Had a nice weekend, my brother came to København for the days! He arrived Saturday morning, and I was hoping and trying to get him a reservation to eat at the restaurant. But due to no cancellations, he didn't get to eat at the restaurant-per se. Everyday at five we break for staff meal for 35 minutes, so he came and had staff dinner with us then! But before dinner I gave him a nice tour of the restaurant, and introduced him to many of the people! Was very nice!
Sunday we headed out early afternoon for a walking tour of the city, including seeing two of the palaces, the royal gardens, the original Carlsberg brewery and the current Jacobsen brewery! Nice place to visit, with a great area setup to look around and visit. Carlsberg as it turns out is very important to the city of København, and the history. The famous "Little Mermaid" in København? Purchased and donated to the city from Carl Jacobsen, son of the founder of Carlsberg. One of the highlights was a room explaining taste and the five senses and how they affect eating and drinking, and then a station set up with the 12 aromas found in the beers they produce, separated and able to be inhaled at once. Interesting! Also incredibly cool, "Bar Jacobsen" a cool, modern, sleek, bar located literally above and a glass wall away from the whole Jacobsen production for Carlsberg. Jacobsen is their craft and premium beer they produced, brewed only at that location. At the bar, they served Jacobsen beers, brewed mere meters away from where we sat.
Later we went to my favorite Vietnamese restaurant to meet up with a few other people from Noma, whom we spent the night around and about town with.
I spent my last week on snacks this week, as unexpectedly, I will be on "The Boat" next week! The boat is the location of Noma's research and development kitchen, with three chef's jobs dedicated to solely developing new dishes and researching techniques and ingredients. Located merely in front of the restaurant, docked in the canal with a view of the restaurant. This is where currently Chef Rene is spending most of his time. One stagiare at a time is allocated to the boat!
Anxious, nervous, proud, and excited I am! This is a cooks dream! The place of all (some) new happenings in the current culinary world, what the whole scene is talking about! Incredible!! Only El Bulli's El Taller compares! Perhaps the biggest and most important opportunity of my whole career! The dishes and sights I will see could be the next thing of the year! This is the birthplace of the dishes that launched the restaurant to number one in the world! Huge experience, and I begin in the morning! I hope I will gain much insight as to the creation and development of dishes, flavors, and foods, and what it takes!
Should be a very lovely week (a bit earlier hours, also?)! More coming very soon, stay tuned! Have a nice (warm) week! Two weeks remaining here!
There is something addicting about working an intense service at a restaurant. The pre-game of checking everything over, the routine of tasks needing to be done to be prepared. The look at the reservations, notes on any VIPS, special customers, dietary restrictions.
Go time. Checks start coming in. Before you know it you are no longer joking around with your colleagues but working alongside, heads down, making sure that one herb is standing perfectly, that everything is in line, finishing seasoning that plate. More and more comes in, you keep pushing. Sometimes, unluckily, a stutter occurs. A server took that plate to a wrong table. Or this table has a nut allergy, as discussed before service, but you forgot to make that special. And because of those moments of stutter, or maybe due to the mind, the rest of the service just isn't as smooth, paced. But you keep pushing.
Or sometimes you can run a perfect service. Happy with all of the plates, the way the sauce is falling. A perfect pace, one that keeps your working and focused throughout, busy enough to keep you going but not overwhelming. The energy acquired from a well working kitchen with equally passionate colleagues during its height at night is astonishing. The air feels like gold, the energy overwhelming. Your feet and hands move faster than ever before, standing those 25 pieces of micro cress up on the chestnut domino like dish in a mere minute and a half, a feat you could never conceive.
And then there's the post service, often with high fives and smiles all around. You did it again. Even with the stutter and maybe the collapse during service, most of the time the mood is quite upbeat. You clean the station, and then begin more mise en place for the next day, the prep list, and ordering.
Before you know it you are unbuttoning your jacket, walking home in the utter cold, thinking about the day, what could be done better, quicker, more efficiently. Thinking about what went wrong, and why, or how well the day went. Often thoughts about how tired or hungry you may be find their way to the head also. But mostly thoughts of the day are running through the head on the now appreciated culmination of the day walk through København south en route to home.
