- Marina del Rey, Calif.
- Feast Fest's nine offseason additions on Monday afternoon participated in the New Chefs' Orientation session on the Feast Fest floor. Despite the title, it's not about orienting new chefs with Feast Fest--they've been practicing all week and some have appeared already in offseason exhibitions following their signing--as it is about orienting hierarchical chefs with the new hires and how they can be best used.
Co-Head Chefs Jim McAllister and the Mason Duo, and Head Sous-Chef Lynn Avi, the event's four most powerful chefs, identified Kevin Olschmeire and Ondrej Yiivitimaev as the "highest-level go-tos" out of the nine.
It essentially means that if a direct order is placed on a chef by one of the Big Four, they'll trust Olschmeire and Yiivitimaev the most to carry it out.
It's especially important for Lynn Avi, who as Head Sous Chef plays something of a messenger's role between the Elevated Table and the rest of the chef body.
"All nine are spectacular chefs and all will have chances to shine on Thursday," said Avi, "but from a tactical standpoint, when we need to call on something specifically to get something done, Kevin and Ondrej look like the most competent ones to be able to deliver on demands."
As for the seven other new hires, she said, "We'll let them get their feet wet this year, performing menial tasks as most first-year chefs do. This group is loaded with potential for the future, however. The new chef orientation is just our way of getting acquainted with the newbies so that we can know what they're most skilled at and so that we don't task them with something in an area in which they can't excel. That's really all it's about. We want the best chefs working on the areas of the dinner that they can perform the best in."
FF Wire Service
No comments:
Post a Comment