EXPLORING--->EXPLODING

IT'S SO NICE TO SEE THAT THERE ARE PEOPLE WHO LIVE FOR FOOD ALL AROUND THE WORLD. IT'S A GLOBAL THING, IT'S TURNING INTO A REVOLUTION, IT'S A TAKING OVER THE WORLD THING. HEY KOREAN BROTHER JEONG HERE'S YOUR KIM CHI, ROLL ME SOME KIMBAB, WANNA TRY MY KEBAB? LET'S MAKE FUSION, EXPLODE IT, DON'T WORRY IT'S BETWEEN YOU AND ME...FOR NOW...WORLD IS OURS..INGREDIENTS ARE FOR US TO USE..WHY DO YOU SETTLE WITH WHAT YOU GOT... I DON'T...I WILL PUT SEA CUCUMBER IN "KURU FASULYE" NEXT TIME...

FORMULA 1 EXPERIENCE@ABU DHABI

I was in Abu Dhabi last week for the final grand prix of the season. I went there 5 days before the race, to get ready. Getting ready for what? For the biggest F1 catering in the world. Yeah, the company I work for, does catering for F1 grandprixes all around the world. Almost at every race. Of course there is an F1 cooks and patissiers team but for this unbelievably huge organisation they needed some of us and also other cooks from different places for help. Because Abu Dhabi Grand Prix is not like any others. There are 17,000 hungry and high quality service expecting people and all we have is 3 days. So that means, push push push for more than 150 cooks.

Anyways every single cook worked his ass off for 5 days at the organization and it was a success for whole team. Everymorning, we were picked at 5.00am from the hotel and got back at 00.00am. And of course if you are a cook, you have to enjoy a couple beers with your friends and talk about the day and then things other than cooking. Nothing is more fun. So If you are lucky, you get a two hours sleep before they pick you up again.

I remember my facebook status on those days.
"it's like very very vip but it's for 17,000. it's like for one very special moment, but it will last 3 long days. ok summarizing, we are not working like humans"

I want to talk about a little bit about how things worked out at the organization.
You go to your working place in the morning all the trays and everything are ready for your use.
When you are working, you leave your space to grab something and when you're back,your space is cleaned, garbage is empty. If you go into a chilled room, you can not see one thing without a label on. When you finish preparation at the main kitchen and go to paddock area to your box( there are like 25 lounges at the paddock area. One for each team and for some big companies in Dubai and Abu Dhabi.Each of them called 'box' with its kitchen and lounge.) All your 'mise en place'(preparation before service, also called 'A place for everything, everything in its place') is ready waiting for you for the service. You never look for something, you know where it is and just go to get it.
This is called 'SYSTEM' people. I hope everybody understands what I mean. Especially my Turkish colleagues. For me, I don't even want to think about the senario if this organisation was held by us. I see broken equipments,cooks that go to tea break in every 30 minutes, fighting people, joking around all the time, ' a lot of place for everything, and everything in each other's place.'
No doubt that we are good at what we do. We may be very talented but surely the laziest also. Because of this, also no doubt that we can not become anything important without system and discipline. I guess we have to focus on these for a long time to contol instead of being controlled.

Skirt Steak Presentation @ Wildfire

WILDFIRE PHOTOS

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WILDFIRE, Chicago

I remember that I loved swimming in Lake Michigan,next to the highest building(Wellis Tower) in the USA, walking on the long flat avenues, crossing across the river on iron/wooden bridges, taking photos of the beautiful city. The only thing I don't want to remember is November cold. Yeah, Here I am in Chicago once again. Getting off the train at Chicago station and walking whole downtown area in this cold but adorable place. I promise my fellows that I'll be their dark knight in this dark night. I should warm them up. If I can't, I'll let someone else or some place do it. Thanks God that I made a research on Google and found this fun place before we hit the road. That place is Wildfire and the people are of course Wildfire's talented cooks and servers. One of Chicagoans' most favorite open fire steak&seafood restaurant. I didn't know it was this popular before entering that door but when I saw there wasn't any empty table in a quite big salon, I realized who I was dancing with. Yeah we had two options, waiting for between half an hour and fourty five minutes or sitting on the high chairs and tables next to bar area. None of us wanted to wait one more second so we did what other 30-40 people did. It was unbelievably crowded inside and for a second I thought 'you must be insane to work at such place like this'. It's only Thursday and almost end of the month.