Its addicting, the lifestyle, however intense it may be. There is something about working with such intensity day in and out, working the services and seeing happy faces in the dining rooms. The drive and dedication it takes, the friendships made, the touching of wonderful ingredients and produce, producing things that taste wonderful. I thought about these thoughts quite randomly yesterday, after waking up from sleeping nearly all day(until 8PM). I woke up, and thought about the tiring week, but was energized by the thought of the restaurant, and my heart warmed to the thought of cooking.
Hope the above thoughts weren't weird, just started writing! Here onto other thoughts
The past two weeks I have been in Toast University 101. The station that is responsible for the first 8 bites of the meal, labeled snacks. :
Moss and cep
Seabuck thorn leather and pickled rose hips
Cookie with lardo and currant
Fried leek and garlic
Rye bread, chicken skin, lovage, and smoked cheese
Pickled and smoked quails egg
Radish, turnip and carrot, soil and herbs
Toast, herbs, smoked cod roe and vinegar
The final snack, a crisp, wavy, toast made from a simple bread, dotted lavishly with a smoked cod roe emulsion, covered "forest-like" with a multifarious array of herbs including but not limited to: sorrel, lemon verbena and balm, chickweed, water cress, carrot tops, chervil, and dill, finished with shaken vinegar powder and a crisp duck "skin", made from the film that forms on top of duck stock.
The picture may or may not do justice, but each one of these can take up to four minutes time, depending on the herbs and skill of producer. This combined with the attention this one snack gets on its perfection from both chef de parties and expediters, about the mere length, amount of dots, size of herbs, and placement on plate, it becomes a real time consumer. During services, there are two full time cooks doing this all service long, with more hands coming in when needed. I got a "Herb toasts look good today" from Rene himself!
Snacks is a fun station to work, you are a part of service everyday, and there is always something to do. This week was beyond intense, as Rene was back for the first time in the new year. The mood was much more concentrated, serious, extreme. It was beyond stressful walking toasts up with the man of the restaurant there at the past, look with eagle eyes at his creation that you just created with the guidance from his workers. Interesting guy, perhaps I will tell more about him at a later date.
This coming week I will be plating:
Seabuckthorn leathers with pickled in-season rose petals from the coast,
Radishes, Carrots, and Turnips in a pot, with foamed herb emulsion and malt "soil"
And many of the other snacks, here and there.
The past weeks have been nice, the weather the past week was creeping on warm, with the sun out on most days! Nice! But this weekend coming into this week it is cold, and suppose to stay cold, with snow forecasted (for the first time in two weeks?) on Wednesday.
On Sunday, a large group, American and not, went to a local pub and watched the superbowl! Was a nice experience, many in the group had never seen a game before, didn't know the rules, etc. The place was packed, as were many of the other places with tv's around town. Many Americans were out, didn't know so many were in København! Also during the evening, my birthday hit!...
Monday was my birthday, which turned out to be a bit nicer than I had anticipated! Woke up late and relaxed, then made dinner for and with my roommates (French student and Ivorian mom). Got a present, to-go coffee mug! Had a cake, ate a nice large salad, Aglio olio e Pepperoncino, a beef and rice dish, grapes, and participated in "hygge" ! As defined by wikipedia: "One of the fundamental aspects of Danish culture is "hygge", which, although translated as "coziness" is more akin to "tranquility". Hygge is a complete absence of anything annoying, irritating, or emotionally overwhelming, and the presence of and pleasure from comforting, gentle, and soothing things. Hygge is often associated with family and close friends. Christmas time when loved ones sit close together with candles lit on a cold rainy night is "hygge", as is grilling a pølse (Danish sausage) on a long summer evening. These examples, although they do not precisely define "hygge", can give an English speaker an idea of a deeply valued traditional concept of Danish culture.[4]"
Was nice, sitting, talking for a long while around the table during and after a nice meal. Thank you everyone from the US who remembered and wished me a happy birthday! I expect presents and celebrations when I return! 20, not a good age, just doesn't sound as good as 19 and in Denmark cooking. 20 puts me with the rest, I have to act civilized now! ah!
