Letters to a Young Chef (1 of 2 free samples)

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COPYRIGHT
Letters to a Young Chef by Daniel Boulud. Copyright 2003 by Daniel Boulud.
All Rights Reserved. Sharing not permitted.

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LETTERS TO A YOUNG CHEF

Daniel Boulud

To Alex Lee, whom I met as a passionate young cook, and who worked alongside me as a chef de cuisine from 1993 to 2003, for the thousands of dishes we enjoyed cooking together.


DO YOU REALLY WANT TO BE A CHEF?

Writing these letters to you has inevitably made me think of myself when I started out in this business more than thirty years ago. I had yet to see an avocado, taste a truffle or eat my first dollop of caviar, which happened to be a spoonful of beluga over a turbot braised in champagne sauce. You, on the other hand, having spent three years in cooking school, know a lot more about our craft than I did when I threw myself into this career when I was fourteen. I left our family farm in St. Pierre de Chandieu and went to work at Restaurant Nandron in Lyon.

I very soon got my first taste of truffle.

Chef Nandron had just shot a pheasant, grown autumn plump on overripe grapes and juniper berries: He marinated it in cognac and Madeira, stuffed it with foie gras and the first black truffles of the season then roasted it in juniper butter, with cabbage, salsify root and a chunk of country bacon. Even for a kid raised on the glorious food of the Rhône valley this was a sensual revelation. I knew how to hunt and cook a pheasant country style, but that was simple home cooking and this was real cuisine.

Restaurant Nandron was only ten miles down the road from home, but my little village remained much as it had been in the nineteenth century with the exception of cars and electricity. Lyon, on the other hand, was very much part of the modern world: huge, busy, full of cosmopolitan people with sophisticated tastes. It was a far cry from the Boulud farm, where finding a snake in the barn provided enough excitement for a week's worth of conversation. I loved restaurant work from the moment I tied on a crisp blue apron (only the chefs wore white). It didn't take me long to decide three things: I knew I loved to cook, I knew that I wanted to learn from the masters and I knew that being a chef was the only thing I wanted to be.

It was probably a stroke of luck that I did not know much more. In the beginning, I didn't have a clue how much it would take to go from a lowly worker in a French restaurant to creating a restaurant of my own in New York City; I now know that it takes much more than simply knowing how to cook.

People often make that mistake: they confuse skill in the kitchen with being a chef. I've had some wonderful people work for me who can cook damn well. They have the talent. They've learned from the best. And yet I know that they will fulfill their talents best by continuing to cook in a great restaurant rather than trying to run one as a chef or owner.

To be sure, you need to know all the basics: cooking, from savory to sweet, curing to baking, the almost mystical art of sauces, seasoning, spicing, texture and taste. Add to that an up-to-date knowledge or at least acquaintance with the evolving styles of the important contemporary chefs all over the world. Yet this is only the beginning. How to work with people, how to manage them in the cramped quarters and fiery heat of the kitchen, how to practice self-discipline and bring it out in others, where to find the best ingredients and how to squeeze every last penny out of them, how to move around the dining room and be genuinely interested in every customer, how to fulfill the constantly changing food fantasies of a demanding public -- these are skills that have nothing to do with shaking the pan but everything to do with whether or not you have what it takes to be a successful chef.

This lengthy list is not meant to discourage you. What I really want is to lay out before you some things you need to consider now, as you begin your career. And as far as I'm concerned, being a chef of what I would call a gastronomic restaurant is a wonderful career. By this I mean a restaurant that in the spirit of the Michelin guide is "worth a journey," not just a detour. In these letters I will share with you lessons I have learned in the hope that they will help you figure out if this is really the life you want. Of one thing I am sure: The only way you are going to make the grade is if being a chef is indeed what you want most to be.

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