Facing the challenge in New York – part 12

From July Roland Oláh, formerly the chef of Café Erté, tries his luck in the USA. He regularly reports to our magazine: ‘Now I work in the French bistro Martel, which is just 15 minutes walk from our flat. I will be leading the afternoon team. My tasks will include writing the day’s offers and preparing these courses. Martel is a 60-seat restaurant, but on an average evening 100 guests turn up and at weekends 140 guests have dinner. Our kitchen is really well equipped and we have a large refrigerating room. Unlike in Hungary, here you can store different types of base material next to each other: we simply put heat-treated ones to one side and raw ones to the other. In the evening three cooks work in the kitchen.

We make simple bistro-style dishes and the place is very popular. Many well-off people come here to relax in the evenings. My offers of the day (starter, soup, meat dish, fish dish, dessert) are completely different from what is on the menu, but guests really like them and Marty, the owner likes diversity. Marty does not have a family, practically the restaurant is his child. Eric, the executive chef does not work in the kitchen, he is more of a manager. He likes my work and it is good to work with him. I get on well with the guys in the kitchen because I work together with them: we are a team. Now that I have this new job I can spend much more time with my family, but I cannot work on my career. Fortunately Juci and Bogi really like being here. My only problem now is that they returned to Hungary on vacation’.