I have found a few places that I really enjoy, including a nice vietnamese restaurant. Hip place, delicious food, and good for Copenhagen standerds service. (The service here is really, really horrible. Incredible that they are allowed to get by with it, really.)
Hit and reckoning with the one month homesickness, I miss all of my family and friends! No relationship can equate to those developed in Midlothian and Richmond.
Starting to hit anxiety about what is next, after Noma. May have an in with an incredible restaurant in Australia, but don't know yet. Had a talk with a few people at Noma on Saturday evening about being an American and trying to work in Europe, seems from their perspective harder than I had thought. We will see.
My best friend from the street I grew up on and lived at for my whole life, Emma is coming to Copenhagen on my last day of work for a week! She will try to eat at the restaurant, and we are planning what else to do whilst she is here! So utterly exciting, can't believe she is coming!
More than a month has already flown by here, quite incredible really how it is flying by. One month remaining! I will hope to blog more in the coming weeks, for sure.
Also, more pictures should be posted in the future, as my wonderful aunt from Washington has a camera En route for me! Incredible! I am in debt to you !
I sent my cover letter and resume to eleven restaurants. Eleven. Ten of them are scattered across Europe: Czech Republic, Brittany France, Sweden, Italy. And the only one I heard from, maybe the most sought after for a position in the kitchen, Noma, in København, Denmark. Unbelievable.
So here I am, a short time ago (Saturday) finishing my second week at the restaurant where I will reside at until March 5th. Never in my career did I think I would arrive at one of the top restaurants in the world so early. I can recall quite vividly my discovery of "The List" of best restaurants, a night during high school, after a long day of school and then working at the Can Can brasserie. I don't recall why I was searching, or if I just stumbled upon it. But I found the list, and it had my heart racing from the start. I began going to the restaurants websites, watching videos, and seeing things that blew my mind and that I had no idea about. At the time I was at the Chesterfield Technical center learning basic cooking skills, working at a French Brasserie in Richmond, Virginia. A secluded and...poor cuisine world(mostly). I believe I got very little sleep that week, because each day I would return home with time for myself around 11:30, after a full day of school and work and begin again reading and watching and looking at all of these places doing miraculous things with food. I set as a dream for myself to one day step foot in, if not to eat then to cook at one of the restaurants. Thinking it was very far off, after I had spent many years in kitchens and slowly building up my skills, I still have this dream. And now I am for two months in one of those restaurants, surreal. A young 19 year old boy, with 3 years under his belt, no formal education, from Richmond Virginiawhere?! is that?, who spent two months in a former Michelin starred restaurant, walking in every morning with cooks much older from around the worlds top restaurants, and working alongside. Luck? Skill? Fate? Who knows.
For those unaware, Noma is the restaurant ranked #1 in the world by Restaurant Magazine's 2010 list published every April. Located in Old Town København, Denmark, along side a canal that makes up Christianshavn, or the old part of town, mere steps away from the palace. Started by a young Danish Macedonian, Chef Rene Redzepi, only 8 years ago, and the restaurant has quickly risen to the top in the world. Known for due to their usage of pure Nordic ingredients, inspirations, and techniques. During the warmer seasons, the kitchen team is also known for their usage of local herbs, greens, and vegetables, foraged by kitchen staff and other local personnel.
My position at the restaurant is a stagiare, a common position created amongst the larger restaurants in the world. I come for a set period of time, work for free(sometimes living and expenses are provided), and then leave(or maybe get offered a job?!). It is a bit crazy, this system the restaurants have created, as in any other industry I don't think free labor still exists. But seeing as I did not go to school, I see it as my expense for that. Much better in that case, as I am seeing the world and cooking! Noma's kitchens work on a loose 8:30-11:30 schedule. Some days earlier, some days later. Therefore, I am working at least 15 hours a day, sometimes more, with Sundays and Mondays off. In 3 days I am working over the "overtime" for the U.S. You've got to be loving your job to do this! With a 30 minute walk to work, it leaves little time in the day for anything else.
