I have spent the last 20 years of my life in the culinary world and I have no intention of ever stopping. In those years I have traveled across the country and back and cooked in dozens of types of restaurants. I have been there on the first day of a restaurant opening. I have been there on the last day of business ever. I’ve seen a lot of chaos in my life in my career. And I still can’t quite tell you exactly what it is about the food service industry that keeps me in it. We work impossibly long hours for ridiculously low pay compared to the amount of work we are expected to do with little-to-no gratitude from our peers, superiors or customers. We are seen as a “lesser” crowd because our industry is full of drug addicts and convicted felons, so everyone assumes that we ALL are on drugs or have multiple felonies under our belts. For a majority of my career, I WAS on drugs but I am now eight years sober. We are the ones rejected from society because as our friends and family are enjoying their weekends and going out to bars and parties, we are busy at work feeding them and won’t be done with our shift until just before the bars close. We miss most family functions, birthday and holiday parties, BBQs and every other type of social gathering you could imagine. We never see our families let alone have time for friends. We learn to eat fast and typically hunched over a garbage can or crouched down behind the line where we are out of sight. The only people we see are our brothers and sisters in the kitchen, so they become our second families and our best friends. Because nobody else understands our world. Some people are lucky enough to love their careers, but we are a different breed who LIVE our career. We don’t know why we do it. We don’t know why we love it. But something about the kitchen ignites a passion within us that nothing else in the world compares to.
In my years, I have spent all but the most recent behind the line. I’ve worked every station and in every type of kitchen you could probably imagine. I loved the chaos and the uncertainty. The complete insanity of not knowing what to expect every day, not knowing what kind of fresh hell you are walking into each shift, the incredibly fast pace and nonstop sense of urgency. The danger of the kitchen where everything is either hot, sharp or actively capable of maiming you. I have stabbed my hands, severed finger tips, had 365° fryer oil scald my arms, broken bones and dropped stacks of plates or sautée pans on my toes. The high raging flames. The even higher raging tempers. I loved every bit of it. I LIVED for it. I gave up a career in art that I went to college for to stay in the kitchen and I regret nothing. The kitchen brought out the best in me because I had true love and passion for what I did and I cannot imagine doing anything else in the world. The thought of a desk job makes me sick to my stomach. And yet, I gave all of that up.
I fought tooth and nail to get to my position of Executive Chef at the Cavalry Club in Manlius. I was hired as a grill cook and worked my way to become the most trusted part of that kitchen. I took on responsibilities and daily tasks that were above my pay grade. I gave everything I had to get promoted to Sous Chef, which is essentially the Assistant Manager of the kitchen. And then when the Executive Chef left, I was offered his position. I felt like I had finally gotten the chance to reap the rewards of my dedication. But little did I know, I fought so hard to get to where I was in my career while neglecting my life at home. When my life began to crumble, I walked away from what I had dedicated my entire adult life to achieve. I finally had a kitchen I was truly in charge of and I gave it all up to save my marriage and my own sanity. There was a lot of professional issues going on that were a major part of why I walked away as well, but I knew that if I continued on the path I was on, it would destroy my marriage.
I was presented with an opportunity to leave the line and the standard kitchen behind and work in banquets and catering at Drumlins Country Club. I had never worked in banquets before. I had worked at places that ALSO had banquets and events, but it was never my primary job and instead was something I did on occasion in between my regular duties. At first, I wasn’t happy. I missed the chaos and the insanity. I missed the creative freedom of having my own menu. I thought I had lost my passion and sold my soul because instead of making something I truly cared about and created, I was making the same thing 300 times and it wasn’t MY food. I looked at Drumlins as a place to hang my hat for a bit until I figured out the next step.
But then something clicked in me and it allowed me to rediscover the passion. I realized that for the first time in my life, I had a true work/life balance. I was home more. I could actually see my wife and spend time with her in a regular basis for the first time since we got married six and a half years prior to my leaving the Cavalry Club. I was no longer stressed out and angry and taking my frustrations at work home with me. Chelsea and I were truly communicating and rebuilding our relationship from the damage I left in my wake. We went to marriage counseling and learned how to communicate with each other again. We were able to rebuild the foundation of our marriage and connect on deeper levels than we had in years. All because I sacrificed my career for the betterment of myself and my marriage. And I regret nothing.
Being truly happy at home and working on myself, my own happiness and my marriage allowed me to be at peace with my career. I realized that I had NOT given up on myself professionally and instead could take the love and passion I was rebuilding at home and focus that same energy into rebuilding my love and passion at work as well. I no longer need the chaos and insanity. I no longer thrive in it. Don’t get me wrong, I still love the intense days where I have a lot of work to do and what seems like very little time to do it in. But instead of rushing all the time and being strung out from not sleeping, I can work at my own pace with a team of people who all excel at their own individual areas and we can come together to execute a beautiful meal, just for 300 people instead of 3. It no longer matters to me whether my food is going on a plate or a buffet line, I can still put the same amount of care and passion into what I do. I love the days where we have massive plated dinners with several passed hors d’oeuvres followed by a plated salad and then dinner, but those days aren’t as prevalent.
Just last night, I had a plated dinner for 260 people for Coach Jim Boeheim’s retirement party and it was a lot of work. It took us two days worth of prep to put it all together, one person and I almost two hours to pre-plate the salads and then an hour of working in an assembly line of five of us to plate the dinner itself followed by just under an hour for myself and two other people to assemble the desserts. I worked a total of almost 24 hours in two days. And I loved it. But I also love the days where everything is going on a buffet line and the day goes so much easier. Those are the days where I get to work in the morning and help prep the food and then leave early while my team puts the final touches on everything and sends out the party. Those are the days that I get to be home with my wife. Those are the days I get to make dinner for Chelsea and I and spend time working on US instead of my career. I’ll take a month of being home at a decent time and not being buried in stress and two days of insanity at work over having to deal with it every day again.
I found a new kind of love for my career. Drumlins has provided me with the most important thing I could ever have in my life: time to be home. There’s no more drama. No more politics and nonsense. No more chaos. No more stress. No more never-ending long days where I’m never home. I still love what I do, I just do it differently. It was an adjustment for sure, but once I settled in to the changes I realized that the time home was infinitely more important to me than my pride or my ego at work. Gone are the days where I get so stressed out from my job and then bring that stress home. I found a new kind of love at work and at home. And I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to go back to the career I thought I wanted. Gordon Ramsey once said “Nobody ever gets into cooking to get rich” and he was right. But for the first time in my life I FEEL rich. Because I have found what matters to me the most, and that is worth more than anything the line has ever given me.
Below are some pictures of the food for the previously mentioned Jim Boeheim Retirement Party 260 person plated dinner.
