Kitchen Graduation: Sass Cobra's first appearance

Friends, good morning from rainy New York, from your good friend Sarah, who is happy to report that Sass Cobra (my alter ego) I had a little 5 step graduation yesterday in the kitchen where I am a stage in New York.

 

As a reminder, I do not get paid to work in this Michelin star restaurant.  I do this to learn, to be humbled, to be taught and coached and corrected in a field where I do not necessarily belong.  I get nervous in situations where I am not the expert, and I have to remind myself to just breathe through it, that I can do it, that it will be fine, that I can trust myself.  Oh, Friends, this experience is so, so, so good for me.  I need a refresher on confidence right about now, and good confidence always first starts with humility, which is where I am currently at.  Nonetheless, I love it. I love it so much, every single day.  There are a lot of things I have gotten wrong as I learn things here, but there are signs that I am getting some things right, and that includes my 5 step graduation yesterday.

 

Step 1: Yesterday, I got to trade in my white apron and paper fry cook hat (check out this super hot-ness here…sitting on top of the box for my mandoline which is used to shave 950 Brussel sprouts a day.....yeeeeeah baby!).  I told Chef I wanted an extra supply for these at home, because they were so hot.

 

 

I got to trade in these paper hats and my thin white apron for the dark gray heavy fabric apron and matching hat.  I most likely do not quite deserve this yet, but Chef decided it was ok, and so I wear it with pride and am SUPER grateful to not worry about a million bobby pins attempting to pin down my ever-curlier hair under a flimsy, unstable paper hat a la McDonalds 1992. This is a big deal to me, because it shows that I am being accepted a little more and more into the team.  I think most of them thought I would walk away from this, that it would wear me out, that I would think it was too hard.  It is too hard. It is tiring. I have stopped, mid-chop, and wondered even out loud, “What the hell am I DOING here, anyway?”  But I kept going, and they kept teaching, and there has not been talk of “thanking me for my service” and have a good life yet.  This is a good sign.

 

Step 2: Next up for graduation is that Chef decided I would not just do all of the prepping, but instead I would be working on the line, making food for customers.  This is a big deal for me, because this means that they trust me enough, knowing that I will (and did) get it wrong a few times before it sinks in and I get it right.  And I will, and I did.  But I need practice and I must learn faster.  Still, this was graduation Step 2, and I was very, very proud even of my less than stellar work (which will be repeated today and from now on, after I prep 35 heads of cauliflower, make 7 quarts each of multiple vinaigrettes, peel 950 brussel sprouts, and promise to scrub out the work areas, which include garbage storage, which, of course, I do.)

 

I love it. I love it every day.  I had to cut my fingernails super short, my feet ache like nothing I have ever experienced due to being on them 12 hours a day with only a 20 minute break, and I have blisters and bruises in places I did not know I could, but I love it every single day.

 

Step 3: I knew I was being more accepted into the group when I could sass the hot line.  Now, “hot” does not mean “HOT,” though there is a power dynamic in the kitchen which fascinates me, and fascination always includes more than a little intrigue, and the energy in a kitchen makes things…well, hot, sexy hot in a clever, clever, clever fast-paced way, kind of like surgery.  But the hot line here is a group that is a team of a well-trained machine.  They have a rhythm I do not yet understand. They have skills I do not even know the names of, and they use them effortlessly.  I cannot even LIFT the heavy things they do, and they do it all day, every day.  They have skill, they have experience, and they have sass, which brings me to Graduation Day, Step 4, Sass Cobra Comes to the Kitchen.

 

Step 4:  One day, terrible Sarah’s alter ego Sass Cobra came out to play, as one of the younger Chefs on the line was giving me a really hard time.  He was playfully (yet intensely) making fun of me not being able to keep up my manicure.  He made fun of the knives I had bought because they were not $400 apiece.  He kept going, jabbing me with comments about my lack of skills, in a funny way, yet a pointed way, and I kept quiet, until Sass Cobra decided it was time to bring out the big gun, but just one, quite, teeny tiny comment that would show that I was unafraid, that I had cajones too, that I had a right to be there and had earned my spot.