This past week, there were around 25 other stagiares in the kitchen, along with the 14 paid kitchen staff. Funny thinking of those numbers, and then thinking about the 40 available seats for lunch and dinner daily at the restaurant! It is truly incredible the amount of work that goes into the mere prep of a dish at this restaurant, the amount of man hours taken to create the food. Without the stagiares, all of the hands, the restaurant wouldn't be able to do what they do. Some of the more almost humorous kitchen projects include: picking chervil leaves off of the stem to get around a 1 inch miniature leafless "tree" for a garnish on the Pickled Vegetables and Smoked Bone Marrow dish(300 a day), peeling raw chestnuts first of their husks and then peeling the skin off, and maybe the worst, picking veal strands off of the cooked veal for each single string.
But I have really enjoyed my time thus far at the restaurant. The first week I worked hard and quickly, almost "proving" myself that I not only wanted to learn but that I was capable of doing other jobs. Maybe due to my youngness, I somehow emerged out of the endless projects that the kitchen had to offer and now do somethings that seem to be out of the stagiares normal realm. I am questioning it all, at the moment however, after hearing the others credentials. Certainly they are far better cooks than I, perhaps it's just my energy to keep on pushing. I have even begun to work dinner services, dressing plates, and even running food to tables(even when the queen was present!). The kitchen is divided into five? sections, and currently I am working on the section that is responsible for appetizers. The restaurant serves a seven and twelve course menu, so for the sevens course maybe three or four courses come from our section, and the twelve course maybe quite a few more. Depends on the menu for the day. Including the courses on the menu, there are quite a few other "courses" that get sent to the table, including snacks which is 6 or more it seems.
Cold section seems to have been a great starting section. Next week, I will most likely get moved to another. The Chef de Parties, or paid positions on the station are Trevor(head) from England?, Oliver from England, and now friend Leo from Ireland and Portugal. Leo has almost taken me in, and because of that I have gotten to do and see many more things. Not only has he become a great friend but also a great mentor. Also on the section are more stagiares, including now from the beginning Henrike, a Swede. Henrike travels daily from Sweden, a in total two hour commute one way. I feel horrible for the guy, thinking about how much time he is left with in his day. By the end of the week, he is often looking very tired and downtrodden. But he is very funny and like minded, there are a few mostly stagiares who feel the need to talk, the entire day. It is often very nice to work and have silence, and the certain people break that quickness and peacefulness so often with jabber about what restaurants they have cooked at or this that the other.
Everyday we eat dinner at 5:00, and during the work week other than early morning and late night snacks that is my only meal. Usually it is quite good, an Irish cook's daily task is to make dinner. On Saturday he did an American meal: Barbecue with Macaroni and Cheese, and Coleslaw!
Currently Chef and face of the restaurant, Chef Rene Redzepi, is on vacation for the month in Mexico. It is his first restaurant since the restaurant opened. It will be very weird and interesting to see how the dynamics will change once he returns. The past few weeks, it is often talked about keeping the energy of the restaurant up in the dining room, as he is not in the kitchen and guests are traveling quite a ways to eat there. Although the food is no less of quality I am certain, the energy level is most likely lower without his presence. I have heard some stories and things about him from some in the restaurant, I will be interested to meet him!
The restaurant is situated in the corner bottom floor of a very large building, "Nordatlantens Brygge House" which is an old warehouse building that use to be the departing and arriving building for boats headed to Iceland, Norway, Greenland, and the Faroe Islands. Because of this, the restaurant houses now the Faroe Island and Icelandic Embassies, a museum, and a few other offices pertaining to the cultures. That is why when Noma was created, it must only have been a Nordic cuisine restaurant. With mostly all of the original interior, panelings and floors, it is a very unique space. From the upstairs prep kitchen windows, the Palace, Canal, and Opera house are all visible.
