I don’t know about you guys, but I am so ready to say goodbye to 2017. Don’t get me wrong, it was a great year. Very productive… But, also VERY busy.
Recap:
Well for starters, acooksbeet.com was born. It took a lot of work to get my website into production, especially since I am an idiot when it comes to technology. (Thanks for all your help Lis!)
And as everyone remembers, I started culinary school at the beginning of the year. Since April, twice a week I trek down to SoHo and get to cook in a REAL kitchen. It’s a dream compared to my kitchenette I cook in the other 5 days a week!
I was able to fit in a few races here and there in 2017 in between school and my two jobs. I ran a couple of half marathons and successfully completed the Tough Mudder. I didn’t quite understand that “Mud Mile” literally meant wading through mud for an ENTIRE MILE… Word to the wise: bring an extra pair of shoes so you don’t have to walk through the streets of New York City back to your apartment barefoot. Not that I did this of course!
Yuck.
I learned it wasn’t a good idea to run a half marathon a week after the Tough Mudder upon spraining my foot during the second race. And yes, I AM blaming the sprained ankle on running too much, and not on the more likely reason—me getting older and not being as spry as I once was.
I’ve already blogged about my eating my way through Spain earlier in the year and of course I moved apartments. My family jokes that the “A” page of their address book consists of scratched out street names and apartment numbers for me because of how often I move around this city. And yes, they still have address books.
I fell in love with the idea of cooking parties. You can read more on this in my “What is a cooking party” blog. Essentially it’s a class in your own home where I show you how to make a dish. It’s an all inclusive session of knife skills and recipe instructions, along with some history and interesting facts about food. The reward at the end of the night is a gourmet meal for you and your party!
In October, A Cook’s Beet finally became A Cook’s Beet, Inc.
Yaaaaaaassss! This means that I’m the sole owner of a corporation! (Insert evil empress laugh here).
What do I know about running a business? Believe me I’m learning as I go. There are so many things you don’t think about, like business cards, and advertising, and bank accounts, and credit cards. The list feels like it goes on forever. Luckily, I ended up opening up my bank accounts just in time to start taking on clients.
My first event was a 23-person graduation party. I had worked a 24 hour shift the day before. I left the hospital at 8 AM and then proceeded to make 90 bacon wrapped dates, 30 roast beef sliders, 6 cups of hummus, 30 sesame chicken skewers, 60 homemade pita chips, and a partridge in a pear tree…
Oh. Wait. Sorry.
Got carried away there. Well, everything but the partridge bit.
The next weekend following another 24-hour shift (I really don’t learn, do I?), I received a huge order for holiday treats. I made chocolate roulade, Linzer cookies, chocolate mousse, chocolate chip cookies, cranberry walnut bread, and apple tarts for the client. After three trips to the grocery store, one broken food scale, and an emergency cellophane run later, I finally completed my order at 11 PM the night before it was set to go out for delivery. After cleaning flour from inside my coffee pot and picking up runaway cranberries off the floor, I was almost too tired to shower. That is, until I saw that I had chocolate in my eyebrows and butter in my hair. It’s still unclear if that mess on my face happened before or after all of my grocery store runs (maybe that’s why the cashier had that funny look on her face).
I had a few more orders that went out before I catered a Christmas lunch for a group of 25. Let me tell you, one person cooking for 25 is not an easy ratio. It’s definitely rewarding though, especially when your clients make you a chef hat out of printer paper!
And now I have one more month left in the last level of my culinary program. This level consists of cooking multiple portions of the same dish and presenting your plates to the Chef at a certain time (not a minute early… And definitely not late!) while making sure that they all taste and look identical.
I’ve spent the last nine months cooking for the toughest of critics (the ones with the tall white hats). Your dish never has enough salt and you just say “Yes Chef” when he/she tells you to add a little butter, when in actuality half the stick gets put in the pan.
And now, in less than a month, I will start my externship.
Yes, they will soon unleash us into the real world to cook for people whose first names are something other than “Chef.” I chose to do my externship at a company called Carried Away Chefs. They specialize in small scale catering, personal chefs, and meal prep. All of which are what I anticipate A Cook’s Beet, Inc. to specialize in. I’m sad to be leaving the school’s kitchen, but plan on absorbing any and all information that my externship provides.
And although 2017 was a good year.
The birth of a business, the start of a website, a change in careers stemming from a potentially early mid-life crisis…
I’m excited to see what 2018 has for me.
