Golf Carts, Goldfish and Garbage...

Without a doubt, one of the most laid back cooking jobs I ever had was as the acting Banquet Chef of an upscale golf resort in the middle of nowhere. This particular golf community was in it's infancy and all of us who worked there spent a great amount of time sampling wine (did I mention it was also a winery?) and practicing trick shots on the putting greens. There were some busy days... don't get me wrong, but all in all it seemed like a year of collecting a very undeserved paycheck.

The reason for the lack of business was due to a serious lack of people. The developers of said golf resort/community planned on selling 200 acre parcels for rich Bay Area commuters to build houses on, but because of the isolated location and lack of a reliable water table, only four houses had been built in the two years it had been opened. That left us with a million dollar kitchen, all the high tech gadgets a Chef could dream of, gorgeous banquet facilities, two full-service bars and a serious case of boredom. Four kitchen employees + unlimited access to wine + nothing else to do in the middle of nowhere = trouble...

Due to the nature of the golf course operation, the kitchen employees were always the last to leave, and we were responsible for locking up everything. One building we got to lock up was the golf pro-shop. I know what you golf enthusiasts are thinking but no, we didn't steal any high-performance golf balls or high-dollar clubs. We may have been trouble, but we weren't thieves... besides that, there were cameras in the pro-shop. The reason we had access to the pro-shop in the first place was because that's where the carts were garaged. To explain, our waste containers were about a mile and a half away from the kitchen so without the golf-carts, taking out the garbage every night would have been exhausting and time-consuming. We would simply grab a couple of the carryalls, load up the cans and go for a ride.

Right before I started working there, one of the new cart mechanics showed our closing cook how you could adjust a gas-powered golf cart's regulator to make them go up to 50 miles per hour. He had given us the green light to do so just as long as we promised to set the regulator back to normal before the first tee-time the following day. For the most part, we were pretty good about doing so. Except for one fateful night...

After one particularly slow workday, we decided to close a bit earlier than normal. The sun was still out, but the last golfers had already headed home. We weren't the only ones who decided to call it a day; the clubhouse office staff, the pro-shop guys, the maintenance crew and even the guard at the front shack all took off early leaving us to an afternoon of sunshine, wine and a world-class golf course all to ourselves. Needless to say, it was turning out to be a very nice afternoon. As we were loading up the trash cans onto the carts, one of the line cooks asked if we could stop by his car on the way to dump the trash. He explained that he had brought his fishing gear with him and had been wondering what fishing for the Japanese goldfish on hole 11 would be like. Being that we were all pretty tanked on pinot noir, it seemed like a great idea. Not just that, but he had his Wife's and son's pole with him so we could all fish.

We dumped the trash, dropped off the cans back at the kitchen, grabbed a few more bottles of wine for the road and proceeded to hole 11. We dropped lines and within seconds, the koi were biting. These were big fish too. Big, lazy and stupid fish... We were seriously hooking them at a rate of about five per minute but we were releasing them. Keep in mind that each of these fish were worth about $200 each and besides, what were we going to do with all those koi - run them as a lunch special? We stayed there drinking wine and trying every possible bait in the tackle box (those stupid fish even bit at tin-foil) until the sun started going down. It was officially time to close up shop. We jetted back to the pro-shop after returning the fishing equipment to the car and then went to tuck the golf cart in for the night. Amazingly, we managed to lock everything up and headed home for the night.

The next morning, we all showed up to work bleary-eyed and headachy but we still managed to get through lunch unscathed. Sometime around 2:00 though, we were all called into the clubhouse manager's office. She told us to have a seat and then asked us why we thought a golfer had tipped a cart going about 35 miles per hour that day. Speechless, we all looked back and forth at each other and had a mental conversation. You could tell what each of us was thinking... "I didn't readjust the regulator, did you?"

