Spiced

Most of the people in my culinary program began their search for an externship by looking over the long list of restaurants and corporate dining rooms that participated with the school’s externship program. Some students jumped eagerly at the tiny number that actually offered a small pittance of payment; others went for those that offered the shortest commute. After working for almost a year at a three-star restaurant, I wanted quality. I also needed to keep my full-time job at Nobu at least until I completed my externship so I could continue paying my rent, so I needed something that would fit into my work schedule.

At first, I was set on advancing my cooking career while getting closer to my Danish background, but a trail at Aquavit, New York’s only three-star Scandinavian restaurant, left me feeling uninspired. Though the food was innovative (smoked avocado, espresso mustard, goat cheese sorbet), delicious, and meticulously executed, the kitchen vibe just didn’t feel right. Maybe I’d grown too accustomed to Mika’s gentle guidance and Jemal’s genuine interest in teaching. When Steven, one of the senior managers at Nobu, suggested I do my externship at Layla, a restaurant owned by the same restaurant group as Nobu and just a block away, it made sense. I’d get to extern two days a week at a great restaurant (the recently opened Layla had just received a glowing two-star review from the New York Times), and Nobu would be flexible with my schedule. Steven walked me over himself.

Layla was a large corner restaurant with enormous windows, hanging lantern-style lights, and lots of colorful tiles. As we sat in one of the booths, Joey gave me a brief overview of his style. He’d trained both in New York and Paris, so his food was rooted in traditional cooking methods, but he favored the flavors of the Mediterranean, including Italian, which was his heritage. Layla’s food spanned both Mediterranean Europe and the Middle East, so he incorporated many of the flavors and ingredients of the region—zaatar, couscous, sumac, phyllo—in a way that seemed completely natural.

As I sat listening to Joey, I tried to get a feeling for the place (after all, a “feeling” had turned me off to Aquavit and another “feeling” had motivated me to enroll in cooking school). The dining room was full of natural light that bled into the completely open kitchen which extended out from the long, curved bar. I could hear music, Oasis’s “Champagne Supernova,” playing in the kitchen. The cooks were smiling, and they seemed calm. One of them was a woman.

For the next month, I spent my two days off as well as a few of my mornings at Layla, arriving at nine a.m. and staying well into the evening for service. Most of the time I served as an extra pair of hands and did whatever little task anyone needed (or, more often, hated doing themselves): brunoising sticky, dried apricots for the bastiya, juicing zucchini for the Israeli couscous, plucking pomegranate seeds. I became the phyllo flower “queen.” Jessica, the sauté cook, hated making the ruffled phyllo flower garnish for her bastiya, but I, apparently, was good at it. The flowers became part of my routine there, and she was happy not to have to deal with them. When you’re here, she said, complimenting me, my whole stress level just drops.

My pastry experience often landed me at the pastry station during service. Though it was the one place I felt confident (plating desserts was second nature by that point), it also made me slightly uncomfortable. I just didn’t think the desserts at Layla were as good as those at Nobu. All the plates looked the same: something plopped in the middle of the plate and surrounded by sauce. The chocolate cake was thick and dense, not airy and oozing like the bento box cake, and in my opinion they used an inferior brand of chocolate. I felt guilty for being such a snob after hardly a year in the business, so I kept quiet and did whatever they asked.

I’d been externing for about a month when, rather suspiciously, the cooks started dropping hints. You’d fit in great here, Juan, the bread station cook, told me in the privacy of the walk-in refrigerator. He manned the brick oven that bulged into the dining room. Joey’s a great chef, and he’s a nice guy. You’ll really be able to learn at a place like this, Jessica quietly advised. Even Chris, the rough and burly daytime sous-chef, put in his two cents: We got a real good crew here, he announced. By the time Joey sat me down and officially offered me the position of garde-manger, all of their “subtle” encouragement had worked its magic. I took the job.

It was the last time for a long while that Joey talked to me for more than two minutes at a time. It hadn’t taken me long to figure out that all the women at Layla had crushes on Joey. I was far too intimidated by him to consider him in any role other than that of chef. I made no attempt to be his friend, I just wanted to do a good job. In any case, he barely spoke to me, and when he did, I was usually flummoxed. He once asked me if I’d been “one of the smart kids” in high school. Not knowing the correct answer, I just shrugged. It’s the smart ones you gotta worry about, Dolly, he said cryptically and without context, and walked away, leaving me panicked. Didn’t he think I was smart enough to make it? Or, was I too smart to succeed in the virtually nonintellectual arena of the kitchen? He was a mystery to me. Far more worrisome, though, were his oblique comments related to my position in his kitchen.

“So, Dolly . . .” said Joey, edging up to me while I organized the various bins of greens I needed for service. He insisted on being called Joey, not Chef, and in the two months I’d been working at Layla I never heard him called anything else. He also insisted on adding a final “ee” to everyone else’s name, too, which unfortunately made me Dolly, even on the official schedule.

