When I was a kid, my parents were fairly active in the Peace Corps, which I didn’t really think was all that cool since they didn’t get guns, but it did have the family moving around all the time. I remember my paper route in Los Lunas, and my Schwinn Stingray with its torn banana seat and its orange pennant flying high behind me. I brought the Albuquerque Tribune (may it rest in peace) door to door. I was never much of an athlete, so I wasn’t comfortable tossing it on the go, and sometimes I’d get tips for carrying the papers all the way up the front walks (which, in rattlesnake country, can be pretty scary).

One afternoon, when I got to the top of a hill too steep to ride, I was suddenly blinded. That’s all I remember - just bright light, nothing else, except for what must have been every dog for a mile in each direction barking like crazy. Then silence. And darkness. Next thing you know, I’m home in bed.

At the time I assumed this kind of thing happened to everyone. Maybe that’s what the onset of puberty felt like. I didn’t know. But as I got older I’ve come to believe I was abducted by aliens, and that I’m not, in fact, Jay Murray. I mean, that’s my name now, and that’s been my name as long as I can remember, but what about before then. And this got me to thinking philosophically… what if each of us here at the restaurant was replaced by a namesake - a literary, rather than literal doppelganger. How would anybody know? In Lacanian theory, our names define who we are to a certain extent. Would we look the same? Only Google can tell us that. And so I took it upon myself to search. Above I present to you members of the Grill 23 management team, at least in name. I can hardly tell the difference.

It seems like Mark wants to kick this competition up a notch. I plan to accompany him on guitar. I’ll post the final performance on this site.

I lived for so many years in Ceuta as I child, I have a somewhat fractured sense of patriotism. We knew we were Spanish nationals, but we were separated from the motherland by about 17 miles of the Mediterranean, so sherry and siestas were rarely on our agenda. Instead I worked day in and day out in the bakery, my hands calloused from kneading and my arms striped with scars. Between our village and the Moroccan countryside stood a 10 foot fence topped with razor wire, but nobody ever bothered to get to the other side. What was the point? I remember one day burning an entire batch of bread. Mother scolded me and struck me repeatedly. She ordered me to feed the bread to our pigs. Outside I saw a girl about my own age. I recognized her from our escuela. She was soaking from the rain, scrawny and looked like she hadn’t seen a meal in weeks. I tossed her some bread - pita bread. 

I’ve lived in America for many years now, but still struggle with the idea of nationalism. I am like the child who, never having been loved, is unable to feel love. But what gets me most is the odd juxtaposition of pride for our nation with, well, I’ll just go ahead and say it, sex. And it seems like everyone gets into the game. Like, why did Lindsey fashion this housecoat and go without pants today? Apparently to make an American flag cake to celebrate our Independence from the king of England, and that guy’s been dead a long time.

Yesterday I saw this post on Imgur. As you can see, if you were indeed curious, or at least courteous, enough to click on the link I so generously provided, some fellow somewhere has a very patient brother. And as is often the case, karma rewarded his patience with the opportunity to photograph a rare and quite stunning kingfisher.

Now, you’re thinking, what’s this have to do with anything? Well, be patient and I will get to that. While I hate to generalize, famous chefs generally fall into one of two categories. The first of these is the feral chef. Feral chefs travel in packs of alpha males (and females). It is no less common to see a feral chef in the wild than it is to see a fire hydrant, or a doughnut franchise. It requires no patience; conversely, in fact, they are often difficult to avoid. 

The second famous chef category is the domesticated chef. One seldom encounters the domesticated chef as he or she is often home, browbeaten by a spouse and tethered to the demands of suburban family life. And this, my friends, is why I am patient. I wait and wait, passing time with electronic games and the Steve Jobs biography, until finally… is that one? Out here in the wild?!? It couldn’t be, but it is! There’s superstar chef Eric Brennan of Post 390 before my very eyes. I must stand very still. Don’t move a muscle. Don’t make a sound. OMG this is such a thrill! Can you see how deftly he manages 2 pairs of glasses.  I don’t dare sneak a grilled oyster, no matter how badly my body aches to taste its ambrosial brine, for fear of startling him back into domesticity before I soak in the reality of the moment. Oh thank you, karma, for this opportunity.

