A Recipe for Revenge; a Dish Best Served Cold

When the new trainee, young Englishman Kevin, first came to our Parisian restaurant, he was raw as steak tartare. Still, he showed some promise. Well-bred, he was raised properly, although a little nutty for most people’s taste. At first, he was as flaky as a day-old croissant, but after a few weeks, he seemed to develop the hard crust needed by a chef. He was still soft and fluffy inside, able to soak up all the tastes around him.

Physically, he had little visual appeal. He resembled a cheese souffle with frogs’ legs for limbs. His eyes were grey, like over-boiled quail eggs, rimmed with tomato sauce. His nose was a bulbous purple sweet potato, and his hair hung in limp strands like squid ink pasta drenched in olive oil. Yet, who cares if a chef is not attractive to look at?

The sous-chefs did not take kindly to Englishman Kevin. They began to make constant fun of him, playing silly chef’s tricks on him, like leaving stinky cheese in his locker. It was not very mature. I could never catch them at it, they were slippery as jellied eels.

A restaurant is a giant pressure-cooker, and I understood the need for them to let off steam, but they kept stirring and stirring Kevin, picking him over like half-spoiled crab meat. To them, he was as welcome as a plate of lamb’s brains brought to a vegan feast.

Kevin began to develop a problem. He cooked with wine, but none of it went into the dishes. His temperature rose at the slightest jibe, so I took to leaving him in the cold room to cool off. I tried many times to smooth things over, but he developed a thin skin like a bad custard. He could dish it up, but he couldn’t take it.

I was afraid that one day he would simply explode, like the time he experimented with microwaving chocolate lava cakes flavoured with a large quantity of popping candy.

One night, after service was finished and the sous-chefs had left, I took him aside.

“Take what they say with a grain of salt. Don’t let them curdle your ambition,” I told him.

I tried to explain what it meant to be a chef. “To be able to cook in this restaurant means you are as lucky as the last live lobster left in the kitchens of the Titanic.

“Here, we are creating happiness with our food. We faire l’amour with our dishes.

“To a Frenchman, a camembert is not just a cheese. A baguette is more than a loaf of bread, a crepe is not just a pancake and steak frites is not steak and chips.

“A souffle is a sweet whisper of air which you can eat. To savour our bouillabaisse is to bathe your tastebuds in the briny fruits of the Mediterranean Sea. Our pate de foie gras with grilled peaches is a Roman orgy in your mouth, and once you have tasted our mousse au chocolat, you will never be the same. It is as addictive as crack cocaine.

“Then we have our Tournedos Rossini, sauce Madeira. One bite, and you are transported to the Corridas, you are at a bullfight by a beach in the Azores, and you have the iron taste of blood in your mouth, the scent of earth in the truffle, with the strength of oak in the aromas. It is a dish imagined by lust, conceived in seduction, and delivered with nothing but love.

“Our cuisine is not just magic, Kevin, it is pure alchemy.”

Yet, as time wore on, Kevin did not improve. At lunch service, he wanted a fast food choice, rather than the traditional slow foods for the customary two hour French lunch. He served rabbit instead of snails, Le Mc’Baguette instead of turtle soup.

Our restaurant was in a hotel, so. I put him on breakfast service. Surely, I thought, someone named Kevin could make a full English?

Perhaps something was lost in translation. I asked for a breakfast of champions. I received a plate of mushrooms. A breakfast of champignons.

I taught him how to make a simple omelette. “It’s a piece of cake,” I said.

Imagine the complaints I received from customers who received a slice of gateau Napoleon instead of their eggs.

“I’m afraid you’re just not cutting the mustard,” I told him, only to later find tiny criss-crossed knife marks in all the condiment pots.

I kept an eye on him as he cooked. “A little more thyme and it will be perfect,” I said, and he left for an hour. “Don’t crowd the pan,” I counselled, and he stood a metre back from the stove

The other chefs kept adding acid to the mix, skewering him with barbs, milking his torment like they were pulling jackpots on a slot machine. I didn’t coddle them, but they were sprinkling salt into his wounds, and it could not continue.

“Eat humble pie,” I told him. I tried to let them all stew in their own juice, but to no avail. I was in a jam, and no matter how much I tried to butter Kevin up, I knew he was toast.

Kevin’s culinary journey was destined to end at the lowliest station, the soups. There, he made endless bowls of vichysoisse, a chilled summer dish; a bland melange of left-over leeks and potatoes with a chiffonade of parsley and a sprinkling of soggy croutons.

Kevin’s consommé was clear, but colourless. His bouillon was bold, yet boring. I had to let him go. It was time to cut the apron strings.

The decision was mutual. “Too many cooks spoil the broth,” said Kevin.

Months later, I visited him at a tiny bistro he had started in a back street of Montmartre, where he worked alone, specialising in soup dishes. He had only one small room, with folding chairs and red checkered cloths on the wooden tables spilling out onto the pavement. There was a steady stream of lunchtime patrons. I ordered the vichysoisse.

Quelle surprise! The earthy, bland, unadorned starch of the potato had been whipped into a silken puree, absorbing all the pungency and piquancy which is the essence of the leek and garlic, a harmonious symphony of flavours, bound together by a soupcon of crème fraiche, and all as fresh as a dewdrop on the first day of spring.

It was as though every molecule in each ingredient had melded to the others, so that they were individually present, yet also indistinguishable, each from the other. The soup was both light and full-bodied, sharp and mellow, sweet and savoury; lingering, yet all too fleeting on the tongue. All this at once, and in every spoonful. Alchemy.

It was Kevin who had the last laugh. A few weeks later, I saw that same bowl of vichysoisse gracing the cover of Gourmet magazine, with Kevin’s name above it. His Vichysoisse persille avec des croutons a l’ail had won the Cordon Bleu in the World Culinary Olympics. It is a dish at its best when served cold.