As he stood next to me, I kept my head down and continued picking through my bin of mesclun, searching for the imperfect greens that had become the bane of my garde-manger existence. Garde-manger, an entry-level position and the lowest in the kitchen line, is responsible for the cold appetizers, including salads—things that require the least amount of skill. I spent what seemed like hours picking through piles of leaves searching for any that were starting to brown, wilt, or, worse, slime—any that might have gotten in the way of my nightly quest for salad perfection.

“Just wondering,” he said, lingering at my side. I turned nervously back to my greens and folded a clean, dry side towel over them, lovingly tucking them in the way Joey had showed me. Why was he still standing there?

“Vine-ripened tomato,” he said officially, raising his chin slightly, as if he were announcing royalty, “stuffed with a grilled Gulf shrimp and escabeche salad, with curry oil and balsamic reduction.”

Jessie worked the sauté station, and, thanks to both her calm demeanor and talent, she’d been my best source of help since I had started. She patiently answered my endless insecure questions and never made me feel stupid for asking in the first place. After five minutes and a quick chat with her, I was standing on the hot line, fifteen scored vine-ripened tomatoes and a bowl of ice water at my side, waiting for my pot of water to boil and still wondering what to make of that strange conversation. My year at Nobu had given me a bit of confidence, enough to keep at bay the fear of being fired at any moment. It had taught me the importance of organization, preparedness, and efficiency, and I’d put those skills to use at my new job at Layla. As far as I could tell, I hadn’t yet made any major mistakes.

I came in early every day to make sure I’d have enough time to be prepared by the time service started at five thirty p.m. I was responsible for all of the cold appetizers on the menu, which included all of the mezze and salads, thirteen items in all, half of which required the use of the Robot Coupe, a heavy-duty commercial-strength food processor that we lovingly referred to as R2-D2. My predecessor was unimpressed with the responsibilities of garde-manger. I didn’t spend two years in culinary school just to make dips, he’d said scornfully under his breath when I was still an extern, but to me it was just the first step on the way up. It was my chance to make an impression as a real cook making real food for paying customers in a real restaurant for a real chef.

For weeks I hounded my more experienced coworkers, toting around a Robot Coupe filled with hummus (or baba ghanoush or herbed feta). Does this taste right? More tahini? More salt? More lemon juice? Unlike the dessert production at Nobu, there were no recipes, only lists of ingredients and basic methods. Everything was done by taste. After taste. After taste. Slowly, slowly, I gained confidence in my taste buds and my instincts. Surely Joey had noticed that it no longer took me an hour to make hummus because of all the second-guessing, hadn’t he? And that I was always, always, set up and ready for service? That I kept my station clean and organized?

Some things had become second nature to me, like blanching vegetables and salting my water. I threw in a handful of kosher salt (rule: always salt the water, salty like the sea). Once the water reached a full boil, I gently lowered in the tomatoes.

What had Joey meant, What do you want to be when you grow up? Did he think that cooking was just a temporary thing for me, a hobby? Or did he simply think I wasn’t cut out for it, as in What do you want to be when you grow up, Dolly . . . ’cause you sure do suck at this? Was he questioning my commitment? Wondering if I was an employee worth investing in? Why hadn’t I told him that I love cooking? Actually, Joey, I should have said, I’ve wanted to be a chef for as long as I can remember. I read cookbooks when I was twelve! I made crêpes from scratch for my friends in high school . . . for fun! Oh, and by the way, I am already grown up and this is what I want to do. I gave up a safe, stable office job for this! No, I hadn’t said any of that. As usual, I hadn’t been able to think that quickly.

I might not have been so worried if I had ever gotten some sort of concrete positive reinforcement, a single moment of serious conversation when Joey actually commented on my job performance. But no, that’s not how it worked. Joey’s biggest contribution to my self-confidence thus far had been to nonchalantly dip a pinky into one of my mezze and mutter “quality control” before popping the finger into his mouth and walking away. No “yum,” no “perfect,” not even a “Good job, Dolly.” Only what sometimes felt like an interminable daily grind in which I had no choice but to believe that no news was good news.

It only took a minute or two for the tomato skins to start peeling away from the shallow Xs I had sliced into the bottom of each one. I lifted them out of the water with a spider (a round wire-mesh tool with a long handle) and placed them in the bowl of ice water I had waiting (rule: always use ice water to stop the cooking).

While my tomatoes cooled, I moved on to the shrimp. After tossing them in olive oil, I sprinkled them evenly with salt and twisted the wooden pepper mill over them, giving the grayish crustaceans a generous dusting of freshly ground white pepper (rule: season everything with salt and pepper). One by one, I lined them up on the hot grill.

Mina had started back when I was an extern. She’s Jewish and Peruvian, and she can cook, Jessie had told me excitedly. And she speaks Spanish. She was younger than me but had already worked in great restaurants for years. Mina bent her knees to lower the heavy stack of half sheet trays on the counter, each one fully loaded with a single layer of the meats and fishes she would need for her station.

