gfron1

@Alex On my book tour, in New Orleans, I stopped in the Museum of Southern Art and they had a exhibit of modern tea cups, some of which were for sale. I immediately was drawn to what she calls "Meditation Bowls," and jotted down her name for later research. Since then, she and I have had numerous conversations, and we've worked on making the materials food safe, less likely to chip and so forth. And quite frankly, I don't worry about such things as customers stealing these. If someone wants one that bad I'll bless them with it. But it won't be easy for them to get since I and my sous will be the ones placing and removing the dish from in front of them. And Alex, let her know the connection to me, she'll be tickled.

Nothing new to report. Building hunting. Popup dinners. Meeting new connections. I've been spending more time finding the artisans who will create my tableware. Here's ONE that I've already contracted with.

I'm in episode 3 and I can't not tell you all how amazing this show is. I'm learning so much! "You never eat meat with paratha, only roti. Paratha already has a layer of fat."

Thank you for doing that. I'll give it a try for breakfast tomorrow and see how it goes.

I use my dehydrator like that (mostly for chocolate) but when I need moisture I just add a hotel pan of hot water.

Host's note: this topic was moved from its original location in Japan: Cooking to China: Cooking because of information in the second post. I bought this because it looks like something I'd enjoy. A mix of grains (millet, oat, lentil, black rice, brown rice and others) but I'm not sure how to use it. My guess, based on the photo, is to add sticky rice - I'm thinking I could do it all in my rice cooker and I'm guessing at a 2:1 ratio on the brown rice setting. The photo is a rice cake so i wonder if I need to add sugar and liquid like sushi. Any better advice? [btw, I posted this in Japan Cooking but some of the text looks Korean and the product is from Taiwan so I have no idea.]

I've got to get through my two-night pop-up in Kansas City this weekend first. It will be so nice to have my own kitchen again. Lugging my kitchen around is exhausting.

@Alex All good points. The more I work through the play list, the more I add and delete. I tend to delete anything that is too up tempo, too high pitched, anything whiney and anything with vulgarity. I tend to keep midtone songs where the voice is in balance with the music. In the end, who the artist is is irrelevant to me, but how the music feels in the space. The wild card will be when I play the music in the actual dining room, which I can't do until we have a lease, build it out and put some tables and people in it. I've recently made contact with a local person who does this for a living and I'm looking forward to seeing where he takes things.

Met with a bank loan officer today. Currently we're looking to structure the finances roughly in 1/3 components of landlord financed TI (tenant improvement), bank loan and self/investor funds. While meeting with the bank they offered an equipment leasing option where I could (hypothetically) get a chocolate tempering machine with enrober that they purchase and lease to me. That's a really interesting option for me to be able to equip better but not tie up my opening day operating funds. I need to explore this more but it's interesting to explore this option. In a small detail, the credit card processing that their related company does is only 1.5%. I generally see 2.74% as the going rate. That is very interesting to me. We signed an LOI on our property last Tuesday and are still waiting for a response from the landlord.

That's all we'll have. Imagine a kitchen in the center of the room with two horseshoes tables on either side for 12 customers per side. That's the set up. When we get to that point I'll share design images.

I've thought about that and shared that with the designer. That will be a consideration in the material...or maybe we'll be the first socks only restaurant MrSpiffy - I appreciate the comments...and all the ideas being floated. The skirt over the glass floor is the perfect example of why I wanted to share my project. I did learn long ago to be open to ideas, but to stay true to my vision. At the end of the day the success or failure of Bulrush will be on my hands.

We've been exploring this idea as well.

Yep, I missed that. Thanks for flagging it for me. I do have glycerin.

what about the glass slide around the skyrise in downtown LA?

Guilty of being a guy on this. Hadn't even considered that. I'll have to think more about this. Might be resolved with parallel walkways -clear and solid.

Final semester student from the top program in the city. It's no different than back in New Mexico when I hired a cook who had worked in the other 4 nicer restaurants in town, and his first day happened to coincide with the day I picked up all of my county fair animals for butchering (4 goats, 2 lamb and a pig), and we spent the whole day breaking them down. He said it was the first time he had ever cut meat before for steaks or restaurant cuts. Crazy.

Today I am visiting a mushroom farm. I don't think I've previously shared this, so pardon me if I have...One of the key features of my new place will be that you'll walk in over a glass floor that is a window into the basement. The basement is stone lined walls (old building) with about an 8' ceiling. I'll be setting up a mushroom farm of my own down there (in addition to my wine cellar, chocolate production and koji meat processing). So, imagine walking about 20' over the forest floor with logs and hanging bags covered in mushrooms; hydroponic wild plant hanging gardens (chickweed, purslane, reindeer lichen (if I can get it to grow domestically). Every design element has a cost, and I have to justify whether or not it is worth it. In part, this is my response to Farm to Fable and the pervasive fraud in the industry. I want people to see everything about their food. I want people to feel a stronger sense of connection to food and its preparers. I'm so mindful of a culinary school student that I met a few months ago at work who didn't know how to identify the top (v. the root) of an onion. It really has become my mission to eliminate that lack of connection.

