Knives at Dawn

by Andrew Friedman

  That evening, the team again took over the salon for a lengthy planning meeting that covered all aspects of the remaining days. Everybody was there: Coach Henin, Hollingsworth and Guest, Kaysen and Pelka, and John Guest and Kate Laughlin. Laughlin and Pelka had already spent hours that afternoon working on the menu—the printed list of proteins and garnishes that would be provided to the judges. (It would be inserted into a bound booklet that had been produced by Level, the same design company that created the team poster. The booklet featured a statement by Hollings-worth, photos and portraits of the team, and montages of the Hollings-worth dish sketches, serving pieces, and platter renderings from Tihany’s company.) Also, there was another newly arrived member of the growing posse: Allison Wagner, who handles public relations for Thomas Keller Restaurant Group out of the company PR Consulting in New York, was on hand to field media relations concerns. As the team met, she worked at a makeshift desk in the corner, typing and printing.

  There was also a potentially ominous sign: Hollingsworth and Kaysen were both drinking bottles of water sudsy with Airborne, a cold-prevention remedy. Hollingsworth had felt a cold coming on for the past twenty-four hours, and was trying to stave it off.

  The team discussed the needs for the practice session the next day, as Hollingsworth ran down the long list of items that would need to be executed before practice could commence: slice bresaola, slice bacon, make chestnut puree, make pistachio puree, clean black truffles, make pistachio crumbs. “We could use a lot of help. We have a lot we need to accomplish,” he said. “If we could have help from, uh, people who are experienced in the culinary field.” This was his polite way of making sure that, in addition to himself and Guest, only Kaysen and Henin would be working with the food.

  The to-do list for the day was insanely long: Measure out stocks (veal stock, shrimp base for the foam, the shrimp stock that would be ladled over the custard); determine which smoke (hickory or applewood) to use in the bowls; test the caviar tube, and so on. There was also a growing list of nonkitchen tasks; for example, somebody needed to buy a screw gun for opening and resealing the crates the platters would arrive in. Oh, and they’d need to make a surrogate platter out of cardboard and/or Styrofoam for use in the practice. About this last issue, there was some much-needed good news. During the meeting, both Pelka and Laughlin received e-mails informing them that the platters had cleared customs and would arrive at L’Abbaye on Monday.

  Forty-five minutes into the meeting, Kaysen’s cellular phone rang. He answered it.

  “Hello?”

  “Gavin!” It was Boulud.

  “Hello, Chef.”

  All other conversation stopped. Kaysen put Boulud on speaker phone and set it in the middle of the table.

  “Congratulations, Chef,” said Hollingsworth, referring to the four-star review.

  “Timothy!” hollered Boulud from New York, quickly establishing an aural presence nearly as vivid as a hologram. “Are you good? Are you comfortable?”

  “I’m loose. I’m ready to go.”

  “Adina, how about you?”

  “Yes, Chef. I’m good.”

  “Don’t eat too much saucisson, or you gonna get thirsty.”

  Everybody laughed.

  “No charcuterie for twenty-four hours before you go! You have all the equipment, you’re fine?”

  “Yes, Chef.”

  “You’re going to be able to do a full run tomorrow?”

  “Yes, Chef.”

  “Where are you going for dinner?”

  “I think we’re ordering pizza,” said Gavin. “I don’t think we’re getting out of this meeting any time soon.”

  “Okay,” said Boulud. “Make sure you tighten up all the little screws so we can fly to the moon!”

  Everybody burst out laughing, again.

  They disengaged the call and got back to making the list that would guide them in the coming days: when they finished on Saturday, they would have to pack all their boxes in the order they would be unpacked the day of the competition. Because each hand-crafted smoke glass needed to be kept paired with its lid, Laughlin suggested rigging a box with Styrofoam compartments to hold them, but they resolved to keep them in their original boxes and use plastic containers in their stead for the practice.

  The meeting went on for nearly three hours. They made lists, debated packing techniques, remembered crucial details. And then they ordered a pizza. It wasn’t the best meal they’d have on this trip, but it got the job done.

  ON SATURDAY, JANUARY 24, Roland Henin was none too happy. He privately approached Jennifer Pelka and asked her to scale back the size of the group attending what had become the one and only remaining practice session. The team didn’t need distractions, he argued; only crucial personnel should be on site. But nobody was disinvited, and as was often the case in this saga, one uncomfortable situation was immediately followed by another: over breakfast, the team learned by e-mail that the silver pieces, the ones that had been agreed upon and ordered from Scannell just before they left California, had been completed at the last possible second and that, to avoid a customs disaster, Scannell would be bringing them with him to France. (He, along with Richard Rosendale, were coming to help the team unload and get set up on Day Two of the Bocuse d’Or, lending their culinary-competition experience to the effort.) Scannell would deliver the pieces to the team personally on Monday at a Bocuse d’Or briefing at the Sirha.

  The group convoyed out of town, and pulled into the parking lot of L’Abbaye. Not twenty seconds later, Jérôme Bocuse, just arrived in France, pulled in behind them, looking debonair in his dark coat and jeans.

