High Season (18 page)

The thing that will stay the same at Rae's is Vinnie. It's his name that hangs over the door. He's the common factor among all the kitchen crews that have passed through the joint over the last fifteen years and it's his energy and enthusiasm that maintains a sense of continuity about the place. And I haven't dismissed the idea of sacking Jesse and getting a new chef de partie—that's what I'd normally do—but this year I'm physically feeling things a little more than I'd like to, and I'm struggling to ramp up the energy and enthusiasm that running a five-star restaurant requires.

I know Alice is getting tired of the high seasons at Rae's. And there are other options. As I flicked through the positions vacant in the local paper last week, I became fixated on an ad placed by a small restaurant in town that's seeking a new head chef. And what interested me most about that job is the fact that the restaurant is a dinner joint: they don't open for lunch or breakfast or have room service to worry about. The idea of starting work around two in the afternoon, six days a week, has become like a sweet dream I can't escape. Particularly at eight in the morning when the kids are jumping all over me, and instead of enjoying the experience I find it a struggle to maintain my equanimity. While I'm covered in glory by working at Rae's, the cost is killing me. And though the money is good—at least thirty grand a year more than I'd be getting at the dinner joint in town—there comes a time when it's never enough.

The equation in terms of pay for a head chef works in such a way that the lower down the food chain a chef goes the more control they have over their hours, but the less pay they take home. And it works that way because to work in an environment that puts a premium on everything you do, from the quality of the produce to the type of crockery you use, to the tone of the service, is inspiring. The attention to detail and the customers' expectations in a fine-dining scene ensures a certain level of both adrenaline and sophistication that becomes intoxicating. The problem is that unless you own the restaurant and can occasionally step back from the madness, the obsessive attention to every little detail and the need for single-minded perfection means that life becomes too narrow.

‘Vinnie wants some canapés for his table of friends, Chef,' Scotty calls into the kitchen. And Scotty knows the kitchen is closed. He understands we've packed the lunch service away and we're in the process of scrubbing down and getting ready for dinner. And he knows because, like me, he's seen it all before.

‘Just something simple,' I suggest, mimicking Vinnie. ‘Some prawns, a few oysters and scallops, maybe a sweet pork and papaya salad?'

‘You're all over it, Chef,' Scotty replies. ‘Might be best to keep things extra-simple, though, and just do a nice, big, fresh seafood platter.' He walks out.

Soda and Choc have stopped what they're doing and are looking at me, soapy scourers in hand, sections in chaos, like
you can't be fucking serious
.

‘One seafood platter, boys,' I call.

‘Yes, Chef,' they reply, their enthusiasm for the task buried somewhere so deep it struggles for breath.

‘And no fucking short cuts,' I add. ‘This is for the boss. I want every little thing perfect, okay?'

‘Yes, Chef,' they repeat, still subdued.

‘Don't fuck with me, men. Get cracking!' I say, clapping my hands. And that's all it takes to pick the boys up. Really, I'm surprised how well these two are responding. They actually give me some faith that if I do choose to stay on at Rae's, all I really have to do is get rid of Jesse and find some fresh energy for his section. Why throw the whole thing away? I've worked hard to get the restaurant where it is, and other than Jesse the crew is strong.

‘Fuck this. I need a smoke.' And just like that, Soda bombs my daydream.

Choc and I watch as Soda walks out past the bar, his head hung low, pulling a crumpled pack of Winfield Reds from his pocket. And I say nothing, picturing instead Soda leaping up onto a moving train.

‘It's you and me, old mate,' I say to Choc.

‘Yes, Chef,' replies Choc.

‘I'll do the bugs and the prawns and the fish, you get the salads started and crack that crab open.'

‘Yes, Chef.'

If it were any other time of year, I'd be forced to sack Soda—and Jesse—today! But because I can't, and because they know I can't, I have to suck it up as Soda stomps up the wooden hallway that runs beside the kitchen.

‘What's his problem?' Choc wants to know.

‘Well,' I say, ‘I think he's probably just a young, pussy-whipped pain in the arse who can't stand the heat. I think that, because of Jesse, this crew is probably going to fall to shit sometime soon and there's not much I can do to stop that happening.'

