Make It Messy by Marcus Samuelsson

Author:Marcus Samuelsson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Published: 2015-06-09T04:00:00+00:00

One of my good friends in the Victoria kitchen turned out to be an Irishman named Gary Hallinan. Like so many of the Irish men and women I would meet in restaurant kitchens over my career, he was friendly and generous and easy to get along with. Gary—who had jet-black hair, pale skin, and a smile that cut deep dimples into his cheeks—never let the stress get to him. In fact, just exchanging a few words with him had the invaluable effect of bringing my blood pressure down. He was from a hotel family, had earned a degree in hotel management, had already worked at Dublin’s posh Shelbourne Hotel, and would eventually go on to a very successful career in San Francisco, but the truth was that he wasn’t much of a cook. At Victoria, his time in the kitchen was just a part of learning the ropes, and he approached it sportingly. One day, while trying to sharpen his knife against a long steel, Gary slipped and cut his arm pretty deeply.

The first-aid station was right outside Stocker’s office, so Gary walked over and sat down on the floor in front of the office door as he waited for treatment.

Eventually Mr. Stocker came along, and as he came up to this injured man, blood everywhere, Gary looked up at him, and in the middle of what was probably true shock, still managed to keep the hierarchy front and foremost.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Stocker,” he said. And then he passed out.

Stocker stepped over Gary, saying nothing, and went into his office, shutting the door behind him.

Which is not to say that Stocker wouldn’t get vocal when he saw a screw-up in process. In another kitchen disaster, not long after Gary, a kid named Otto was put in charge of grinding meat for the day’s meat loaves. Otto was German, so he had no problem understanding instructions, but he was distracted by the pressure, and in what would turn out to be his last day, he took a shortcut. Otto used a metal ladle to push the meat through the grinder. At first it worked well enough, but on one pass, he pushed the ladle too far down into the neck and the auger blade caught it. Otto didn’t let go fast enough, and his arm was stuck in the machine, twisting his hand downward toward the pulverizing auger. The second that Otto realized he couldn’t retract his arm, he let out a howl. Out of nowhere, it seemed, Stocker showed up and slammed off the power, two seconds before Otto’s hand would have been ground into mincemeat. Stocker and a couple of others untwisted Otto’s arm from the machine, and the whole while, Stocker never once asked if Otto was okay; he just berated him.

“Why the hell are you using the wrong tool?” he screamed. “What were you thinking? You were this close to losing your arm! Are you trying to get our department in trouble? Trying to get me fired?”

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