After two months in the real world, I've come to realize that cookery schools should include a values education class in their curricula. Alongside the usual classes on knife skills, sauces and plating, future chefs should be receive a grounding on critical life and career issues, including:* Moderating one's alcohol and cigarette consumption. Since I began my practicum I've received almost daily invitations to go out drinking. I've always turned them down because I feel uncomfortable being the only woman in a group of strange men, and because I'd rather catch up on sleep than get soused up.
"So you don't drink or smoke?' one asked incredulously, implying that I've been living a dull, monotonous existence. Sorry dude. I have a rich, meaningful life full of enriching experiences. I don't feel the need to get piss-drunk or fill my lungs with carcinogens to feel alive. And I'm not square; I do drink and go out with friends once in a while. It's just that doing it everyday, and to the point of senseless inebriation, is not a very adult thing to do.
* A how-to on dealing with sexual harassment for the ladies, and a guide to gallantry for the men. I lasted only 140+ hours at Artsy Asian Outpost because of this. Okay, that's a little misleading - I left because I got accepted to a five-star hotel. Come on men - do you really need to fire off crude jokes and molest female coworkers to cook?
This was something I'd been totally unprepared for when I began my practicum. I actually sobbed my heart out in the bathroom on one particularly bad day when I got bullied and touched inappropriately by four different chefs. Nothing - not my friend's stories or reading up about the kitchen - had prepared me for the real thing and what made it even more of a shock was that I'd worked for such a long time in a company that was a model corporate denizen. The male chefs in school are all nice people. They were the kind you'd want to grab coffee with after class. I'll never forget chef Vic when he asked to excuse himself because he had to say the word 'condom' in class. That's who they were - decent, salt-of-the-earth people. Compare that to the animal who put his arms around me as he proceeded to "teach" me how to properly fabricate chicken, or to the asshole who'd repeatedly comment that I favored a particular sexual act whenever I bent down to lift or pick things up on the floor.
I never could fathom why they needed to do this, but somehow, I'm thankful for the experience because it opened my eyes and showed me I needed to be tougher. I learned valuable things about my self and how to navigate these situations. I left when the offer from the hotel came but if that hadn't happened, I'd probably still be at that resto, toughing it out. If we get fired by the establishment we forfeit our diploma but let me just exult a little: I fired my establishment instead.
* Being a joy to work with. Don't let your competence and rank in the kitchen get to your head; stay modest. You're not hot property - you're not CEO of a Fortune 500 company, you don't have a PhD, and you didn't earn your master's degree as a scholar of two European universities. I've met and been friends with achievers with this sort of pedigree and they're the nicest, most modest and down-to-earth people I've had the fortune of knowing. You're nothing, Power-tripping Chef de Cuisine (you're not even that high up in the kitchen hierarchy!)
And please, don't be mean to those of humbler rank than you. At that resto, they like to order the dishwashers and junior cooks around, just because they can. They're like dogs pissing on their territory.
* Respect for yourself and your customers. Develop good working habits. Work clean; you establish yourself as a conscientious, circumspect chef who respects the food he makes and the people who pay to eat it.
In spite of a somehow bruising encounter - and I've probably only barely scratched the surface - the romance of cooking and making good food is still there for me. Some of the glint of being a chef might have gotten scratched off, but I hope my passion for the profession never fades.
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