February 4, 2012

In front of long-haired Vinny, in four steam-baths that are laid into the stainless steel counters, are ten pans of food. The first caldron holds two half-pans one containing tweleve pieces of cannelloni that look lik they were stuffed with canned cat food, the other containing seven-layered meat-and-cheese lasagna that has precut into

tweleve equal pieces. The second caldron also holds two half-pans, one of Italian-spined-ricotta-cheese manicotti and the other an American invention, Italian meatloaf stuffed with mozzarella cubes. The third caldron holds the three, main red sauces: think tomato, onion marinara, and chunky meat. The last bath holds four pans: a sixth-pan of yesterday's meatballs soaking in an oil-and-water mixture; another ofdried-out shriveled sausages; a third-pan of lumpy bechamel, and a third-pan of steaming hot spaghetti, which will be refilled from sixty to eighty times in one night. Vinny, the assembler, drips sweat from his face caused from the bellows of steam escaping between the pans.

After cooking the chicken, I add a three-ounce-ladle-full of Marsala sauce to the sauteed mushrroms and chicken. Using a pair of tan, plastic tongs, I remove the golden-brown pieves of chicken and put them on an octagonal plate. I stir the Marsala-mushroom sauce and the pir it over the chicken. After adding dried parsley flakes, I place the completed dinner in the west window.

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Setting up a commercial kitchen: Pages Taking Position Behind the Burners Checking Drawers Stock The Assember's Station Sells a Ticket Appetizers End of the Line