Your equipment

So it doesn’t take a $500 chefs knife to make a good chef, it takes understanding the equipment you have and using it to its max potential! If you have a knife and feel it isn’t performing give this a read and use some of the techniques, I’m sure you will find you’re equipment is just fine!

An Edge in the Kitchen: The Ultimate Guide to Kitchen Knives -- https://m.barnesandnoble.com/w/edge-in-the-kitchen-chad-ward/1012399190?ean=9780061188480

Something in the oven

 So I’ve got to talk about one of my biggest culinary influences in my life! Though I grew up learning from classic Italian chefs, Lebanese, French, and some pretty rogue American chefs, I was always struck by Latin America and Spanish influenced foods.

Picarones

  

It was easy to start trying simple Tex-mex  flavors; and being from Vermont I thought I was being adventurous. Burritos, chimichangas, nachos those were my limitations to any food south of the border where I was from at the time. As soon as I left VT I worked for an Asian inspired restaurant but had been inspired to learn from the other employees whatever I could. There were only a few Latino Americans in the kitchen there at this time but all of the cooks had something to offer from the Latin American culinary Repertoire, thus began the adventure. 

Peruvian Chicharones

Next thing I know Im living in Florida buying tamales from the little village behind my apartment complex, I started reading more cook books by chefs like Jose Rodriguez and Gaston Acurio, I couldnt help my self at this point. I spent the rest of my professional culinary adventure trying to find more Latin flavors all the while producing the food that the owners and chefs I worked for wanted from me. 

Caldo De Gallina

Now having said that Latin American and traditional Spanish flavors are my greatest influence is true however they are obviously not the only thing I cook. I enjoy a very well rounded library of styles in the methods I use to prepare foods. It is damaging to ones pallet to limit yourself to a typical style and rarely venture from that. Hold that one cuisine in your heart and always try something new.

Hello again from many years of inactivity. A lot has happened since my last post on here. I went through a lot of lifestyle changes due to some medical issues but am back on my feet. I had to change careers but still enjoy my passion of cooking and still live my life following the same rules I had set in place while I was a professional chef. The one thing I must say about not working in a professional kitchen 80 hours a week is that I do have more time on my hands to do the things I enjoy. Also I have pretty much acquired all the toys I ever wanted in a professional kitchen for my home kitchen.

Perks to being a 9 to 5er with over a decade in the food service industry. I get to cook my family amazing food and no one can tell me what kind of food to cook. I get to change the menu every day, I can grow what I want in my garden and use it how I see fit. I also get more time to read more cook books and try out new recipes, I also get to share my creations with my neighbors who are so spoiled by it! I am fortunate that my ability to be home in the day time has given me the opportunity to foster a relationship with my neighborhood thus creating a healthy community that watches out for each other and make sure we are all happy and healthy.

I do miss the heat of the kitchen, the music of the pans and the dancing of the line through the night. I miss the family you build and the intensity of the rush, the uncertainty of the calm before the storm. Then theres the clean up, everyone is sweaty and beat from the crushing service, its time to pack it all in and leave the kitchen like nothing happened. You look around and see the remains of the battle that had just been fought, you look at all the soldiers who fought it with you and think about the beer that you will all share when the last pass of the mop is done and you're all changed.

The many kitchens, chefs, friends and influences i have worked with in my life ring loudly in my dreams every night and will never leave me. I still have nights where I can hear that god awful ticket machine running in my head before I fall asleep.