Hello Peeps,
So............ Not been on for a while as December was a very busy month for us and i couldnt find the time to post, thought i had better put something on as on the 2nd i fly home for a couple of weeks and some serious adventures.
We as i said had a busy one with the highlights being a Safari Champagne Breakfast we did in the wilds of the Nairobi National Park, which the hotel overlooks.
Xmas morning im up at 5am and leave the girls sleeping hoping i can get home by Bubba's bedtime to see her open her presnts on what was her first Xmas,
I get to the hotel and start to load up the vehicles with eveything from portable BBQ and burners to water and spoons, we need to take everything to cook and serve the breakfast,
The guests who have upgraded come down at 6am to warm croissants and coffee, we have have about 34 for the breakfast with the remainder having a poolside breakfast in the hotel overlooking the park.
We leave the hotel by 6.15 to set up first-light has just come and we drive the short distance to the park gates to enter and set up, the spot where we are going to be is an observation post high up on the hill overlooking the park, we dont see any action on the way in except for a few wide awake and alert Impala's.
We set up quickly and as we do we see a lioness walking across the plain in front of us!!
The guests are having their game drive and will be with us around 9am so i tell my 2 breakfast girls and my Sous Chef Edwin to relax a while whilst we wait, we do some game watching but dont see much except what is maybe a Rhino in the far distance,
My plan is to greet the guests and get straight back to the hotel to oversee lunch and the set up, we are expecting around 120 but that could easily rise.(and did!!!)
The guests come we greet them pop open the champagne and settle them before i give the girls the final direction and then me and Edwin set off back to the hotel passing a big family of Giraffe on the way.
The F&B Manager Vijay looks after the guests and when he leaves they see a lioness take down an implala and rip it to shreds...............we missed the good bit!!!
Lunch prep is hectic and the dry ice i had got for the buffet we realise the stores man has managed to split the bag and all the dry ice is ruined.......oh well plan B.
Lunch looks real good, a nice set up and quickly gets very very busy with guest walk ins waiting for tables they hear we are good and can see the set up and really want to eat with us which is good.
3pm we are still rocking.3 becomes 4, 4 becomes 5 and we end up doing 172 not bad,
I get my guys some beers, drink one with them thank them and im off having cooked my Goose in my oven here, GM pops down to the kitchen and thanks the team,
I had already decided to try and help some of the homeless people i pass by on my way home so one of my team preps 6 take aways with a hot turkey lunch inside, i pass 2 ladies with babies most days and they will be my first drop off, but as i drive up the highway through the city i see a homeless guy and stop to give him a lunch he looks really suprised to see a Mzungu (Swahili for white man) stop and give him food but gives me his best toothless smile and im off again, my ladies are there so i give them 2 lunches they smile and send me blessings and merry xmas greetings they are happy!!!
It makes me very sad to see this and in contrast to the beggars of the UK who make a living from it, these people really have nothing and to see the warmth and gratitude in their eyes from something so simple really makes you think and i honestly have a tear or so in my eyes as i think of how lucky we all are at times.
Further on are 2 more ladies and their kids and then another one and im done, just need to drop of my Directors Turkey and bits and pieces i cooked for them (they live very near me) and im off to my girls, presents, champagne, foie grs and goose follow and by 10 im done, knackered and ready to kip.
Boxing day was busy then we slow getting ready for tommorow NY Eve!!!!
We are due to fly home on the 1st and have a lot lined up Kasia will turn one year old, we are having a big family party for her birthday christening with family coming from Scotland and Poland (and Wales) and then some serious eating out, El Bulli, El Celler De Can Roca, Les Duex Salons, Bar Bouloud and Tom Aikens amongst others with my fellow blogger and best buddy @chefbennett01 who is also Kasia's Godfather!!!
Im just worried the weather stops the flights again so fingers crossed i wont start to chill until we are in the air!!!
Anyway a very Happy New Year to you all and lets hope 2011 is good to all of us!!!
Cheers!!
Kevin
Will post some of the pics of the breakfast etc asap,
Thursday, December 30, 2010
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Catch up on the last week or so
Alright All,
Not had much really to say the last few weeks, it has been very busy with both year end parties and one of the restaurants, (the fine dine is still being finalised, hope to open that in a few months)
Not feeling at all festive the shopping malls are all done up but Africa just doesnt seem Christmasy and with the heat no chance of a White Christmas!!
