Laundry Thief

    Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice...go fuck yourself! As you all know, I recently wrote a post complaining about someone jacking my laundry. I knew it was being taken and not just getting mixed with others' because only the prized items would go missing. Side towels, aprons, etc. The things a student is always in short of (seriously, side towels are the currency that run this school), and what better way to add a few extra uniform accessories than to shop at Pete's free laundry. At the time I was pissed for a brief moment because it was the night before my AM class leaving me little time to plan accordingly. After a while it became almost comical. Hysterical even, that someone was so desperate for aprons and side towels that they had to keep taking them from my laundry rather than pay the measly $6/per. But why me? I haven't heard any chatter about other things getting stolen, just my shit. I made the post, laughed about it and breathed a sigh of relief because I thought the bandit made his final mark. Apparently the madman has a taste for blood now. At first his methods were sloppy, but now hes changing his pattern. Hes getting better...hes....evolving....

    All jokes aside, this is just getting ridiculous! I ran a load of my sheets, pillow cases, and workout gear in one washer, and my chef whites, aprons, side towels, and such in the other. When the half hour was up, I walked down to the laundry room and switched them to the dryer instead of leaving them in there for someone else to do it for me (I forget sometimes...shit happens). This was late at night, my usual laundry time (who wants to do laundry immediately following 8+ hours on their feet. Not to mention my class only starts at 1am) and I planned on drying them to be picked up in the morning when I was done with class. I get back to the laundry room and my stuff is sitting on the table next to the dryers (people always move your stuff so they can use the machines). I carry my laundry back to my room thinking "there is no way someone took my stuff AGAIN" Sure enough I'm folding laundry like a crazy person so I can dive into my bed and sleep the day away. Looking through my pile there is no neckerchief to be found...I had just bought a new one because someone jacked it last time. "C'monnnn" I say to myself too tired to dwell on it. "Screw it" I continue folding my stuff and am all set to put the fresh sheets on my bed...."wait, where the fuck is my bed sheet??" It wasn't there. Running back to the laundry room I checked the washer again to see if it was stuck to the walls of the machine. Nope, not there. "Ok, it's probably still in the dryer. I stop the dryer my stuff was in the night before and check for it. Not there either. Doubling back to my room I check my pile again. No sheet. I have been up for 24 hours straight, on a new sleep schedule, and someone jacked my fucking bed sheet? what the FUCK!?! Yeah, take my side towels, take my aprons, take my neckerchiefs to add to your stack for kitchen class. But my fucking bed sheet? This has gone toooo far. This thief has crossed the line. I thought there was an unwritten code of man that you don't mess with another man's bed garments. Isn't that the 11th commandment or something?? 

    Our dorm mattresses are not made of cotton like the one I have at home where it would be easy to sleep straight on the mattress, no, these mattresses are made of a cold plastic material. Today I was forced to roll myself up in my blanket like the burritos I made for breakfast. I hate this fucking kid...I promised my dad I would keep the profanity on this blog to a minimum because he feels it doesn't add anything to the subject material. I can agree with that. I think we all can agree, however, that there are times in life when swearing is completely warranted; and this is one of those times. This kid is a fucking ass clown, and needs to be stopped! Tomorrow, I will have to make time to go to Target to buy new sheets...

   These events have inspired me to create another installment of the "detective Haham" series, a fictional story I created one day when I was bored ( Part I & Part II ) so all is not lost I guess...look for Part III of the saga later next week...that is all.

Final Boss: Chef McCue

(BACKGROUND MUSIC #1)

    Here at the CIA, like any other small college you hear a lot of talk about almost anything. Word travels fast on this small but beautiful campus. The thing that people seem to talk about the most is other chefs. When you talk to someone about a new class the question they will undoubtedly ask is, "WHO DO YOU HAVE?". You always want to try and obtain as much information on your upcoming chef as possible. If you think having the inside scoop isn't to your advantage your dead wrong. Some chefs, the infamous ones, you here about from the beginning. Chef, Clark, Chef Roe, Chef McCue, all these chefs are notorious around here for varying reasons so its always a good idea to talk to people who have survived their classes. Dating all the way back to my very first skills class I have heard side chatter about Chef McCue, the K-16 lunch/dinner chef. From what I have gathered about Chef McCue I can confidently say that the man is NUTS! Outside the kitchen he is engaging, friendly, and hilarious (he's hilarious in the kitchen as well). Inside the kitchen, however, I have heard stories about him that will make the hairs on your arms stand up. With most chefs, if you have a great day in class your fine. McCue on the other hand will mess with your head whether you have a good day or not. He is, what Eric and I like to call "the final boss"...

