Bittersweet Symphony

Well, this time I don't mean the song..

And its more bitter than sweet, the story I'm going to tell you in this post.

And then again, I might sound a bit contradictory, but, damn! There are some things that are fucked up.

Here we go.

Mexico is a great country, and mexicans are (the most) really nice people, who are proud of their roots, their past, their present and future.
But there's this little thing about us.
A foreign person comes, and recieves a warm welcome, people from all over the world comes to Mexico and decides
"I love this weather, i love the food, and plus everything's cheap! I will live in Mexico"
And what do we do? We let them stay, just like that.
They want to come and work here, and we let them work!
Now I'm going to say I agree with that, It's fine! but..what happens if a mexican wants to go to other country and reside there, or work there?
-And by a mexican, I mean an educated mexican, who has enough studies and qualifications to apply for a job or decide to live somewhere else-
So, what happens? the answer, often is reduced to a "NO".
Why do I say that?
My working permit in France was denied.
My working permit in Norway was denied twice,
I appealed their decision and it was denied once more!
This is ridiculous!

Can the stupid regulations and immigration rules extinguish the interest of someone to go work in another a country?

Actually I'm tired of sending my application to the UDI or Utlendingsdirektoratet once and again, and hear the same story:
"we are sorry but you don't have the minimum age required to apply for the job that has been offered to you"
For real? You think experience and qualifications are measured according to your AGE?
And then again you think there will be tons of mexican chefs over 30 years old fighting to get my job offer?
And even worse, do you think a norwegian (or any other nationality) is the right person to make MEXICAN food?

And answering my own question, No the rules and constant setbacks from the UDI won't stop me.
I'm a professional, I'm qualified and THEY want me to work for them... what else do you fucking need?

And I'm sure there are many others, mexicans and people from other countries who are in the same situation. What if we 'd organize? and fight back?
We welcome everyone in our country who will contribute to our society,
I think we can demand the same for the ones who will enrich they society and culture as well.

God natt folkens!

Remembering my first day at work

Time goes by, things change, we change.

2010 was a year of challenges, of success, and really few failures. Really!

I'll share the best moments of 2010, which represented the greatest challenge for me and my team working at Puro Corazon.

I have to start telling you that my first day as Executive Chef couldn't more challenging. I got in the kitchen on 07/12/09, 8:00 am.

The first person I met was the General Manager. After a talk with the other staff and managers, i was taken to my workplace: the kitchen.

If I could say one word describing what i was thinking at that moment...um probably would be censored. But the second word I'd choose is shocked.

Shocked because of course, I was educated in a very strict Culinary School in Cuernavaca, and then in Paris.... where I learnt from my teachers and also the Executive Chef Phillippe Daigneaux from the Hilton Arc de Triomphe Hotel, and the Executive Chef Damian Delgado from the Courtyard Marriott Hotel, needless to say the hygiene, organisation, training and quality was present at all times. Come on, its France, home to the best culinary creations, chefs and restaurants.

So of course I was shocked when I first took a look to the kitchen.

If I can be proud of one thing (And im proud of many...) that I achieved at Puro Corazon's kitchen is organisation.

After cleaning up the kitchen, the fridges, freezers, throwing sabotaged things away (like flour with salt, coffee with pepper, etc), and giving an ultimatum to my new kitchen brigade, I was almost ready to work.

And I say almost, because it took me more than 3 weeks to clean up the kitchen , considering my bosses didn't want to close the restaurant ANY day. (yes we were open 8.00 - 20.00, 7/7).

However, I didnt have time for taking a break, why? it was 7th December. The upcoming Christmas Dinners for the next two weeks were almost fully booked everyday, sometimes having breakfasts, complete meals, dinners and coffee breaks at once.

And considering my brigade was of 9 and I didn't have a Sous Chef, or someone helping me with the recipes (Because the pseudo-chef who worked there before me, took all the recipes with her, after deleting all the files from the computer.)

So my main concerns were:

1.- Order and organisation: the staff was singing out loud to country music all time! No control of any kind about storage, cleaning, orders, purchasing, etc processes! No organigram, who was the boss, whos the steward?

2.- Hygiene: both waiters and cooks were messy, dirty, careless....

3.- Purchases: i didn't know any suppliers, only a few list of emergency suppliers , bad quality at a high cost...

4.-Recipes: even though I know about mexican food, we needed to have a cardex or standard recipe for all our items, and someone would need to do it

5.- Accounting: how much I was spending, in what, why, and how would we pay it?

This was my main concern during my first month at work, however everything worked out good, we served to large parties, the senators, politicians, syndicates, etc.. and we finished the year exhausted.

How was your first day/month? Please share!