Good thing is we have done all these large functions and no Turkey so unlike most of you guys in the UK i havent cooked any Turkey and doesnt look like we will until i do my Beer Basted Turkey Xmas Day!!
Ha-Ha i dont miss Turkey Dinners at all...............
Had to make a decision on the crappy side of the job and let one of my Sous Chefs go i had been watching him for a couple of months and he just does not do what a Sous should, he has "lost the dressing room" to coin a cheesy footy phrase and the boys have lost respect for him along with a few other things i decided to change things around.
On the plus side my Jnr Sous Ephraim can now step up and i hope grow and i have had the chance to promote one of my CDP's George who has been with me a while to Jnr Sous he can now take on a little more and hopefully we can develop these 2 lads. its something i have been looking at for some time as i didnt want to lose him as he grew......so its up to him now we are all right behind the boys to make things happen.
On a happier note it was my ?? birthday last Sunday so i took 2 days off/together for the first time in ages and had 2 great days with Ania and my daughter Kasia who will be 1 in January, had a nice meal in a cool new Japanese restaurant on their Teppanyaki table we had the seafood menu, amonst others things we had lovely well cooked King Prawns, Lobster and Grouper and then a nice really creamy rice pudding with hot caramelised pineapple from the Teppanyaki Grill,
Until you have had Pineapple here in Kenya you havent really had it, Del Monte have pineapple farms as far as the eye can see just outside Nairobi, one of my suppliers grows for Del Monte too and when he first came in with samples i could litterally smell the fruit before he reached the kitchen, so tasty.
I have worked on a Pineapple tasting plate for the fine dine, should be nice.............
Last night we went to the new kid on Nairobi's food scene Seven Seafood Bar and Grill, food was ok but the service was far from it, it went a lot like this;
Sat for around 20mins with wine list and menu,with not much attention from anyone,
Ordered some Reisling Wine, waiter came back, Sorry and reccomended a very similar wine in a Chenin Blanc!!!!???? in place of a Reisling???!! Where's Oz Clarke when you need him!
So....ordered the grossly marked up Gerwurtztraminer and guess what............
Then we settled for an Italian Trebbiano which was nothing to Blog Home About,
Ordered food some bread came and then our starters, 2 Calamari which was tasty and well cooked with a little Salsa Verde,
They then brought some dips and oils which the lady proudly said go really well with the bread which they had cleared 5 minutes before!!.......anyway....
Main course Ania had the Giant Prawns and me the New York Striploin Aged,
Prawns were top notch, nice and fresh and well cooked,
The medium steak came woefully overcooked the juices that were left running brown!!
The manager looked in horror as he knew the cock-ups had just gone into overkill he was good and after the waiter was told it was overcooked (and not medium as he kept telling me it was)
anyhow after Ania had already started i tiold them not to worry i would go with it, to be fair it was sort of tasty and not a bad piece of meat just a bad pair of hands had looked after it.
And as i fancied something sweet onto dessert, Chocolate Brownie with nutty Semifreddo and the old favourite Chocolate Fondant with Baileys for Ania.
I noticed a cheeky Sauternes by the glass so ordered one each with Pud,
And.............guess what no Sauternes so we plumped for a Muscat which was very nice but would have tasted a lot better with the dessert and not after they cleared the table!!
All in all not bad food just poor untrained service!!
Had a cheeky Double Espresso to finish which said it came with a trio of Petit Four think they had given up then and had left the P4's with the Riesling, My Medium Steak and the Sauternes.
But was still nice evening spent away from work and with the girls....................
Im really excited as we are due to fly home January 1st and have some great meals booked with Steve-O
Im also waiting to hear if i have a table confirmed at El Bulli.!!! Watch this space for an update...............
ChefBennett01 has told me to put more pictures up as soon as im more confident on the posting of them i will do my best!
Catch you all soon,
Ill try and post at least a Christnas Wish to you all before the time,
Roll on 1st of January ive got my shorts and flip flops packed its warm in UK isnt it???
