Criminals are Encouraged

Yada, Sulimay’s

Criminals are encouraged to Apply

I was looking around for an a.m cook job in Fishtown, when I saw a listing that popped up on google. The heading read “Line Cooks, No late Nights.” Subtext “From $20 an hour” “Criminals are encouraged to apply .. Sulimay’s”

So far the best job I’ve had in Philly was at OCF Cafe. A few of the cooks there had been locked up before, and the rest of us were outsiders in one way or another. The Chef who had hired me, Marc B was tattooed from head toe. Before he became a cook he had a past life as a pornographer in L.A. He smoked a cigarette while we interviewed. We were facing the Easter State penitentiary, standing right outside the cafe. He asked me if I could do the job, in more or less words. I told him that I could and he introduced me to the cooks. A crew of older men with grey beards, tight eyes, mean laughs, scary senses of humor. I remember they used to take pictures of the head chef as he was on his way home, then text him photos of the back of his head. Beyond the jokes, they were solid and compassionate in a way unique to the kitchen. Working with them was a good introduction to the city.

A few months after I took a job at Penn Medicine, OCF was shut down permanently. A barista was trying to unionize the staff. They sent thier demands to the owner of the cafe and of OCF realty generally, Ori Feibush. He took a minute to read over their letter, then fired everybody. The cafe was mostly a project to uplift Fairmount. In terms of the income it generated, it had to be tiny in comparison to the larger company. The union was a bad idea, but if I had stayed I’d have joined out of solidarity. In the back of my head though, I respect Ori for setting up a place like that. He had it worked out, so that the baristas, very left leaning people, had to work right beside cooks, honerable degenerates, most of us.

When I saw Sulimays was encouraging people with records to apply, I thought I might have found another OCF situation. I emailed the owner, chef Chad Todd, about applying for the job. He got back to me about a week later, asking if I could come in the following Monday. I told him I could, and showed up then, wearing grey joggers and a baby blue champion sweatshirt. I took a seat at the counter. Behind it a young kid, brown hair and glasses, wearing a purple t-shirt and blue jeans, was brewing coffee. Some orders came up in the back of the restaurant, and he ran plates of scrapple and pancakes to a handful of people sitting at booths. The place felt homely. Grandmotherly in the way kitch was scattered everywhere. Banners and Posters were all over the walls. Classic jerseys from Philly teams. Plastic nic-nacks. Toys and race cars, and little rubber ducks. Towards the back there was a table filled with half empty bottles of hot sauces. Tabasco, Redhot, Tapatio, Siracha, Texas Pete, bottles with no labels at all, all together on a little table. Behind the counter near the coffee pots was a little radio that played music from some local F.M station.

The density was nice. It killed the nerves.

The kid pouring out coffee, handing out plates of pancakes and eggs, told me he’d be with me in a second. He set a plate of food down in front of a few grey haired men wearing Levi jeans and nylon Starter jackets, then came back to the counter and asked me how he could help. I told him I was there to interview for a cook position. He asked me to give him as second, while he went to the back to grab Chad. I was reading the Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler at the time. While he was gone I pulled the book out, and read a few pages. A few minutes passed by. When he came back he told me Chad would be out in a second. Then he asked what I was reading. I told him a west coast detective story. A disillusioned man falls in love with a beautiful woman. He seemed interested, but it might have just been the charm of the place coming through him. He asked a few more questions before Chad stepped out of the kitchen and took a seat at a table in the back. Before I got up to walk over, I asked him if Chad was an intense person. He shook his head and told me “Nah he’s pretty cool”

I walked to the back, past the table with the million hot sauce bottles and took a seat across from Chad. A large guy. Tall, not fat, but definitely heavy. His eyes were squinted behind a pair of glasses. He wore a stained apron folded below a blue tie-dye shirt. A blue bandana was tied around his forehead. He reminded me of John Favreau. He asked me the standard questions and I gave him the usual answers. I want to say he received everything I had to say well, but it was hard to read him. He gave me the pitch about the place. Greek owned and operated, which meant a lot of stuff was held together by duck tape and chewing gum. I told him I wasn’t pretentious. He asked me if I could come back and stage in a few days. I was working at PHS Pop Up by this time, but only for evening and night shifts. I said I could come by and stage whenever. He pulled a loose piece of paper from somewhere nearby, and wrote my name and a date on it, then pinned it to a cork board behind him. The board was surrounded by a thousand other things. Calendars, flyers, receipts, blank notepads, stickers, silly buttons. If he had burned it and arranged the ashes back in order, it might have been easier to find.

