The Trip Back Home Part 3: 'Home-well'

I used to love catering; growing up in Texas, my mom used to make wedding cakes, and many a weekend found us toting elaborately decorated tiers in the trunk of the car, then out and up the church steps, setting up the cakes—maybe serving punch or miniature quiches, my brother and I racing around on the chair dollies behind the scenes, or pigging out on devilled eggs when grown-up backs were turned. Daydreaming about those days can easily make me homesick for mom’s cooking—or for the ubiquitous presence of all those piles of smoky brisket and spicy sweet sauce that stained the white paper tablecloths at so many of those events…But maybe ‘homesick’ is the wrong word… ‘Home-happy’, maybe? ‘Home-well’ is more like it. Because, thanks to my mom teaching me how to cook, I can carry all those flavours, all those memories with me, and unlike lots of folks without that magic key in their pocket, I can pull them out whenever and wherever I am and set them up, not like photos on the nightstand, but more like the actual places and times themselves, physically present; I can cook, and because I can cook, I can taste and enjoy all of those sights, sounds and flavours whenever I want. Wherever I am.

Over the years I continued to cater from time to time; in 1996, I even did an entire wedding spread out of the kitchen of my tiny apartment that actually paid for my move from Texas to California…

When I lived in San Francisco and worked for Millennium, I became the ‘go to’ catering chef because I actually enjoyed it—every new job was a new challenge, the planning, the organization, the ordering, the staffing, the math—but most importantly, the thrill, the excitement when the job came together—happy customers—good food—a job well done. Every catering was like a little restaurant start-up: we would arrive to find a new kitchen, new tools and new customers. We would set up, prep, organize, finalize the décor, check the ovens, check the stovetops—every site was a little different; if we were lucky, we’d get a visit a month or two before the event, a chance to look around and kick the tires—if we were really lucky, we would be returning to a spot we’d been to before and we’d already know if we needed to bring an extension cord, say, or a can opener. Sometimes, we’d have to bring along a lot more than that…

Once I organized and catered food for an event for 1600 people on Treasure Island in San Francisco—the facility had no kitchen and as a historical site, it was requested that the temporary catering kitchen be set up outdoors, but by this point, I had cheffed on a number of caterings and I knew that almost anything could be rented, delivered and set up for me. I happily bit at the challenge of this massive event; we arranged for stoves and ovens, sinks and even refrigeration—but neglected one thing, a roof, and, as luck would have it, halfway through one of the largest and most challenging events of my cooking life, I found myself balancing on the wet roof of a large truck weighting down a tarp to provide a modicum of shelter for a 10 person crew cooking underneath me in the middle of a freak summer rainstorm… My memory of this event? Pure bliss. Sure, we ran out of food a little too early, and yes, our floor plan for the interior of the event was a pure disaster (note to self, never have a circular bar in center of a room with no other access points). But even after all that, it was the biggest thing that I had ever done, and, all in all? Although not unqualified, it really was a success.

I also organized a similarly sized, if not as un-coordinated a meal at a PETA event in Los Angeles; My job was to go down a week early to tool around on the Universal Studios back lot and spend lots of vegan dollars in order to organize rentals, source products and do all the prep for an event that I then jetted out of town for so that Chef Eric could swoop in on the day of and meet all the big name celebs attending the event. (It was my idea; he was the headline, after all. And if he did meet Paul McCartney, he never admitted it, graciously sparing me at least that bit of disappointment…Thanks, E…)

Some smaller events were also memorable—a wedding at the Palace of Fine Arts where the wind carried off half the chairs and tables, a private dinner in a home with a porous floor in the kitchen that would be ‘completely ruined by a single drop of oil’… My first experience in a synagogue; a wedding in a chalet where every single food item, table and piece of equipment had to be carried, by hand, up a sheer 20 foot narrow stone stairwell…also fun at that event, a cook read the words ‘salad greens’ on the list and packed a case of Swiss chard so that I got to drive nearly 30 miles to a grocery store to retrieve a suitable replacement while my crew set up and stalled the hosts long enough to put off the inevitable service of the first (salad) course… Fortunately the greens I found were pre-washed.

Once, I discovered that an oven didn’t work only minutes before the course that was supposed to be heating up in it was supposed to be served. At that event, I also discovered that a propane gas line can be temporarily repaired with duct tape and a latex glove. Another time, a cake cutting was arranged in the middle of a room full of anxious children whose tiny hands kept attempting to come between the cake and my rather large and very sharp knife; needless to say, I have always arranged a second SEPARATE space to cut the cake at every wedding since (don’t worry, to my knowledge no tiny digits were lost or harmed at that event, but certainly not for lack of effort.) Over time, I learned other tricks to ensure if not a seamless event, at least a less chaotic one. I developed a habit of putting a pot of water on to boil as a first step at any event (whether I needed it or not) just to make sure that at least one burner was working and to determine exactly how fast—if all else fails, I had discovered, I can do an awful lot with one good working burner. I learned to always pack a bowl and whisk, and an extra ladle, an astounding number of sauces can be pulled together at the last minute (should one be lost on, say, a porous floor?) with the help of those utensils. I learned to think on my feet, to get a lay of the land from the moment of arrival (you never knew when knowing where the can opener or, perhaps, the gas cut-off for the building was, you know, ‘just in case…’) I learned a lot, and I had a lot of fun learning it.

