The Day I Was Chef

On about a decade ago, I received a day in Charlie Trotter’s kitchen as a gift from some friends. They had purchased it for me at a charity auction. I like to cook for my friends and do so often. I also worked in restaurants through my teens and college so I have nearly a decade’s experience at the prep and line level. As far as home cooks go, I consider myself a pretty good one, but by no yardstick a chef.

Charlie Trotter’s, if you do not know, was – maybe still is – one of the most important restaurants in culinary history. Following Alice Water’s legendary focus on highest quality dill for salmon and chocolate for cakes, Charlie Trotter blew it up by putting the chocolate on the salmon. Chicagoans were lucky that he built his practice in Chicago. His was the spear tip that drove culinary innovation. His protégés sparked countless award-winning restaurants and turned Chicago into one of the finest restaurant cities in the world.

More purple, damnit!

By the time of this story, these kitchen certificates were standard fare and had been given to charities for years. They were more special to the recipient and less expensive for the restaurant than a gift certificate. Hundreds had gone before me, and the program was well established. I was greeted at the door by the sommelier and escorted into the secondary dining room where lunch was awaiting me. He explained the day which included some time in the kitchen, the pre-shift meeting with the manager and servers, some front-of-the-house time, and some other experiential but out-of-the-way activities. He also asked about my expectations. I told him I wanted to experience the true Charlie Trotter’s working environment. “How are your knife skills?” he asked. “Pretty good, I think, but you can be the judge.” With that I was sent down to change into my awaiting restaurant-supplied whites.

The kitchen was abustle when I entered. Bright lights, colorful ingredients, and a dozen rapidly moving chefs gave the room a magical intensity. I was set-up on a prep table and handed 2 dozen sous-vide artichoke hearts. I was instructed to quarter them and carve each part into the shape of a flamingo – the choke making a colorful beak. I’m sorry what? The chef picked one up, pulled a raptor knife from his pocket, and with one deft slice, turned the vegetable into a bird.

I wasn’t deft but I figured it out. I guess I did a passable job, because when I was finished, they let me stay. Next came in an overflowing tray of morels. You could have bought a used car with what these mushrooms were worth. I cleaned and cored them for maybe an hour. “Next?’ I inquired?  Out came 4 flats of strawberries – each to be cored, cut in half, and then sliced onto 32 equally thick pieces, which would then be added to the maceration solution. On this task I spent the next two hours.

Another give-back that Charlie Trotter created was a program that hired inner-city high-school kids to work in the kitchen. They cleaned, prepped food, and assisted the chefs. I am sure that many of them went on to successful careers in the culinary industry. I wish I remembered the name of the fellow in this roll the day I was there, because he is important to this story but for that I apologize. We had been working side by side for a while, chopping away, when he referred to me as “Chef Curt.” I chuckled humbly and informed him that I was just renting the spot for the day and a chef by no means. For the first time that day, he stopped moving, looked straight into my eyes and asked me, “are you working in Chef Charlie Trotter’s kitchen today or not?” I agreed I was, and he informed me, “then today you are Chef.” This soon turned out to be truer than I could have imagined.

I had been working at the team’s disposal for so long – and perhaps so quietly – that the front-of-the-house staff forgot I was there. I missed the pre-opening meeting and the shift meal with the wait staff. In fact, by the time I proudly lifted my head from that glorious vat of liquifying strawberries, the kitchen was buzzing in a whole different way. I ventured to the front of the room and found a safe place to observe. Dinner had started and the staff had moved to their action positions around the line. Well-dressed waiters were coming in, grabbing plates, wiping the edges, and heading out. Charlie had not yet arrived, but the chef in front, likely the sous chef, controlled the room like a conductor directing an orchestra. There was commotion, but also a sense of forced, busy quiet.

As entrees started going out, the appetizer dishes started to pile up. I noticed with interest that there was not person assigned as dishwasher.  This organization was so flat that every chef was expected to do everything of which he was capable. I also noted that the institutional dishwasher was a brand I recognized from my own high-school restaurant days. It was many decades newer but worked basically the same. I set to work rinsing the plates, placing them in the racks, opening the door, running the machine, and removing them to airdry. The process took about 60 seconds per load. I had no idea where they went, so I just stacked the dishes on the counter and prepared the next load. After about 10 minutes of this, I heard a sharp request. “Chef Curt! Did anyone tell you to wash those dishes?” “No sir” I replied, “but I know the machine and figured I would help.” “Chef Curt,” he now ordered, “I need you behind the line at the sauté station!”

“More caviar! No we can’t charge them for more, we just do it! That’s what we do, the right thing. Anything less would not be enough!” 

