old chef de cuisine, too. I amassed a lot of phone numbers in my brief
time at Coco Pazzo Teatro and at Le Madri: some very fine Ecuadorian
talent.
The next job I landed, I peeled off some of the best cooks in his
organization. They are close pals and valued associates to this day.
DESSERT
A DAY IN THE LIFE
THANKS TO MY BIGFOOT training I wake up automatically at five
minutes before six. It's still dark, and I lie in bed in the pitch-black for a
while, smoking, the day's specials and prep lists already coming together
in my head. It's Friday, so the weekend orders will be coming in: twenty-
five cases of mesclun, eighteen cases of GPOD 70-count potatoes, four
whole forequarters of lamb, two cases of beef tenderloins, hundreds and
hundreds of pounds of meat, bones, produce, seafood, dry goods and
dairy. I know what's coming, and the general order in which it will
probably arrive, so I'm thinking triage—sorting out in my head what gets
done first, and by whom, and what gets left until later.
As I brush my teeth, turn on the shower, swallow my first couple of
aspirin of the day, I'm reviewing what's still kicking around in my walk-
in from previous days, what I have to unload, use in specials,
merchandize. I hear the coffee grinder going, so Nancy is awake, which
leaves me only a few more minutes of undisturbed reflection on food
deployment before I have to behave like a civilian for a few minutes.
I watch the local news and weather with my wife, noting, for
professional reasons, any major sporting events, commuter traffic and,
most important, the weekend weather forecast. Nice crisp weather and no
big games? That means we're going to get slammed tonight. That means
I won't come crawling home until close to midnight. By now, half-