01 Feb A Surf & Turf Dinner Party
The life of a personal chef is always full of variety. I’ve headed across NY Harbor 4 times this past month to cook dinners for the same client (whom I GREATLY appreciate!) who lives in Staten Island, just steps away from the Ferry Terminal, so despite the long subway ride from Upper Manhattan and the ferry ride, it’s actually quite convenient. This is the 4th and final of the dinners. This night, the client was having over some of his best friends for a guy’s night dinner, & wanted guy’s food! When he asked for Surf & Turf, I thought to myself “Geez, I’ve never done that for a client before, it’s the kind of meal you go to a seafood restaurant or steakhouse for.” But the great thing about a personal chef service is that everything is personalized and customized, so of course I said yes!
The hard part was getting the timing right. The main course involved steak, lobster and risotto, all 3 of which require to-the-minute timing! (especially since we had steak orders for medium-rare, medium, & medium-well!) Since the risotto takes 20 minutes, I started that, and then was aflurry with the rest of the cooking as I kept coming back to the pot and wooden spoon to stir! Luckily, the broccoli I had pre-cooked and just heated up right before service. I managed to get it all plated in time (including the drawn butter, but excluding the fancy “Charlie Brown Cut” lemons, which didn’t make it to the plate when I took the photo, but which I sent to the table later).
Check out the story on Whrrl, which is a great micoblogging platform which lets you upload photo essays on the fly at events or while on the road.