Creating A New Menu

At the restaurant we change the restaurant every month.  We love that we do this, and sometimes we hate it.  The initial reason we decided to rotate so often was to keep up with the changing of the seasons.  Even though a vegetable may be a spring, summer or fall product, there still lies a time period during that season where that vegetable peaks.  Think of a tomato.  It makes you think of summer right?  While summer is definitely "tomato season," tomatoes peak in late August and early September.  So, August is when we put tomatoes all over the menu in fresh preparations and by September you start seeing them cooked. 

Another benefit to a monthly revolving menu is that we can use an array small farms during the year and not put a supply "stress" on them.  This wasn't something we thought of when initially laying out our menu concept, but to say it has been a benefit would be an understatement.

Back to the love-hate relationship I have with creating a new menu:

LOVE:  There are some months that anything can inspire a new dish.  Nothing feels better than to put together a menu and be utterly excited about each and every dish.

HATE:  Especially in months like this, you find yourself working with the same five ingredients you used last month...the month before that.  There are only so many ways to cook a parsnip and trust me I know all of them.  There is always one dish I just can't seem to conceptualize.  Sometimes I would do anything for the tiniest bit of inspiration.  Seriously, anything.

LOVE:  Working in a professional kitchen means you have to not only be cooking with finesse and precision, but also with speed and efficiency.  This means lots of "assembly line" prep.  Say we have to make 40 stuffed cabbages for the night, if we rolled them one at a time it would take forever.  In an effort to expedite the process we roll 10-15 at a time.  Any time we can save is invaluable.  Keep in mind that this is only one item of a dish and there are usually three or four more processes just like this one to complete the dish.  A day of food preparation can be quite monotonous but it does have it's pay off, the time when it all comes together, the evening service.  Now imagine if we had to make that same item every day for months.  A monthly changing menu keeps life interesting, especially for my young staff...they are like sponges soaking up new information every month.

HATE:  Remember those 40 cabbages, and the three or four other items on the plate?  These have to be learned by an entire kitchen staff.  Then we have to iron out any kinks we feel the dishes have.  Now we have to do that with fifteen other dishes.  Every month the same process.  It's like opening a new restaurant every month.  Don't forget the front of house also has to go through their training, learning every dish inside and out AND learn about any new wines we have added to the menu and their pairing options.

LOVE:  I love the process of perfecting the dish as the month goes on.  Almost no dish is exactly how it was in the beginning.  Sometimes it is as simple as a little more sauce or adding some vinegar to the puree, but it can also mean a complete overhaul.  We have 30 days to perfect a dish, name one chef who doesn't love that challenge.

HATE:  The stress of knowing that a dish is just not right.  Having to watch it go out and then watching some of it come back uneaten.  I am an extreme perfectionist but I also understand that taste is objective.  I can tell you at the beginning of the month objectivity goes out the door.  I am far too insecure about the dishes, the just aren't quite right but they have to go out.  If you come into the restaurant at the beginning of a new menu, you are guaranteed to see me standing in the kitchen doorway watching the dinning room like a hawk in constant banter with my staff.  "How are they liking it?"  "Did they not like the potato?"  "Why didn't they finish that last bite?"  Why do the critics always come in the first two days of the menu?

LOVE:  I love that with all the excitement that each new menu brings, be it love or hate, I can honestly say that the grass is never greener...