I had this really cool idea today. I can’t wait to call the big boss and tell him what I did! I thought what if we scrap the whole steakhouse thing and go with little burgers. How’s this for a name: Nuthin’ but Sliders? People will be like, “let’s go to Nuthin’ but Sliders tonight,” and, “Dude I was thinking the same thing.” And like, “yeah man, sliders are awesome,” and, “I could go for some fries, too.” The thing is, we would still have other stuff, stuff like fries and other things.

Check it out - I even did a google search for the name. See that. Nuthin’ comes up. We’re gonna be living the dream!

By now the whole world is dialed in to our epic sous chef fish-of-the-day battles here at the G23. Bitter rivals Mark and Ted are barely on speaking terms these days, which is fine by me since Mark has this nasally, high pitched, shrill whistle of a voice, and Ted sounds like Eeyore. Wait for Ben to throw his hat in the ring and we’ll be verging on Armageddon. 

So one day I decided to see what all the fuss is about and do my own fish special. I felt that, as a leader, I should join my comrades and throw down with my sous chefs, or you know, put them in their place. But just what would I do? 

Drawing from my years in Austria, Spain and the Pacific coast of Mexico, I created what I’m certain will be the Next Big Thing. I’ll just go ahead and give it a name, too: Austrospagnolican Cuisine. Kinda floats off the tongue, doesn’t it? Well, you heard it here first. And the founding dish in the Austrospagnolican movement’s repertoire is what you see above: monkfish schnitzel with a crabmeat and avocado salad, gazpacho vinaigrette and splash of cilantro oil. It turned out so darn good that the restaurant even decided to put a version on the real menu! Imagine that - my own dish on the real menu! I was tickled, to be sure.

Now a note on the photography. I was going for a slightly off-focus look. It’s the trademark of what I call the Tanqueray and tonic informed aesthetic, characterized by shaky hands and unsure vision. It takes many years of dedicated study, so don’t feel bad if you can’t reproduce these kinds of results.

Sprinkle, sprinkle, my little star. It’s time we came out to the world Lindsey Mason, pastry sous chef and so much more, my friend for benefits. We’ve been through so much together, housing the homeless, ending hunger, saving our schools, cleaning the harbor, making Boston, nay the world, a better place for humankind. What we have is so special, I just can’t keep it to myself any longer. I need to shout it out! Lindsey Mason and I are friends for benefits! Oh how I love doing it with you! Like no other. Well, I like doing it with Mark, too, but it’s not the same. And I really like it when you, Mark and I do it together, but that’s not the point. You are the one for me. 

I interviewed for a chef job once, a job that my punctuality and steady pulse guaranteed I would be offered. And during the interview, Jo and Craig (I think those were their names) shared with me a bit of sage advice on how best to manage my employees (since I would have three of them). Jo said that in the pilot episode of Star Trek the Next Generation, Jean-Luc Picard, the affable captain expertly portrayed by hairless Patrick Stewart, turns over the helm of the Enterprise to his first officer, Commander Riker, to dock the ship. That was it. Good talk, Jo. Needless to say I took the job.

So what does this have to do with the photo, you wonder? Well, today I turned over the helm (duty) of the ship (making canapes) to my first officer (sous chef, expertly portrayed by Mark Mariano). What are those? I ask him. “I don’t know what they are, but they’re weird,” he answers. Which goes to show you that it’s been eighteen years since I exchanged pleasantries and references with Jo and Craig in their Northampton office, and I still don’t know a bleeping thing about how to manage people. Although I should mention that Jo did give me a gift certificate for a psychic reading.

Although she doesn’t like to brag, my pastry sous chef, Lindsey, is what we call in the industry a “career changer.” Career changers are predominantly women, but not always, who often wind up in pastry kitchens. It sounds like fun to them, as if any of this life were fun, as if your job is supposed to be fun. But of course it’s not. You’re supposed to hate your job. That’s why it’s a job. Anyway… in a prior life Lindsey earned advanced degrees in genetic engineering at MIT, a local school specializing in science stuff. And she’s been working like a dog on a new project.

So here you have it: Lindsey Middle Initial Mason has at last found a way to cross breed red velvet cupcakes with blue velvet cupcakes. After years of failed attempts, thousands of empty calories wasted, the pastry kitchen floor slick with the sweat of her brow. Congratulations, Lindsey. I think I speak for most of America when I say… You deserve a Lowenbrau. Isn’t her first litter adorable?