Wearing the Chef's Jacket

Wearing the Chef’s Jacket
July 30, 2010

Cooking school is almost 10 years behind me. Just the other day I had to purchase a new chef jacket as my others are beginning to show signs of wear and tear. The original one from school is going to be retired - the one that has my maiden name on it, the one that seems like it was first put on a lifetime ago. In many ways it is a lifetime ago as the journey from then to now has been one of no clear destination to one of finding who I am and where I belong. A big piece of that definition comes when I put on my chef jacket and begin the work day in the restaurant - the place where as the sous chef I am finally beginning to embrace the reality, “I am a chef!”.

A few years ago, when I was first married, my wonderful newly inherited daughter and son-in-law asked what I wanted for my birthday and my reply was ‘a chef jacket’. The kitchen work in the ‘home for ministry’ where I worked had taken its toll on my t-shirts and I decided it was time to work smarter and wear a jacket. Yet I was a little unsure of wearing it because it seemed a bit presumptuous to wear one in this beautiful private home that provided a place for retreats and also opened its doors to provide a safe sanctuary for disenfranchised women. A few eyebrows went up at times but it sure saved my shirt wardrobe from constantly bearing the marks of cooking!

While a nice white chef jacket is a part of the kitchen uniform, I am realizing that, for me, there is so much more to putting it on each day to begin my work. It is the realization that indeed I am a chef, a culinary artist. For so many of us we are so reluctant to truly, deeply embrace who we really are, with all our pieces, with all our creativity and passion. We are afraid to ‘put on the jacket’ that is simply a little symbol of the real person whose shoulders it rests on, whose heart it covers, and whose spirit is expressed in every move that is made.

The move into a restaurant kitchen a few years ago was a surprise for me as I never envisioned that work environment as where I would be. Yet today, a little over a year into it, I realize that this is my new ‘training kitchen’. The chef I work with has a passion for excellent food and creates such delicate flavours and is a gentle family man that shares many of the values in life I have. This is no ‘hell’s kitchen’ that I am working in!! No Gordon Ramsay’s allowed! It is a time of learning the nuances between a good sauce and a superb sauce that elicits a ‘wow’ when tasted. There is the challenge of learning to love making desserts and striving to get the ‘perfect’ texture and flavour with each one. Becoming more artistic with each dish, consistently sending out an excellently presented and flavoured appetizer is a daily challenge. I ask myself constantly how can I let my creating become a sacred work even when I never see who receives it or know how they enjoy it? Learning to be patient and precise are two challenges when I prepare desserts because, as my closest friends know, I always hated doing desserts! Not only did I not want to prepare them but I never really enjoyed eating them! Becoming a chef, in this season, means that I must take the challenge of learning to strive for excellence in the areas that are not my forte, and begin to love them because of what they teach me. Learning to be diverse in what I create allows me to be more versatile as a chef.

All those years ago in cooking school I never imagined ‘wearing the jacket’ would mean that I would proudly say ‘I am a chef’ and believe it to be true. I used to think I simply loved to cook and had a passion to let others experience the beauty and sensuality of food. Oh I still do! Yet, it is now more clearly, the realization that in order to continue to create good food, share it at our table with family and friends, to let guests experience the sensuousness of eating, there will always be the desire to know more about how excellent food is created and to be mentored by those whose experience and knowledge is much broader than mine. Wearing my chef jacket is not about having arrived but rather it is the wonder of the adventure to always finding that there is such a vast well of learning that will be a lifetime of creating new culinary tasting experiences!

At home, I still love that my husband is the dessert creator and I am the savoury food creator. It is a great team and only metaphorically do I wear my jacket at home! In my soul, all my life, I have been moving into being a chef. That is who I am.