Where Jessie was all about delicate touch and calm determination, Mina was just the opposite. She had an edgy energy more like a machine in overdrive and had no qualms about bossing me—or anyone—around if she felt it necessary. She had contempt for anyone “soft,” and on the rare occasion a waiter burned him- or herself by grabbing a hot plate from behind the line she had no sympathy. It’s a kitchen, she would say matter-of-factly, and shrug. Everything’s hot. I had managed to stay on her good side, and she was friendly most of the time, so I didn’t take her bossing personally. She did know what she was doing. She grabbed the tongs impatiently from me and deftly began turning three and four shrimp at a time before handing the tongs back to me, lesson accomplished. (I had turned them one at a time—much too time consuming.) Sometimes I had to be taught the most obvious of things.

It only took another thirty seconds or so before all the shrimp turned opaque—just cooked through—and I could get out of her way. Using her three-at-a-time method, I loaded the cooked shrimp onto a half sheet to cool, then cleaned the grill with a few quick swipes of the grill brush before leaving her station. Mina gave an approving nod (rule: you use it, you clean it).

Back at my station, I took the cooled tomatoes out of the ice water and swiftly peeled them, cut out the lids, scooped out the insides with my fingers, arranged them upside down on a towel-lined half sheet tray (lids on the side), and slid them into my lowboy. It was five thirty-five p.m., and from my station, an extension of the bar, I could see silhouettes of the first customers coming through the sunny, glass-fronted entrance of the restaurant. Early birds. I had to stop obsessing over Joey’s cryptic messages and focus on service.

I gave my station a once-over. Hummus, baba ghanoush, tadzhiki, tabouleh, taramasalata, white bean puree, herbed feta, cumin-spiced carrots. Check. Bins of frisée and mesclun, cleaned and picked through. Check. Dolmas, vegetarian and lamb, both heating up. I had backups of everything. I found two empty squeeze bottles and filled one with the neon yellow curry oil, the other with a dark, syrupy balsamic vinegar reduction.

As soon as diners were seated, they got a small bowl of marinated olives and white bean dip for their table. We went through so many olives that Joey marinated them with his secret combination of spices downstairs in an enormous tub that was big enough for me to bathe in. I kept a smaller stash of them at my station for service. I spooned some olives into a small bowl and some of the garlicky rosemary bean dip into another one and set them on the bar of my station to be picked up. Until it got busy, the waiters would casually walk by, declaring their olive and bean dip needs, which I in turn would fill. Sometimes they would even thank me. But as the night progressed and the crunch set in, their requests would start to sound more like angry demands. Olives for two! For six! Olives for four, twice! Olives! Olives! Olives! I need olives! Their frenetic requests used to intimidate me, but after a while I found their madness almost amusing; they rattled so easily.

“You got a hummus and a baba, Dolly,” Joey said, standing at the edge of my station. “And you got a special coming your way.” He stuck a yellow copy of the ticket onto my dupe slide before returning to his post in front of the printer, across from the hot line. “Pull out the mise-en-place,” he added. “I’ll be back in a sec to show you the plate.”

I grabbed the appropriate dishes for the hummus and baba and spooned a dollop of each into their respective bowls. The hummus got a small well of extra-virgin olive oil and lemon juice and was topped with finely chopped red onion, toasted pignoli nuts, and chopped chives. The smoky baba, a roasted eggplant dip, got a sprinkle of chopped black olives, tomato concassé, and chopped parsley. And then, just to be sure, because it had been that kind of a day, I dipped my finger into the hummus, then into my mouth. Delicious. It wasn’t until I set the small plates on the bar for pickup that I noticed the two guys sitting farther down at the bar, drinks in hand.

I saw that, one of them mouthed with a self-satisfied grin. I smiled weakly at them, wiping my finger on a side towel. Most of the time I loved working in an open kitchen—being able to see the diners, look out the windows, and hear the music—but every once in a while we got someone with an obnoxious comment. If you’re afraid of people touching your food, I wanted to sneer back, don’t eat in a restaurant.

“Don’t worry about them, Dolly,” said Joey, who had suddenly appeared at my side. He dipped his knuckle into the baba and, nodding at the dorks at the bar, licked the baba off of it. More “quality control.”

I pulled a chilled white plate from the lowboy (greens, like ice cream, work best on chilled plates) and set it on the counter next to the rest of the mise-en-place I had already gathered nearby.

Joey grabbed a small bunch of the juicy escabeche, paper-thin slices of red and yellow pepper, red onions, and fennel that were marinated in lemon, lime, and orange juices and extra-virgin olive oil, and dropped it into the bowl with the frisée.

“Make a little bed for the tomato to sit on.” He spread a dab of the mixture onto the middle of the plate and set a tomato in the center of it. He added four grilled shrimp to the remaining salad and used that to stuff the tomato, letting two of the shrimp peek out of the top.

“Then, curry oil and balsamic reduction. Make dots all around the tomato.” He handed me the two squeeze bottles. “Just think of Seurat,” he said, giving me a nudge with his elbow. “I love Seurat.”

I held one squeeze bottle over the plate, letting bright yellow dots of curry oil fall onto the plate, then followed with the dark balsamic reduction, filling the leftover white space. They looked like miniature oil slicks.

I wiped the edges of the freshly plated special and set it on the bar next to the hummus and baba ghanoush that went with it. Maybe my initiation period of uncertainty and insecurity was coming to an end. Maybe the whole day had been some sort of a test.