You got 12 mins. Go. Blog #51

Happy New Year to everyone out there. Now I received millions and millions of fan letters as to why the last part of Blog #50 was encrypted. I wanted to see how many of you out there were reading it. Ok I can’t lie. I really don’t know why I did that. But if you put your curser over the white space and double left click it magically appears.

So let’s talk about the Resto. We had a pretty good week to end the Christmas season.  We were closed for a few days which gave me a much needed rest. I went to my family’s for the holidays and really did nothing but sleep.  I came back on the 29^th and had a really good day.  Friday was ok and then Sat was the big day and for the first time, I was nervous although I’m not sure why.  Maybe it was more excitement then nerves. We had to seatings and the menu was as follows. 

                      Seating one 6pm – 8pm

Escargot napoleon French snails, bacon, garlic, spinach finished with a chardonnay cream

Frenched Provimi Veal Chop with fondant potato and eggplant caviar with sauce bordelaise

Baby pears soaked in cognac with strawberry ice under a sugar cage

Coffee and Smoking Le Bon Marché Pralines.

Seating two 9-pm-12am

Fantasy of Goose Liver with quail egg, with a moat of Gewürztraminer Jelly and Melba toast

Rosette of Canadian scallops dressed courgette blossom, port truffle sauce.

Slow braised oxtail and fillet of beef on white bean ragout with shallot tart.

Peach Nellie Melba

Coffee and Smoking Le Bon Marché Pralines.

Includes one glass of champagne at Midnight. 

The menu was one that I’m very proud of. I learned a lot of the dishes in Britain. When I bought the ox tails, I could hear the cooks screaming bloody murder. I told Kyla and Sol that at the SaVoy we were given 12 mins to debone one tail. After showing them how,  I said, “your turn”. They started at it I could see them struggling but not saying anything.  By the last one, they had it down to 15 and 13 minutes respectively. That’s the great thing about making the dishes from scratch. I get to teach ppl what I’ve learned and they get to learn something that they probably would never see anywhere else.  The Foie Gras pralines are another favourite of mine. To cut into them and see the layers of green spinach, pate, the white part of the quail egg and lastly, the bright yellow of the yolk, oozing out ever so slightly is perfection!!!! It is a very difficult dish to create and it’s such a thrill to see it come together. I also found out that if you through a little dry ice into warm water and serve truffles on it the crowd goes wild!!!!  Ha ha ha. It’s the old Smoke On The Water vs. Lazy scenario. Oh well a happy guest is a happy guest.

Alexis and Ted were there to provide musical entertainment. They were even nice enough to learn my favourite Nora Jones song which they performed flawlessly. I had some dry ice left over from the dinner and put it at their feet so that it was kinda like an Adele meets Ozzy concert.  Ha ha ha. I was very happy with the night and we laid the first building block down for years to come.  Everyone had so much fun that we lost time and missed New Years and had to do our own count down at 12:01.

So that was our Holiday season rush. For our first time out, I was very happy and proud of the team. On a sad note though, the 31^st was Brendan’s last day. He is leaving for New Zealand in a few days. The poor bugger. I feel so bad for him. Tomorrow, I officially start as a server. And lucky me, we have a 16 booked for lunch.  Now I’m nervous!!!!! So that’s it from this side of Lilith until next week. The News Letter will also be out this week so if you want a copy, email me at: glenn@lebonmarche.ca and I’ll add you to the list.  Have a great week everyone and I’m wishing you all the best in 2012.

Cheers

Rusty Chemise.