Here are my stories. I’m a dishwasher who happened to get really lucky. That’s how I describe my life and career in the kitchen, and it’s absolutely true. In my thirty-plus years of cuts and burns, stupid mistakes, and lessons almost all hard learned, fortune has almost always been on my side. In learning the ways of the stove, knife, and how best to play with food, I’m grateful to have had tremendously talented Chefs to work for, both unrelenting tyrants, and virtual saints, with monumentally high standards.
Whenever one walks an arduous path, one will inevitably collect things along the way. On my journey, there were many recipes, of coure, but also the req uisite skills with which to execute them. I will always cherish the beat up old tool box full of gadgets, a myriad of knives, and make-shift implements of culinary creation.
The collection that brings me to this dusty corner of this particular kitchen is of most singular personal importance. That is the stories.
So many stories and memories, some sad, some funny or cute, and many frankly utterly terrifying. This is where you will find them written down, shared for prosperity, sometimes just so that they are not forgotten. I endeavor to make them known, to invite the reader into a world that I fell in love with, (and sometimes suffered for). Perhaps that joy can be communicated thusly.
_A few disclaimers= These stories will be told with no censor or filter. Many times, bigraphical media is described with the phrase, “warts and all”, attached. Some of these tales would better be tagged as simply all “warts”. If the graphic nature that some of these works has offends anyone, I will apologize here and now this once, but never again. You’ve been warned.
With each of these kitchen stories, there will also be a recipe. Sometimes the connection will be obvious, others might require a bit of a leap of logic to arrive at. I will do my best to make the connection.
And with all of that said and finished, I sincerely hope that you enjoy.
Jason Miller- Chef, Dishwasher extraordinaire.