chefjustinbasta
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Posts posted by chefjustinbasta
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I don't have the life experience to offer any insight beyond what you have already found yourself. You have passion, focus, technical skill and will, and that combination will take you far. Good communication with your colleagues and supportive superiors will validate if you are doing right by the standards that are set or if you have to compensate somehow or push to reach standards that aren't being met.
I guess the only advice I have is go ahead and aim for perfection, but if you do not achieve it, do not let frustration from imperfection distract you from pursuing your passion. "Perfection" is a relative term more often than not.
If this was just any job, I imagine that life priorities reach far beyond getting a paycheck. But since this your life's passion, I say find fulfillment in your cooking and strength in your abilities, but know that you are more than your physical capabilities.
Thank you for sharing your story. I tip my glass to you.
I had 3 open heart surgeries, 13 electropsyiology studies, 14 catherizations, 2 T.E.E. 's and now a pace maker/defib combo my friend. There are days when i want to quit but i dont. I found that people saying i cant or could not do things because of this condition i have that is rare, actually helped me. When my body and mind wanted to quit, i said no and then usually passed up most in the kitchen who said i cant, then i lead the crew. A title and a name on my chef coat. I say this not to boast, i say this to help you because no one really understood me. I know the feeling. Just keep @ the pace and path you are on my friend and i am sure you will be the man left standing. I admire your courage, bravery, strength, and heart. I can promise that the obsticals you face day to day just to come in to work, will only prove as your catalyst in the end. You are a good man.
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davidshap....
my advice to you being that you are a "newbie" is try with simple things that are stated above as classics but mabey employ similar cooking methods as well to both protiens and sides at the same time to help you discover things like texture and pairings. Example would be braising lets say a chicken along with some root vegetables such as carrots and parsnips. Sometimes if you apply certain tekniques (cant spell very well thats why i cook...) it often leads to the "suitable" sides, a guideline if you will. Then maybe you will develop what is "proper" for a dish to start off with in a classic manner. Search for how each one of your "sides" can be cooked and use it to your advantage with your main. Once you get more tekniques under your belt and find that many sides you are using that are being prepared in the same manner as the main, you will find yourself then searching- and thats where the mother of invention kicks in. Again start with the classics, build up a recipie arsenol, then you can mix and match. i think that trial by error (at least for me in the first few years) was the best because i started with a strong foundation- learned how different sides were prepared, planned my dishes from that (w/main) and then eventually expanded. Take the time and you will not be disappointed. Pick up an old Escoffie book on recipies or La Gastronomique and you will see what i am talking about with the old recipies and how europeans used tekniques pairing the dishes to THEIR advantage & so that your not doing 10 things at once to start as a beginner. In those books they even detail sauces and other (side) substitutions for the main so i defininatlely reccomend them. Good luck and sorry for the bad spelling --- i chose to NOT work in an office so.... ....... ........ ........
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Quick Recipe for salmon of the Asain type flavor.
Using a very hot pan lightly coated with SESAME OIL......... sear the salmon on both sides. A little dab of oil will do you since salmon has a lot of natural oils which eventually increase the oil in the pan and spit at you
Sear both sides for Only 3-4 minutes on each side. Take the salmon out of the oil & pan off the heat and then SHALLOW POACH the salmon IN WHITE WINE OR MIRIN in a seperate pan, then place in the oven for an additional 8-10 minutes on 400-500 F. (when dealing with YOUR customers tell em 350 for 13-15 minutes)
While the salmon is in the oven, and your sesame oil is still hot in your first pan- put it back on the stove and throw in;
tbl spoon minced pickled ginger
1/2 tbl spoon minced garlic
Some chopped cilantro (as much as you like, as i cilantro is 50/50 to people)
1 tsp red pepper flake
sliced green onion (bout a small palm full)
and saute for a minute.
then add 5-6oz of MIRIN (you can use white wine instead) to the mixture in the pan to deglaze, then a touch of soy, and a regular spoonful (not heaping) of HOISIN SAUCE. Stir to blend well while it BOILS (keeping pan on high heat)
Let this reduce until it coats the back of a spoon.