I came by a few days later to stage. The brown haired kid with the glasses was off that day. There was a girl, with long braids serving instead. She had a pitcher of coffee in her hands when I walked in. She smiled and circled around the dining room to refill coffee mugs. When she finished, I told her I was there to work in the kitchen for the day. She told me Chad wasn’t there yet, but Brad* was in the back. She took me through the door leading into the kitchen.

The kitchen space was tiny. A two man line, outfit with a small flattop, a fryer, and a four burner stove. The dishpit was maybe 3 steps from the line. A rack for the dishes was on the wall and a little machine to run them though was nearby. The server pulled Brad from a cooler in the back. I told him I was there to help out for the day. Brad was around my height, but broader, heavier. Dirty blonde hair, hard face, hard blue eyes. He wore a t-shirt, blue jeans and some workmen boots.

He scratched his head and told me he didn’t know anybody was coming in today. If I had tried to find that little piece of paper with my name on it, I would’ve been looking forever. I told Brad, Chad had asked me to come in, and stage for a little bit. Brad said alright, I could use some help. He walked me around the setup, and gave me a brief overview. What food got plated on the circle plates, what food got plated on the oval ones. What gets cooked on what, what the specialties were. Then he set me to slicing up some carrots, onions and celery for Mirepoix. I did that for a while until just before the rush started. Then I followed his instructions around putting plates together and sending them out to the server. Outside of making a few orders of eggs and french toast, he did almost everything.

Lunch died down and we talked for a second about the business. He told me Chad lived upstairs. That he was probably up there now, figuring how to juggle repair costs and electric bills. I asked him how long he’d been there. He said a few months. He'd worked there a few years ago, but had got locked up for a little bit and was getting his situation back together. He was taking care of his daughter, and having some trouble dealing with her mom. He wanted the mom to move in with him, but she was kind of unhinged, reckless. She’d come to his palace and start trouble. Or he’d go over there to pick up his daughter, and there’d be trouble. I asked him why he didn’t move on and find someone new. He said, “I don’t know. I love her.”

That made me laugh.

He checked me out for the day. Told me I did decent and that I should follow up with Chad. That he’d put in a good word for me. I told him I would probably follow up. He stared at me kind of hard. It was the first time all day I’d felt him get upset I told him I would definitely follow up with Chad. He said alright.

And I did. I liked the kitchen. I sent an email as soon as I got home. Chad never got back to me. The email probably got lost in the mix.

Interview at Kalaya

Yada // Kalaya

I started applying to jobs a couple days before Dettera fired me. The Beer Garden, PHS Pop Up, got back to me first. I interviewed with Beth a few hours before I had to head in for a dinner shift. I walked through the iron gates to the garden and Beth was sitting at a table by the bar, smoking a yellow American spirit. A blonde lady. She had here hair slicked back. Icons tatooed on each of her fingers. She was typing something on her laptop when I walked up. The interview was fast. I was professional while but flirty. Expressing competence, suggesting sex. I think that’s what got me the job. She set me on the schedule for the following week. A couple days later Dettera let me go.

I couldn’t get along with the Sous Chef there. He was a short guy, thin and well manicured in his chef whites. He had a pencil mustache and big watery eyes, like he was always on the verge of tears. He’d ask me to do heavy tasks at the last hour. Which I could tolerate. But every once in a while he’d siddle up to me, brush his shoulder against mine. That was getting harder to tolerate. One night he told me that I needed to scrub the grill before I could leave. I left anyway and caught the last train from ambler to fern rock. The head chef fired me the next day when I came in. Before I could make it out the door, he asked if I wanted to come back in two weeks to pick up my last check. Or If I wanted, I could have it mailed. I was surprised he asked me at all. I told him to mail it.

…

A few days before my position at PHS started I got a message from Will at Kalaya in Fishtown. He asked if I was available for an interview. I told him Monday at 2:00, I could come by. The date came around, and I arrived a little early. I was sitting on the curb outside Kalaya, wearing the same thing I wore for the interview with Beth. Grey joggers, black vans, a short sleeve black collared chef's coat. I took the coat from Penn Medicine when I quit the job.

2:00 rolled around and I walked into Kalaya. Past the green and cream decor of the entrance, into the dining room. Palm fronds were scattered throughout the space. They had an open kitchen, just past the dining room. I could see some of the early chefs setting up the line. A girl was behind the bar. She wore a black t-shirt tucked into grey jeans. And was quality polishing glasses, while I stood near the entrance. Noticing me, but at the same time pretending not to. After a minute, a guy came around from the back, and asked if I needed help. He was a front of house employee, wearing a black Kalaya t-shirt. He had long hair, a stubbly beard, gauges in his ears and tattoos on his forearms. I told him I was there to see Will for an interview. He showed me over to a booth, and told me to wait a second, while he went to find him..

