Fork My Life: The Michelin Man

When I booked my solo reso at the two Michelin star restaurant, L’Olivo, I didn’t expect to be plating the same dishes 24 hours later, but life is just surprising like that. Both the dinner and the stage were incredible. I had yet to eat at a restaurant boasting two Michelin stars, so I was pretty excited.
Outside of one of the servers delivering me their number as a pre-dessert, the service was flawless. Even the bread service was impressive. All of the baguettes are made in house daily served tableside with your choice of salt cod brandade, tomato sauce, or sautéed chicory, along with a selection of various small breads like roasted tomato croissant and olive bread. The only disappointment of the dinner was my fault. I don’t like steamed fish, the texture is

revolting unless it's juxtaposed with something crunchy. But, I trusted my server to choose my main. He ordered me Spigola al Vapore con Ostriche Gelatina di Mare e Verdure. It’s a beautiful dish. When it arrives, white anise steam pours out from under the fish laying on a bed of haricots de mer, sea beans. It’s intensely pretty, but the lack of texture contrast totally put me off. Unfortunately, to add to the horrific texture combo there were multiple whole oysters hiding on the plate. The steam that blurs the photo is created by dry ice, Pernod, anise seeds, and fish stock held in the basin under the perforated fish plate. Regardless of my opinion, it really is a beautiful dish.

Before I actually refer to this as a stage, you first have to visualize this stager. I was a little caught off guard by the opportunity to work in the a two Michelin star kitchen last night, but I wasn't going to miss the Grand Ball because I didn't have the right dress. So, picture me in a gray short sleeved tee, black skinny jeans, pink Nikes, and not a single knife to to wield. Got an interesting picture going? It’s probably accurate.

The Stage
I expected to be stiflingly intimidated by Chef Oliver Glowig. He's a German-born, French trained chef with with a total of Three Michelin Stars and I was wearing pink Nikes. They turned out to be a nonissue, I turned out to be not intimidated at all, and Chef Oliver turned out to be an incredibly ni

ce and fun guy. We wandered around the coolers while I asked 5,000 questions regarding his products, gathering all sorts of information about dried pasta purveyors, olive oil, butter, cheeses, flour, I even got to the bottom of where and when the anchovies were caught.
He explained to me why he brought in French butter instead of using domestic Italian. This is Chef stealing the tag off for me: Beurre de Baratte de Normandie.
That's when he opted for some fresh air. We went upstairs to the outrageously pretty garden.

Chef showed me his San Marzano vines that he clipped and brought over from a friend's crop in Sorrento.

Capers!

I'd never met someone with such accolades- I couldn't help but grill the poor guy! When I asked what actions led his feat of the second star at L'Olivo he told me, "Consistantly holding high standards...Consistency through everything." This was evident all over his kitchen. Each station is equipped with laminated recipe sheets with pictures for how each dish needs to plated every time.
Every thing cooked in that kitchen gets timed. The only instance I use timers at work is during prep for my 4 minute eggs since they are pretty easy to forget about and seriously expensive to screw up. Additionally, the eggs come from my farm so each lost egg hurts twice as bad. Here, different pastas have different cooking times, and believe me, those are observed right down to the last second. After the risotto has been par-cooked perfectly, it get's ten minutes on the pick up, every single time. There's no room for human error because it's cooked within seconds of how Chef wants it, as regulated by timers.

Every station has at least two timers on it. Constant alarms become the chorus to service.
Further, each station either cryovacs individual portions of garnish or wraps them in timbales so that when they have to pick up the dish, the amount of vegetables that make it onto the plate are the precise amount expected and always the same quantity. It was all very consistent, just as Chef likes it.

The language barrier made translating recipes into an intense game of kitchen charades and allowed for some interesting discoveries of the english words for chicken wing, ham hock, and pig ear. I think the most mind boggling game of charades was the path to finding the word for "quail." I have never seen a grown man do such things.
The absence of an understanding of the entire Italian language made for a difficult work environment. Everything had to be visually explained, and slowly. I was of no use during service. There's no time for visual explanations with 15 tickets on the board so it's not like I could pick up on little things being called out and help. Tickets sounded like jibberish and attempting to read them was a joke so I got out of the way and did universal tasks- cleaned spoon water, emptied trash, and scrubbed the line. And why is it that everything sounds angry in Italian? I never knew what Chef was saying, but even when he was smiling, I am pretty sure he was angry.

