Kitchen Guy

Blog Topic: Service Service Service

Posted by Chef Jim on January 21, 2010  |  Comments Off

SIMPSON BAY, Sint Maarten, Netherlands Antilles – There’s a restaurateur here whom I came to like and admire very much over the last few years. He and his wife retired from the U.S. and opened what became a very popular tavern/restaurant. He’s just one of several expatriates I’ve met in Sint Maarten. It can be a daring move for anyone, and a number of these folks seem to be retirees, so they’re gambling with their savings and security.

Sometimes these gambles pay off. Many times they don’t. I’ve seen both instances a number of times. If you put together a menu that people want, and if the food is good, and you can hire as many of the right people as you possibly can, that’s a formula for success. A major problem in Sint Maarten, as far as I can tell, is the labor law that seems to require an excess of personnel, many of whom are just biding their time, collecting their paychecks.

I’m not saying this is unique to Sint Maarten. I’ve had the misfortune of supervising a number of “employees” like that right here and I’ve told more than one not to let the door hit them in the back. Nevertheless, when you have this excess of personnel, my expectation is that no customer should ever be ignored or have to wait for service.

I remember the first time I visited the island and went to a bagel shop on a Sunday morning. I was astounded to see that it took four people to complete an order for a toasted bagel: one to take the order (in triplicate!); a different one to pass the order to the kitchen; the person in the kitchen; and the cashier. It’s no wonder the place went out of business. Food margins are slim enough. Bagel margins are even slimmer.

These restaurateurs I wrote of earlier owned a restaurant that used to be walking distance from our apartment in Simpson Bay, located in a strip shopping center along the very busy Welfare Road. The owners seemed to have it made. The place was always busy and the food was decent – not great – but decent. There was always a large, jolly man with cornrows and beads in his hair to greet you; he remembered your name; there was always a hug and he made sure that the wait staff paid attention to your needs. I could always forgive the missteps from the kitchen (invariably there was always something) because the atmosphere was playful, friendly and the prices for beer, wine and mixed drinks were very reasonable.

I’m not sure what motivated them to move their location across the Bay, but the whole character of the place changed. The prices increased dramatically, no doubt because the rent and other overhead expenses increased substantially in the new place. A bone-in rib eye steak, of unknown grade and origin, cost $39.95, when the boneless version was $10 less. That didn’t make sense to me – I know bones are great for adding flavor, but I just can’t abide paying that much extra for something I can’t eat.

Nevertheless, here was our experience: It was a Sunday evening, about 7:30. We parked our car and walked into the new place. You’ll recall what I said about places having an excess of employees. We stood at the host’s stand for nearly 10 minutes before even being acknowledged. Finally, a bartender came out from behind the bar and seated us at a table near the kitchen. Imagine a bartender not asking if you’d like something to drink!

It was nearly 10 minutes before a different bartender came by to ask us if we’d like something from the bar and then I watched our two-drink order sit on the bar at the wait station for more than five minutes. We still had not been given menus. Finally, the drinks came to the table. To my way of thinking, when one orders a martini, it automatically should come with at least one olive. That’s part of what makes it a martini. When I pointed this out to the server/bartender, he acknowledged the missing garnish and brought it over. Then, after a quick glance at the menus that finally came to the table, we ordered our appetizers and dinner.

Our appetizers came in a reasonable amount of time and they were good. As for the main course, we waited and waited and waited for our entrees. I actually saw our order placed on the pass, ready for delivery to our table. But a server took it somewhere else. About 10 minutes later, one of the wait staff volunteered to us that, “Another table ordered exactly the same thing you did and they got your order.” Really? What’s up with your computerized POS system that prints out the table number?

It was very nice of the server to comp a glass of wine for each of us. But another 25 minutes ensued before our entrees arrived at the table.

I asked my wife to rate the place on a four star scale and she said she would give it somewhere between two and two-and-a-half stars. I would have to agree, leaning toward the lower rating. Service is so critical to the dining experience. The entrees were okay (not great) but the service was so seriously lacking at this place and it saddens me that I’ll probably cross it off my list of places to go when I’m here next.

That saddens me, because as I wrote at the beginning of this piece, I like the owners and have always wanted them to do well. I understand they’ve taken on a partner who will buy out their interests some time in the coming year so that they can retire again. So to the new owner I say: as long as the government of Sint Maarten requires you to have so many people on your payroll, why not train all of them in customer service?

Blog Topic: The Great Gravy Boat Incident

Posted by Chef Jim on December 21, 2009  |  Comments Off

For some ridiculous reason, there’s always a story that comes out of holiday gatherings at my house, usually the result of a guest at our table.

This year was no exception. And every word is true.

I have a very dear friend, who’s been at my dinner table a number of times, but this was his first Thanksgiving with us.

In addition to all of the cooking I do for others, I also make a complete turkey dinner (a basic mirror of ours) for the men and women who have to work on the holiday at the TV station where my television program is broadcast. It’s the least I can do for them because they make me look so good. (They get Christmas dinner from me, too.)

Anyway, back to this guy. We asked our guests to come about an hour and a half before dinner so that we could have a drink and socialize a bit before sitting down to the massive feast this holiday demands.