As it turns out, a rather intoxicated golfer hit a corner going way too fast and had an unfortunate mishap involving a tipped golf cart and some very surprised ducks. The only reason the golf course wasn't being held responsible was because thankfully, the golfer wasn't injured and was rather embarrassed at being so drunk in the first place. All that said though, the guys from the pro-shop passed the blame onto us (it was our fault after all) and we were each written up and put on probation. As an added measure, the golf cart mechanics were instructed to start locking up all the gas-powered carts and the kitchen could only use one crappy old electric cart that was on the verge of being retired. What used to take just 5 minutes now took the kitchen almost 30 minutes and two trips to dump the trash.

Needless to say, the relaxed atmosphere changed on us rather quickly and that added to the lack of work forced us to look for jobs elsewhere. I myself found a job closer to where I lived that payed double what I was making before. I heard the Sous-Chef went on to become the Chef of another golf course and the line cook with the bright idea to go fishing for koi ironically ended up opening a pet supply store with his brother. If not for a careless drunken oversight, some of might still be there twiddling our thumbs today. Strange how things happen sometimes...

"Did anywhere see where the tip of my pinky went?"

Ask any seasoned Chef if they've ever cut their fingers and they'll probably show you some pretty impressive battle wounds. I'm no exception. I've cut my fingers and burnt my arms so many times during my career that anymore, I don't even feel it when it happens half the time. My hands and arms are a timeline of busy shifts, careless mistakes and nights I should have stayed home. I've donated enough blood in the kitchen to keep a hemophiliac alive for weeks (thankfully, I'm not a hemophiliac or I'd be dead by now), and had I bought stock in those NSF first-aid kits found in all kitchens, I'd be a richer man today. 

I'm sorry if this article makes you squeamish but you have to know that this stuff happens. Think about it - you take a person who probably drinks way too much, put them into an environment were the temperatures and moisture levels can be dizzying, hire about ten people wearing tuxedo shirts to place unrealistic demands on them, expect them to knock out about a hundred or so meals an hour more than 40 hours per week... and then throw extremely sharp instruments into the mix. Sounds like a recipe for disaster, doesn't it?

I've had my share of soiled band-aids and have learned to cook and cut with both my left and right hand. Most of the time when I cut myself, it's more of an inconvenience than anything, but I have had some near-crippling accidents that sent me to the emergency room on more than one occasion. Being the loyal (though somewhat mentally disturbed) individual that I am, I usually do my best to wrap up the cut and work through the shift, but now that I'm older and wiser, I'm not afraid to get to the hospital when I need to. I have enough nerve damage already and scars don't heal as nicely at thirty-four as they did in my early twenties. Besides that, I no longer have anything to prove. I'm a reliable worker, I value my health and if you're planning on firing me because I need medical attention, you can get yourself a nice tall glass of go fuck yourself.

Almost a decade ago, I finally got a good break and scored a job as the Sous-Chef at a new upscale Italian wine bar and grill, and I was eager to pour my blood, sweat and tears into the place to build up my reputation. Keep in mind that up until this point, my most illustrious job title had been 'cook' at a golf course, and now I was going to be the second in command at a fine-dining restaurant. I was ready to do anything for that restaurant to prove myself. For the week before opening night, the Chef and myself worked almost around the clock organizing the kitchen, planning out the mis-en-place for the various stations, stocking the walk-ins and freezer and prepping up all the food. Opening day, we were nervous, stressed out and exhausted. About two hours before the doors opened, the serving staff showed up to have a staff meeting and iron out any final details, and they decided to hold the meeting in the kitchen - much to our chagrin. we were almost fully prepped on all the stations, but the salad line had been delegated to the servers and needed some attention badly. They had spent the entire two hours talking about where to put the damned salad forks without actually stocking the salad station! They hadn't so much as opened the cases of iceberg or romaine, and their mis-en-place was empty. The Chef agreed that I should help them chop, slice and set up the salad station so I went to work. One thing I had to do for them was slice some beets paper-thin so I grabbed the only mandoline available and went to work. This particular mandoline belonged to the Chef, and he'd had it for quite a long time. He kept the blade sharp, but one of the legs was ready to fall off so I was exercising extreme caution with this tool. I was about halfway done prepping the beets when the leg slipped out from under the mandoline. In response, I quickly jerked my hand out of the way to avoid cutting myself, and I didn't cut myself on the mandoline.

