Karla.

14. did a month on the sea, two different ships, home for 2 weeks and off on the 25th and now just home again…..like most trips all the same day in day out, captive eaters, three meals a day, usual complaints….`why is coffee and tea not on before 6 when we go to work`….why does the guy serving us wear gloves and why is he washing dishes at the same time, `hey fred we’re out of forks!`…..`potatoes again!`(and I try, I try I make mashed potatoes with cream and butter, with sour cream(because we have twenty tubs outdated!), with older milk, with cheese, with with withththththht…….
    This time though I brought along a helper …he is in a program called the SFWWP(small foreign wool worker program)…we got along but I hacked his emails(well since his english was not the best, ,
    
    

    

    set him up with an acct and I had the pwd!)…and he was not that happy with rough seas, the heat of course, and the steam and the HOURS!!!!  The complaints rolled off him of course as he did not
    
    

    

    

    understand the lingo…..got hurt once but hey
    
    

    

    …the money, the experience….
    got pissed at him a
    
    

    

    couple of times,,had too cool him off
    
    

    

    

    all in all  a great trip…he is a little sealegged and taking time to get back to being a landlubber but I think he way want to go again..big hearted fellow….once a salty dog………
15. 

    freddychef

    

    

    on the hunt…a good hour today….
24. 

    freddychef

    

    

    

    

    

    
25. 

    freddychef

    

    

    

    

    Gabe begins his first ever `FULL ENGLISH`, finishes and then shovels out the walkway…way to go boyo!!!!!The London Review of Breakfast would be proud!!!!!
26. 

    freddychef

    

    

    

    

    

    

    

    

    my sous chefffie  diggn the lamb..marches in paris, an oyster breakie at marche bastille,,,,,yum,,,,,,
27. 

    freddychef

    

    

    

    

    

    

    

    

    trippin
28. 

    freddychef

    understanding something, for nothing,

    About 10-12 years ago I began my research into Mic Maq heritage. Like many growing up on the west coast of the Island I was often called a `jackie tar` due to my ever darkening complexion during the summer. Back then, the term jackie tar for us children was someone who was dark, not the more familiar person that was of French-Indian descent. Today I am often still called it, in a joking manner, as I am often asked when did I get back from vacation. Again the colouring (I’ll leave all the inherent discussion on this to the side for now).
    I was a curious sort due to my anthropological training at university and decided that at the time I knew little of actual Mic Maq culture on the western part of the island. As I began my research, there were a couple of great documents that outlined the Mic Maq place in the island’s history and culture. I found this captivating as I could see before me the connections of so many people on the island.
    What I began to realize was that outside of the existing Mic Maq communities there was little to try and make the connection I was looking for, outside the community. This took a bit of work and finally I came across a couple of links in genealogical research that helped me make my connections. I then began to look at the way in which I could push this forward, trying to legitimize my linkage, my long distance heritage.
    I contacted the FNI(Federation of Newfoundland Indians) and with no real help from them(I was even gruffly told off by the head man himself, Brendan Sheppard). This was before the push for the signatures and identification that has led to the problems now. Eventually, when the politics of all this became important it was quite another story.
    I work at sea, and after trying to make connections, trace family history I made inroads that more or less to my satisfaction, connected the dots. I was able to trace my family back to the Mic Maq of the province. It was after coming back a few years ago that I once more contacted the FNI and lo and behold there was a whole process in place to become a member of the newly identified Qalipu nation, or its’ nascent beginnings. I was quite impressed and like most began the next process of seeing what is was to `join`. Now here is the rub.
    As I began to get my documents together I was still not sure what I was doing. I had wanted to trace my history and in a sense the history of so many people from the western part of the island (Bonne bay and north more or less) that was more or less overlooked by the existing players involved. I had believed that like others I was able to make the connections but I found myself now hesitating because as I put my documents together I looked at the criteria for joining Qalipu and realized that one of the most fundamental criteria did not apply and I then asked myself what the hell was I doing?
    On my list of criteria was one that stated that I required two signed affidavits from actual existing FNI band members stating that I indeed visited an existing band under the FNI in the province, showing that I was interacting with Indigenous culture. I did not. Many did. All of a sudden I had many relatives joining up, proving that they did indeed visit and participate in this new identity. I Now look back and wonder how many of these did so, and for what reasons.
    It was then that I understood this journey. I had wanted to show that while there was Indigenous cultural ties going back 5-6 generations, I realized that for all intents and purposes I was white. I grew up in a very conservative monoculture, that would for years ignore any and all connections to other cultures. I guess for me it was wanting some form of institutional recognition. Now I look at the mess that has occurred and really, truly wonder how many people are involved in the whole process for the wrong/right reasons.
29. 