(BACKGROUND MUSIC #2)

    You don't need to be a lover of video games to understand what a "final boss" means but basically a final boss can come at the end of a level or game who must be defeated in order to progress to the next level or beat the game. Even movies have a final boss. You know the evil bad guy at the end that the good guy has to defeat to get the girl at the end. Bowser from Super Mario, Jaws from Goldeneye, or any bad guy from James Bond for that matter ("Do you expect me to escape?" "No Meester Bond...I expect you to die!"), Mr. Sandman from Mike Tyson's Punchout, Hitler from Wolfenstein 3D (from which this picture was doctored) are all infamous final bosses. I can remember as a kid spending hours trying to defeat these bosses, screaming and throwing a controller in frustration with my mom in the background telling me to take a break. Defeating a final boss isn't just to beat the game, its a right of passage. If I never beat those bosses I would like to think my life would be filled with fear and self-doubt rather than confidence and self-worth...

   (BACKGROUND MUSIC #3)

   Some of the stories you hear about Chef McCue are pretty funny because they were at the expense of somebody else, but when our class enters K-16 I am sure he will have a whole new batch of tricks up his sleeve. here are the stories about Chef McCue I have heard thus far:

1. A student once stupidly took one of Chef McCue's side towels during a busy lunch service. When McCue noticed he made the kid wear a roll of paper towels around his apron strings. Every couple of minutes he would call the student off the line (when they were in the weeds) and ask for paper towels. When the student would approach Chef McCue he would take ONE paper towel and tell him to get back to work. This transpired though the entirety of service. 
2.  Before a class started one time he made the entire class stand in a line outside the kitchen, and asked each student a question pertaining to something we have learned at the CIA. Get it right and your granted access to the kitchen. Get it wrong and its back of the line. I saw a student get a question wrong 3 times when I was walking by the other day. 
3. My friend Matt and his class were slow one day so McCue told everyone to stop and come to the front of the class. He told them for family meal they had to take a banana out to the baseball fields (other end of campus) and take a picture of someone eating it at home plate then return with the banana peel. 
4. One day Chef McCue kept noticing gloves in the compost bin (we have separate trash bins for trash, compost, and recycling...word to the wise, don't confuse the three!) so he dumped the compost bin out onto the floor and told the class to dig through it until they found the gloves. After digging through the pile of compost McCue said to them, "I was just kidding, there are no gloves in the compost bin. I already took them out." 
5. Right before lunch service Chef McCue walked up to a student who had just finished making Hollandaise. He tasted the Hollandaise and said it was perfect. Then dumped a ladle of hot water into the bain marie of Hollandaise and told the student to fix it...THREE MINUTES BEFORE SERVICE. See, you don't need to make a mistake for McCue to mess with you.
6. Last but not least, my personal favorite. Chef McCue used to have a case called the "Burnt Food Museum" where he stored all the food students badly burnt. Since they were so badly burned they were preserved for years. 

    If you don't believe me about that last point check this link out. Its taken directly from his Facebook page: Chef McCue's Burnt Food Museum

(BACKGROUND MUSIC # 4)

    I'm not making this stuff up, the man is crazy! It used to be that with other chefs, if you had a good day and kept your head down you would go virtually unnoticed. With Chef McCue, even if your doing great he will find a way to throw you off your game. He is awesome though. I like that he screws with people. I like that he tries to throw you off your game because it will only make you stronger in the end. Students always say to me, "Don't take him seriously. When he calls you over if your real serious he is going to mess with you even more. Unless he is crazy pissed. Then be serious." I think I am going to have a blast in his class. I can't wait. Chef McCue, if you ever happen to read this...bring it on!!!

