June 23rd, 2022
Jun. 23rd, 2022 10:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
innerstoryStarted rewatching Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown as a catharsis before making the difficult journey to watch Roadrunner. A movie I am excited to see, but also profoundly sad as it is a final farewell.
Kitchen Confidential was released right as I was coming to grips with the fact that a career path of a cook I had been on since the third grade was ruining my love for it. Money has a way of sucking the joy out of things and I had let my family heritage of working as a chore to get the best of me.
I was working in a kitchen at a classic New England inn as a prep/line cook. I was also working as a line cook in a nursing home and moonlighting as a front line staff doing social services. That last one had offered me a job with more stable pay and benefits.
I took the pay and benefits. Within two years my cooking career was completely over.
Everyone hopes to be an executive chef, but obviously only a small group of the absolute most talented ever get the chance. My chance wasn't coming. I was proficient at most things, which is a terrible insult in what is a field based on creativity. I simply lacked the support network, the background, and the time to slug it out to make a name for myself. I spent most of high school figuring out where to sleep that night, my focus was too divided with basic needs.
I have been enjoying Tony's output for more than twenty years now. It provides a shot of hope to get me back in the kitchen and keep growing, even if I dont wish to revisit it professionally.
But he is gone and all that will be made has been. I have little attachment to most things, that is not the case here. Thinking about it make me well up every time.
Kitchen Confidential was released right as I was coming to grips with the fact that a career path of a cook I had been on since the third grade was ruining my love for it. Money has a way of sucking the joy out of things and I had let my family heritage of working as a chore to get the best of me.
I was working in a kitchen at a classic New England inn as a prep/line cook. I was also working as a line cook in a nursing home and moonlighting as a front line staff doing social services. That last one had offered me a job with more stable pay and benefits.
I took the pay and benefits. Within two years my cooking career was completely over.
Everyone hopes to be an executive chef, but obviously only a small group of the absolute most talented ever get the chance. My chance wasn't coming. I was proficient at most things, which is a terrible insult in what is a field based on creativity. I simply lacked the support network, the background, and the time to slug it out to make a name for myself. I spent most of high school figuring out where to sleep that night, my focus was too divided with basic needs.
I have been enjoying Tony's output for more than twenty years now. It provides a shot of hope to get me back in the kitchen and keep growing, even if I dont wish to revisit it professionally.
But he is gone and all that will be made has been. I have little attachment to most things, that is not the case here. Thinking about it make me well up every time.