    freddychef

    Well, home a week or less, and routine was as I left it…..I had wanted to write while at sea about the daily travails of the life but a tired, worn body fell in the narrow bunk each night. Exhausted I would type briefly but then the laptop went down as did I.
    
    
    It was an interesting trip non withstanding the usual ups and downs, work chatter, and same ol rigamarole of being at sea. Being thrown into a training role was a highlight. On the downside you had the usual aspects of trying to get the job done while making sure someone else was doing the same but it was nice to see that I could temper my frustrations as each day did offer new culinary surprises that come with a new guy learning this trade. Was it age, wisdom or just the simple fact that you just have to get it done, probably a combination.
    
    
     I think of trade here and as I worked alongside this young guy, he echoed a well worn story about his training(lack there of) as a cook at sea. It seems that nothing has changed since I last trained a few OJT’s(on the job trainees). They come aboard with the classic stance of greenhorn arrogance coupled with naive a level of skill that has set them up for a long trip. Learning the basics about french cooking, or commercial quantity cooking is in itself a fine endeavour BUT not being prepared for a month at sea, well the story goes….
    
    
    The first glimpse of this was when trying to plate three orders(with me pushing him to pick up speed, as I wipe his thumb print off the plate rim) he looked at me and said `this is not fine dining is it?` What to say to that as my mind walks a line each day trying to balance this notion; a constant struggle to feed a captive group of customers, three meals a day for 28 days that looks at the standards of sea going folk with a mix of more interesting food stuffs.
    
    
    Of course it is not fine dining but it is dining just the same and the game is  not like most cooks in a commercial restaurant would encounter. How to explain it?
    
    
    When I began this career change I had already spent many years slogging as a grunt in kitchens  encompassing many diverse forums of cooking; the brigade of the hotel with little wannabee generals running around screaming at us grunts, the many restaurants of the Bourdain type that bordered on slave labour, the alternative routes-camps for kids(knife wounds included), loggers(being run out of the site as I did not believe in hang guns and all non-whites should be talked about behind their backs), catering to the ego centric Tv and movie crews where you quickly realize most will fade into the background just like the many movies of the week you worked on but cannot remember a title or lead actor name, and my list goes on.
    
    
    The point though is that cooking at sea is a beast of its’ own. My first inclination to reply to his statement was yes you are right, this is not fine dining but what does that entail? Here you are on a ship and you have no skills(yet) that would enable you to work in any culinary world. The skills learned here though will prepare you in many ways to tackle ANY culinary world.
    
    
    My young trainee was coming out of a commercial cooking program with the standard skills from just about any commercial cooking course in North America. His initial instinct was to apply them on a ship, rolling slightly, beginning to leave the safe harbour of St. Anthony to enter the strait and the unknown of weather, crew, and his own ability to get it done.
    
    Most commercial cooking programs set cooks up to work in the heady world of the fine dining establishment while in reality the majority of trainees will end up in a niche that makes them feel good about what they do or hate that they have ended up looking at cooking as just a trade, learned and now applied. Often the backbone of the industry. Remember for every celebrity chef out there are large groups of grunts doing the work and this gloss on the real world of cooking is just that, the gloss.
    
    
    In this case my trainee had the basic commercial cooking skills that would work in a hotel/restaurant setting but the fundamental missing link was that his instructor had never been on a ship! The problem is that as  an educator you need to understand  that to fully appreciate a work environment you need knowledge of that environment. Training cooks to work in a large hotel kitchen is miles away from working in 30 gale winds, running low on milk and eggs, your 2nd cook in the bunk, seasick, and the a crew member asking if there is gravy with the pasta.
    
    
    In the past 8 years or so since I began this aspect of my culinary career I have learned a few interesting lessons as to what it means to be a marine cook. A lot of this will not apply directly to working in a restaurant, yet some will.
    
