If You Can't Take the Heat...

Day 8

My mom said it would happen.

There was no doubt, she told me, the chefs in culinary school would scream at you, put you down and make you feel like dirt. Well, eight days in, that time has arrived, and I'm pretty sure it's only going to get worse.

But that's OK. Really. I know the instructors are there to push you. How else are you going to make it if you can't multitask in an efficient manner? After all, the quote is, "If you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen," right?

My partner and I were "f***ing behind" today, according to the chef. "Embarrassingly slow" I was told (loudly) in my right ear. Next time I make farmer's soup, I will be sure to focus less on my paysanne cuts measuring a perfect 0.5 cm x 1 mm and more on getting it done. "What farmer do you think focuses on perfectly cut vegetables?" the chef added as an extra stab.

We weren't the only ones, though. As a whole, our class was so far behind schedule that we couldn't really eat lunch because we were busy cleaning up and preparing for the second half of the day. We wanted to step it up—and we did.

Our beef consomme—the first either of us made—wasn't too bad. And we did it without falling behind.

I think this morning's test is what killed us. None of us knew what to expect, so many (including myself) were up late cramming every last bit of information into our memory. By the time our answers were turned in, our brain activity was already slowing down. In college, I would have headed back to my dorm and taken a nap before the next class. Here, we still had an entire day of soup making ahead of us.

Ryan would probably joke that it's time to suck it up. (It was his favorite line during his residency, initially told to him by his first-year chief.) The chefs would likely say the same—but mean it.

I'm slowly developing a thick skin.