Cooking at menu6

My first week of senior project was spent at a local independent cleveland restaurant on Larchmere called menu6. On my first day at the restaurant, I sat down with executive chef and co-owner, Michael Herschman to discuss his expectations of me during me first week of project; he told me his goals for my first week included aquatinting myself with the kitchen and where everything was located, basic food prep, and understanding his expectations before any dish is sent out to a customer.

As in most kitchens there is an established hierarchy among the chefs, the higher up the better jobs you have in the kitchen... me, being the newest guy in the kitchen was stuck with all the "not so wonderful" jobs, like peeling and de-vaining hundreds of shrimp, blanching and peeling off the skin of tomatoes, scrubbing the shells of various types of oysters, and slicing up squid. While doing these tasks are necessary to dinner service, to put it bluntly are not fun at all! It's important to keep the food at a certain temperature range in order to prevent the food from spoiling so nearly every one of my "un-fun" tasks had to be done in ice cold water, so by the end my hand were nearly about to fall off.

However, as the week progressed I had the opportunity to move away from the prep and jump onto the line during dinner service. Generally Cavs games put somewhat of a damper on the amount of business the restaurant did in a night, so Michael would leave early those nights and I would stay with just one other chef in the kitchen. However, on this one night we had a huge rush and I was able to assist with the grill station and a little bit of sauté. I made these awesome prosciutto wrapped filets, crispy skin whitefish, in a red miso broth with Japanese noodles, mushroom risotto with black truffle butter, and deep fried shrimp with the most incredible sauce EVER! (aka the Cali sauce also used on the calimari) This "Cali sauce" is sweet and spicy and absolutely delicious, it could be put on nearly anything and I would be more than happy to eat it. If I leave this restaurant with nothing else, I need to know how to make that sauce.

Finally the rush ended and I was able to make one or two interesting deserts for the few remaining customers after the Cavs game. To my surprise he ordered something off of the menu, and I asked can he do that... the response was "he's a vip" I then ask "what do you mean" his response again, "when a customer has a bill racking up more than $2,000, we'll make them whatever the f*** they want." (This man had apparently ordered a $1,200 dollar bottle of wine)

Anyway, I have learned many interesting recipes, tips, and techniques so far, and am excited to learn more in the upcoming weeks!