Knife's Edge - Restaurant Rants & Raves

Corporate Takeover

Yesterday I received the following email:

Dear Sir or Madam:

I am contacting you on behalf of a client with regards to a recipe that they are interested in featuring as a menu item. I'm hoping you might be able to point me in the right direction as to whom I might speak to regarding this matter.

The recipe is XXXXXXXXXXXX, an award-winning recipe created by Haddock in the XXXXXXXX Festival

My client would like permission to:

• use the Festival / Contest name in menus, on its website, possibly on television, and in other promotional materials;
• commercialize the recipe, offering it as a menu item on its menu
• make tweaks to the recipe, for example, to adapt them for commercialization in a 500-unit casual dining restaurant chain
• reproduce the text of the recipe in promotional materials

In exchange for the permissions set out above, the client can offer to provide free publicity for the Festival / Contest Organizer and Creator of the recipe.

I hope you will contact me at your earliest convenience to discuss this matter further. I appreciate your time and consideration.

Free publicity?

Free publicity?

I think I have all the free publicity I might need if a 500 unit casual dining chain wants to feature my recipe. 500 units is a lot. That’s TGI Friday’s and Chipotle sized. Chili’s is something like 650 units. That’s a lot of restaurants. And they’re offering free publicity?

I don’t think so.

The email was from a company specializing in IP acquisition. I sent an email and got an out of office due to illness reply. We’ll see what today brings.

As a young musician I worried about selling out. You know, wanting to be a rock star, but with creative control, not dishing out the corporate rock. As a chef I want my food to have integrity, a sense of place and purpose. As an owner, I want to pay the bills. As a father I want financial security for my family.

The old joke goes- Man turns to the elegant society lady at a dinner party and says, “Would you go to bed with me for $100,000?” She says after a pause, “Yes, I would.” He asks, “Will you go to bed with me for $100?” She blanches and says, “What sort of person do you think I am?” To which he replies, “We’ve established what sort of person you are. Now we’re just negotiating price.” So the question is; what sort of person am I and what’s my price?

There is no way this recipe can be produced on a mass scale and still be good. By its very nature it’s a small batch production. The “tweaks” they would need to do to make it suitable for a 500 unit chain would destroy what makes it special. This isn’t me being protective of my creation, it’s just the truth. Some things scale up for mass production, and some things don’t. This doesn’t. So once I let someone else use the name, the recipe, what have you they will destroy the value it has to my restaurant.

 What’s that worth?

 What if the “client” is some horrific behemoth that I would be mortally ashamed of being associated with? How could I hope to instill my morals, world view and values in my son, if I can be easily bought. When Rick Bayless did his shtick with Burger King, I was a little grossed-out. Not that I know him or really care what he does, but seeing the former chair of the Chef’s Collaborative shilling for Burger King made me a ill.

The GM accuses me of being an idealist. I am. I also wouldn’t mind having my bills paid.

Anyone know a good IP lawyer?

Five Things

Joy, my favorite whore tagged me for this, and like her, this is difficult because I'm one of those no secrets, compulsive disclosure kinda guys. I mean, I keep a blog.

The deal is I'm supposed to write five things you may not know about me. I could be a smartass and write who I am and where my restaurant is, but that won't work for some of you who have blown my cover. The real difficulty is finding five things that are suitable for for a PG rated blog like this one.

I collect neckties from the 1940's
Not long after the GM and I met we moved to Chapel Hill, NC. To raise cash, and to lighten my load I decided I would sell my collection, keeping only 10 favorites. When I told her my plan to drive to SF to sell my tie collection she thought "What kind of nut have I hooked up with? Sell ties? What are we gonna get, fifty bucks?" A thousand or so later, she thought differently. I am no longer the rabid collector I was, and still have only about 30 or 40 ties but I can't pass a rack in the Goodwill without thumbing through it. These days I only buy them if they're in perfect shape and really cheap, a rare combination. It's been nice working the floor as it gives me an excuse to wear them.

Besides culinary school I've had only 7 years of schooling
Some of you may know at the advanced age of 13 I decided to quit school to become a rock star. The years from 13 to about 24 provide the fodder for all the other things you don't know about me that aren't fit for publication. You might not know that I skipped first grade. On my second day of the first grade in Austin, TX I was told I was now in second grade and to report to another classroom. I had great plans to be done with school in 12 days. Alas.

I have lived all over this great country of ours
Born in Ohio, lived in Indiana, Illinois, Texas (numerous places around the Gulf like Port Arthur, Beaumont, Galveston as well as Austin and Burnett), Florida (Hollywood, Gainesville, Keystone Heights), Nashville, New Orleans, upstate New York (Oxford, Mt Vision, New Lebanon), New York City, North Carolina and California.

Janis Joplin was my babysitter
Or so my mom says. It's certainly plausible. We lived in Port Arthur when she did and the hippie scene in those days ('64-'66) was pretty small. If true, this may explain a lot.