I'm not pushing hard on this anymore because currently I'm working with a chef who is very bullheaded. He is dead set on one of his recipes that is almost a chocolately angel food cake. He's not a pastry chef at all, so he likes it because he can soak it three days ahead of time and still be able to pick it up for service. Don't ask me why (hanging my head in culinary shame at the lack of freshness). I don't think he realizes the vast options that are out there for people who do pastry, and I'm reluctant to put time into a hopeless cause. What he wanted was a plated tiramisu. So I helped him get a 2" sphere of mascarapone filling that was stable enough for the cook to pick up by hand but soft to the spoon. I got him a chocolate anglaise sauce. We figured out all the garnish - chocolate plaques mostly. He is determined to do a dehydrated meringue garnish, which I hate what it does to the teeth in a dessert like this. I've been arguing for texture. Tiramisu is all smoosh and no crunch. That's fine when you're serving it out of a 9x13 as a square, but as a plated dessert that's not acceptable. I've suggested some type of granola inspired crunch using almonds and brandy. But mostly I wanted the cake to have some crunch to it, but still not be so far away from a traditional tiramisu that people ordering it get disappointed. There is a stark difference in visions and ultimately in this case he is the chef so I've backed off.

I've never heard that sound on my machine.

The $45 is a set price that will include a diverse parings list. Ala carte options will be available as well with a wide range of prices. So this morning was interesting. A design firm reached out and said - what if they came in as an investor where their services were the investment? Not sure what this entails - is it a gift? an investment? Anyway I share it here because it's a cool idea that I hadn't thought about yet. i'm also thinking today about what happens with weather closures - St. Louis has a big ice storm coming in today. That's lost revenue. How do I handle customers who have pre-paid for a meal who can't make it in. How do I deal with the money, the rescheduling if we're fortunate enough to be booked far in advance? Can I have added seats to add them onto a sold out dinner (chairs at the end of the table to expand seating. Just thinking through at this point. Since we're closed 4 weeks a year I'm leaning toward acting like a school and adjusting snow days to our summer break to address the financial loss.

@teonzo All of the above, and with the non-alcoholic drinks, we'll be giving equal care. My starting point for wines is the portfolio of Eric Solomon/European Cellars. I love all of their stuff. For beers, St. Louis has a crazy good craft scene that includes plenty of diversity but also foraged brewers and experimental brewers. The person I'm recruiting for Beverage Manager has been making a name for himself in Texas, and was my very first high school intern, so he knows how to incorporate foraged items into cocktails. This is the area where I see the most potential revenue growth since on the restaurant side we're limited by the number of seats and days. And unlike New Mexico where I could never afford a full liquor license (most recent rate is $750k), in Missouri they are $315.

Even with this second go around I used the same strategy to keep it from feeling overwhelming. Using you as an example...how many chocolates will I really sell in one day - not Valentines, but in October. Let's say you expect to sell 10 boxes a day at $20 per box. Besides chastising you for undervaluing your chocolates I then do the math from there. 10 boxes x 5 days a week x 52 weeks. But we know that may not be realistic. Sundays may be worse. Hot summer months may be worse. Let's say we expect to sell $52,000 in chocolates per year. I then make the guess more conservative and say 60% = 31,200. So many factors though, right? Christmas, wedding catering, corporate gifts...just start breaking it down. Let me show you a few examples from my current business plan (pre-edit): Here is how I got my $45 drink pairing ticket price... $45 drink pairing breakdown Drink (71.147%) Tax (7.113%) Gratuity (20%) Bank Fee (1.74%) $34.92 $2.48 $6.98 $0.61 $45.00 Estimated alcohol sales per yr 16 ppl/stg @ $45 $720 per seating x 6 stgs/wk $4,320 per week x 48 wks of 6 stgs $207,360 per 48 week year $124,416 60% capacity Breakdown Drink $96,174 Tax $8,850 Gratuity $24,883 Bank fee $2,165 Sorry for the goofy formatting but I think you can follow my logic. The moral is...start at one bite and expand it, then apply a conservative number so you don't come up short. On the expense side I fluff things quite a bit too.

That's exactly right. Our SBDC said that they had succeeded if they helped people realize they weren't ready to start a business. Not for the faint of heart.

@MrSpiffy that's exactly right. For the Kumquat I worked through the Small Business Development Center (SBDC) to assist in writing my business plan. Even with that, much of what was in there was a best guess. This go around I'm using professional contacts to review my plan - friends who are lawyers, architects, etc. (many of whom I am hoping to have as investors). Instead of my 10 page plan with demographics and all the standard stuff, I'm skipped some of the fluff and got right to business. My new plan says Here's what I did in New Mexico; Here's what I plan on doing in St. Louis; Here are the financials. Experience drives my current plan, not theoretic and hypothetic data.