Our tradition is to serve turducken as the main course and if you aren’t familiar with that, it’s a Cajun specialty that is a completely deboned chicken, stuffed inside a completely deboned duck, stuffed inside a mostly deboned turkey. They leave the turkey drumsticks and wings. In between the birds and in the chicken cavity is a stuffing – either a Cajun sausage with cornbread stuffing or Creole seafood stuffing with rice. (I buy this and have it shipped to me because even though I know how to debone poultry, I’d rather let someone else do this task!)

The three-bird combination yields some tasty drippings which, in turn, gives me the makings for one fine gravy, because we also serve a combo dish I call marbled mashed potatoes, combining Russets and sweet potatoes; an apple and sausage cornbread stuffing, plus the meat – so there’s plenty of food on the plate that is appropriate for gravy.

As we sat down to the table and began bringing the various dishes around to serve to our guests, my friend’s wife quietly warned my wife not to let my friend have the gravy pitcher until everyone else at the table had it. My wife thought that was a strange thing to say and when she told me, I thought the same thing, but let it pass.

Well, we found out why she gave us not a hint, but a warning. My friend didn’t get the pitcher last, and for some unknown reason, he was the third person out of eight to get the gravy pitcher and he poured the entire contents onto his plate! I estimate that to be about a pint and a quarter of gravy.

“Are you kidding me?” I barked (and I confess I added an expletive or two).

My friend’s wife responded, “I told you so. He did this at my mother’s last year and he hasn’t lived it down since.” There was a stunned silence at the table and a goofy look on my friend’s face. The lighting was dimmed for dinner so I couldn’t see if there was any sign of embarrassment.

“Hey. What can I tell you? I love gravy,” was his response.

“And what about the rest of us?” I asked. He shrugged his shoulders. His wife then added, “If he’s ever invited back, you can just make up some of that powdered gravy mix and give it to him. He wouldn’t know the difference.”

I’ve shared this story with my hundreds of Facebook friends around the world and they reacted as I’m sure you are reacting now as you read this.

One of my guests, who probably ought to be in the diplomatic corps, said: “Well, Jim, at least your turducken, and extra stuffing are moist and tender just as they are. And I guess if you wouldn’t mind, I’ll just put a little butter on my potatoes.”

Guess who’s not getting invited back next year?

Blog Topic: Oh, Walla Walla!

Posted by Chef Jim on December 4, 2009  |  Comments Off

WALLA WALLA, Wash. – I am acquainted with a wine salesman who once told me that climate change was pushing the grape growing regions of the Northern Hemisphere farther north.

Interesting concept, I thought, and apparently true as we see more and more viniculture outside of the more temperate regions of our country.

One such area is the Columbia Valley in the state of Washington, specifically an area around Walla Walla. There are some mighty good wines coming out of this region and the reputation of the growing number of producers has begun to reach beyond the Northwest.

Our recent trip to Portland, Oregon included a planned detour through Walla Walla, as we were acquainted with at least two producers whose wines we enjoy very much. One such place is Bergevin Lane.

One thing that makes this particular winery special is that two women are the principals, Annette Bergevin and Amber Lane. To be sure, it’s not the only winery in North America run primarily by women, but they are in a distinct minority. They know their stuff and proved it to me originally at a dinner featuring their wines – six courses, including dessert, with Bergevin Lane products to match with each.

They produce an outstanding reserve Cabernet Sauvignon they call Intuition, and we made it a point to get to this winery specifically for this wine. As the women point out, making a great wine starts with intuition, and they had a hunch that blending cabernet sauvignon with petit verdot, cabernet franc and merlot grapes would make a great tasting wine. Their intuition told them further to leave the wine unfiltered, letting time in the barrel and then in the bottle work their magic. You know all the clichés about women’s intuition. I’m a believer that Annette and Amber have it.

We also bought their vigonier, regular cab-sav, pinot noir from grapes they bought in Oregon and their citrusy Calico White.

I first became acquainted with L’Ecole No. 41 with a dartboard pick at a steakhouse in Spokane. I had asked our waiter for some guidance, but it soon became clear that he knew little to nothing about wine, so I closed my eyes and let my index finger pick the wine blind. How lucky am I?

L’Ecole No. 41 is one of the star producers in the Columbia Valley. The winery is located about 11 miles west of Walla Walla, and they are in a converted schoolhouse, hence the name.

Their best-known product is the estate-grown Merlot, but there are a few blends we managed to pick up that I haven’t seen on any wine lists yet. The first, known as Perigee, is a blend from their Seven Hills Vineyard and I’m at a bit of a loss to understand the thinking behind the name, because they make another called Apogee. The former means the low point of an orbit, while the latter means the high point. Our palates told us to buy the Perigee and not the Apogee, so if I were naming them, I might have switched the names based on our opinions of each.

Windblown loess and geologic good fortune created the soil mixture for L’Ecole to grow these vines, including an outstanding white they call Luminesce. It’s beautifully made and has interesting notes of citrus in the background, but also two other tastes come forward – surprisingly lychee – and a little melon.

To be certain, grape growing and winemaking have been helped immeasurably by advances in science, virtually guaranteeing decent product from hundreds and hundreds of wineries.

But there are a select few that go beyond decent and Bergevin Lane and L’Ecole No. 41 are two that, in my opinion, surpass all expectations.