I felt off when I walked in. The pressure inside was high. My nerves got shaky. My tongue got slow. Umberto, a cook I used to work with, told me he quit Suraya ( Kalaya's sister restaurant ) because it was getting too hot. Too much unspoken tension in the air.

After a few minutes Will walked out from behind the kitchen line. His blonde hair was in a nice coif, and he was wearing a blue short sleeved collared shirt, some tight khakis, and heeled leather shoes. He seemed confused when he saw me. He asked my name. I told him I was Yada, and that we emailed a couple days ago about an interview. Monday at 2:00. He said he’d had an interview scheduled at 2:30 but not with a Yada. I took out my phone and showed him the email chain.

He said he remembered it, but never received a response from me about the date. He showed me his laptop. The same email chain, just missing my last message. I was ready to leave then. Clown shit, funny glitches, a sure sign something is off. But he asked me to stay for a second, that he’d interview me right after the other guy was finished. He handed me an interview packet, and a glass of water then disappeared into the back.

I filled out the paper work, while more staff filed in. More cooks were setting up behind the line. One tall guy, with his dreads pulled back, was his chef's coat with the sleeves rolled up. The front of house started moving in, all of them wearing Black Kalaya t-shirts, black jeans, or slacks. Many of them with flash tattoos up their arms. A few with gauges, or septum piercings. Most of them, young looking, but the tightness in their eyes, gave them away.

I finished filling out the packet and another guy came in. Not a cook or a server. He was dressed in blue jeans and a heather blue t-shirt, his wavy, dark hair unkept. He was actually young. Lean and broad, but still flush with some leftover baby fat. He took a seat at a booth across the room from me. The girl behind the bar, polished a glass, filled it with water from a spigot and sat it in front of him. She asked if he was there for an interview. He nodded and she skipped away to go find Will.

A moment later Will came back out, holding another packet. He set it in front of the scheduled interviewee. They exchanged a few words, then he walked over to me, pulled out a chair and took a seat. He told me while the other guy was filling out the packet, we could go ahead and do the interview.

We moved through the standard questions. Where are you from? How’d you get into the business:

I'm from Tulsa, Oklahoma. I went to Temple after high school to study psychology, then dropped out after reading Bourdain's book, Kitchen confidential. I moved to the pacific north west, and started washing dishes at a Red Lobster. A decade later I moved back to the east coast to start a publishing company.

He seemed to like everything I had to say. Which surprised me, I thought my email getting lost was a clear message from the powers that be, that I was unwanted. He asked me when I could come in and stage for a night. I told him I had to work at the PHS garden over the next few evenings. He said he had to leave the country soon. Senior management was going on a company trip to Thailand to get familiar with the food. He brushed a hand through his hair and asked if I could stage that night.

I told him I could. If he could wait a minute, I’d uber home and grab my knife. I caught a ride back to Hunting Park, took off the black chef's coat and my black vans. Put on a black tee and slipped on some rubber kitchen shoes. Then ubered right back to Kalaya. Will walked me past the line and introduced me to everyone in the kitchen. A cute lady was washing dishes. She had gold studs in her pointy ears. A shorty, she was barely tall enough to look over the dish rack. She saw me asked how my Spanish was, “Dos que tres, Ocita.” Will introduced me to the women working in the prep kitchen. They had their hair tied up in buns, wore white aprons, and were rolling up dumplings. They looked, long enough to say hello then went back to folding up dough. I remember one tall Spanish lady, had thighs like a stallion. She side eyed me a little, as Will escorted me downstairs. He showed me the locker room, and where to get towels and an apron.

We headed back to the line where he introduced me to Justin. Tall, dark, almost all muscle. He reminded me of my little brother. Will intorduced me to Ben, who I'd be shadowing for the shift. Ben was tall and gangly, loose in a funny way. He looked almost like Anthony Bourdain. Will asked him to walk me through any prep that was left, then he disappeared into the office. Ben was playing some trap music on a little speaker near his station. Him and Justin were talking. I was tuned into the prep Ben was doing, but I keyed into their conversation when Ben made a joke. Something about Justin smelling like Coco Butter. I laughed. It’s funny people still know about coco-butter. Justin looked hurt, but not offended.

Ben spent maybe 5 minutes showing me how to slice ginger on a mandolin without splitting my fingers open. I did that for a while, while Ben gathered up some things for service. A few third pans of chopped cabbage, and some extra squeeze bottles of sweet fish sauce. While he was gone, i remember looking at my cuts of ginger next to his. His were wafer thin, almost transparent. Mine were oafish, blocky, dense.