Anyways I looked up the wine menu first and saw 'Wildfire Chardonnay'. I decided right at that moment. I thought it was pretty cool that a restaurant in Chicago had vinyards.But when I asked the waiter,he told me they are getting it from a vinyard called Mountain View in California. Nevertheless, the idea of having their own brand was still impressive. I chose "London broiled" sword fish with oven roasted tomatoes and red onions,completed by potato gratin. Both my friends got " grilled skirt steak(medium) with veggies". I decided to eat seafood when I picked Chardonnay but it was really quite an experience. I was very happy with my choice. Fish was just like how it should have been. Crispy out and soft inside, very oceanic flavour, takes you to seaside. Also someone else was happy on the other side. I haven't tasted such a soft, well tenderized steak for sometime. I love Americans not marinating the beef with herbs such as thyme or rosemary. They season it just before cooking and let it meet with fire. You taste just meat but nothing else.

I am not described as a wine expert. I am working on it, trying to taste a lot of wines at every chance I get. So for now, My Chardonnay was tasty and easy to swallow.

Oh I almost forgot. Before the dinner, the white roll bread with bacon cubes on and branbread with raisins and anise went through my stomach very well. Also the hand made salty butter. For dessert, we got no empty space.Sorry for not sharing our non occured dessert experience.

For all this nice, tasty experience and fast service, our sin was just 99.73 dollars. Wildfire satisfied three young men with their food and warmed them up with a very nice service.We all think that they deserved every cent of that price. I strongly recommend this place!

What Am I Going to Share?

Well, after being selected among hundreds of candidates I was one of the lucky 11. We went through tough trainings and finally started flying. We work on planes at long range flights, like North and South America, Far East and hopefully Australia soon. As a future chef I would like to share my interesting eating and drinking experiences with you. I hope you all like it. Let's get started!!!!

Who Am I? How I became a Flying Chef?

Hello Everybody. I am Denizhan Dagdelen, creator of this blog. I am 23 for who would like to know and have been in food&beverage industry for 5 years now.Before, when I was a student I have been in the USA for a year at high school as an exchange student and then I came back for college with full athletic scholarship from swimming. But this was the part I fell in love with cooking so I dropped out and went back to where I came from.Istanbul,TurkeyThe most beautiful city in the entire planet. I worked at every single spot.Once, I was the guy who opens the restaurant in the morning,cleans the floors,places the tables and chairs, cleans the toilets and prepares breakfast for the cooks and servers. Then at some other places, I served beer and fries to drunkards until 5am. After I got my City&Guilds diplomas on both Pastry&Bakery and Cooking from MSA(Mutfak Sanatlari Akademisi) in Istanbul. I started working at the best hotels and fine dining restaurants in Istanbul. I worked in pastry department, sometimes with Michelin starred chefs, hot kitchen, cold kitchen, even in the office sometimes when Chefs' assistants were on vacation. As you see everything was going normally for a young cook who is on the way of his dreams to become a great chef.

How I Became A Flying Chef?

Last summer, I was working in the southern Turkey at a super lux boutique hotel where the richest people who we see on tv everyday come for vacation. I was working in the hot kitchen as griller. Air temperature outside is 40 degrees celcius and with the help of my grill my work place temperature was 60, almost like a sauna. But I love it, barbeque and grill have always been my favorite (mangal in Turkish). I love seeing chemical changes in meat. And I love its smell of course. Anyways for some reason***(There is a region in Turkey where most of the cooks come from since the Ottoman Empire. And I wasn't coming from there and I guess that was a little problem for the hot kitchen chef) I found myself in the snack kitchen preparing food for kids. Well I was still making the same money but I knew this way wouldn't end up with the Great Chef. So I quitted.

And a miracle happened. Five minutes after I finished my paperwork with the hotel. I got a text message from my culinary school. -English speaking cooks are needed!!!! I was really curious about this. Because none of the cooks in Turkey can speak English and even if they can, nobody needs a cook that can speak English. So I felt lucky. I thought if it was a good job that I could use my English finally, I couldn't be happier. I got a phone call two days later.They invited me to interview. I said this is it. Done. I got it. Because, never in my life, I got a refuse from a job interview and this wasn't going to be the first one. But wait a second, this time the job title was a little bit** different. 'FLYING CHEF'. What was that? I was very excited for the interview. The moment I got in the company. I was shocked. There were like 100people inside.May be not but at least 50. It was like Flying Chef occupation has been Turkey's national job for hundreds of years. How did you know about this? I saw familiar faces. How did you learn English in a couple months when you can not even speak Turkish. Anyways, interview was quite fun and I got the reply I was waiting for in twenty five days. I AM A FLYING CHEF.