A SWISS CHEF'S CAREER: THE GOOD, THE BAD, THE YUMMY (10)

CHAPTER 10

                     It was June 1970 and the host country for the World Cup was Mexico. My Boss was German and of course was able to book the whole German team inclusive their wife's in the Hotel Maralisa. Needless to say, the Swiss chalet had to wait for my attention  and for 4 Weeks I spend full time at the Maralisa. I remember at that time England was my favorite Team but of course the circumstances changed my mind and I rooted for Germany. It was on exciting time with the press here and meeting all the players. Beckenbauer and Muller where the most famous ones. I was very busy to take care of the big entourage but the team itself brought in their own chef. That made my job easier and I just had to help him with the food ordering. 

                            

                              Once the World Cup started all the player moved to Leon were they had the first games. Most of the entourage and wife's stayed back at the Maralisa.  The team got us, my boss and I great  tickets to all the games Germany played. Of course I could not afford the travel to Leon, but we went to one against England. Yes it was a great, exciting game and Germany won 3 to 2. 

                               Again I realize that all this is part of the benefit to become a chef. There is always something exiting going an around you and you meet some great people. Just to let you know, Germany eventually lost against Italia and Brasil won the World Cup.  

Restaurant Swiss Chalet in Acapulco

                                I finally got to the Restaurant Swiss Chalet and El Patio.  In my mind the Swiss Chalet had a great kitchen crew. I saw one problem, way to many regular boring  menu item and not one really related to SWISS . That was easy to solve for me. Specifically, the # 1 Swiss national dish  to organize. First of all I had to go out and buy some Fondue dishes and in a short 4 weeks Cheese fondue was #1 seller in the restaurant. With a few more additions like diced Veal in mushroom cream sauce, bratwurst and roesti, schnitzel with morel sauce , homemade salad dressing etc,  something still was missing. Desserts!! They had been non existent.  I found out why, there was no location to produce desserts, there was no pastry shop.

El Patio beside the restaurant Swiss Chalet

                                 

                                Also  El Patio served no pastry. It was right outside the Swiss Chalet, a wide open 60 seat garden restaurant with only umbrellas offering some shadow. The food offering was mostly authentic Mexican food like ceviche, posole, carnitas, carne asada tampiquena, tacos, huachinango, chile rellenos, enchilada, mole etc.  Again a great kitchen crew and very nice service personnel in Mexican costumes. 

                                  At that time I had a long conference with Mr Harbich and phone calls to the headquarters in Houston. Two days later I was permitted to hire Xaver Odermat from Switzerland as Executive Pastry chef and to my surprise he accepted. Now I had to hurry and convert a large existing room in to a Pastry shop with walk- in cooler and freezer. Also machinery like Dough roller, mixer, steam kettle and Convention oven. The rest of the necessities I decided was up to Xaver to buy when he arrives.

                                  Xaver was amazing! He arrived with Trudy his wife and seemed to be very happy to be here. He hired him some help and start producing tasty, beautiful, state of the art desserts for all 4 establishment. He was an instant hit for the company and of course I could take some credit too.

I always went to work, teach and  help out were  it was busiest 

                           

                                  At about that time Teddy Stauffer approached me to start a restaurant at our own, close to the Hotel Villa Vera. We called it Teddy's Hideaway. We had a piano Bar with Jack Trommer playing every night . The restaurant had a unique setting, the main floor with 6 large tables and the rest of the tables on different levels with view of the Acapulco bay on a 50 yard hill full of tropical plants.  It was sensational but a pain in the neck for the servers. I made a very limited menu easy for two cooks to handle on a busy night.                        

This was the billboard on the street below the Hotel Villa Vera

our first attempt  promoting the restaurant

                 Note:                  

                              I am sorry for the poor quality of all the photos at the time in Acapulco. In actuality I took a lot of Slides in that time, unfortunate I lost them all on my move to the USA. Most of the photographs you see where given to me by friends.

                                  Like the name of the restaurant suggest it was hidden and not easy to find, but with all the followers of Teddy the restaurant was packed  every day from day one. Henry Kissinger was my first famous customer. He came with a whole entourage and secret service. Two of the secret agents even watched me cook their dishes!

                                  There where lot of movie-stars who spend vacation in Acapulco at that time and they all came to see Teddy.  My favorite was John Wayne, he stayed for two weeks. During the day he went fishing on his yacht and later he brought me his catch to prep for him and his people. It was just a great satisfaction to have a conversations about food and fishing with a gigantic super star like John in my kitchen. Again I was happy that I choose cooking as my profession. 

My first fresh shark to dress and cook

                                   It was also a great employment to see how my Parents loved the attention they got from all these people and I was glad being able to give them that experience. 

                                   My two year anniversary in Acapulco was close and everything was going great in my life and career,  but just in a few hours it again changes even to the better.                                                             

                                  Three gentlemen came to the restaurant for dinner and after they invited me to their table. It was the GM , the food and beverage manager and Executive chef from the Princess hotel under construction. It should open end of 1971 and was already recognized as #1 hotel in the world. It is unreal but they offered me a chef job as of right now. Needless to say two weeks later I started my new job at the princess. A whole new experience! But  that comes in my next chapter.

Huachinango Veracruzana

                        2 each  1 to 1.5 lb Red Snapper

                                                      Clean and scale the fish without cutting off the head or tail with                                                              a sharp knife score the fleshy part on both side of the snapper.

                        1 tbsp    olive oil

                        4 tbsp   butter

                        1           medium Onion sliced

                        1/2        julienne of red pepper  

                        1/2        julienne of yellow pepper 

                        1/2        julienne of green pepper
                        1 tbsp   chopped fresh garlic

                        1 tbsp   Tomato paste

                        1 cup     peeled and sliced fresh tomatoes 
                        2 tbsp    capers
                        1/4 cup  white wine
                        1/4 cup  clam juice or chicken stock
                            salt , pepper, lemon juice and chopped parsley
                       Season fish with salt, fresh black pepper, lemon juice and a little Worcestershire 
                       Saute red snapper in olive oil and some butter golden brown on both side

                       add white wine and simmer fish for a few minutes

                        In a separate pan saute Onion, peppers and garlic
                        ad tomato paste, capers and clam juice or chicken stock  

                        Simmer for 2 minutes and ad the tomatoes
                        ad to the cooked Snapper and serve with the peppers on top and chopped parsley               

Enjoy