‘Everyone's just stressed out, Chef,' Choc assures me.

‘Mate,' I say, ‘everyone just seems over it this year. We've had a pretty good run, and we need to see the season out, but it might just be time to fuck this puppy.'

‘Which puppy is that, Chef?' Scotty calls out as he dumps more dirty coffee cups onto the crowded waiters' station.

‘Fucking stack those plates, Scotty, or the whole thing's going to crash and burn,' I tell him.

‘Which puppy are we fucking?' Scotty asks again.

‘Nothing,' I tell him. ‘We were just talking shit.'

‘Vinnie said to hurry up on that fucking platter or he'll sack you,' Scotty adds before he walks out.

And that is just so Vinnie Rae I can't stand it. He would have seen Jesse go up the tunnel, followed soon after by Soda, and he'd know why they did. Because he's a chef, Vinnie can feel the pressure in the kitchen building, it's an intuitive thing that a chef doesn't lose—apparently—and all that experience tells him that when things are at their most critical, it's the perfect time to throw a firecracker into the middle of it all. He's an expert. Really, I've learnt everything I know about how to get the most out of people from Vinnie Rae. The problem with Vinnie's model, though, is he keeps pushing until everything does crash and burn. Not that he gives a fuck. I guess he figures that chefs are only at their best for a couple of years anyway and it's better to get fresh talent through the place every so often. Nine days out of ten I'll just sidestep Vinnie's jab, maybe even serve it back with something extra, but it seems I'm getting slower and somehow dumber.

And that's the way it works. Pretty soon, a new head chef will arrive at Rae's with a couple of his or her crew from the last place they all worked at. They'll do a new menu and deep clean the joint, the soundtrack to their labour a constant put-down of the last crew and their piece-of-shit menu. They'll whine to Vinnie about the state of the coolroom and the grease at the back of the stove and Vinnie will shake his head like,
un-fucking-believable
. And then he'll say something like, ‘Have you done the dinner menu yet, Chef?'

In fact, the new head chef will sound just like me in whatever new joint I land in. And I figure the reason crews crash and burn, come and go, ‘until the next gig . . .', is because the job of being a chef is intrinsically creative. Every day is a journey into the heat, colour, movement and chaos of creating a new plate of food for every single guest who arrives at our restaurant. And every time I cook a dish, it's a new dish. Things change. Cooking in a fine-dining atmosphere is not like working in McDonald's where there is no room to experiment. In here, in the heat, sweat and abuse of a busy five-star restaurant kitchen, it's a fucking circus performance each day and every night. And it's draining. Most places have their rosters better figured out than Vinnie allows, but again, it doesn't have my name over the door and the way Vinnie sees it is that, if he was head chef, he'd be in here at six o'clock every morning and he wouldn't leave until midnight when the kitchen was Firedogged to within an inch of its life.

And I don't know what it is about today—maybe it's the sight of Vinnie popping that consolation bottle of Cristal that he never got to drink with Paris, or maybe I'm just getting too old to dance to this particular beat—but I resolve that I'll phone the owner of that little dinner joint in town tomorrow and sound him out about things. Just the thought of talking about a new menu with a new boss, standing inside a different kitchen with a different array of cooking implements . . . well, it's the most inspired I've been for a few weeks.

‘Salad's are up, Chef,' Choc informs me.

‘Good work, Choc. They look awesome. Really, that's nice work, mate.' And I'm serious. The food is clean, fresh and alive. It looks both healthy and irresistible. Great Thai food is like that. ‘Now get that platter down and polish it. And get some banana mat on it.'

‘Yes, Chef.'

There's no use fighting the endgame. I could walk out myself now—and I wouldn't be the first head chef to walk out of Rae's without giving notice—but I don't want to. If I'm going to leave, I want to do so on my terms and I want a nice, long holiday before I start up somewhere else. At least a week. And at least fifty kilometres away from where I live.

‘Get these bugs onto the banana mat and cut up some lime for me, Choc.'

‘Yes, Chef.'

‘How are the oysters?'

‘Yeah, good, Chef.' Choc hands me a freshly shucked local oyster over the pass.