After service, Chef and I chatted about working in hotels, sharing similar views on accommodating obnoxious high-paying clientele. Speaking of my Mom…who puts in a room service order as long as a sonnet while their daughter is in the kitchen? She actually decided to write her own menu last night. Chef walked over to me and showed me their ticket. He shakes his head and says, “Flan? We don’t even have that!” Later we agreed that special requests won’t be handled so cordially in our own restaurants, even if it is my own mother. His eyes lit up with fire when a few orders came in requesting “sans sale.” Without salt. "Why eat!"
Chef sent delicious panna cotta up to her room today to quench her "flan" thirst and later gave me the recipe. He was a seriously nice guy.
When the guys saw the burns on my arms, they asked where I got them. I thought that was a strange question coming from a bunch of cooks. Chef said, "Shannon, we don't sleep in the kitchen, we sleep at home." Funny.
I walked away with a handful of ridiculous recipes including the one for the best risotto I've ever had in my life. Turns out we don't do much differently in preparing the actual rice- props to Chef Ryan- but the exquisite flavor came from the lemon butter it's finished with. I'm forever cherishing the recipe! I also landed his versions of Ravioli, Tagliatelle, and Papardelle dough. It feels like Christmas morning with the amount of recipes I scored. The grissini recipe I was going to bribe the room service guy to grab was mine simply via asking. Anyway, enjoy some pictures of the kitchen.

The making of Baccala Tripe.

First, take all the skin off the belly and boil it for two hours.

After being dried in the oven overnight, they are deep fried and puff up like pork rinds for bar snacks.

Mediterranean Blue Lobster with Saffron, Black Lentils and Cacao.

Bar snacks including the Baccala Tripe, freshly caught anchovies with heirloom tomatoes, fried zucchini blossoms stuffed with...zucchini, smoked mozzarella wrapped in pancetta.

The making of Minestra Maritata, a classic regional dish created out of necessity to utilize day old bread and meat scraps. Similar in concept, the Ribolita made back at the Nell is just a Tuscan version of this classic.

Executive Sous Chef Dominico and Daniel making Sea Urchin Pasta and Lemon Risotto, respectively.

Ravioli Caprese

Sea Urchin Pasta
Both mine and Chef's favorite dish on the menu.

The pasta is accompanied by a salad inside the urchin body.

The lemon butter used to finish the risotto. Check out that color. You will never guess where it comes from!

Shrimp and Zucchini Tortello
The egg in this dish racks up .80 E. That's insane. I thought our eggs were steep at .50 cents. That's the most expensive egg I've ever seen, but isn't that tortello gorgeous?

It was a great night. My favorite discussions with Chef occured over post-service drinks. Apparently pink Champagne is always Chef's drink of choice after service. I could not believe this was the same guy I was scared to talk to earlier in the day...he was ordering Laurent-Perrier Rose. If there was any hint of intimidation left at this point, it all just disappeared. The next song I requested at the bar was "Lady in Red."
Anyway, over Champagen, we discussed why he chose Italian food considering his background in German and French food. We love it for all the same reasons. Your food can only be as good as your ingredients. Italian cuisine focuses on the quality of the ingredients and respecting them. Even the variety of tomato used in your cooking effects the final flavor exponentially. French food, he said, involves too much butter and cream. By the end, you can't taste what you started with. The more you mess with your ingredients, the more you take away from what made them wonderful to eat to begin with. The challenge in Italian food is it's sheer simplicity.It's a challenge that we both embrace.
I think I’ll go back tonight… I just can’t resist the kitchen.

And I did.
Here's some photos from the second, equally awesome night.

Quail with Foie Gras, Quail Eggs, and Asparagus. The Chef de Partie on this station had me rolling a few of these to order. Talk about being in the weeds.