By that time your salmon should be finished and your ready to sauce your fillet. You can pair the salmon with baby bok choi, snap peas, raddish any-&-or- All to compliment your protien and round off your meal. good luck and keep at it. If you try all the dishes above including this one, you now have several to rattle off to your fish loving customers.
Enjoy
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Well Done! I am truly envious of your oppourtunity to be present at this event. Ferran Adria is my hero and i wish to visit El Buli when i travel abroad next summer. Again, job well done.
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i misspoke. a rushed thought sometimes leads to defeat
Carmilization was what i had in mind. -
i have done little research on sous vide cooking and i was just trying to make a parallel. By the way Malliard Reaction is 338 degrees F. Thanks all for the feedback as i am enjoying all the views on this.
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Having sworn off home-use stick blenders years ago, weary of feeble little motors which whined and smelled of overheating, I'm deep in the middle of soup season, and remembering the convenience factor of blending in the pan.
Maybe not fondly enough to buy another underpowered toy though. Our regular blender is a second hand Vita-mix, and that thing is a workhorse, but a batch of soup can easily be three beakers full.
Does anyone use a small commercial stick blender at home - maybe something like the 12 inch Waring? - I know that I don't need a double-handed 40 gallon concrete mixer.
Your experiences, good or bad, and recommendations please.
JBPrince.com has the smallest "graduating" to the biggest blenders available for commercial use. You can view what you are looking for and get the specks on that site i believe. Their products are usually top shelf and the company is very reputable as i have used them for many things in the past. As for a small stick blender, i use one at work that is a BRAUN and that too is a workhorse but im not sure if they have intermediate sizes available. The one i use is small but it gets jobs done. Much luck
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One thing is certain to me - I don't need a chemist in the kitchen. I want to cook from my heart.
I don't think one excludes the other. It's possible to use the latest equipment, ingredients, techniques, flavor combinations, etc. from the heart and it's also possible to bang out classic dishes without caring at all. Restaurants that focus mainly on the wow factor of it all may or may not fall victim to the trends but the ideas they are making happen will influence the food world for a long time to come in my opinon. Although, I sincerely hope I never see a McFoie with Cheese Caviars and supersize French Fry Consomme with Ketchup Foam.
Well put try2cook. Exactly. I again am not trying to follow trends. I am just trying to use exact science in order to achieve spot on results. For instance a chapter on "Softening Lentils" by Herve' This in his book "Molecular Gastronomy the Science of Flavor" discusses the processes of achieving a perfect lentil by using exact sciences. It discusses the hardness of water and how to change that to achieve perfection using Sodium Bicarbonates & time and tempature rules discussing exact tempatures that directly effect the proportion of lentils that are ruptured to the lentils left intact varying on the tempatures involed and the time it took in order to "cook" the lentils themselvs. When applied this can be very useful as you can precisely dertimine using EXACT SCIENCES when your "lentils" are finished.... this is without worry or done with checks apon checks of your product for consistancy. Is that a "trend"????? No. Is that trial by error, yes. It enables me to go to work in the morning, set my lentils to temp and maybe even time via timer and it leaves me with no back of the mind worry allowing me to work on other things & being able to come back to perfection. I think somone above was right when they suggested a food sciences degree for me.
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I don't think there is a clear cut answer for the proper timing between courses - too many variables. If it's very busy and a restaurant needs to turn tables or feed a pre-theater crowd, then obviously times between courses is shorter. If reservations are well-spaced out and customers are not in a hurry, then a few extra minutes between courses is nice for some diners.
Now I'll be honest and say that I do not have lots of FOH experience (I've been stuck in the kitchen). However, I will venture to say that I believe the proper timing is best determined by the server on a table-by-table basis. Well-trained servers should be able to send fire tickets and pace each meal based upon what they think is the proper timing for each table, all variables considered. After all, table 12 might be trying to catch a movie, while table 13 wants a nice, long, romantic dinner.
And if a server anticipates that a table is significantly slower or quicker than the average pace at that particular restaurant, he/she should communicate that to the kitchen ASAP.
I agree with wax 311. Usually i rely on the pace of the diners themselvs and the intuition of a well trained server to let me know when to fire so that there arent any miscues with the table. I have had plenty of foodies lost in conversation & not ready for what is headed there way. Sometimes people want the convience of controlling "their" convience of dining out.
