I get asked this all the time. I lucked out? I moved to SF after graduation thinking I was hot shit. I couldn't get a job for my life. I had been working in restaurants since age ten and just graduated at the head of my class at a big name cooking school. It didn't mean dick! Every job was paying minimum wage. Nothing over 10 bucks an hour. Too much competition. But once I got my foot in the door. I excelled there. went up to 15 bucks an hour. Thought I was doing good? Then was offered a Sous Chef job on Nantucket Island. Salary, and in charge of forty kitchen staff. I was twenty. I can't remember how much I was making. Something that equalled to 20 bucks an hour. But a 3k bonus at the end of the summer. Thought I was on top of the world. Restaurant closed for the winter. This next winter I wanted to move to New Orleans. Long story short. I got a job as a private chef on a 200 foot yacht. Starting pay was 125k tax free a year because the boat was a foreign flag vessel. I was twenty. I've been a private chef now for fifteen years. Restaurant work is for people that either own the restaurant, Mexicans, or it's for kids. You work like a slave in dangerous conditions. Fire, knives, boiling hot stuff all around, and big time stress and attitude. I would never advise culinary school to anyone unless they just wanted to cook for themselves and not as a career move. Private Cheffing is the only way to go. I know for a fact. The Top of the World Restaurant in the Stratosphere in LV averages 1.4 million per month. There's five more restaurants inside that Casino all pulling down big bank. The Executive Chef has been there maybe ten years. He works at least 100 hours per week. He makes 80k per year with a 10k Christmas bonus. How does that one work??? And this guy is as high as he can climb. I mean unless he goes to bigger and better casinos. Those jobs are impossible to get though. Catering and Private Cheffing are the only way to go. Go work in a restaurant before commiting to a culinary school. Then anyone in their right mind will see it's not the way to go.
I've been in the food industry for 25 years now. I've worked all over the world. Just telling you the way I see it. As I mentioned about the chef in LV with the 80k. Might not sound so bad? But he's in his fifties and it's taken him his entire life to get there. I welcome everyone to the brotherhood of cooking. But honestly very few people get rich doing it.
That was my impression, and there's no way I had Tim's talent or passion so I would have been in deep shit.
cheftim what do you think about quinoa
From 'How Baking Works' by Paula 'Is It Bigger Than A Baguette' Figoni:
Quinoa was a staple crop of the ancient Inca Empire and still grows best in the very
high elevations of the Andes Mountains in South America. Quinoa seeds, which are
small like sesame seeds, are very high in healthful unsaturated fatty acids. Quinoa is a
seed, not a cereal grain. Unlike wheat and most other cereal grains, quinoa is high in
lysine, an essential amino acid. When used in multigrain breads, quinoa compensates
for their amino acid defi ciencies.
Because of its high level of unsaturated fatty acids, quinoa seeds can oxidize fairly
quickly, especially once the seeds are ground. It is best to refrigerate quinoa seeds if
they are to be kept for a time.
