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

PROLOGUE

     I've been asked so many times about my professional life. Also many questions about pros and cons of a chef’s career, especially from young people who would like to cook for a living. This is not an easy task to explain, what it takes to devote yourself to become a service oriented person.

    I  think I should start with the pros!

     You will have a lot of joy, recognition, and satisfaction in pleasing, surprising, and overwhelming your guests. One of my main reasons to become a chef was the adventure of traveling. You can find yourself a job anywhere in the world. (Most other jobs are limited to countries and special regions). You have a chance to see other cultures and learn foreign languages. It made me very proud being able to communicate in 5 different languages in my life as a chef, especially after being one of the worst pupils in school in learning French! One great thing, once you are established, everybody in the hotel business knows you and you never have to look for a job again. You will always get lots of offers and it will be up to you to make the right decision. Beside, you will probably have that dream and good feeling to one day build your own establishment.

     On the negative side:

      There a lot of cons to this profession, starting with your willingness to work ungodly hours and most every holiday and being daily under pressure to timely serve your hungry costumers. You will not get wealthy either. Yes, you can make a descent living but unless you go into television you never will pass middle class. You will have to get very lucky like me to find a special partner in life, if you desire to start a family. She or he has to be ready to relocate any time a new job offer comes around and if you have children it will even get harder. Believe me, if you like to be successful you have to relocate quite often.

     I will give it my best effort and jot down all my memories starting with  my first food service experience in my early teens all the way to the end of my chef's career. I guess it could be bit boring to some, so just ignore it and don't judge me, after all, I am not a writer. Expect a new entry every few weeks in the near future.

We been in this together since 1976 

SAINT PATRICK DAY PARTY

Thursday, March 16^th

                                      We combined  the March birthday party for Ed with ST Patrick day. That made it easy for me to put together a menu.

                                       And here it is:

Beverage

Chardonnay, Champagne, Jack Daniels, Bacardi and coke

Dinner

( Irish themed)

Shillelagh Sticks

served with Guacamole

Lamb Terrine

minted green goddess sauce

*

Corned Beef and Cabbage

Boiled potatoes and baby carrots

*

Chocolate Bread Pudding

Kiwi Cream Sauce

Vanilla and Strawberry Ice Cream

Blood Oranges

Grand marnier flavored Cream Anglaise

                          Donna helped me with the resource to find a Irish appetizer and came up with Shillelagh Sticks. It is fairly simple to prepare and taste great with your appertive. 

There are bread sticks wrapped in bacon and coated with

rosemary flavored parmesan cheese

                I made a Lamb Terrine wrapped in Puff Pastry and I served it with a creamy montricher dressing mixed with crushed mint leafs and parsley. The trick is to have a green sauce enhancing the terrine flavor and mint goes pretty good with lamb, and I was right. I incorporated the lamb meat with fire roasted red peppers, chanterelle and pistachios.

The corned beef and cabbage was very traditional and nothing

out of the ordinary!

Now the chocolate bread pudding is something only I can accomplish!!

( unless you are willing to spend a lot of time)

                       First of all I had to bake 3 different pound cakes, one butter, one orange and one lemon. I used the same receipt for all tree except one with lemon juice and rind and one with orange juice and rind and of course a touch of food color. Mix the diced pound cakes in a bread loaf with quartered pralines and ad some fresh orange slices. Fill with a royal cream ( cream, eggs and sugar) and bake for 1hour on low heat or until it is firm.

                       To serve, I made strawberry and vanilla ice cream and cream anglaise with Grand Marnier. And because it was St Patrick Day I fixed a green Kiwi cream.

                        You have to take my word for it, everything was delicious!!

                   There was one technical difficulty, Ed was not feeling very well and he had to leave a little early ( before dessert), but I promised him to deliver his dessert the next day whenever he is ready. 

PROST!! UNTIL NEXT TIME

80 BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION (SWISS CHEESE FONDUE RECIPE)

                       To bring you up to date with what has been happening here.

On July 26, 2016 Dr. Ed Roach, our neighbor and dear friend celebrated his 80th birthday.
He invited us for dinner at the Brick Top Restaurant, a great place in Frontenac, a posh part of St Louis. We all had a wonderful meal and since I also baked him a Birthday cake we decided to go home for dessert. During dinner we handed Ed his birthday present Donna and I had come up with. As you know, it's difficult to find a present for a person who has practically everything. So Donna made him a booklet with lots of "good" advice, pictures and monthly calendars with a promise to have another party on or around the 3th Thursday at each month. So far so good, we had a successful dinner party every month since then.

July 26, 2016

Joyce, his beautiful wife keeps Ed young. Nobody would

believe he's celebrating his 80th

Marty and his wife Pat were driving us to the Restaurant in their van,

a treat by itself

Chocolate mousse cake, Ed's favorite

Since I just started up the blog again I hadn't taken many pictures, but I kept some notes in a file.

      Just a quick refresher:      

August 18th 2016 we enjoyed

Ceviche

Grilled Filet Mignon

Meringue glace 

*

September - Thursday 15th 2016

we prepared to fly to Switzerland for vacation and we had not

much time for a dinner party.

we went to Ed and Joyce's house and had some finger food

"Mini Beef Wellington with Bearnaise"

*

October - Thursday 20est 2016

Just coming back from Switzerland we had of course

Raclette with all the trimmings

Ice Cream

*

October - Monday 31st 2016

We could not miss Halloween, our yearly tradition and also anniversary
of our friendship.
We always enjoy hors d'oeuvre:
salami coronets, smoked salmon, steak tartar
shrimp cocktail

Pralinees

*

November - Thursday 17th 2016
Mixed greens
Vol au vent fruit de mere
hot chocolate melting cake

*

December 15th 2016
Alaskan King crab Crepes
Wienerschnitzel
Apple Strudel, cream anglaise
*

Because it was close to Christmas we celebrated in style with
Lemon Drops Martini prepared by the bartender Donna

January 26th 2017
Find all the details in the blog
posting on February 13, 2017

Called "Tree years later"

February - Thursday 23th 2017

                            And now today's happening. I am planing these little gatherings with an appropriate  theme like I chose cheese fondue because February is the coldest months in the year and most people eat fondue when it's snowing and freezing outside. Unfortunately this did not worked out because it is 75 degree outside, the warmest February ever. Oh well we still enjoyed it!

Getting ready for another fun evening!

Appetizer

Grilled avocados filled with dill flavored shrimp salad

Entree

Swiss Fondue

Dessert

Soufflé glacé Grand Marnier

Vanilla sauce with cognac

Everybody liked the shrimp salad

I had the feeling the fondue wasn't for everybody's liking, I better

make a Fondue Bourguignonne for Ed next time

but great success with the dessert, it never fails!!

another happy evening

Recipe

Swiss cheese Fondue

serves 4 people

                                           300gr Emmentaler Cheese  grated

                                           300gr Gruyere Cheese grated    

                                           4 dl    Chardonnay

                                           8  each medium size fresh Garlic coarsely chopped

                                           3  tbsp cornstarch

                                           2  oz Kirschwasser

                                           1  tsp ground black pepper 

                                           1 loaf of Bread cut in 1 inch cubs 

                               bring wine, garlic and pepper to boil in fondue pot, ad grated cheese and let melt
                               mix cornstarch and Kirschwasser and ad to 
  boiling cheese mix to thicken. Serve immediately on fondue set with lit sterno to keep cheese hot.

 

Until next time............