Thursday, January 21, 2016

THE HIPPIE PASTRY CHEF

I remember one time when I first started at Dallas Hyatt, I’d had a tough day. I fucked some stuff up. Sous Chef's aren't supposed to fuck stuff up. I went back to the pastry shop. There was David, the Hippy Pastry Chef. I'd met David a few years earlier, at the Pritzger Dinner.  I asked him a couple questions about what he was doing . He looked at me funny.
He said ‘Why are you asking this?” I said “I just fucked something up, and I’m just trying to get my mojo back”
He said “Oh, you are looking for a friend”
And he took me over to a production line where an Oriental girl was piping whip cream onto cakes. Perfect little round balls of whip cream.
He showed me how to do one.
But my little round ball had a tail on it, where I pulled the bag away.
I did a few, and they all had tails. We took the balls off, smoothed the cake and he showed me again.
I did another few, and one looked good!
“I think I got it now” I said.
He looked at me and said “No one gets it on their fourth try. I been doing it 10 years. That’s how long it will take you”
The Oriental girl looked up, smiled at me, gave me a thumbs up.
David let me do a few more, and I went back to the Main Kitchen, rejuvenated.


After transferring to Hyatt Hotels in Hawaii years ago, David is now an instructor at KapCC, a Culinary Arts program at the Community College in Hawaii. It looks like he has lost the beard, but he still has the hair.Follow the linky to read more about David. (Click Here)

No comments: