holy grail moment

pan seared sea bass, spiced coconut reduction, wilted Asian green 

this dish is inspired from my ex head chef Jitin Joshi at Vatika, Southampton. i started as chef in charge for canape, starches for main courses and petit fours section. it was easy for me and i was quite happy to do that. but some where within me i wanted to be the king of stove and fryer section. on occasions i had word with head chef about me cooking orders. to get the opportunity sooner i started doing extra work than i was expected to do and did blunders and got dam bollockings from chef. but it was all worth the day chef asked me to take over stoves during lunch time. after few orders i crumbled and i was sent back to my section with another load of bollockings. matter of fact i never gave up to bollockings as i knew for sure that i am learning and in days to come bollockings will turn into silence (which was a form of praise from my head chef). it was clear to me from day one that "The only real stumbling block is fear of failure. In cooking you've got to have a what-the-hell attitude".

next day i went up to chef and asked to allow me to cook orders, he looked very hard at me and after about 10 seconds or so he said "margin for error is zero". in between when i was handling stoves all alone it happened (DISASTER), it was friday dinner service and orders started pouring (i was cursing Danny the restaurant manager for punching all orders in one go)in and i started to crumble again. it was 5 course menu for table of 4. chef called for 3rd course and started cooking 4 sea bass pan fried. after about 7-8 minutes i shouted "Chef bass on pass", almost immediately he said it bloody over cooked, do it again and do it right. bloody me i under-cooked the second batch. that was enough for chef to piss off. bass plates started flying around in the kitchen and it was dam pin drop silence. he said this is your last chance either do it the way its suppose to be done or that's the exit door. 

i started off cooking the same order third and final time. i was sweating and bollockings were piling up. after about 7 minutes i shouted "chef bass on pass". pin drop silence. i couldn't bear to listen "fuck off from kitchen" hence started off doing next order by which time there too many piled up. and i got to hear the most beautiful sound, SILENCE (PAUSE), SERVICE BASS AWAY. 

after that incident i never either over cooked nor under-cooked any fish, but always cooked it to the right donenes. i got praised about my fish cooking skills from even Michel roux junior at Master chef UK professional.  

that friday dinner service was my holy grail in cooking, after that i learnt to handle and treat any ingredient with utmost respect and "the philosophy of MARGIN FOR ERROR IS ZERO STUCK TO ME FOREVER."