I did, however, slice the tip of my pinky clean off on the serrated knife some dumb-fuck server had set on the countertop with the blade hanging off the edge of the cutting board. They even went so far as to set a wet rag over the handle to assure that the blade wouldn't move as it was cutting like butter through one half of my 'hang loose' sign.

This was no small cut. This was one of those cuts where you not only see the bone, but can tell how fast your heart's beating by the pulsating spray of blood. A lesser person would have passed out (and I'll admit, I almost did), but I knew that for me to leave on opening night would have more than assured me a place in the unemployment line. I had to get through the night come hell or high water. The first thing I did was demanded to know who the dip-shit was that set a blade out like that but of course, no one confessed. Next, I looked around and found the severed tip of my pinky on the floor and washed it of. I knew I had to clean up my wound before attempting to dress it, and already the initial shock was wearing off. When I ran my injured digit under the faucet, the pain hit me like a ton of bricks. The cooks were coming over to get a peek out of morbid curiosity and the servers were turning whiter than I was when they glanced at it. I knew there was no stopping the bleeding but I was determined to wrap it up enough to work.

After completely depleting the supply of band-aids in the first aid kit (seriously, why don't they include some actual human sized band-aids?), I resorted to wrapping the finger in plastic wrap and then taping the thing up with duct tape. By this time, customers had started filing in and orders were coming fast. So fast, in fact, that I didn't get a chance to focus on the dull throbbing pain in my left hand. Unfortunately though, my makeshift bandage soon proved no match for my hideous wound so I had to once again clean and redress. Shit! The pain was unbearable at this point and the tip of the severed tip was starting to turn purple-black. Never mind the fact that it wasn't even attempting to reattach itself. I had to take some drastic measures, and I had to do so quickly. I told one of the bus-boys to go to the supermarket next door and get a tube of super-glue...

Yes, you heard that right. Super-glue. I had heard somewhere that soldiers in WWII had used superglue on the battlefields to stop bleeding and I was desperate to stop my own bleeding. When he got back, I carefully superglued the tip of my pinky back on and then wrapped it tightly with medical tape. Let me tell you, I know they say child-birth is painful but this had to be a close second! After I bandaged the finger up without passing out, I continued working for the rest of the night with only one hand. I'm not sure exactly how, but I made it through the rest of the night. All in all, we turned the tables four times that night and had over 200 covers. It was an impressive opening and my job was safe.

Instead of enjoying some celebratory post-shift drinks with my new colleagues, I drove straight to the emergency room where the Doctor lambasted me for so stupidly using superglue on my wound. He actually needed to surgically remove the glued on tip and see what, if any, viable tissue he could salvage.  Two plastic surgeons and about $4,500 later, I was sent home with a water-proof dressing, a scrip for vicodin and instructions to stay home from work for at least one week.

I showed up to work the next day fifteen minutes early...

The night Elvis tipped me $100...

Once upon a time, I was employed as the Chef of an nieghborhood restaurant, and while it wasn't exactly fine dining, I enjoyed the fact that I was able to toss pizza dough in front of the customers, create some great specials and most importantly, put on a nightly cooking show for patrons sitting at the bar. Thanks to the fact that the previous Chef/Owner had designed the restaurant with showing off and drinking in mind, I seemed right at home doing my thing until the restaurant group unfortunately changed hands. Things weren't always a party though. Because it was my first job employed in the capacity as Executive Chef, I really had to work my ass off. I had to prove myself, and I did so by agreeing to work 65 hours per week on salary (can you say $3.75 per hour?)