My living situation has been quite perfect thus far, and the cheapest I have heard from all the other stagiares situations. I am living in a room I found from CouchSurfing, with an Ivorian mother and a Brazilian student. Just a small room, bed, desk, and couch. But who really needs luxury when you are working all day? The Ivorian in the begininning week was very helpful in helping me learn about the city, where to go, etc.
I had a classic Danish lunch last week, at Restaurant Schønnemans. Pickled Herring, Lamb Meatballs, Aquavit, and Rye Brød med Lard and Butter. Delicious. Last weekend I also found per the sommelier of Noma's suggestion, a good local wine bar. The owner was very welcoming and interesting to talk to. Currently I ride on a train in return to København, I spent the weekend in Goteborg with friends Simon, Robert, Jonathan, and Jonathan's girlfriend. Last night Simon and I had a chill night, (Simon is quite the cook!) and today we toured Goteborg, had meatballs, and many laughs. Was quite nostalgic returning to the first city I visited in Europe. The trip was short, I hope to return again atleast once during my time in København.
Although I won't necessarily learn to "cook" on this journey, I believe my time spent at this restaurant should have a huge impact on my career. I hope to take from it the philosophy of the restaurant, the style, thought process, and seasonality of one of the best restaurants in the world. Soon to become habit surely will be the ways of working in a kitchen. A kitchen whom accepts nothing less than 100%, cleanliness, perfection, finesse, quickly and efficiency. These are things that I can surely take along. The time spent at a known restaurant will surely also open new doors never imagined for the future.
The current menu at the restaurant is as follows:
12 Course
Snacks
Moss and cep
Seabuck thorn leather and pickled rose hips
Cookie with lardo and currant
Fried leek and garlic
Rye bread, chicken skin, lovage, and smoked cheese
Pickled and smoked quails egg
Radish, turnip and carrot, soil and herbs
Toast, herbs, smoked cod roe and vinegar
Menu
Leek and seaweed
Dried scallops and grain, squid ink and rucola
Langoustine and sol, parsley and seaweed
Oyster and the ocean
Cauliflower and pine
Celeriac and black truffle, garden sorrel
Turbot and unripe elderberries, stems and cabbage
Pickled vegetables and bone marrow
Wild duck and apple, malt and browned butter
Dessert
Pear tree
Snowman
Øllebrød and skyr
This post has been a long time coming. I apologize for the delay, I hope to get one written every weekend. We will see how that goes! Thanks everyone for the support. Thank you again everyone at Secco for a great last night, I will never forget my time spent with you all. I hope to return! Thanks especially to Julia and Tim for your wealth of knowledge, guidance, and support. Thanks to my friends for the great going away before leaving! I miss you all. Thanks family for a wonderful Christmas and holidays spent together.
Unfortunately at the moment I am camera-less, and phone-to-computer cordless, so I haven't anyway to post a few of the pictures that I have taken on my phone(decent pictures). Next weekend I will try to find a cord to connect my phone to my computer. But blog readers, don't forget my birthday is coming up...ha!
Perhaps next week I will post more in depth about the food at Noma. Thanks all for reading, talk soon!
Well, here is the promised returning blog post. Not quite what I had in mind or probably you, but I am super excited about it and found it blog worthy. ! Since my return from Spain, I am now cooking and have been promoted to Sous Chef at Secco Wine Bar. If you haven't visited me there yet, you truly need to come in. Beautiful unique space, under the ownership of River City Cellars' Julia Battaglini. Really really great Italian and Spanish influenced food from Chef Tim Bereika, my time thus far has been both a learning and truly an enjoyment, I learn something everyday! You can taste not only the love, but the flavor from the ingredients that are purchased from local markets. And, the people working around me, WANT to work there! They care about the Beer they are serving, and the cheese that abounds! Passion emanates from all corners of the restaurant, come in and experience it!
But I am not writing to advertise Secco, but more to record my making of Apple Cider! That's right, what screams fall more than a nice glass of local Apple Cider!