In fact, I could tell these stories for hours—each catering was a miniature world, a self-contained ‘instant restaurant’ sort of like a theatrical opening or a rock show—the object for me was never perfection so much as the perception of perfection; the players always miss a line on the first night, the question is, how well can you recover? I enjoyed the spontaneity, the excitement, but more than anything, I enjoyed being the boss.

You see, Eric, my boss and Chef, didn’t tag along for these events; in fact, it was pretty clear that they did not really interest him. He was certainly able to, and in fact he did quite well when he did, he just didn’t really seem to want to… This meant that although within the four walls of the Millennium kitchen I was second in command, that on each of these outings, these field trips, I was my own man. This was a feeling that was in no way wasted on me at that point in my career. That elusive position, that role I had sought since slinging tacos at La Taqueria when I was 19, the role of leader, the guy in charge, the boss. I was finally wearing the tallest toque which I had waited so long to don.

When we started the branch, I arrived with the attitude towards catering that I had always had—that sense of joy, excitement—that giddy feeling that anything could happen but that with planning and luck, everything would come out fine—so imagine my surprise to discover, almost immediately, that the joy that catering had once brought me was now completely gone.

This was not a gradual disenchantment. In fact, it was clear from the very first event we took on—the thrill was not fading, it was gone. The strange thing was that I had no idea, at least not at first, as to why. I mean, it didn’t help that one of the first events we took on at the restaurant was a total dog—we felt that it was such an honour to be asked, so soon into our new venture, to be the exclusive caterer for a brand new festival that we didn’t hesitate to accept; then we were given a set of numbers by the organizers of the event based on presumptions alone as to how much we should prepare, numbers that were well beyond anything I had encountered at Millennium, that were well beyond even the 1600 people I had managed to almost feed in the rain on the island… but the numbers, it turned out, were a fiction, a hope, an idea. But, if you couple that circumstance with the fear of running out of food brought on by my experience at the island event, (we had even signed a contract for this event promising that we would not,) as well as my inexperience with concession versus straight catering… Well, suffice it to say, that in the end, that single event very nearly broke the back of our fledgling business. We continued to pull items purchased for it out of our freezer for the better part of the following year, and dreamed up a whole new list of ways to redirect an almost overwhelming abundance of frozen salsa, beans and corn… We borrowed more money to right the ship and we plugged on, more careful and cautious than ever.

But even that, for all that would be an entirely rational reason, even that was not why I lost the thrill. In fact, in hindsight, the real reason is clear.

I already was the boss.

Catering in San Francisco had been a chance to expand, to experiment, to test, to grow. But…OK, here’s a simple way to describe it: it’s like dating; when you are young and single, why wouldn’t you want to go out with lots of different girls? (or boys, or whatever, I don’t judge…) And why not play the field? It’s no harm to attempt a connection with, let’s say, a few different ‘types’ to discover what works and what obviously doesn’t… But once you’ve found the right one… ‘the marryin’ kind’ as we would say back home; for me at least, I can only assume it is the same for others… the idea of going through all of those ultimately failed attempts again; it just doesn’t sound like the least bit of fun.

The branch kitchen is my kitchen. I have set it up, laid it out, tested it and measured it… I know exactly what it is and what it can do. I love this kitchen; I know it is not perfect, but I know every nook and cranny well, I know how fast water can come to a boil on every burner, and I know how to do everything through five years of practice, through good times and bad, (through sickness and health?) and more so than ever over the course of even these last two weeks, in which we have installed a badly needed new floor, cleaned and reorganized and installed new and amazing lights, a two week period that has completely re-introduced me to this, what has become not only one of my favourite places to be, but honestly? Something I can only describe as, perhaps, a reliable old friend…. These days, the thought of going to work somewhere else holds almost no appeal for me at all. And in hindsight, it is also probably why Eric was so content, back at Millennium, to just stand back and let me run off and go.
I don’t much care for catering anymore. These days I’m a solid guy, loyal and true. I appreciate my pleasures and am smart enough to realize that for all the work, for all the stress it has taken at times to build up this little kitchen—that one thing is certain, more and more, every week and every month, it has always felt, and continues to feel like home. I have not only gotten to know this kitchen, it has gotten to know me.

I love my little kitchen, my smoker out back makes barbecue that tastes just like Granddaddy’s did—sometimes better. My range helps me make chili and cornbread that tastes like Mom’s and sometimes even a chicken spaghetti that, even without the Velveeta, almost has me tucking a paper napkin into my shirt and reaching out for Mom’s hand to say the blessing.
I have a sign, made for me by a neat guy who helped us out a lot in putting this place together, and although I don’t get to see him much anymore, I hope he knows how much we all appreciate everything he helped us do… Anyway, he made a sign for me and gave it to me on my birthday one year, I put it up, way up high on the wall in the Branch kitchen; a wooden sign, hand-cut and hand-painted; red white and blue—the word ‘Texas’ is emblazoned on it in big, bold letters. When new cooks walk into the Branch kitchen for the first time, I like to point up to it and say “See that? Once you’re in here, you’re on my turf. It’s Canada out there, but in here, you’re in Texas.” In here, you’re in my home.

Home-well.

--Chef Bruce

Starting this week, the Branch Restaurant is changing its name to the Branch Restaurant and Texas Grill.