I did manage to learn a tremendous amount about Napolitan cuisine while working there though, and I enjoyed learning the nuances of using an authentic wood-fired brick oven (I still can't grow hair on certain parts of my forearms). When I first started (you'll read about that night from hell in another future post...), the GM decided to bring a previous Sous-Chef back on as a temporary consultant to help me adopt my skills to a more traditional "sauce and strings" menu. At first I was a bit offended, but when I found out that this guy's second language was English and he enjoyed Corona Beer as much as I did, I lightened up a bit.

One interesting quirk the consultant from Naples had was that he wouldn't allow subsitutions or take special requests... ever. He was very vocal about it to which I'm sure ended up losing more than a lion's share of loyal regulars. Keep in mind that the kitchen was open to the diners and the acoustics were just right for everyone in the dining room to hear everything the kitchen staff said. "I Don'ta Fuckin' CARE Iffa She's Allergic! She Shoulda Stayeda Home!"

I, as well as many of the servers, were a bit intimidated by this guy's flat-out refusal to accomodate special requests, and it gave me no pleasure to see a server freeze up whenever a customer would ask for a side of soup instead of vegetables. It was like watching Bambi in the headlights of a big rig. I asked him on several occasions why he refused to be more accomodating to the customers and he said "They gonna breaka your balls if you let 'em! Tonight, maybe no cheese on top butta next time, they bringing in there own food for me to cook! They no gonna breaka my balls!"

Thankfully, he would usually get pretty hammered on the box wine by about 7:00 and take off for the night leaving me to run my own damned kitchen! At that point, everyone seemed to breathe a sigh of relief (including the Owner), and at that point I would gladly fulfill any requests made by the customers. Tips would increase, servers would actually smile and I didn't have to worry about a crocked Italian setting my kitchen on fire... oh yeah, he did that too one night. Long story - another post.

One particularly slow Thursday night, a guy came in right as I had pretty much finished closing the kitchen. I overheard him ask one of the waiters for a menu and the waiter turned his head to me looking like a terrified chipmunk, and it made me think of the consultant's bad behavior regarding requests. I did not have any desire to be at all like him. To me, the customer's always been the boss. Even though I was literally five minutes from having the freedom to leave, I simply nodded yes to the server and turned the oven and fryer back on. The server (we'll call him Chris), explained to the guy that he could order from the appetizer menu because the kitchen was already cleaned and then went out back to smoke. While Chris was on his break, the guy at the bar said "Excuse me, Chef? I know you're only serving appetizers right now, but I literally just drove in from Vegas (a ten hour trip) and haven't eaten anything all day. You think there's any way you can cook something a bit more substantial? Whatever's easy for you. I'm just starved!"

For just a split second, I could hear the consultant's voice in the back of my mind "He's no gonna breaka my balls!" and I decided to feed this guy and feed him right! I told him to go ahead and order whatever he felt like off the menu but he asked what I would recommend. Being that I'm a genious on the grill, I told him I'd make him a filet mignon with the condition being that I'd try out a new sauce I had going in my mind. He would be my guinea pig and I would make sure he had a great meal. He said to go for it and I started cooking. As I was plating the finished filet, he offered to buy me a beer for my troubles. I told him he didn't have to because I also fed the bartender, but I thanked him anyways. As he was eating, I cleaned up the mess I'd made and wrapped everything up for a second time that night feeling good that I was nothing at all like the pissy consultant. I could only imagine if he had seen the whole thing. He'd probably throw a chair through the window.

Before I left for the night, I asked the customer how his steak was, and he said these exact words. "I spend most of my time dining in the best restaurants in Vegas and I rub shoulders with some of the top entertainers on the marquees. Never before have I had a finer steak. I know you didn't have to stay and cook but I'm glad you did. You've got some magic. Thank you. Thank you very much..."

And then he reached out to shake my hand and in it was a hundred dollar bill. One... hundred... dollars. Holy shit! I told him that wasn't necessary but he refused to take it back. I told him he was welcome to eat after hours anytime I was still there and introduced myself. He handed me a business card, gave me a playful hand gesture of shooting a gun and left. When I looked down at the card after he was gone, it read "Elvis Presley - Musician and Actor"

How to cook 250 Filet Mignon in 50 minutes...