"Steve Jobs"

    See I have this blog. And every so often I like to post funny things on it. Well one day a while back I posted something about my then Product Knowledge Chef--Freddy B, looking identical to Steve Jobs. In class I leaned over to my friend Eric and had a little side conversation.
Me: "Who does Freddy B look like?"
Eric: "I donno, who?"
Me:  "C'mon, think. Someone famous."
Eric: "Uhhh I can't really think of anyone."
Me: "Doesn't he look like Steve Jobs?"
Eric: (*Stares at Freddy B for a while*) *Realization face* "OH MY GOD!" *turns to person next to him and whispers the same thing* "This is one of those things that now that you've mentioned it, I can't NOT see him as Steve Jobs...what have you done!"

R.I.P.

    From there the legend of Steve Jobs was born. Fast forward to present day and I had just finished up my post about the "laundry thief" (seriously screw who ever did that). I was making my way over to the rec center to grab some Courtside to go when I bumped into Freddy B himself leaving the building. I said hello, but didn't want to disrupt his conversation with another student. Walking into the building I hear his voice from outside, "Peter, hold up a second!" Here is the ensuing conversation:

Me: "Hey Freddy B, what's goin' on?"
FB: "I wanted to tell you, the weirdest thing happened to me the other day"
Me: *Perplexed* "Oh yeah?"
FB: "Yeah. I was surfing the internet the other day, and don't ask me how, but somehow I think I stumbled upon your blog!"
Me: "Hahaha....wait, really?"
FB: Yeahh I don't know how I found it, but I saw your post about me"
Me: *realizing he's talking about the Steve Jobs comparison* "Chef Brash, I meant nothing by it. It was just a joke I wasn't trying to make fun of you or anyth.."
FB: Nooo I thought it was hilarious. I was reading it and I called my wife Chaun over and said, 'Chaun, do I look like Steve Jobs??' She said I did, and we both started laughing. It was histerical!"

    Breathing a sign of relief that he was not offended (he's a pretty laid back and comedic person but still, ya never know right?) I told him I had literally just finished up a new post. He was interested to see more, but had absolutely no idea how he stumbled upon my blog. I asked him if he had a pen and paper (he did), and I wrote down the link and we both went our separate ways.

    That was last week, and I have been thinking about it ever since. How did he find me? I mean, there are literally hundreds of blogs and articles named "Food for thought" (I created the name realizing that. I thought it would be funny, almost poking fun of myself because that's what my blog would represent). And its not like I have a million followers so my blog would be the first one to pop up on a Google search or anything. No you would either have to get my blog link from someone who has it or you would have to do some SERIOUS digging to find it. To put it this way, if I started ranting about terrorism, bad mouthing the present, and death to the infidels it would take the FBI weeeeeks to find me. People living off the grid have a bigger footprint than this blog...

"Come find me, bro!"

    So how the hell did Freddy B find me?? I love that he saw it and that he might read more, but how did he stumble across this blog? Is this my ticket? Is this the big moment I've been waiting for all along? Is this my ticket to fame and stardom? If it is, I promise I won't forget you. I know what your thinking. "But Pete, what if you get all rich and famous? What if the money changes you?" Well rest assured if that does happen, it will. I'm headed straight for Hollywood babayy!! *shoots pistols into the air* *dismissive wink* "Up top!" *pulls hand away* "TOO SLOW! 

Night Owl

    Its half past Midnight now so I thought why not a post to keep me up, eh? This upcoming week I will be starting breakfast in the infamous K-16 (high volume production kitchen) before moving to lunch as my last class before leaving for externship. I'm forcing myself to stay up because my breakfast class STARTS at 1am and ends at 9 so I need to try and get on that sleep schedule so I am not in zombie mode for class. They say it takes a week or two to get used to a new sleeping schedule, but here at the CIA we get a weekend...

What was I doing...oh yeah, breakfast burritos.

When we met with Chef McCue (he's so crazy he has to have his own post) he stressed to us the importance of making coffee. We took notes while he discussed the ins and outs of the class, how he wants the homework done, job responsibilities, etc. Right in the middle of his lecture he says, "Oh yeah, and make F-ing coffee! Seriously you'll piss everyone off if you don't. I want you to write that down in your little notepads...'make F-ing coffee!'" For your information I did not edit the quote to say "F-ing" he actually said "F-ing"...Anyway so that will be my next week and a half with the "ex girlfriend".

    I did a Google search for: ex girlfriend Memes and GIFs so I could have something clever to add and this is what came up...

