next and topped with crème fraiche and salmon roe.
"The other was a presentation of scallops. Big divers scallops. I roasted sweet potatoes, Serrano and jalapeno chillis, garlic and sweet onion. Whipped them with some extra-virgin olive oil and cumin and smoked paprika. The mixture was placed in a mold in the middle of the plate. The scallops were simply cooked in a very hot skillet with peanut oil. Turned once at three minutes. I put toasted sesame seeds around the dish and drizzled a sauce of tomatillo, molasses and soy around the edge. If I wanted to close a deal I'd do this or another version and it never failed."
The two sauces I felt clashed, which is why I wanted the separation for the tasters and Sara brought me back.
"It's no big deal. They'll both be good. Come on, I'm on the hour with the camera and the kitchen."
"You either believe in me or you don't. Together will ruin it!", which I delivered with almost a yell.
My first tantrum. It felt good. I could get back to my business or do it right.
They were eating the salmon now. One portion had been set aside for the photo work. The colors worked because the blackberry coulis had a brilliantine sheen, which the lights caught and the variety of salmon I chose was Sockeye, both for its vibrant orange and its incredible flavor and then the crème fraise and the roe were subtle shadings. The testers and Sara were into their second bite without comment. Their faces were turned inward, a good sign.
