I should probably have saved this for Valentine’s Day.

When i upgraded to Leopard, i lost all capabilities with Fireworks and Photoshop. For whatever reason, they simply don’t like 10.5. Pewps. I’d rather not have to spend hundreds of dollars on all my software when i upgrade my OS, but i suppose that’s just how the racket works. For weeks i’ve been lamenting the loss of my image manipulators, but i finally just said Eh, Fuggit – here’s a straight scan. I’ll be doing my lettering and frames by hand from now on, i suppose. It’s cool. I kinda like it.

I don’t know if i’ve done any puns yet with RubberMug, but if you knew me youd understand: puns make up a fairly large percentage of my humor attempts. In the kitchen, i’m mostly a bitter and cynical jerk. It’s later at the bar that the puns come out.

The best thing about this comic, besides the fact that it is entirely a true story, is that the Chef in question probably has no idea it’s him in the comic. He was the King of Blissfully Ignorant. He could write some of the most amazing menus i’v ever seen, but as with most great chefs he was also a royal pain in the ass.

I don’t miss him at all.

I’ve always found that a touch of humor goes a long way in the stressful, nomadic environment of the professional kitchen. To that end, my Get Back To Work missives would have an edge of the ludicrous to them. Motivational Posters are mocked because they take themselves too seriously. Mine were actually read and followed. Posters like these adorn my kitchens. This one hung in the dishpit of the Latin Fusion Joint as a gentle reminder to the dishdogs that their job description went beyond mere plate juggling. If i ever saw someone slacking off in the pit i could point to the sign and say, “Find something.”

It usually worked. My prep books were so full of crazy shit like this that they were often followed meticulously so as to not miss any of the jokes. They were also kept much cleaner than they had been before the ridiculousness. Bored lackeys would read the posters a hundred times a day simply because they were fun to look at, and without knowing it they’d have my to-do lists burned into their skulls. There was never any excuse for Shit Not Getting Done. Everyone else may have thought i was crazy, but my ends justified these means.

A smile is the key to communication.

This story is 100% true.

I sometimes think about that lady. I hope she was okay.

Forgive the camphone pic. They’re just way more functional in a kitchen than a real camera.

This was my favorite dish at the latin fusion joint where we did our funky bottle sauces. It’s really pretty simple. This dish was tasty and looked good. Done and done. Best of all, i could ask top dollar for what was essentially chicken and rice. I named it after my long-time friend Jim Alexander, the best baker Orlando has ever had, and one helluva chef in his own right. Mad love, homey. You can’t front on this. He’s the one who showed me the Lime-Coconut Marmalade when we opened his groovy little cafe in Thornton Park, back when it was still seedy and full of character… before the bankers and lawyers moved in. Bastards.

Simply:

Black beans and rice, middle of the plate. Cuban black beans. Yellow rice. I’m sure you can handle that part.
Grilled, marinated chicken breast goes on top. I recommend recaito. Can’t beat it.
Around this, we glopped our bottle sauces and some mango salsa. Yum. So nineteen-nineties, but damn delicious.
Finish with lime-coconut marmalade and a single fried plantain chip. I also garnished with washed and split pineapple leaves. My Second, Justin, used to mock me for this as pineapple leaves are inedible, but i didn’t care. I loved their visual texture and color.

The coup-de-grace, of course, is the marmalade. Sweet yet sour, chunky and smooth; it was a garnish of intriguing contrast. It was utterly fantastic, and it only takes a little more than a tablespoon of it to finish off the dish.

Straight from my cookbook:

Coconut-Lime Marinade
For Pollo Alejandro and Scallops Tapa

12 limes, washed well
2 cups water

Zest and skin the limes, removing the white pith. Add zest and lime segments to sauce pan and water. Bring to a boil and reduce heat. Simmer until zest is soft and water is reduced. Puree lime in robot coup with:

4 C. sugar
With processor running, add:
3 cups coconut flake
3T. Lime juice
1t. ginger, minced
1t. white pepper

I’m told that the morons cooks who followed after me couldn’t get this recipe right. They had to take the Pollo Alejandro off the menu since nobody could figure out how to pull this off. Surely, you aren’t that stupid.
The trick, of course, is in the sugar. You’re essentially making a soft ball mass and whipping air into it. It takes a little finesse to judge the amount of water correctly, and to keep the water at a high temperature (near boiling) as you process it into the sugar. After a couple tries, you should have it.

If not, i feel sorry for you.

Being a chef has it’s distinct disadvantages. We usually live in vampire hours, either at work before the sun comes up, or safely passed out at home before it does. We work in kitchens which most advocate groups would consider ‘slave-labor conditions’: ridiculous heat & humidity, high stress, loud background noise, sharp, hot, backbreaking. It’s no wonder we end up addicted to coffee, whiskey, cocaine, sex. It’s easy to see why most of our relationships fail. We’re a cursed lot.