  The team carried the red plastic boxes down from the upstairs holding area. Henin inspected the smokers and proclaimed: “None of them broke! Let’s keep our luck going!”

  In the kitchen, one of the first orders of business was to fly the American flag, which Pelka produced from a box and draped from a utility rack, holding it in place with silver domes.

  The next two hours were spent getting set up for the practice: Guest processed pistachios, measured vinegar, counted eggs into a plastic container, and melted butter. She wasn’t performing any knife work, but the urgent, deft movements that she exhibits at her best were seeping into her behavior.

  Meanwhile, in the corridor, friends and family were pitching in: Dr. Guest was ironing team jackets and aprons; Laughlin had set up a printer on a wooden table to generate notes and menu drafts, and had a camera around her neck to memorialize the day with photographs.

  As the team continued to unpack and set up around the kitchen, Henin appeared to have magically changed into his chef attire: white coat and a blue apron with side towels draped from its strings. He seemed even more towering than usual, a knight suited up in his armor.

  The cast of characters from the past few days appeared: Vincent Le Roux, in a suit and tie, and Paul Bocuse, nestled in a heavy winter coat. After the Bocuses left, Le Roux remained to host the team, offering a steady stream of coffees and waters. In the adjacent room, two dishwashers worked, their arms lost in the deep sinks.

  Hollingsworth, assuming authority, asked Henin and Kaysen to label containers. As they did, Guest noticed something wrong out of the corner of her eye. She corrected Kaysen on a label. “It’s not sugar; it’s Simplesse.”

  Kaysen cocked an eyebrow. Though young, he’s a traditionalist, and doesn’t use all the newfangled molecular stuff. “How do you spell that?”

  “S-I-M-P-L-E-S-S-E.”

  As 11:00 a.m. approached, Pelka grew concerned that things weren’t progressing quickly enough. She knew that Boulud had landed and was visiting his parents. But before long he would be there and he was under the impression that, as in Orlando, the team was going to mimic the timing of the actual Bocuse d’Or, arriving at the crack of dawn and starting at the same time they would on Wednesday. She discretely sidled up to Guest, busy weighing ingredients on a digital scale.

  “If you were to guess, how long before you get s
tarted?” asked Pelka.

  Guest didn’t even look up. “An hour and a half to two hours.”

  Pelka fought to maintain her composure; it was not the answer she was hoping for. Not even close.

  Hollingsworth put on his white chef’s jacket and his blue apron, engulfed for a moment by the feeling of home, a phantom sensation that he was back in The French Laundry kitchen. He started brushing the black truffles.

  Kaysen scanned the kitchen. It’d been a fun week, but now it was all business.

  “D-Day,” he said to himself.

  Hollingsworth noticed Guest’s off-the-charts intensity. “How you doing, Adina?”

  “Good, Chef.”

  Clearly joking, he asked, “Ten minutes?”

  A slight smile penetrated the Game Face. “No.”

  “One hour?”

  “Maybe.”

  As all of this unfolded, Coach Henin had receded almost into the background. He leaned in the back doorway, chewing on a toothpick, watching Hollingsworth intently as the candidate began to gain his flow, mixing crème fraîche and gellan in a blender, while periodically coughing into the crook of his arm. Still not 100 percent.

  Guest gathered a number of plastic containers on a sheet pan, and walked them into the walk-in freezer, passing under a sign that read Chambre Froide.

  Off to the side of the room, on a shelf, were eight smoking guns. Newly purchased from a different purveyor than PolyScience, they had arrived, and were still packed, in boxes that bore a photo of Bob Marley on them. He was, by far, the most relaxed person in the room.

  KATE LAUGHLIN AND JOHN Guest left to procure some lunchtime sustenance, but Chef Bocuse had other ideas. He returned to L’Abbaye, shuffled into a central passageway highlighted by a gargantuan fireplace, and summoned his dishwashers to move a long wooden table so it was angled under the chandelier. Then he had them light a fire.

  As chimney smoke billowed into the hall, a spread was laid out on the table: cheese, sausage, babas, and terrines cut by Bocuse himself. The team filed out of the kitchen and formed a chow line for their second meal compliments of the man who bore the same name as the competition they’d be joining.

  “Just to give you a comparison,” said Kaysen, as they tucked into lunch. “When I was here [in 2007], our lunch was bread and Uncle Ben’s was our sponsor, so I made rice.”

  As the roar of a passing train shook the air, Kaysen asked, “How do you write a thank-you note for this?”

  The group murmured as they ate. Nobody had any idea.

  “I know how you can thank him,” Kaysen offered, answering his own question. “Win!”

  BACK IN THE KITCHEN after lunch, Hollingsworth and Guest reviewed their notes from the various meetings, public and private, over the past several days. Chef Bouvarel dropped by, noticeably more relaxed on a day off, and made the rounds of the kitchen, shaking hands. Hollingsworth presented him with a copy of The French Laundry Cookbook. In turn, Bouvarel handed Hollingsworth a yellow jug of sunflower oil. Hollingsworth tasted it; just what he was looking for.