    
    Everyone is a cook
    
    
    I remember one of my first trips(insert tuvak trip) and while I was getting into a work boat a sailor asked me `do ya make bread or wha?`. I said no as to alleviate anymore questions as I scurried up the worn ladder next to the ship and tried to find my way to my cabin. This would be a routine question opener, along with being told that the last cook was great at…., and so and so was great at BUT…..all ways in which sailors want to get across what they like you to cook. Of course this would always be in line with constant reminders of how to cook. Unlike other jobs aboard a ship the cook’s job while elemental, also is judged as one in which everyone knows how to do it.
    
    
    Tradition
    
    
    On one of my first assignments as a chief cook in the Coast Guard I was told the following by my boss the logistics officer, `they like to try new things, as long as they are not different`…it kind of summed up that trip and many more. Most recently I was told that `well boys ya did a great job, great job, But the boys are not use to all the different vegetables and stuff. Meaning that a couple of them were upset that turnip, carrot, cabbage and potatoes, covered in gravy was not on the menu EVERYDAY! Truly, how does one respond. I was also told on the last trip that I made the trifle wrong. I had put bananas in it and unknown to me(but of course it was pertinent knowledge)one deckhand loved trifle but not with bananas. You have to love it!
    
    
    
    
    Food respect
    In all culinary situations cooks often come up against those patrons who well for lack of a better term, do not respect the food they eat or the dedication into its’ preparation. On board ships I often find myself frustrated when this occurs.
    A recent busy morning while docked in a bay on Baffin Island I began my daily lunch preparation. I thought that the crew would like tacos. So I decided on both beef and chicken. Later on in during the lunch hour I went out to the mess room to see how things were going and that is when it happened. I had prepared enough filling for at least fifty tacos and here I was standing looking at a crewman eating about a third of that on his plate covered in the culinary arch nemesis, ketchup.
    It is funny really to look back and remember how upset I felt. Not only to not make the tacos, but to just cover it with ketchup. More importantly if how I felt when I thought about the greed aspect of this (especially when you see half of what many take end up in the garbage). Loading up his plate the crewman did not think of the next guy in line.
    Other instances that get under my skin is when I prepare for steak night and have to take beautiful strip loin steaks and turn the majority into shoe leather (well done). Or, when I make home made cabbage rolls only to be told by a crew member that they are not as good as the other cooks’—these being the frozen ones in box loads in the freezer.
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    Daily chores
    (what it is like to work 14 hour days; the skills required, the new muscle groups, the constant cooking lessons from the crew)
    
    
    I can remember my first trip aboard a ship. It was a pretty calm day out and I was working away getting use to the slight stumble as I began to move about the galley. A little later on I noticed that the ship was moving a bit more from side to side and I was adjusting accordingly. At first I was simply doing it. The laws of a moving ship dictated that I now walk more like a crab and the muscles of my inner thighs began to strain (the next morning I would be reminded of the first days at hockey practice after a summer of ease )as I walked sideways, crouched and in tune with the rolling of the ship.
    
    
    On another I had two 15 step flights of stairs to go up and down on order to get supplies. This ship corkscrewed a lot and made rails a lifesaver. Often would be carrying a bus pan, loaded down and just the ability to lean against the rail saved me many times from going over backwards.
    
    
    I watched one new guy one time using his knife and I cringed as he had many near misses. He was trying to cut and chop as if he was standing a shore at a workstation and each time the boat went to and fro his rigid stance meant that eventually a digit would feel the pain. It did. He quickly learned to use the counter as an anchor of sorts, bend at the knees and use the motion as the guide, not just his cut fingers!
    I know there may be typos, but just read it anyways,,,
    
    
    fred
30. 

    freddychef

    

    homemade a weekly treat
31. 

    freddychef

    

    

    Blue Puttees run aground–Port aux Basques, nl…earlier in July
    pumpkin cream cheese cake for Diane….
32. 

    freddychef

    back on land

    another month at sea working with three different groups of science techies from Nl and Quebec, a long hitch as I had to not only do my job but help the new chief cook(an 18 year old greener from school with only his OJT under his belt),,,so long days became longer and multitasking became doubled as I did my job and abut 65 percent of his…..then rough seas added to the fun…all in all I never questioned my sealegged stance at the bar yesterday as the Kilkenny flowed but fatigue grabbed me and home I went
33. 

    freddychef