Welcome to another stain on Chef Delaney's Cutting Board. I say the word "stain" not as a bad thing, but rather proof that the Cutting Board's being put to proper use. Don't worry, if you feel dirty after reading this next entry, you can always soak in bleach and hot water then rinse with vinegar...

Before I begin, let me say that I enjoy being a Chef. I'd have to. I really love creating menus and specials, organizing my mis-en-place and bringing together a band of misfits to dance together during a busy service. I love the frenetic pace of pushing out food so fast that I forget what I plated 5 minutes before. I love the interaction between myself and the front-of-house staff, no matter how heated it may get. It lets me know I'm alive. More importantly, it lets me know I'm needed! And what Chef wouldn't consider his or her favorite part of the day enjoying a post-dinner service drink with their fellow "Cookies"?

All that said, being a Chef is tough work. It's nothing like what you see on the Food Channel. All those Celebrity Chefs you see wearing pristine white jackets and taking one hour to make one dish? Yeah, half of them have never even worked "on the line." I'm not putting them down (with the exception of Rachel Ray - she's not a even worthy of the canned food she cooks with), but there are some that I have a lot of respect for. Those rare few have actually proven themselves by starting in the trenches and working their way up through hard work and dedication. I guess what I'm trying to elude to is that what you see on television is in no way a reflection of what working in a busy kitchen's like at all. I have twelve years worth of stories to share about just how difficult and taxing it can sometimes be. The following is one of those stories...

New Year's Eve, 2002. I had just been "stolen" away from a restaurant that had pigeon-holed me to prep-cook hell by a Chef that I met at a dessert competition. He had just started to work at a busy new upscale bar & grill and was desperate to put together his kitchen staff. He offered me a position as his Sous-Chef and I gladly accepted - two days before Christmas. Needless to say, I burned a bridge with the restaurant I was already employed at, but I had heard promises of a raise and promotion for far too long. So, I start working at the new bar & Grill the same day I quit at my former job, and was immediately asked to help plan a New Year's Eve menu. The Chef already had most of it put together, but just wanted a fresh set of eyes to make sure the menu was simple, yet offered enough of a choice and would be easy to execute (we were all new staff starting in an unfamiliar kitchen on one of the busiest restaurant nights of the year). Together, we made a few tweaks, and started preparing for dinner service of 300 people. New Years night before dinner service, we had a little pow-wow to see what stations each cook would work. It turned out that I had the most experience working the grill, so I was put in charge of cooking the Filet Mignon. I didn't have any problems with that choice because I knew I was strong on the grill and wanted to prove myself to my new Chef and Boss. By the end of the night, prove myself I would...

There were only four items on the menu for the night and we knew that the Filet Mignon would be a popular choice. Just how popular, we highly underestimated. The doors opened, and the appetizers started to flow out of the kitchen. Things were off to a great start. About 20 minutes after opening the doors, the first dinner tickets started coming in. "Fire on 2 filets - 1 medium, 1 medium-well!"

No problem Chef, I got this...

Two minute later, I heard "Walking in, 6 filets - 2 medium, 2 medium-rare, 1 rare and 1 well-done!"

Okay, now we're starting to dance a bit...

"Walking in, 4 filets - 3 medium, 1 medium-rare!"

Breathe Delaney... you can do this.

"Party of 8 walking in! 3 medium filet medium, 2 filets medium-well, 1 filet well-done! Call back please!"

Shit - getting buried. "Okay Chef, I've got 9 filets medium, 6 filets medium-well, 2 rare, etc..."

"Walking in, 4 more filets medium-well!"

Okay, at this point I was beginning to sweat. It was only 15 minutes into dinner service and I had about 45 filets going at the same time - all with different temperatures. Tickets were starting to literally fly in and I had to use every ounce of my cognative ability just to remember how many steaks I needed to cook.