Brilliant!

   I thought that was genius and awesome. On a sidenote: in high School when my home was calling the ringtone used to be the theme from Jaws. *Donit...donit...donit...donit donit donit donit...donit* "Pete, your Mom is calling!!!" To be fair, when I was a teenage my Mom was a HAWK! She always tried to catch my brother and I doing bad, so we had to come up with clever ways to elude our secret agent mother. Through creativity the jaws theme ringtone was born. Love you mom!

    I am semi on track for my new sleep schedule partly because Friday after my cooking practical I was so exhausted I immediately crashed in my bed for several hours...ok so it was 6 hours. Apparently I said goodbye to my roommate but have no recollection of the talk (he left for externship). Hours into my epic slumber my RA came into the room to tell me I had to clean the room because a new roommate would be coming soon. Half awake I asked her if I could do it tomorrow and she told me I could have a new roommate as early as that night. She left. I slept. When I woke up a Korean kid was in my room unpacking his stuff. I forgot to clean. Jumping out of bed, I said hello in my boxer briefs and apologized for the mess (it was just a butt load of laundry on the floor, nothing crazy). Great first impression he must have. I folded my laundry while he was out and emptied the trash so he didn't think I was a slobby bottom dweller. Later that night Bum Seung and I talked for a while and I told him a little bit about his upcoming classes. He moved from a different dorm (for what reason I did not ask) so he's not new new, but he is still in his first skills class. Coming from Korea Bum Seung's English is pretty broken so my job is to make him as comfortable as I can while I am here before I leave for extern. I wasn't sure how long it would be until I received a new roommate, if at all before I left. Needless to say, you know you've taken an epic nap when you go to bed while your old roommate is packing, and wake up when your new roommate is unpacking. "Where am I? What Year is it?"

Real Men of Genius!

    I remember those old Budlight radio ads that swept the nation a while back called, Real Men of Genius. The announcer came on the commercial began with the annoucer saying something like: "BUDLIGHT PRESENTS: REAL. MEN. OF. GENIUS. Today we salute YOU! Mr. driving range golf ball picker-upper." and a background singer adlibbing the narration "(YEAHHH you pick up those ballls!)"My neighborhood friend Todd Meyer and I would make a cd with a bunch of them on it and play it in the car. If your not familiar with the commercials take a ganders:

    Anyway, today some friends and I went to Warrens Kitchen & Cutlery after our practical to sharpen our knives for our cooking portion of the practical tomorrow morning. I grabbed a fish spatula and a tin box of tea. An avid coffee drinker I like to drink tea and switch it up from time to time so I bought some Black Current tea by Harney & Sons Fine Teas. It was 7 bucks but well worth it if you want something more than liptons teabags. The tea leaves come in a little sachet pouch but I realized when I got back to my room that my roommate already took his microwave home (I dont't have access to boiling water so I usually resort to his micowave...such is dorm life). Thinking of ways to make tea I noticed my Keurig coffee maker and remembered that a girl used to make tea with it.
    Instead of putting a coffee pod in the lever, you simply run the machine with no pod and you will have piping hot coffee at your finger tips. Brilliant. The problem, however, was that since I've brewed coffee with it so many times there was old coffee grinds from the pods in the filter. When I ran it to get hot water it came out yellow with specks of grind in it. Whats a kid gonna do? I want my tea (it smells devine). Again having to think on my feet, I wondered if my Brita filter would turn it to clear hot water so I tried it. I poured the gross pond-like water into my Brita and VOILA, crystal clear hot water. Its no significant moment of insight but I was pretty impressed with my decision making skills...

Coffee water...

The magic of Brita!

Crystal clear

Getting there...

Tea time!

    I must admit I was pretty impressed with the Brita filter. I usually use it for tap water but I have never tried yellow scummy coffee water before. I never thought in a million years it would come out perfectly clear. So if you want to take the unconventional route for making tea all you need is a Keurig machine and a Brita filter.