World Famous Chef Homaro Cantu quoting Charlie Trotter

You want some context? Imagine, you are sitting at Wrigley Field in some hard-won front row seats. Anthony Rizzo has been yanked, and David Ross approaches you and tells you that you are needed at first base – right now! My job was sautéing salmon – four to six pans at a time, moving between them, ensuring that none stick, and flipping when ready. Once to temperature (no thermometer, you tell with a touch), they were plated and garnished. I was getting along surprisingly competently when Chef Trotter arrived and asked what I was doing there. I learned later that in all the years of the charity certificate, I was the only recipient who had ever received this honor. I was sprinkling brightly colored flowers across a plate while I introduced myself, and he responded with, “well, welcome, now, damnit, more purple!” I absolutely beamed.

This is one of my favorite stories and not without lesson. The whole day turned with an earnest and insightful request from a teenager that I reconsider how I view myself. I had hoped for a terrific spectator vantage leading to improved understanding of people I admired. But when my heart and mind opened, the experience carried me beyond my expectations. I came to observe the show, but in the end I was part of it.

Following my 10 minutes behind the line, I was handed a glass of fantastic Brunello and sent downstairs to change out of my whites. My wife and another couple were meeting me there for dinner, and I had brought a change of clothes. In my excitement, I accidentally (I swear) put my restaurant supplied whites into my backpack with my own dirty clothes. I meant to return them, but the restaurant closed several months later. Those whites have hung proudly next to my suits, for the past 9 years as a reminder of the time I got yelled at by Charlie Trotter for not putting enough purple flowers on top of a piece of salmon and was able to live-out a real-life fantasy because a kid told me to be more than I thought I was.

NFT Soaring Prices Explained

Did that headline hook you? Well, I was kidding. I can’t even come close to explaining the recent prices paid for NFTs. But I am pretty good at questioning what I see and can perhaps shed some light on their true values. And if you have never heard of an NFT, keep reading. I will explain them in a bit.

This whole quandary started when Nyan Cat (see image) sold for $800,000 in March. That’s right, a digital gif that was created a decade ago and until recently would have been considered absolutely worthless by everyone from a seasoned investment manager to my 9-year-old daughter, sold for nearly a million bucks. In explanation, the Wall Street Journal paraded a crypto expert who explained that much like da Vinci’s signature on the Mona Lisa guarantees its value, a digital file associated with Nyan Cat guarantees that this is the original Nyan Cat sold by the original artist and hence has value.  Many investors bought this pile of cheese. I only saw holes.

This digital file is called an NFT. It is a nonfungible token or blockchain-based digital device that is associated with an asset. This device stores the data about the asset in a permanent and noneditable ledger somewhere. That data will include originator and date of creation as well as records of subsequent ownership and information specific to the asset. The asset is generally but not necessarily digital itself.

An NFT is like a label in a sweater. It tells the manufacturer, country of origin, cleaning instructions, maybe the collection year, and if your mom is doing her job, it has your name on it. It is all valuable information, but if the label comes off, you can still wear the sweater just fine.

So the Nyan Cat sale included the original artwork as well as a permanent record of the date created and the name of the artist. Or that is what we are told. Neither of those things is fully true.

An NFT offers no guarantee that this asset was created by anyone in particular. All it purports is to know is the name of the NFT’s creator, and when the NFT was associated with the artwork. Nyan Cat’s NFT only works because it echoes the pre-existing trademark, something decidedly low-tech.

Second, the NFT offers no guarantee that this is the original Nyan Cat. “Original” is a tricky concept in digital art. Many copies are created and sent around during creation and the final original version is not the same as the one that is optimized and distributed. Furthermore, the internet is rife with authentic variations of Nyan Cat in all sorts of different costumes and situations that predate the NFT. The NFT promises to know when it was created and associated with the artwork, but not when the artwork was created or if it’s the original version.

Similarly, an NFT does not guarantee Nyan Cat’s value. To point out the problems with the WSJ’s example, the true value of the Mona Lisa is a function of the quality of the painting, the name of the artist, and the work’s importance in history, not a verified signature. Nyan Cat exhibits no artistic quality. It is cute and ironic but lacks artistic merit or conceptual depth. And the artist is certainly not as famous, nor has the cultural significance of many artists whose work sells for far less – take Salvador Dali or Frida Kahlo for example.