 

First I kept my head down, chopping, chopping, chopping brussel sprouts, all 950 of them.  I looked up when he talked to me and “Oui Cheffed” him in response, as we are trained to do to acknowledge all things Chefs say, and I kept quiet….a little too quiet, as I waited for the perfect time to pounce.  You see, Friends, Sass Cobra knows that there is no good strategy in biting hard and fast right away, noooooo, that’s too easy.  You need to wait for it, let them take the bait and run far, far away with it, before you jerk the line back and show them you have been listening all along.  You see, I knew I did not have the best equipment in the kitchen.  I knew my skills and experience were probably the least of anyone there.  I knew he could cook circles around me.  I could not rely on any of these things as I went to toe to toe with him, no, Sass Cobra had to be creative but still leave a mark.  And Sass Cobra did not disappoint….to the contrary.  Even I am shocked at what came out of my mouth that day.

 

Sass Cobra looked at this young guy, this justifiably cocky young guy who had a bit of a need to SHOW ME that I was below him, and after the last biting comment about the knives, Sass Cobra set down her knife, looked straight into this young Chef’s eyes and said, “You keep sassing me and I’m going to go and f**k your father, don’t think I won’t.  And then you’ll have to call me Mom at all your Christmas dinners as you cook for me.”  And then, that wicked, wicked wonderful Sass Cobra turned on her tail with a naughty, knowing wink and walked away, back to my Brussels sprouts.

 

Oh.  Oh Friends.  Oh my dear sweet Friends.  Where and How terrible words like this come out of my mouth, I do not know.  NO ONE in my family speaks this way, ever. I don’t think half of them even know what the F word is and think the word is “fudge” instead of what came out of my mouth that day.  I don’t speak like this in my medical world, though I hear it from plenty of managers and surgeons.  But I sure do know the words, and I am not afraid of them.  The kitchen and New York are places where language and F words are thrown about every other sentence, and I figured out I am comfortable with this.  I am only a little bit ashamed of myself on behalf of my family, my Friends, my clients, myself, but I am also secretly proud, make no mistake about it.  I am blushing just remembering the situation as I write to you, because it was shocking, it was not ladylike, and it hit home in a way that was a homerun in that kitchen, like nothing else I could have said or done, because it showed that I had a strength and confidence that could and would keep up.  When you can give and take sass in the kitchen, you know you belong, and so I proved myself right then and there, and I found my spot.  This was Graduation Step 4.  But the best was yet to come.

 

Graduation Step 5 included me getting Named in the kitchen.  The kitchen is mostly a very, very masculine, uber-manly place.  I love that energy, dirty and powerful and sometimes stupid as it is in its bravado.  I love it.  There are women Chefs in this kitchen who are awesome, and they hold their own, make no mistake about it. 

 

There is another Sarah in this kitchen, and she is far more skilled than I am.  When working under intense pressure, you must have precise communication in seconds.  Since there was already a Sarah, I had to have a nickname, and yesterday, unbeknownst to me until it was announced to the team, Chef gave me one.  I knew I had really graduated when I got named “SM,” (my initials), in addition to “S&M,” as of course, the kitchen now calls me, because it is ridiculous and full of sass and awesomely stupid and clever and wonderful.  It shows respect, believe it or not, because they trust that I get it, the undertones of sass, the welcoming “you’re now part of the team” naming.  If I had been given my middle name or some other cutsie moniker as my name, it would not have been as powerful a sign of acceptance.  This name shows power, even if it is tongue in cheek.  It’s perfect for me, given that the story of me sassing to that young Chef made its way around the kitchen in record time and got their attention.  You don’t have to understand or like it, this system, but if you have ever been part of an intense team, you will know and understand just how important this silly, sassy, full-on “Bring it” naming ritual is.  It shows me that I made it.  I graduated.

 

No longer am I the paper frycook hat girl in the thin white apron. Now I am right alongside the “real” chefs in my gray apron and hat, being called on by Chef as SM or S&M, and I will work ever-harder to continue to earn my spot in that kitchen I love so much.  I graduated to the next level, which will only be harder, but Sass Cobra and I are ready for it.

 

Friends, may we all have situations that bring us to our most humble so that we can earn our spot, and may we all have the hard work that helps us be ready when it comes.  You might be going through something really tough right now, but maybe, just maybe, it is sent to you as a way to be ready for something awesome, some new experience that suddenly, without warning, shows that you graduated, too.  I can hardly wait to see what comes next, but I had better keep an eye on that wily Sass Cobra, because I have a feeling I am going to need her.

 

With lots of love from New York,

Your Good Friend Sarah