I Might Have Made a Huge Mistake… but I Doubt It

About three weeks ago, I gave my resignation notice to the firm I have been working for the past eight years as a Project Manager and Web Developer to attend Culinary School in the fall.With no money, no savings and a very hungry and seasonally employed younger brother crashing on my couch, there are countless reasons why this is not practical.

Then why can’t I listen to any of them?

I have been considered an amazing “home cook” for much of my adult life. I have never worked in a restaurant despite my silent confidence that I could often prepare a better meal (don’t get me wrong, I love to dine out) but then again, I am imagining preparing this meal for between four and six friends – not between four and six hundred paying customers.

My apartment has remained the gathering place where friends come to eat since my college graduation and I have been more than happy to showcase my good taste.

Roughly a year ago, I bumped into one of my former classmates and fellow English lit majors (you’d never no that now…) from William & Mary at a Whole Foods Market and we caught up briefly and when asked what I did for a living, I answered that I was and had been for several years, a web developer. She seemed confused and answered “I thought you were going to be a chef?” and I could do nothing but jokingly tell her that life and the need for a steady paycheck got in the way.

I was devastated. Both because I was not only NOT a chef but also had reached a stage in my life where the idea of becoming a chef seemed like a pipe dream that would never happen. and I was becoming okay with that.I would continue to cook for small groups of grateful friends and spend my days behind a cubicle.Today, after submitting my application and completing my FASA, I had my first personal interview with the Director of Admissions at L’academie de Cuisine.

The interview was amazing.

She found my essay passionate and well written, which I took as a major compliment and she commented on the care in which I put together my admissions package.  

She was kind, witty, informative and blunt.

I would not survive culinary school or work in a professional kitchen if I could not do exactly as I was told. Fast and perfectly. Whatever my personal philosophy about food was and whatever personal touches I hoped to add would be reserved for when my name was on the door. I needed to begin reading the food blogs every week on The Washington Post and The New York Times. Immediately.

Following my interview, I was given a tour of the facility.

We started in a small lecture room that I would report to every morning, Monday through Thursday at 7:00 a.m., meaning that I would need to leave my Washington D.C. apartment no later than 5:30 a.m.

I would write down the menu and recipe that the instructor would write on the board, in French, every morning.

I would watch and take notes on a demonstration of how to prepare what I had previously written down.

I would then join a team of 4-5 students and prepare what I had just witnessed in the kitchen and be graded accordingly.

I was then taken to the storage room and refrigerator where I would gather my ingredients every day and made aware of the importance of keeping this space clean and well organized at all times.

Next, I was taken to the lion’s den – the kitchen. There were about 25 students, all buzzing about. Some were tossing baby Arugula with a homemade Anchovy oil, others were chopping tomatoes and cucumbers, some were assembling crab cakes and others were putting their pistachio Crème brûlées in the oven.

I was given a seat at one of the tables and told to by the admissions director that they would be busy at first and to just observe. One of the students would soon bring me my first course and describe it to me.

A puff pastry topped with a salad of baby Arugula, Kalamata olives, haricot verts, slices of boiled egg and Anchovy oil and a pan-seared Tuna medallion.

Almost as soon as it was presented, the young chef in training disappeared and I was unsure if I was to wait for the group or not – so I did until I was told to eat by the instructing chef, a knowledgable-looking, middle-aged, French man – so I did.

I was previously told by the admissions director that there was only one acceptable response to the chef.

“Yes chef.”

It was fantastic.

Halfway through my first course, the instructor returned to ask my thoughts and wanting to make a good first impression by saying more that just “delicious”, I tried to tell him why it was delicious and how I enjoyed the texture of the tuna and the combination of anchovy oil with baby arugula. He nodded and smiled “but you don’t like olives…” and motioned to the small pile on my plate.

I felt like an idiot.

The second course was a crab cake topped with chopped tomato and cucumber and served with the thinnest potatoes I had ever seen. They looked like fried angel hair pasta.I ate everything on my plate this time.

Halfway through my second course, the students at the table I was assigned joined me. They were very cool and engaging even in the midst of all the chaos. They had been there for four months.

The final course was a pistachio Crème brûlée served with a citrus and almond cookie. It was to die for.

After dessert, the admissions director met me again, given another opportunity for questions, told that I would be notified of her decision by next Friday and thanked for my visit.The pamphlet I was given to take home only confirmed what I already feared and new to be true – this was going to be a very costly means of “finding myself” and in spite of that, what I am more afraid of right now – is not getting in.

So I wait until next Friday.