"BUDLIGHT PRESENTS: REAL. MEN. OF. GENIUS! Today we salute YOU! Mr. Unconventional tea brewer guy (Mr. Unconventional tea brewwwerr guuyyyy!!) When others said you couldn't make tea. You...made...tea. (Your a master tea makerrrr!!!) Living in a dorm, armed only with a Keurig machine you brewed that golden tea...HAR-MONIOUSLY (You got harmony in thatttt cuppp yeaahhhh!!!) When life gave you hot coffee water you said, 'WAIT....I'll just filter it!' (That's the power of Britaaaa!!!) So crack open an ice cold Budlight sorcerer of gastronomy (he thinks he's a scientisttttt!!!) because we know...you'll be teabagging ALL NIGHT!" 

Final Assessments, Part I

    If this post goes off trail more than usual I apologize in advance. I've been up since 3am this morning cross-training in K-16 (my next class) or as many of you already know, "the exgirlfriend". We will be starting the breakfast rotation in K-16 on Monday which means my sleeping schedule is screwed. For 7 class days I will be going to class at around midnight and wont leave until 9am or so. This is our high volume production kitchen which means they can pump out some serious plates during a service (especially lunch). In order to know your station and get to know what needs to be done for day 1 you need to trail in the kitchen for a breakfast service. I don't want to get to deep into it, otherwise this post will carry on forever. I will have a post all about my K-16 stage in the near future.

    What I really wanted to talk about was part I of my 2nd term practical. An all encompassing exam to test your knowledge on everything you have learned up to this point. To review, part one is a 100 question multiple choice examination. You are allotted 1.5 hours for the exam, which is more than generous...even for my characteristically slow test taking. Really slow. I never was the guy who finished first, in fact I am usually one of the last ones along with the girl who speaks English as a second language.

  
    That clip was from one of my favorite movies: Real Genius with Val Kilmer. I was, and still am not that guy. This is not to say that I am a bad test taker I just take my time. I do the test, mark any questions I don't know or hesitate on. When I am finished I go back and review the questions I was unsure about. Once I do that I skim the test to check for stupid miscalculations and what have you then tally up my scantron to make sure I didn't mistakenly skip a question (my 8th grade teacher once told me that a student missed question 29 on his scantron and did not notice. Every question on his 100 Q test was one question off so he failed his final. Ever since then I double check. Every. Single. Time.). This used to drive my UB buddies nuts! Most of the time we would carpool to exams and they would have to wait around an extra hour for me to finish. What can I say? I'm a thorough test taker.... 

"Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe." ~ Abe Lincoln

    I finished the exam and felt pretty good about it overall. The proctor told the class we could come back in an hour for the results. We all went to farq and discussed questions we were unsure of. Most of the Qs people were unsure of I knew I got right so my confidence was building. An hour later we all walked back up to the 4th floor to see our scores. Its on a pass/fail basis with an extra category for high passes (95% or above). Chef Jones, a quirky British guy (hes the dean of the Culinary, not the CIA but the cooking aspect...so hes a pretty big deal) came in with our scantrons to give us the results. "Well we certainly have an interesting group on our hands" Chef Jones said in his awesome British accent. "We must have the Harvard group today. Everyone passed the exam and the lowest grade was a 71". Everyone breathed a sigh of relief, but I already knew I at least passed it. I wanted that high pass. "alright chaps, how do you wanna do this? We can do this one at a time privately or I can just say your name and your score out loud. Since you all did well I think the second option will be a lot faster. Dontcha think?" Sure. Lets do this!

    He starts calling out names one by one and their respective score. A couple mid 80s to start with a few near high passes. "Peter...ham? Hahm?....97." The first high pass of the day, YES! "Great job chap! Now I want you to do the same tomorrow to get a high pass on the entire practical" "Yes Chef." He continues down the names, and my friend Eric (our group leader) also got a 97! We were the top scores until the last girl beat us out with a 99....

    Weeks of everyone worrying and frantically telling stories they heard about the practical was finally almost over. I got the high pass I wanted and a tremendous weight is now off my shoulders. It feels pretty damn good. I was talking to Eric after the scores were given and we both agreed that although we did extremely well we wish we could've seen the Qs we got wrong. Here we are, second highest grades in the class, high pass and everything, and we still want to know more. I am not an overachieving snob, I just love this stuff so much. I want to know what I missed. I think that's where passion comes into play. Any other test I would take the grade and not ask questions. I love and respect what I do so much that I want to be the best at it.   

