That much closer
There was a lot happening today, so please, stay with me. Hopefully it will all come together in the end.
One year ago today, I posted a blog that had the following, “He defined what a chef should be and defined what I hope to become one day.” That was how I ended my blog when I found out Chef Joseph passed. I only knew him for a very short time, what a huge influence he was on me in the kitchen.
When I packed up the jeep and headed west to Rioja, I had two goals. The first was to be offered a job. I wanted to work harder than ever, learn more than possible and really focus on desserts, becoming better in the kitchen and if possible become that much more passionate about desserts. Hopefully from this, they would see this passion and dedication and want me to stay on as part of their team. Well, goal one accomplished. They are opening a new restaurant early summer and they offered me a job at Euclid Hall. I was beside myself. It was a pretty exciting moment when they asked. At the time I needed to focus on the daily tasks, but inside I was jumping for joy.
The second goal was to have a dessert special for the night at Rioja. I have seen what Chef Eric creates, and I really wanted to have the opportunity to present something that he would be equally excited about. Last Friday when I was filling out all my school paperwork with him, I asked about presenting a special before I left. My idea was an orange bread pudding with candied walnuts and whipped cream to garnish. I knew we had left over candied walnuts and brioche from Mother’s Day, and was hoping to use them as a starting point. He liked the idea, but we continued on without discussing it further. Sunday, being the busy day it was, Eric decided to make the amuse bouche; a walnut cream filled croissant. It was beautiful and delicious, but the only problem, they forgot about it. At the end of the day we had a few sheet trays of these and I just wanted to cry. I asked him what we should do with these, and his reply, “Save them for your dessert special.” I must have looked like a fat kid about ready to enjoy his chocolate birthday cake, smiling from ear to ear. Yesterday we sat down and started planning the dessert. This was truly a great collaboration. I had an initial idea for the special, but being the good teacher and mentor, Eric took the dessert to the next level without really changing the original concept. We both had so much fun talking about it and creating it.
Today at line up, Eric said the evening’s dessert special was a collaboration between Adam and I. As he was presenting it, the staff was eating this warm bread pudding (and by the way, it’s currently 30 and snowing here in Denver). Being able to watching their expressions as they were eating dessert made goal number two a success. Almost every single person there made it a point to stop by and tell me how much they enjoyed the dessert and congratulate me on a job well done.
Tomorrow is my last day at Rioja. It will be really hard to leave such a great group of people. They really have adopted me into their family, and for that I am eternally grateful. I have learned so much in such a very short time. I have made some very good friends and more importantly I have learned that much more about what it takes to make a really good dessert, something I will have to do here soon at my new job. As my classroom education is about done, it will be time to stand alone and hopefully do what it takes to becoming that much closer to defining what a chef should be.
Below is today’s dessert special at Rioja. The photo unfortunately was a quick snap of a quick test plate in the back. I am not sure it does the dessert justice, but hope you enjoy.
