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.