The NFT doesn’t even solve a needed problem. Like an authenticated signature, Digital art has had a mechanism for guaranteeing authenticity since the late 90s (and a Sol Lewitt wall painting decades earlier). When a video painting by digital artist Jeremy Blake was purchased in 1999, it came with a certificate of authenticity signed by the artist. There are many ways to view and share his work. Some may even be available on YouTube. But only holders of the certificate of authenticity can sell the work. This is an equally faithful guarantee of the artist’s hand and the work’s origin. Unfortunately, there is no stampede to collect digital artwork with a paper certificate of authenticity (said the guy who owns several Jeremy Blakes).

Since we are running out of explanations, one might wonder if the actual NFT and its connection to a rare blockchain has value. Like how gold from an ugly piece of jewelry can be melted down and used to make a nicer one. This is a reasonable explanation until one remembers is that NFT stands for non-fungible token. Nonfungible means it cannot be exchanged, and this NFT, by intent of creation, has no other possible appropriation or value outside of its designated context. So nope.

In the end, I am pretty sure that the price realized by Nyan Cat was a function of NFTs being novel and some unwarranted purchasing momentum for crypto-based assets. In other words, it is a bubble. If you are considering jumping in, beware. Fundamentals might not be the thing that drives an investment’s price in the short-term, but they are always what drives its value in the long term. Understanding the difference is not hard but anticipating when it will pop can be.

Is the NEA really necessary?

The National Endowment for the Arts works for a few institutions and artists, but the amount of ill-will it creates offsets the good. The art world – and country – would be better off without it.

The NEA has lost its relevance. There was a time when the art world revolved around Europe. The creators of The NEA sought to ensure that the post-war America was as competitive in the arts as we had proven to be in manufacturing and commerce. Within a generation, they had accomplished their mission. By the mid-1980s, New York had overtaken Paris as the center of the art world. Today, the US has more galleries, art professionals, and museums than any other nation. We also have the most artists. In fact, there are too many artists and too much art being made.

Yikes, what? The art world hates to see this written but knows it to be true. Regularly, conversations between members of the community often try to quantify the problem. It seems that for every institutionally recognized artist, there are ten unheralded artists making a living through gallery sales. For every shown artist, there are another ten selling out of their garage. And for every one of those, there are another ten that will never sell any work at all. That is a lot – and an almost uncalculatable number – of artists working in the US.

The NEA isn’t needed. The private sector is very good – even better than the public sector – at supporting the arts. Every city has their benefactors and it is because of them (not the government) that we have public art and museums. In most cities, every new building must allocate a percentage of building costs to public art. And many organizations (US Artists, Bemis, Artadia to name a few) have demonstrated that they are better at giving out NEA styled grants than the government was. Of course, the community wants government money and more of it, but what community doesn’t want more free stuff? The arts in the US are thriving and would continue to do well without the coins tossed at it by the NEA.

Anish Kapoor’s Cloud Gate known unofficially as the Bean. A $23 million dollar sculpture funded completely through private donations.

Accessible – easy to grasp and like – art doesn’t need the NEA to fund it. There are lots of ways to get this made and displayed. Benefactors put it up in parks, buildings hang it in their lobbies, and decorative galleries and design shops sell it out of their storefronts.

Really good art is inaccessible to a vast majority of the population and shouldn’t be paid for with tax dollars. It is often head-scratching and not pretty to look at. People may not care, or don’t want to invest the time and understanding. In some cases, they may even find it offensive. These folks would rather see that money go to something they care about – even if it’s only enough to fix a few potholes. Some argue, that this is precisely the reason the government should fund the arts, but again, there are plenty of better sources of financing available and far too much art already.

Too much of what passes for good art today will not be remembered by history. Popular artists often make art that appeals to their contemporaries but lacks political balance. Most work in a political echo chamber where their fellow artists, curators, gallerists, and collectors all have very similar views. As a result, preaching to the choir – and doing so with hyperbole! – tends to get an artist noticed and may be required for public grants.

Yet, as I have argued for years, this does not make for good art! Good art – like good thought – recognizes that solutions are hard, people’s opinions are diverse (even those of educated ones), and that gray is more interesting than black or white.

The NEA provides little benefit relative to the other sources of financing available to the art community. Meanwhile, it creates significantly more negative controversy than other possible uses for the same funds. To repeat my favorite Penn Jillette quote,

You get no moral credit for forcing other people to do what you think is right. There is great joy in helping people, but no joy in [being forced to do it].

I put my money where my mouth is. I care about art and I support it. I buy it, I view it, and I give money to organizations that allow good artists to make more of it. I do not feel I have a right to force regular taxpayers to share in my passion.

[Featured Image. Honey Grid #2 by Karen Finley, an American artist who notoriously directed her 1980s NEA grant toward a shocking performance piece. This author was fortunate to see her at Metro (then Cabaret Metro) in 1991.]