I selected the lovely Californios at the heart of San Francisco for my Ment’or stage. Chef Val Cantu and his teams have the distinction of being the first Mexican restaurant in the U.S. to earn two Michelin stars, and Chef Val is a legend in the culinary world. I am eternally grateful for my stage experience and for all the people I met during the stage!
In the first week of my stage, I did many things, including making date balls for a potato dish, cleaning fruits and vegetables for fermentation, and helping the line finish projects they needed wrapped up. Saturdays were my favorite because I got to spend the morning outside gathering groceries and hanging out with the chef team at the Ferry Building farmers market. We also got breakfast whenever we went! During the second week, which was short due to the July Fourth holiday, I worked with the pastry section during service. I made tea kits, cut strawberries, and helped them plate and work service. Later in the stage, I was tasked with blanching, shocking, and peeling sun gold tomatoes for a new ceviche dish. Eventually, it only took me an hour to do 150+ tiny individual tomatoes. The best part of those days was when I would check in on the line chefs and help them get ready for service. Toward the latter part of my stage, I worked the line helping the garde manger team, and learned how to plate the rest of the dishes. It was amazing to fully experience and actually see what was involved in the making of the dishes served at Californios. At the end of my stage, Chef Val was kind enough to allow me to dine at Californios, with a wine pairing to boot – the service and food were amazing!
One of the key learnings from my amazing stage was how to work clean, fast, and how to physically push myself while also being delicate and maintaining a level of finesse. Learning how to clean and be in a clean environment was also something I carried with me (the depth and breadth of the cleanliness of this restaurant is amazing). Pulling everything out and scrubbing the walls is one thing that stuck with me too. With all the things I experienced, the friends I made along the way have been the best part of my personal journey. In The Bear (yes, the TV show), they speak of legacy, of leaving something behind and of the connections we make as chefs. My legacy and the achievements I have made as a young chef and as a stagiaire in this beautiful space will be: one of being helpful, thinking things through, of bringing the hype, and of reliability and speed. The goals I look forward to are becoming a sous chef and moving into more of a management role. The skills I learned on this journey – organization, cleanliness, speed and time management, and how to better run service – are all things I carry with me and have conveyed to my team back at work.
To learn everyday is the greatest gift you can give yourself, and the Ment’or Grant has given me an amazing leg up. To inspire other young cooks, and have them feel like the workspace we share is a safe and kind environment is my next goal. I want to continue to pursue my goals, push every day, and motivate my team from all that I learned. I will carry these tools with me for the rest of my life and I can't wait to share the information with everyone I meet. Thank you to everyone in the Ment’or team for all the help and support!