"Walking in, party of 10! 9 filets, 3 well-done, 2 rare, 4 medium-rare! 1 Salmon!"

Hey People! We DO have other items on the menu!!!

"Next, fire 7 filets! 2 medium-well, 2 medium-rare..." you get the point.

To cut a 50 mintue long story short, I worked my ass off that New Year's Eve, and by the end of the evening, only had one steak come back. I had earned my reputation of being one of the fastest and most consistant grill-cooks in the valley (may sound concieted, but that reputation has followed me), and I went home that night reeking of smoke but feeling accomplished that I single-handedly managed to perfectly cook 250 filet mignons in less than an hour. Actually, 249. The guy who sent his steak back wanted his to be leather, so it's excused. Five filet mignons a minute... Beat that Rachel Ray!

Grilled Filet Mignon with Buerre Rouge

for the filet -

• 4 eight ounce filet mignon (trimmed and peeled)
• 4 cloves fresh garlic
• 1/4 cup olive oil

for the Buerre Rouge -

• 1/4 cup minced shallot
• 1 tbsp. minced fresh thyme
• 1 tbsp. apple cider vinegar
• 1/2 cup red wine
• 1/2 lb. chilled butter (cut into one inch pieces)
• 1 tbsp. manufacturing cream

for the grill -

• 1/2 cup melted butter
• 1/2 tsp. onion powder
• salt & pepper to taste

Chop the garlic cloves and add to the olive oil and use to marinate the filet mignons for at least one hour. Meanwhile, saute the minced shallots in a heavy-bottomed sauce-pan until just translucent. Deglaze with the red wine and add the fresh thyme. Reduce the mixture by half and add the apple cider vinegar. Remove from heat and add the cream. Next, whisk in the chilled butter until fully incorporated. Hold in a water bath or bain marie on medium-low heat until reday to serve.

Over hot coals or the hot side of a gas grill, mark the filet mignons for about 4 minutes on both sides brushing with butter then transfer to a sheet-pan to finish in the oven. Cook to desired temperature then allow to rest for 6 minutes before serving. To plate, ladle the buerre rouge over the top of each filet and garnish as desired.

As I was flipping through the channels last night, I ended up finding an old episode of ‘Family Feud’ on the GSN. Being that it was close to 1:00 a.m. and the only other interesting show to watch was ‘Golden Girls’, I decided to settle in to the comedy-stylings of Louie Anderson. When I watch ‘Family Feud’, I can’t just sit nicely and take it all in – I’ve gotta play along!

The topic was “Name things that you get at a Chinese food restaurant." There were only two boxes left, and I thought to myself, “Chopsticks… already taken, huh? Soy sauce packets! Nope that’s taken too… OH! OH! FORTUNE COOKIES!” It wasn’t up there yet and I just knew it had to be! Louie, the perpetual host, asked the next person to “Name something you’d find in a Chinese food restaurant” and the person had to think reeeeeeeeally hard before saying “PIANO!”

PIANO?! Where the hell do they find these people?!

“FORTUNE COOKIE!” I silently screamed and tried my best to project my subconcious thought through the airwaves and into their meager minds... and meager minds they were. Sure enough, they got three strikes before finding out that the remaining two answers did in fact, include ‘fortune cookie.’ The other answer was 'fish tank.'

Piano?… Come on…

That little mental vignette got the troll-dolls in my head banging rocks together, and I put together my next blog entry which you are currently reading. Everyone knows what a fortune cookie is, but hardly anyone knows the history behind this stale little sugary soothsayer.