I am a big time hypochondriac
I am perpetually thinking I am about to have a heart attack, or that I have some sort of tumor or disease. I am 99% certain my real illness is plain old anxiety, but it's that 1% that keeps me on the edge of freak-out, anticipating doom at every turn. It doesn't help that I don't have a doctor I trust here. It also doesn't help that I am too lazy to do anything that might help me like yoga, meditation or exercise. I guess I like being in a constant state of nervous tension.

There are plenty of other things to know about me. You'll just have to get to know me to find them out.

Whoops. After posting this I realized I left Colorado out of my list of places I've lived. That's because Colorado sucks.

ADD or Renaissance Man?

I can tell it's time to change the menu because everyone else's food looks more interesting to me than mine. During the winter, when we have fewer customers the internal editor reigns supreme. "Nope, can't serve that." "No one will buy that!" Because I don't like waste, whether of ingredients or of our creativity.

However, it is time to make some adjustments to our winter menu so we'll be working on new dishes to put out this Friday. I've been reading Kitchen Conversations by Joyce Goldstein. I don't care for the gimmicky structure of the book, and I'm not a huge Goldstein fan (she interviewed me for a radio program and was unfriendly and unpleasant) but there are some nice ideas. When we opened we drew heavily on Northern Mediterranean preparations and over the years have drifted, sometimes aimlessly, into new directions.

Dangerous territory in truth. Most restaurants in our price range benefit from having a tight focus. Higher up the ladder a chef's or restaurant's personality can define the style, like say, Nobu, or The French Laundry, but on our rung roaming too far afield leads to diner confusion. Or to an unappetizing mish-mosh of items.

My restaurant problem is the same problem I had in my musical career. My tastes are varied. When I played punk rock, I listened to and loved lots of country & western. I also loved symphonic music and opera. These days I might listen to grating squalling noise, followed by a little Coltrane, then some ambient stuff, old rock and roll, Roger Miller, Nick Drake, you get the picture. The problem lies in finding people to play with who enjoy all the same types of music. The people I knew/know who enjoy country aren't usually too big on squalling noise and vice versa. So in most bands I've played with there is always a significant part of my musical personality left unfulfilled. The same with cooking.

My struggle over the past 8 years is to integrate enough of my tastes and personality to keep myself interested, while not alienating diners. I'm not saying I'm some master of innovation, far from it. More that a trip to Clement St, leads me down the road of exploring the Asian flavors I love while a look at likes from my youth leads me to the South and all its glory. I have neither the capital nor the energy to open all the restaurants I would need to fuel all my interests so I have to continue my tightrope act.

An avenue for this exploration might be a prix fixe menu in addition to our regular offerings. We've been doing one during the various winter festivals we have here and it's worked pretty well. One of the cooks and I have been talking about continuing them year-round as a more adventurous showcase. It makes it easier on the waiters as well as the diners when the specials are printed. No more recitation that the diner only catches half of, a slightly higher check average  and a forum to present some more offbeat items. I'll keep you posted. 

And Flowers Never Bend

I'd like to tell you that my lack of posting has been due to all the sleep I'm not getting as a new father, or that we've just been so busy that I haven't had a moment to pause, because then I'd feel less guilty. The truth about the sleep is that I sleep fine. Since The Sardine's birth 6 months ago I think I've had one night of difficult sleep. This may be due less to his fine behavior and more to my increasing ability to sleep through anything, I'm not sure. And as for business....it's dismal this time of year. I did have a few weeks of major activity but all that's over with.

The truth about lack of posting is that I am deliriously in love with my family and am loathe to give up any time spent with them for writing. The other truth about posting is that I of late have been much more a restaurant owner and much less a chef. Work which needs to be done but telling you about my day updating ad copy, or reprinting menus, or getting plumbing bids won't win me many readers. I've also been trying to get and remain organized and not treat every flat surface in my home as somewhere to start a pile. I'm getting there.

I could tell you about mopping up my overflowing grease trap, but that's really all you need to know about that.

We do have one of the more dreaded days in the biz coming up. This post at Fire & Knives says most of what I would. I am so over these occasions where everyone is pressured to have a good time.

In years past we've tried to get into the spirit with a meal of shared items, meant to be eaten with fingers, etc. but never got too many people to play along so I've been procrastinating getting a special menu together. Tomorrow is our deadline so we can get ordering done and really be prepared for the onslaught.

We tried out a new cook tonight. I didn't get to observe him much since I was on the floor being an owner. He's coming back Monday when I'm in the kitchen so I can work directly with him. His big problem? He's a vegetarian, which isn't a problem per se, just a problem if he's unable to taste things with meat products. I've already got one guy with an alleged cream/butter sensitivity. I don't need another taste cripple. Note to self. Ask potential new hires if they have any allergies or lifestyle issues that might prevent them from using their palates effectively during the interview.

So, I'll continue to continue, to pretend.... you know the rest, sing along.