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Bottom Notes
Throughout the book are “bottom notes” in areas below recipes where space allows. These notes tell a story of how I got from my Bar Mitvah to today. It's strictly optional content.
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Who am I?
Like you, I’m a work in progress. I was born in New York in 1946, the leading edge of the baby boom. I graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, flirted with the Peace Corps, worked in the antiwar movement. At 23, I opened my first of several restaurants. In 1976, I began a catering business. Since that time I have served more than 15 million guests. I have a wonderful son named Noah. Noah's mother and I divorced, but have remained good friends and co-parents. My father died when I was in my early thirties. My mother is vital and in her early nineties. I have one brother who’s four years older and a successful businessman, a sister-in-law and two nephews. I’ve listened to 78s, 45s, 33s and CDs and graduated to the iPod era. A few years ago, after years of single fatherhood, I met Christina and recently married. To date, I’ve not missed a day of work due to illness. I can still labor like an ox, but now after a really long day and night, I need a few days in the pasture. I’m at the latter part of middle age yet I feel younger than I imagined someone my age would feel.
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1603 Latimer St.
Armed with a physical deferment, I was free to pursue work that would advance my plan to open a restaurant. After a brief stint with a caterer, I saw an advertisement for a busboy at La Panetière, one of Philadelphia's two outstanding restaurants. Its owner was thirty-something Peter von Starck, who in the mid-’60s had met a young French chef named Georges Perrier while working at the four-star Oustau de Baumanière restaurant in Provence, France. Returning to Philadelphia with Perrier, von Starck opened a 30-seat French restaurant in a tiny townhouse on Spruce Street near 13th. The area was a culinary no man's land. After several years of explosive success, von Starck moved La Panetière to larger and more elegant quarters at 1603 Locust St. Perrier stayed behind to open the now-legendary Le Bec-Fin. Peter hired me, on the condition that I shave my beard. According to Peter, there was room for only one beard in La Panetière: his. I told Peter I wanted to open my own restaurant. Thus began a year and a half of total immersion in the life of a great French restaurant.
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A Yale Reject
It is hard to assess the mix of chance and choice that defines one’s life. After a comfortable Yonkers youth, my parents decided to move to Miami Beach. Leaving a beloved dog and my childhood friends behind, I entered 10th grade not as the Roosevelt High School Indian that was my proper destiny, but as a Beach High Tide. After a lonely year for me in the sun and sand, my parents returned to Yonkers and restored normalcy to my life. Despite a record that included graduating fourth in my class, class president, National Honor Society president, sports editor of both the school newspaper (My Athlete’s Feats column was renowned.) and the yearbook, I was rejected by Yale. So, I headed to Penn and Philadelphia. It’s funny about life’s serendipity. Had Yale made a different decision, I would not be here, you would not be reading this, 15,000 folks would have had to find a different caterer, and 15 millions of meals would not have been served, first dates, marriage proposals and family reunions altered – so many things would have been different for both you and me.
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French Food and Thai Staff Dinner
As I progressed through the finer points of dining room service at La Panetière, a cook's assistant position opened. Peter granted me the job, provided I would continue fulfilling my flower arranging duties. I moved into the kitchen and up the line. The chefs, who knew me to be a hard worker, were generous with their attention. I found the rush of line cooking on a busy night to be a sublime combination of art, teamwork and athleticism. While I hardly became a chef overnight, I quickly understood the essence of the craft and the rhythm of a kitchen. Some of the greatest highlights, however, were before the restaurant even opened. Many of my coworkers were from Thailand and their cooking traditions informed most of our staff meals. As a culinary tabula rasa, I was stunned by the subtlety of the French food we made for our customers and the cacophony of curries we made for ourselves. I’ve been building upon this experience ever since.
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