    When Chef Jones rifled off the scores I would not be lying if I said I didn't want anyone to beat my 97. Now I am not the overachieving type who is pissed if they don't get a 100, I just want to be the best, and I think you need that drive, that passion to carry you through.

 "The game is my wife. It demands loyalty and responsibility, and it gives me back fulfillment and peace." ~ Michael Jordan

    The success I have achieved from this test and finding an externship location in the same week is exactly what I needed now that things are coming down to the wire. In one of my previous posts I talked a little bit about momentum. I said that as is in sports, you need to hit your stride at the right time. Plenty of people do great 90% of the time but struggle to close it out (i.e. Lebron James). Others sit middle of the pack and then explode at the finish. If you love playoff sports you know as much as I do that you have to be like the second type. I knew that my work in class was slumping a tad so a perfect finish would be needed to carry me through to the next stage. I am a firm believer in the powers of momentum. I saw a Nike commercial one time (and I'm sorry for the abundance of sports related analogies for those of you who aren't sports fans) promoting their "Elevate your game" campaign, where a then young Carmelo Anthony went through practices and a rigorous training sequence. The commercial showed Anthony practicing one-on-one with his personal trainer/ball coach against scenes of him signing autographs for fans and attending meetings for a project he was working on with the community. Back and forth the commercial went, showing Anthony going through plays with his ball coach in the gym. The last play in the gym he practices a move and shot before the commercial transitions to the final seconds of a close NBA game. The coach calls a time out to draw up the final play. The young Anthony looks on as the coach draws up the same play he did in practice. The commercial ends with Melo walking onto the court as his words echo in the background: "why wouldn't I want the last shot? When I know I've already made it..."

    That commercial aired in 2006 and I still think about it to this day. I donno why I love it so much. I guess its because I think that sometimes everything you have done could be for nothing if you do not make the right choices down the stretch. I believe in this not just in sports, not just in cooking, but in life! When things are close you have to possess the ball and make the right choices. Some of the greatest athletes were born under moments like this. So for me this practical exam is more than just a test. Its an opportunity to do as Carmelo did. Its a chance to stand amongst greatness, even if for a brief moment in time...

Mercenaries

    I have had this post in my draft bank for a while now, and talking to Chef Reilly the other day made me remember it. My previous class--Modern Banquets was a fun class thanks in part to Chef Reilly (see Tighten Up! and Laugh It Up, Jabroni for more on the class and Chef Reilly). Every chef I've had the pleasure to learn from here at the CIA has approached the class with their own unique flare.
    Speckamp was our first chef and resembled that tough father figure you spend your whole life trying to impress because he graded so hard (my friends and I have a running joke called the "Speckamp 85" its a perfect score since he didn't give out 100s. "Hmmm good consistency, good flavor, its seasoned properly, its hot, overall its perfect...85!). Chef Brash aka Freddy B aka "Steve Jobs" (they are twins I swear) was the passionate and energetic Uncle because he showed a love for produce that I've never seen before. "Now chefs chefs chefs, chefs of the future! (petting a head of Chinese cabbage ever so gently) Why as chefs do we love to use this cabbage on our menus!" Chef Elia was the blue collar brother-in law because he is one of the few remaining butchers in the world so we learned a lot from him on not only how to breakdown meat carcasses but to use the most profitable cuts of meat. His passion for sausage making is something to be admired. Chef Clark is by far the grumpy grandfather. I say that with a smile on my face because I can recall his numerous rants in class about why Ford is better than Toyota (he bleeds red, white, and blue). Chef Reilly was like a brother figure. Always trying to mess with you but at the same time showed a side of protection and compassion you only get from a brother or immediate family member. We even got to play basketball with him, it was a blast (mainly because we got to see him go from all high and mighty to huffing and puffing on the court). Chef Kief is the nagging cousin. When you make a mistake during class he has a tenancy to never let it go. In his defense his class is the "boys from the men" type of class because it is a significant increase in difficulty from the classes we have had thus far.
    My point is not to bash any of my previous chefs or make fun of them, my humorous observations come from the utmost respect for each one of them and what they do on a daily basis. It is merely a joke on how I depict them in this post and in no way reflects who they are as Chefs. With that being said, lets dive into what this post is actually about: the Continuing Education (CE) class Tim and I helped Chef Reilly with a few weeks back.