Cogito Ego Sum

That's not a typo, I meant to use ego as in I just discovered I have an ego issue. One of the chefs made a remark about "What? Big egos in the kitchen? Really?"  the irony clear. Oh but wait, that includes me? Who me? I don't have a big ego.  I mean, I write a blog in the naive hope that someday others would be interested in my unfolding auto-biography. Ok. Message received.

So what do I do about it? How do I express this ego in the kitchen? I have been taking great pride in always trying to put the best menu I am capable of. I take ownership of it. And there it is, the limiting belief.

Under the guise of taking ownership, I avoid burdening the other chefs with prep for my menu. I'm happy to help my fellow chefs but I am fain to ask let alone rely on them to do my prep for me. I've been utterly selfish and prideful. I made it about me.

SO how do I get out of this? Well, I need to trust the team and comfortably lean on each other for support because the more we synchronise as a team, the better and braver our menus will be. And that is how we achieve 40% of our collective objective - to uplift our students' dining experience.  There is no star chef because we are all star chefs.

What was that about ego again?

Living the Dream

That is the catch phrase of  Chef O, every time someone asks him how he is doing. I must admit that in the middle of all this upheaval (or maybe we should refer to it as a downheaval) I find myself  subscribing to that catch phrase.  I'm living my dream of working as a chef. Not only that but also starting to enjoy work and everyone I work with.  I can actually now look forward to working with these guys with anticipation and not so much anxiety. Anxiety born of my insecurity at not having as much experience as all of my colleagues even though I'm older than all of them. I'm so used to being the youngest in a group when I was teaching seniors, that it feels conflicting that I can be the most inexperienced and yet the oldest in the kitchen department.

I have been trying to taste all of the food that all the other chefs knock up mostly to learn what it is that they think the students enjoy, but also to understand the standard that I must deliver to. Last year I experienced a brief honeymoon with the students, where some would go out of their way to thank me for the tasty food. I modestly put that down as due to being the new chef, they just got used to all the other chefs that it was great to try something new.

I was also modestly disappointed that I did not experience that positive feedback the following term. Perhaps, it really was just a new chef honeymoon and the honeymoon was over. What if I am an impostor trying to pass myself off as a chef?

Well tonight was crazy. Fridays are traditionally slow easy nights as not many bother to come out to buffet. Instead we got hammered. We had plenty of food but we were struggling just to keep up with the continuous flow of diners for the entire 60 minutes of service.  Wait what?  Who gets slammed on a Friday night? Nobody.  Except maybe the impostor mwahahahaha.