The Cakes! (and other perks of writing in a restaurant) [Emily Deming, Writer-in-Residence at Mallard Cottage]

A Writer’s Residency in a restaurant involves, at times revolves around, food: fueled by it, inspired by it, writing about it. Part of the (verbal) contract arranged for this residency was a sort of all-access-pass to the kitchen. I get to observe the butchering on Tuesdays; watch the chefs mix the pastries and meatballs on Wednesday; smell the soups cooking on Thursdays; listen over the cheerful mix of rap, 80s ballads, and Motown that is this crews’ chosen soundtrack, as “Fitz” explains - in terms of preparation, cut, taste and texture -  the difference between corned beef, smoked meat and pastrami. I also get to eat cake for breakfast. 

 

When there are special events, I am invited to record, write and pitch in my pre-residency role as a food, travel and culture journalist.

Here is an excerpt of a piece I got to write last week about a fundraising event held at Mallard Cottage for a new Young Chefs Grant, in which the best sous-chefs, chefs de cuisine and pâtissiers from some of St. John’s most lauded restaurants came together to feed their colleagues, their executive chefs and anyone who was lucky enough to get a ticket:

Last Tuesday it may have been the Ides of March, but all was collegial as the kings and queens of some of the best local restaurants (The Jeremys Charles and Bonia, Shaun Hussey and Michelle LeBlanc and Todd Perrin) willingly stepped aside and enjoyed a menu created by their right hand men and women.[...]

The “Young Guns” who executed this fundraiser were not the executive chefs who we know from the press. These are the people who keep their heads down, and prep and cook brilliant food night after night. These are the ones to watch for. The ones who will build the next generation of Newfoundland food. And it won’t be built by screaming in the kitchen and cults of personality. Picking up the celebrated but no-drama gauntlet and style of their bosses (those executive chefs mentioned above), these sous chefs worked together under the heat lamps in the Mallard Kitchen with a visibly clear ethic of work, cooperation and respect which runs through their entire Brigade de Cuisine.

Kuymin Hahn (Head Chef, Merchant Tavern), along with Mia Boland (Pastry Chef, Merchant Tavern), Barry Fitzgerald (Sous-chef, Chinched), Alex Fitzgerald (Chef de Cuisine, Mallard Cottage), Ross Larkin (Sous Chef, Raymond’s) [pictured above] took time outside of their regular work, planning the event over group emails. As Larkin says, “It’s not like we get Friday nights off to hang out.”

They consider their work, though for different restaurants, a collective endeavour. [...] Watching them in the kitchen build these courses, one after another after another (it was a five course meal consisting of eight separate dishes and six appetizers or “snacks”) you hear no banter, and see no bravado. It is all concentration and cooperation. And joy. Not smiling, laughing, beer drinking joy (that is reserved for after the meal), but the joy of full artistic engagement. In other words, they were killing it”

 

Here is what the best of young St. John’s cooks when given free reign:

Snacks

Corned moose tongue on alder branches.

Nduja made with Calabrian chilies on charred toast.

Warm cod brandade and preserved lemon.

Puffed cod sounds.

Sour cream and onion chicharon.

Pork belly with dips.

 

Main Courses

Smoked Coppa Di Testa w/ brussels sauerkraut, pickled mustard seed, rye crouton.

Raw fluke, snow fungus, brown butter, white soy.

Grilled Squid, haricots verts, fermented turnip, lemon puree.

Sustainable blue salmon, pea puree, courquette, southern Indian spiced butter, mint.

Bucatini, farfalle, strozzapreti.

Moose loin, sagemite chanterelle soil, ash baked turnip, partridgeberry jus, moose sausage.

 

Dessert

Poached rhubarb, milk sorbet, duck egg sabayon

Chocolate pudding, strawberry puree, freeze-dried raspberries, liquorice

 

I will leave off with one more cake, which is saying in its soft, crumbly way, "Come visit":

Comments

[Haweli Canada]

Hello there! Pastrami was originally created as a way to preserve meat before modern refrigeration. Regards.,

[Nayna]

Amazing