Somebody stopped me while I was finishing up and told me it was time for the staff meeting. I followed him around back into the prep kitchen. Justin was marking something on a clipboard, while the cooks circled around. The prep ladies were already gathered, standing at attention with their arms folded. I kept trying to catch eyes with the lady, who had the legs. She looked like measured indifference.

Justin started the meeting by making announcements for the week, then moved into aligning everybody to the day’s objective. Ben came in from one of the coolers, mid-meeting. He looked like the odd one out. A good cook, but clearly different in some way. Somebody asked how he was doing. He took his fingers and spread his face into a smile. The meeting ended with a clap up and some cult-like chant, something like - one, two, three, team. I followed Ben back to the line.

Customers were already seated under the palm fronds, in padded booths. Twirling ice cubes around cloudy drinks, pointing at things on the menu. I asked Ben if it got busy. He said usually it’s packed. He fired up the burner under the wok and showed me how to work it. He told me, the wok gets hot fast and cools down fast. I rocked it a few times, not quite with the finesse he had. It was lighter than I expected. The bowl of the wok was paper thin. Easy to rock but hard to get the bounce right, like working a saute pan. I asked him to show me how to make Kalum. An app they sold a lot of. I figured I could make myself useful for the night by making something simple.

He threw a few handfuls of cabbage into the wok, rocked the cabbage a few times. Then squeezed some of the fish sauce into the bowl. He rocked it a little more, until cabbage started to turn clear, then ladled it out, and into a tiny porcelain bowl.

Justin, standing with his arms crossed on the other side of the line, took a plastic spoon from a bain marie, tasted the cabbage, crossed something off a sheet of paper in front of him, and tossed the spoon into the trash. That was impressive. Very few kitchens actually taste everything before it’s sold. I spent the rest of the night making Kalum. Usually burning it. I’d get the wok too hot, and the fish sauce would start to smoke when I put it in. But every once in a while I’d get it right. To my left a cook was frying giant prawn. Head still on. The pink antenna scratching his chefs coat. On the right, past Ben another wok cook was ladling spoonfuls of hot oil over a big chicken thigh. The yellow claw was still attached at the end.

Between orders we talked about books. I asked if he liked Pynchon. He seemed like a Pynchon guy. He said his parents liked Pynchon. When he was growing up they kept a copy of ThenCrying of lot 49 on the shelf, but he never read it. I told him the book was pretty good. That it was about the ways in which society grounds people. When people are confined they charge insignificant objects ( lot 49 ) with extraordinary meaning ( the crying ), until they’re too heavy to fly away. He told me I might like the SIrens of Titan by Kurt Vonnegut. He said it was about corporations colonizing the galaxy and locking humanity into a subtle slavery. We had a moment of communion. Both of us understood the problem, neither of us started talking about it directly.

Will came to get me not long after. He pulled me into his office and asked about the experience. I told him I was impressed by the diversity and caliber of people he had working in the kitchen. He seemed to appreciate that. He told me for the most part everybody liked me. Which I found hard to believe. They said they’d get back to me sometime soon with an offer. We shook hands. I picked my knife up on my way out, said goodbye to Ben and Justin, and caught the El home.

A couple weeks later I told Will I had to pass. I needed a job in Fishtown. But to work at Kalaya I’d have to give up working at PHS Pop Up. The nature connection at PHS was too important for me to let go. Plus I had a few more interviews in Fishtown lined up. Dettera never sent me that last check, I think they want me to come back and ask for it.

Blog Post Title Three

It all begins with an idea. Maybe you want to launch a business. Maybe you want to turn a hobby into something more. Or maybe you have a creative project to share with the world. Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.

Don’t worry about sounding professional. Sound like you. There are over 1.5 billion websites out there, but your story is what’s going to separate this one from the rest. If you read the words back and don’t hear your own voice in your head, that’s a good sign you still have more work to do.

Be clear, be confident and don’t overthink it. The beauty of your story is that it’s going to continue to evolve and your site can evolve with it. Your goal should be to make it feel right for right now. Later will take care of itself. It always does.

Blog Post Title Four

It all begins with an idea. Maybe you want to launch a business. Maybe you want to turn a hobby into something more. Or maybe you have a creative project to share with the world. Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.

Don’t worry about sounding professional. Sound like you. There are over 1.5 billion websites out there, but your story is what’s going to separate this one from the rest. If you read the words back and don’t hear your own voice in your head, that’s a good sign you still have more work to do.

Be clear, be confident and don’t overthink it. The beauty of your story is that it’s going to continue to evolve and your site can evolve with it. Your goal should be to make it feel right for right now. Later will take care of itself. It always does.