Ask any chef you meet, however, if there’s anything else he’d rather be doing and you’ll get a look so withering it’ll make you cringe with shame for even asking. There’s no other glory like pulling off a 200-cover evening with three of your mates and reveling in it going off like clockwork. There are few brotherhoods like ours where you can meet a total stranger in a bar wearing checks and whites and strike up a conversation as if you’ve always known each other. It’s a grueling business, and it’s not for the weak of heart. We’re a proud lot. We’re strong, brave, and hard, and we can probably out-fight, out-drink, and out-story any motherfucker who dares try us.

Semper Fi, bitches. We bring the Heat.

That’s right, folks. Gawdam baby elephant trunk.

I was going to put all kinds of kinky, debaucherous shit in the left hand but that satyr cock got a little too ridiculous for anything else. Call it ‘artistic license’.

If there’s one thing that’s true of any kitchen, it’s that the noobs will do anything to keep from crying while cutting onions. They come armed with (or recently educated by) old wive’s remedies for keeping an onion’s sulfurous compounds from turning into concentrated H2SO4 in their eye-pans.

The remedies never work.

So what you have is a miserable, gullible fool who’s looking for any quick fix to keep his poor mucous membranes clear and pain-free. Enter the Loki Aspect. I’ve discovered you can make these chumps do just about anything. I offer you a few of the successes i’ve had in my career. Use them as you will. Make up a few of your own.

Truth is, nothing will keep your eyes from burning. You have to endure it, or get familiar enough with your knife to do the work with your eyes closed. I recommend cutting the ends and skin off the onion and placing it in a paper towel to bleed out for five or ten minutes. It’s not a cure, but it does seem to reduce the reaction. Better that the sulfur is in a rag than your eyes.

When i was running the kitchen of a ‘Latin Fusion’ joint in my sweet little Florida college town, one of my more elegantly brilliant solutions for my new menu was to incorporate bottled sauces. These were easily made in a blender and could be implemented using inexpensive squeeze bottles. Idiot-proofing is important in a place where unskilled labor is plentiful. They were colorful, elegant, adaptable, and full of concentrated flavor. We categorized them by acronym, then later by color. It was just easier to ask for the ‘green’ than to ask for the ‘PGC’. Last i heard, they stopped using these sauces at my funky little restaurant. Yet to this day, many of the cooks i used to work with still speak in hushed, fearful tones of the Tamarind-Balsamic Reduction.

These recipes come directly from the recipe database i used at the time. Don’t ask for more detail than this. If you can find cans of tamarind pulp, just go for it. Chances are you wont be too far off the mark. We used quite a bit of canned ingredients there. Latin is an odd cuisine with some relatively hard to find ingredients.

Enjoy!

Blender Sauces:

Red Pepper Coulis
The red sauce
16 large red peppers, roasted
2 cup carmelized onion
3 Tbsp Masala
2 Tbsp Adobo
3 cans pimento, drained well

Place roast peppers and caramelized onions in blender and puree smooth. Add rest of ingredients and puree. Pass all through large-hole chinois with whisk. Pour into squeeze bottles and cambro, label and date.
•

Basil Mint Oil
The green sauce
1# basil leaves
1 bunch mint
3 bunches parsley, stemmed
ALL HERBS: Cleaned and blanched (see Moss if you are unsure of this method)

1 tsp adobo
1 tsp caraway seed
1 quart olive oil

Place all ingredients except oil in blender. Add oil slowly and emulsify. Pour into squeeze bottles and cambro, label and date.
•

Mango-Passion Coulis
The orange sauce
2 pounds mango
1 tsp garam masala
1 tsp ginger, minced

Puree well to fully incorporate ginger, then add:
2 cans passion fruit concentrate
Pour into squeeze bottles and cambro, label and date.
•

Tamarind Balsamic Reduction
Black plate paint so sweet
4 cans tamarind pulp
1 gallon balsamic vinegar
1 cup corn syrup
2 Tbsp chipotle puree

reduce by 2/3to 1/2
•

(mentioned in the above recipes)
Garam Masala Latino!
The crazy mixed up spice mix all mixed up, yet spicy

In Large bowl, mix the following well:
Ounce measures are by weight!
6 oz. Old Bay seasoning
3 oz. coriander, ground
3 oz. cumin, ground
1 oz. garlic salt
1 oz thyme
1/4 oz. white pepper
1/4 oz. allspice
1/4 oz. cinnamon
1 tsp. nutmeg

One year ago today i went to pick up a beautiful woman for dinner and drawing and general loveliness. She had other plans.
I drew this about the time we should have been enjoying steak and wine. Then i got seriously drunk and rambled about, embarrassing myself quite badly.
Somehow, i’ve held onto this drawing all that time.

Happy anniversary, ‘Bear. Fare thee well.

•••

It ain’t no use to sit and wonder why, babe
It don’t matter, anyhow
An’ it ain’t no use to sit and wonder why, babe
If you don’t know by now
When your rooster crows at the break of dawn
Look out your window and I’ll be gone
You’re the reason I’m trav’lin’ on
Don’t think twice, it’s all right

I’m walkin’ down that long, lonesome road, babe
Where I’m bound, I can’t tell
But goodbye’s too good a word, gal
So I’ll just say fare thee well
I ain’t sayin’ you treated me unkind
You could have done better but I don’t mind
You just kinda wasted my precious time
But don’t think twice, it’s all right