Students.......

I (generally) love a culinary student. Any young person with the balls to actually take on this industry and want to make themselves something within it deserves at least a little credit in my books. Maybe they'll make it, maybe they won't. Maybe they'll burn out when they're twenty and go into construction. Point is, they see some sort of future for themselves in this business, and at the very least, they have some sort of passion for it.

There are other students out there, however, who get a part-time or summer job with a company and have the fucking balls to DARE and look down on me and my staff.

Let this be known: Me and my staff work harder and longer than any of you fucks will. Will we ever make as much money? Possibly not. Are we better than you? In the broadest sense of it: yes.

A good cook knows that other people always come before them. It's very likely they are somewhat downtrodden, maybe poor, maybe even scumbags. But they all have manners, they've all been trained to put others before themselves because that's what they do for 8 hours (at the least) for (at the very least) 5 days a week.

We thrive on challenges. We look failure in the eye every day and tell it to take a hike. We adapt to whatever is thrown at us. We're fit, even though we barely look after ourselves. If we're not fit, we sweat like dogs to get everything done until we ARE fit. We are as sharp and keen as the knives we use. And even though we all have mouths that would turn a sailor blue, we've got more common sense and practical intelligence than half of your university's education department.

We multitask. Fuck do we multitask. We do more in one day than you'll do in a month. We balance budgets while chopping herbs, boiling pasta, reducing veal stock and making caramel. While my baker makes coulis, brulees, cheesecake, biscuits, fills a few orders, makes notes for the next days order and lists for that days mis, she's running half the hot line and filling her own bills.

More than manners, work ethic,and inner strength to carry on even though every part of you aches and you haven't had any real sleep in days or sat down to a good meal in over a month though, my best cooks are good people. To paraphrase a great japanese chef: "You are only as great a cook as the person you are." And this is true for them. They are some of the finest people I will ever have the great pleasure to know, and I would not trade them for the world.

However, if you are some snide, sneering, nose-turned-up, too-good-to-be-here, silver spoon-fed, ivory tower, at-home-with-your-parents-living, fast-food-loving, doesn't-give-a-fuck-about my-kitchen-or-the-people-in-it, or the customers that are paying your inflated wage, motherfucking, sycophantic, sucking-up-to-with-MY-food-and-UNSUCCESSFULLY-hitting-on-the-waitresses-while-you-could-be-doing-work! CUNT, you had best stay the hell away from my kitchen. I might have a position for you though, as a dishwasher. Although, my dishwasher says he doesn't like you, and I can't be responsible for what happens to you after work.

Needless to say, I'm not hiring students anymore. Maybe culinary students. Some of them are alrights.