On a cool, Monday morning I ventured up the treacherous what-seemed-to-be 80* hillside that leads you to Charlottesville's Carter Mountain Orchards! There, millions flock yearly for the pick-your-own apples, and, oh yea, Apple Donuts. (They also have grape vines?!) At the orchards, I picked close to 10 pounds of apples, all being Fuji's. Following the pickin', having gotten wind of a special deal known only to those in the know, I asked the registers for apples known as Dear? Apples, or Apples that one necessarily wouldn't want to eat due to indentations or other defects, but perfect for a low budget cider. The pick'em yourself apples are 1.19 a pound, and the 2nd's were 75 cents? I think I left the mountain with between 20-30 pounds, or about a bushel.
Now, conventional Apple Cider makers would use a mill to juice the apples, but being a cook, I chose to use my trusted Cuisinart Food Processor, and then push the juice out using cheesecloth. A little slow, but it did the job!
The Yield from the apples was almost exactly a gallon, and wanting a bigger production, I purchased two gallons of cider. (Note: these must be preservative FREE, or else it will affect the fermentation process/yeasts)
If you are to go about doing this, I would suggest reading anything and everything you can online, as I did. Following my research, I was warned of wild yeasts in the cider producing off putting flavors and unwanted desires. Therefore, it is recommend to simmer all cider before jarring for 45 minutes. Before simmering, I added 1/3 pound of honey in each gallon, and approximately a pound of dark brown sugar in each. (A POUND of sugar you say?!) Yeast is an active micro-organism, or fungi. It is alive! What yeast does, is eats the sugar, lets off Co2, and, well you know the other. Upon some research, I found that the yeast should and will most likely eat all of that sugar.
Now, after the simmering, I let the ciders cool to close to room temperature, which went into the early hours of the morning. Once at an acceptable temperature, I added a controlled purchased yeast, and siphoned the cider into three-one gallon super sanitized with special cleaner jugs. Attached on the top, are sanitized "airlocks" which let the co2 out, and forbid the oxygen or other yeasts or bacteria in.
The jugs now sit for two weeks, for the fermentation to change the cider. Following the two weeks, the cider is then siphoned into bottles, capped, and let sit for one more week to carbonate before being enjoyed. A priming sugar, or sugar added before bottling may be added to give the yeast more "food" to carbonate in the bottle, that decision will be made upon tasting the sweetness before bottling.
This has been an incredible learning experience and exciting process for me to induce, amazing thinking I have been a part since the apples left the tree!
I hope you found this entry as intriguing as I had dreamt, albeit my writing is rusty and it is late! I hope to write more often, thanks for reading!
PS: Apple Butter is truly delicious, and so simple. Google a recipe and make a batch from some apples this fall, you won't regret it!
Although it has been busy since my return to Richmond, the blogging will commence once more in due time! Sorry about the recess, I have much to post! Hope you all are enjoying your summer! Post soon!
Have been living some busy days here on the island! I hope to craft a blog post in the coming days on the world of cooking, perfection, the next step, and generally life on the island. The past week has been great, although extremely stressful and tough. I took over a station by myself, and am doing decent. A new cook from France arrived on Sunday last week, she is extremely nice and I am learning a lot from her. We hang out a significant amount of the day. Amazing hearing about the food culture and lifestyle in France. More on all this later! Tomorrow will mark two weeks until my departure from the island! Today I have off, as does Markus. We are renting a car and driving around the island, eating, seeing. Should be a wonderful day, will take many pictures! A blog on all this coming soon, sorry it takes so long! In the meantime, watch a video of the evolution of an idea at the seventh best restaurant in the world, Alinea, in Chicago, which I had the privilege to eat at last summer. So much thought goes into a single element, the centerpiece, for a menu. Mind blowing, it is a dream place of mine to one day work.
Cathedral
Martin, Uruguayan. Speaks no English, I no Espanol. Our
relationship is funny.
Markus, I, Marco(last night spent at Factoria),
Irene, Irene boyfriend Jose
