For the past few years now, I have been toying with the idea of becoming a chef. Cooking is my passion, and I find myself spending a great deal of my spare time checking out food-related blogs and reading my constantly growing collection of cook books. My senior year in high school, I staged at an upscale progressive American restaurant near my house. Two years later, and I am finished with my Sophomore year at the University of Texas, with no additional restaurant experience. I love college life and living in Austin, however the experience feels slightly unfulfilling. I didn’t have the same passion for my classes as I did for life in the kitchen.
That summer was when I decided I needed to make a major life decision. I would not return back to school, but get a job working in a restaurant. At the time I was reading Grant Achatz’s autobiography Life on the Line. One of the things that resonated with me and may have aided my decision process was the tremendous work ethic and focus toward a single vision that Achatz possessed. Here I am with similar aspirations to Achatz, yet doing nothing to make my dreams a reality. The only question remaining was where. Being a counselor at a camp in Wisconsin made this process quite difficult. I wrote emails to about 12 or so restaurants in Austin that looked interesting to me. After getting exactly zero responses, it became clear the only way to land a job would be through a face to face interview. I only had a couple more weeks to decide whether or not I was enrolling at Austin, and if I had chosen not to enroll but to spend the year in Austin anyway, I would have been risking being jobless and out of school.
That summer was when I decided I needed to make a major life decision. I would not return back to school, but get a job working in a restaurant. At the time I was reading Grant Achatz’s autobiography Life on the Line. One of the things that resonated with me and may have aided my decision process was the tremendous work ethic and focus toward a single vision that Achatz possessed. Here I am with similar aspirations to Achatz, yet doing nothing to make my dreams a reality. The only question remaining was where. Being a counselor at a camp in Wisconsin made this process quite difficult. I wrote emails to about 12 or so restaurants in Austin that looked interesting to me. After getting exactly zero responses, it became clear the only way to land a job would be through a face to face interview. I only had a couple more weeks to decide whether or not I was enrolling at Austin, and if I had chosen not to enroll but to spend the year in Austin anyway, I would have been risking being jobless and out of school.
On somewhat of a tangent, rewind one year- I am in Granada Nicaragua, visiting my mom and step-dad, Ben (who live there) over winter break. I meet a Nicaraguan chef who has run quite a few restaurants in Miami and Georgia. He goes by "Chef Q" and tells me he has plans to return to his home country and open a sushi restaurant. At this point, who knows whether these plans will materialize, but I expressed my interest and took his card. Remembering this exchange, I decided to contact Chef Q to see what was going on with his restaurant. It turned out, not only had he just opened, but he had an available position in the kitchen. The combination of learning a new cuisine, living in another country, learning spanish (crucial in just about any US kitchen) and being a part of a new restaurant seemed like a winning combination.
This blog will be about my experiences working at sushi Q. Along the way, I also hope to shed some light about what inspires me as a chef (in training), what I'm cooking on my days off/ ideas I'm playing with and current culinary news and trends.
This blog will be about my experiences working at sushi Q. Along the way, I also hope to shed some light about what inspires me as a chef (in training), what I'm cooking on my days off/ ideas I'm playing with and current culinary news and trends.
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