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Take for instance sous vide cooking and no malliard reaction. What if there was a way for sous vide cooking to have the flavor and color of malliard reaction........, that sort of thing.
This is why we cook some items in 2 or more stages, combining different techniques. In the case of sous-vide cooking, we'll cook it at low temperature first, then take it out of the bag and grill/sear it. Or maybe we'll sear it first, then cook it sous-vide, then take it out and glaze it. And so on.
Honestly, I'm not that fond of novelty. I mean, I'll use plenty of modern techniques in my cooking, make use of all my know-how, but I prefer simple, hearty, down to earth dishes. I grew up quite poor, so for me it's important when I do go out and do my own restaurant, that it be accessible.
That being said, how do you get into the 'scene'? Own your own restaurant, create hype around yourself, market yourself, and hope your 'creations' are as tasty as they are wierd. Oh yeah, and become a pastry chef. Seriously. Understanding pastry techniques is huge. So much of this 'style' of cuisine borrows from the pastry side of things.
The "scene" is great but again i am really interested in food as a whole on a scientific level. Pastry is indeed one of the staples when it comes to techniques that are able to be applied to many dishes both sweet and savory. I just think maybe i phrased my question or inquery the wrong way.
Maybe i should be more of a lab chef that tests dishes in test kitchens for large companys for extreme volume? I absolutely love what i do but i am extremely fasinated by the science... action, reaction, why, how do i take this information and be able to apply to new? .... thoughts????? ...........
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Chef,
I don't know if switch to molecular gastronomy is at all justified. It's very much in-fashion right now - no doubt, but I question if it's going to be just that ... a fashionable trend, and, like many other trends, a short-lived one at best.
Molecular gastronomy is impressive, indeed. So are other chemical experiments... Quite frankly, MG is "edible chemistry" in it's earnest, but I just don't see a family having dinner at a lab table, and I don't see chemicals at a festive gathering with food and wine... except, perhaps fireworks.
So, why should we cook on anti-griddles, use liquid nitrogen, and jelly-foam everything??? I don't think we should....
The route in this field i am taking is more about the science of flavor and not so much the grandure of elaborate levitating lentils. I am more interested in food synergies and flavor assimilations. Flavor pairings if you will using new processes and scientific steps in doing so. Textures are able to be played with as well and its not so much of "i want to be new and different" thing, its more of how and ingredient can progress when scientific processes are applied that were never even explored. Take for instance sous vide cooking and no malliard reaction. What if there was a way for sous vide cooking to have the flavor and color of malliard reaction........, that sort of thing. Yes i am interested in the whole "fad" type of the cuisine but i would like to learn that as a base and transform IT .
Something in my head along the lines of using something for the good like a superpower if you will (sorry best parallel i could think of.) I know molec gastronomy has many negative connotations but if used correctly i belive it can benefit food. I am happily open to any and all opinions and i certainly value yours, its just i feel that food, espically in fusion cooking is progressing and i think that fusion at its best can be used as a base to move foward again.
any thoughts?
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I have researched molecular gastronomy to the point of mental meltdowns. With that, I am finding it hard to make a transition, or break into this field; and fully turn knowledge into pragmatic application. I have knowledge of the ingredients, processes, and scientific reactions but find it hard to actually go full force into this "new age" cuisine. Do i hire chemists, chemical physicists, a think tank of chefs as well? I have many ideas and try to utilize what i have learned and transfer it into my daily work but come up short. How does a restaurant like Moto in Chicago go from cooking to using class 4 lasers and anti griddles? There is a HUGE gap. Where is it? I am asking anyone for any thoughts, advice or direction so that i may further myself and achieve what i have in mind.
thank you,
chef justin basta
Molecular gastronomy in Paris: Hervé This, etc.
in France: Dining
Posted
Herve' THIS book in english... "Exploring the Science of Flavor" pick it up at barnes and noble, order online. Sorry i just skimmed the first 5 or 6 posts so if someone already made you aware of this book, my apologies. BTW very interesting and i have put it to much practical use.