I slide the oyster into my mouth and can't help but agree. ‘Plate me up a dozen of those little fuckers when you've done the platter.'

‘Yes, Chef.'

‘And fix yourself up something nice for lunch, mate. What would you like?'

‘I might have a steak, Chef. If that's all right?'

‘Mate,' I say with some enthusiasm. ‘I know that because we work at Rae's we get the privilege of watching Vinnie's lifestyle, but every now and then, we give a dog a bone!'

‘Yes, Chef,' Choc says again like the polite young man he is.

‘Here's the fish and chips and the prawns. Finish that platter and I'll get our lunch underway.'

Soda walks back into the kitchen reeking of dope, his eyes a little distant.

‘You joining Choc and me for lunch, Soda?' I enquire.

‘We're having a nice lump of prime rib steak with a little mushroom ragu and some fries.'

‘Yeah, righto, Chef,' Soda replies, and I can tell he's thinking:
That's right! Sometimes I have to eat things rather than just cook them.

‘Well, get this fucking kitchen clean,' I instruct him. ‘Then we can sit down out the back by the pool and enjoy our lunch.'

‘Yes, Chef!'

24

A week after I signed the lease on the terrace in Annandale, the new owners at Darling Street called me into a meeting one morning and basically let me go. I've got to say I didn't see it coming. To their credit, they paid me a couple of weeks' notice plus whatever benefits I had accrued, which amounted to quite a tidy little bundle of cash. And there was a big piece of me that was pleased to end the routine. I wasn't worried about getting more work; in the hospitality industry people come and go, restaurants open and shut, trends fly by faster all the time. If this joint decided they could find someone to do the same or better work for less money, well, good luck to them. That they went broke and shut up shop six months later was not something to celebrate.

A lot of people are cynical about themed pubs, particularly the Irish ones, and I get that, but the London Hotel was different because it'd been in Balmain for over a hundred years. And although there was some naff British stuff scattered about the place, the London was a serious suburban hotel that had recently had some serious money spent on it. They'd hired a good head chef in Andrew and the team was turning out a very smart early-nineties menu. There was a line of four chefs, and when they put an ad in the newspaper for a sous-chef to replace Gavin, Gavin was still there, which meant when I got the job, the person who knew everything about the section was able to hand it over to me in an organised manner. The team was focused, clean and busy. Andrew was constantly experimenting and changing the menu and winning new friends in both the suburb and the media. I took a pay cut after Darling Street, but given the job was for a sous-chef rather than a commis chef or chef de partie, I only dropped a couple of hundred a week, and I figured the benefits far outweighed the negatives.

I was immensely relieved to be back on a line after having been a head chef in kitchens with one or two other cooks or kitchen hands. I liked the grill section; it meant I was doing all the protein preparation and got to stand at the head of line and call the pass. Andrew took control on the two busiest shifts of the week, Friday and Saturday nights, but during the rest of the week he did sauce preparation and menu planning while I organised and cooked the pass.

The menu at the London borrowed from a cuisine that came to be labelled New British. It was lighter than a lot of the stodge that the British seem to love. New British borrowed from the Mediterranean by using olive oil rather than butter and was notable for its use of colour. It was also responsible for putting fruit back on the mains plate with things like passionfruit jus and golden apple galette. A typical dish might have been something like tea-smoked salmon with baby beetroot rosti, butter beans and passionfruit jus. You can just see the colours: the orange of the salmon with the purple rosti crust and the vivid yellow sauce. You'd finish the dish with some micro-herbs or maybe some butter beans and it would be served in a heavy white bistro bowl-plate.

I still like a lot of the things I learnt at the London—even the pork-belly pie—but the thing I enjoyed most was being back on the line without the stress of running the show. I was comfortable cooking for ten or a hundred as long as the rest of the crew were ready for action, but at the end of the day I could go home safe in the knowledge that it would be Andrew stressing about tomorrow rather than me. I started to wean myself off the heroin by beginning the day with a few shots of alcohol. Each morning would see me order a short black espresso from the bar that I would turn into something more delicious with Kahlua or Johnnie Walker or a random combination of whatever else was in the kitchen's alcohol supply.