Kevin
Not had much really to say the last few weeks, it has been very busy with both year end parties and one of the restaurants, (the fine dine is still being finalised, hope to open that in a few months)
Not feeling at all festive the shopping malls are all done up but Africa just doesnt seem Christmasy and with the heat no chance of a White Christmas!!
Good thing is we have done all these large functions and no Turkey so unlike most of you guys in the UK i havent cooked any Turkey and doesnt look like we will until i do my Beer Basted Turkey Xmas Day!!
Ha-Ha i dont miss Turkey Dinners at all...............
Had to make a decision on the crappy side of the job and let one of my Sous Chefs go i had been watching him for a couple of months and he just does not do what a Sous should, he has "lost the dressing room" to coin a cheesy footy phrase and the boys have lost respect for him along with a few other things i decided to change things around.
On the plus side my Jnr Sous Ephraim can now step up and i hope grow and i have had the chance to promote one of my CDP's George who has been with me a while to Jnr Sous he can now take on a little more and hopefully we can develop these 2 lads. its something i have been looking at for some time as i didnt want to lose him as he grew......so its up to him now we are all right behind the boys to make things happen.
On a happier note it was my ?? birthday last Sunday so i took 2 days off/together for the first time in ages and had 2 great days with Ania and my daughter Kasia who will be 1 in January, had a nice meal in a cool new Japanese restaurant on their Teppanyaki table we had the seafood menu, amonst others things we had lovely well cooked King Prawns, Lobster and Grouper and then a nice really creamy rice pudding with hot caramelised pineapple from the Teppanyaki Grill,
Until you have had Pineapple here in Kenya you havent really had it, Del Monte have pineapple farms as far as the eye can see just outside Nairobi, one of my suppliers grows for Del Monte too and when he first came in with samples i could litterally smell the fruit before he reached the kitchen, so tasty.
I have worked on a Pineapple tasting plate for the fine dine, should be nice.............
Last night we went to the new kid on Nairobi's food scene Seven Seafood Bar and Grill, food was ok but the service was far from it, it went a lot like this;
Sat for around 20mins with wine list and menu,with not much attention from anyone,
Ordered some Reisling Wine, waiter came back, Sorry and reccomended a very similar wine in a Chenin Blanc!!!!???? in place of a Reisling???!! Where's Oz Clarke when you need him!
So....ordered the grossly marked up Gerwurtztraminer and guess what............
Then we settled for an Italian Trebbiano which was nothing to Blog Home About,
Ordered food some bread came and then our starters, 2 Calamari which was tasty and well cooked with a little Salsa Verde,
They then brought some dips and oils which the lady proudly said go really well with the bread which they had cleared 5 minutes before!!.......anyway....
Main course Ania had the Giant Prawns and me the New York Striploin Aged,
Prawns were top notch, nice and fresh and well cooked,
The medium steak came woefully overcooked the juices that were left running brown!!
The manager looked in horror as he knew the cock-ups had just gone into overkill he was good and after the waiter was told it was overcooked (and not medium as he kept telling me it was)
anyhow after Ania had already started i tiold them not to worry i would go with it, to be fair it was sort of tasty and not a bad piece of meat just a bad pair of hands had looked after it.
And as i fancied something sweet onto dessert, Chocolate Brownie with nutty Semifreddo and the old favourite Chocolate Fondant with Baileys for Ania.
I noticed a cheeky Sauternes by the glass so ordered one each with Pud,
And.............guess what no Sauternes so we plumped for a Muscat which was very nice but would have tasted a lot better with the dessert and not after they cleared the table!!
All in all not bad food just poor untrained service!!
Had a cheeky Double Espresso to finish which said it came with a trio of Petit Four think they had given up then and had left the P4's with the Riesling, My Medium Steak and the Sauternes.
But was still nice evening spent away from work and with the girls....................
Im really excited as we are due to fly home January 1st and have some great meals booked with Steve-O
Im also waiting to hear if i have a table confirmed at El Bulli.!!! Watch this space for an update...............
ChefBennett01 has told me to put more pictures up as soon as im more confident on the posting of them i will do my best!
Catch you all soon,
Ill try and post at least a Christnas Wish to you all before the time,
Roll on 1st of January ive got my shorts and flip flops packed its warm in UK isnt it???
Kevin
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