The fortune cookie dates back to the fourteenth century right before the Chang Dynasty and actually wasn’t a cookie at all, but rather a type of steamed dumpling. You see, at that time the Chinese were under the control of the Mongols and were oppressed as a people. The Mongols were not known for being kind to the Chinese, and certain groups of Chinese people started to convene in secret to stage a revolt. Obviously if they were discovered by the occupying Mongols, they would be quartered by horses or set on fire, so secrecy was mandatory. The big struggle these Chinese revolutionists had to overcome was how to let the Chinese people know about the revolt without alerting the Mongols. Fortunately, there was among the group a very observant person who noticed that while the Chinese people enjoyed eating a form of dumplings that had raw egg-yolk in it, the Mongols wouldn’t go near them and considered them dirty peasant food.

Chu Yuan Chang proposed using these dumpling (called mooncakes) to secretly deliver messages on stamped copper to his countrymen alerting them to the upcoming revolt. The plan worked beautifully and the Mongols were overthrown and run out of China in 1386. Chu Yuan Chang would go on to become the first Emporer of China, and one of the first things he would do was to oversee the construction of the Great Wall of China.

After the Chinese acquired control of their country, there really wasn’t any point in putting metal into food anymore, so the secret message inside the food went away… for awhile.

Jump ahead a few centuries and the fortune cookie re-emerges in (drum-roll please…) San Francisco! Common speculation is that the Chinese immigrants brought to the west coast to build the railroads brought with them their history, among that being the story of the mooncakes. In 1890, Chef Makoto Hagiwara of the Golden Gate’s Japanese Tea Garden started making a hardened molasses cookie that was shaped around a “blessing of good fortune” written on common paper. (Editor’s note: Even though Chef Hagiwara was of Japanese decent, he most likely would have been lumped into the same community as the Chinese when fresh off the boat. Furthermore, the Japanese would probably know the history of the mooncakes due to their close proximity to China.)

Even though Chef Hagiwara was known for introducing the western United States to the fortune cookie, it was in 1918 that not one, but two official claims were made as to the invention of the fortune cookie. In San Francisco, David Jung of the Hong Kong Noodle Company started to mass produce the cookie while farther south in Los Angeles, Seiichi Kito started to make the same exact cookie at his restaurant, Fugetsu-Do. To this day, nobody’s exactly sure who gets the credit for inventing the modern day fortune cookie but two things are for sure – they are a fun way to end a Chinese meal and nobody actually plays those lucky lottery numbers…

Here’s a fortune cookie recipe I used at a martini lounge and grill I worked at a few years back. We used to print drink coupons to put into the cookies and would give them out to our diners and VIP’s. It was a great promotion and people really enjoyed them!

Fortune Cookies

•2 large egg whites

•1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

•1/2 teaspoon pure almond extract

•3 tablespoons vegetable oil

•8 tablespoons all-purpose flour

•1 1/2 teaspoons cornstarch

•1/4 teaspoon salt

•8 tablespoons granulated sugar

•3 teaspoons water

Preparation:

1. Write fortunes on pieces of paper that are 3 1/2 inches long and 1/2 inch wide. Preheat oven to 300 degrees Fahrenheit. Grease 2 9-X-13 inch baking sheets.

2. In a medium bowl, lightly beat the egg white, vanilla extract, almond extract and vegetable oil until frothy, but not stiff.

3. Sift the flour, cornstarch, salt and sugar into a separate bowl. Stir the water into the flour mixture.

4. Add the flour into the egg white mixture and stir until you have a smooth batter. The batter should not be runny, but should drop easily off a wooden spoon.

5. Place level tablespoons of batter onto the cookie sheet, spacing them at least 3 inches apart. Gently tilt the baking sheet back and forth and from side to side so that each tablespoon of batter forms into a circle 4 inches in diameter.

6. Bake until the outer 1/2-inch of each cookie turns golden brown and they are easy to remove from the baking sheet with a spatula (14 – 15 minutes).

7. Working quickly, remove the cookie with a spatula and flip it over in your hand. Place a fortune in the middle of a cookie. To form the fortune cookie shape, fold the cookie in half, then gently pull the edges downward over the rim of a glass, wooden spoon or the edge of a muffin tin. Place the finished cookie in the cup of the muffin tin so that it keeps its shape. Continue with the rest of the cookies.