  Kate Laughlin brought Hollingsworth a 5-Hour Energy Drink, one of the many items they’d brought along from Yountville, which he knocked back.

  Kaysen was doing what he could to help, setting up the circulator tubs: water in one, blended oil (olive and sunflower) in another. Then he took the slab of bacon into another room and returned with two slices, showing them to Hollingsworth and Guest.

  Team USA looked them over and said, almost in unison: “A little thinner.”

  Kaysen left and returned again with two thinner slices and Hollings-worth and Guest noticed that it was a little thinner on one end, not exactly ideal, but it’s all they had so they kept moving.

  Henin was staring out the window. It had been a long day, and practice hadn’t even started yet. On seeing something outside, his eyes widened.

  “The Man is here,” he said.

  “Paul Bocuse?” asked Hollingsworth.

  “No! D Man.”

  Chef Serge had seen the same thing: Daniel Boulud had just pulled into the parking lot in his rental car. Cotin came scrambling through the kitchen to get to the phone and call Paul Bocuse. A moment later, Boulud entered in his Team USA jacket, hair perfect, a cube-shaped blue bag slung over his shoulder from which he pulled out broccolini, avocados, and microgreens. After he lined a plastic container with paper towels, he put the microgreens inside to help them survive until competition day.

  Boulud walked into the catering hall. Jérôme and Monsieur Paul, now in his whites, walked in. The gang was all there.

  Like a father returning from a long business trip, Boulud made up for lost time with the team, asserting his authority the moment he stepped into the kitchen, asking to review the team’s five-hour plan, pushing them to get started, and declaring that, “Somebody has to play the role of the commis. The commis extra. They need to get used to that.”

  “Okay, I can do it,” said Kaysen, always happy to be Johnny-on-the-spot.

  Boulud looked around the room. “And the platters?”

  Kaysen delivered the bad news in one quick word: “Monday.”

  Boulud’s jaw set and his eyes widened in horror. You’d have thought he’d just been informed that the Times review had been rescinded. “No!” he snapped. “It’s too late.”

  “Stuck in customs.”

  Boulud recovered, immediately, and went into damage control: “Who has his hand on it?”

  “Vincent.”

  That was good enough. Boulud moved right along. He didn’t mention the platters again that day.

  As Hollingsworth and Guest wrapped up their preparations, Boulud stood in the corner of the kitchen, scanning a list of notes from the January 8 practice.

  “How long do you have to set up there?” asked Boulud.

  “About an hour,” said Kaysen.

  “See, that’s what I thought,” said Boulud. “You were going to come here and get set up in an hour.”

  In the corner, near the window, Le Roux asked Henin if he wanted some coffee.

  “No,” replied the coach. “I’m jittery enough as it is.”

  Kaysen came prancing into the room. “What’s going on?”

  Hollingsworth told him, “Adina’s looking over the list and then we’re going to go.”

  Henin looked at the clock: 3:57. He held up three fingers to Hollings-worth and Guest. Three minutes to start time.

  As the minutes ticked by, Henin began doing a drumroll on a Styrofoam fish box.

  Hollingsworth leaned over to Guest: “Better to go slow today.”

  He didn’t wait for the coach. “Ready?” he asked Guest.

  “Yes.”

  “Go.”

  He started a small timer in front of the salamander.

  And once again, but for the first time on French soil, they were off.

  They did a number of steps by rote now: Hollingsworth butchering his beef; Guest overlapping bacon slices for the tenderloin, then hacking the skin off the potatoes with ferocious speed.

  There was a problem right off the bat: Hollingsworth had treated himself to a new knife for the competition, a Japanese Misono slicer, but when he started using it, he realized that it was one inch longer than the one he was used to. This resulted in an on-the-spot period of adjustment.

  The room became dead silent as, with the darkness already gathering outside, Henin, Boulud, and Kaysen stood by the window at the back of the kitchen and watched.

  Hollingsworth butchered with a focus that surpassed all previous practices: He cut the oxtail crosswise into segments, laying them on a sheet of parchment, then sprinkling them with salt and grinding pepper over them. He erased the fat from the tenderloin and asked Kaysen to take it to the freezer. He seasoned and seared the beef cheeks and oxtail, then put them in the “stew” pot and fixed the pressure-cooker lid in place, then broke down the cod in preparation for the application of the mousse.

  For this first (and last) practice, Hollingsworth o
pened a Styrofoam container of scallops and shucked them, working on the box lid. He told Laughlin, who was back on note-taking duty, that he wanted a different knife, like a butter knife, to perform the task in competition. He moved quickly that day, and even when he talked to Guest or Laughlin, his hands never stopped moving. He set a small stainless-steel bowl in a larger bowl of ice, and transferred the shucked scallops into the bowl.

  As Guest began turning potatoes, Henin paced, hands clasped behind his back.

  Boulud entered the cooking area and began speaking to Hollingsworth. “You happy with the scallops?”

  Hollingsworth nodded. “Yeah,” he said. But unlike in Yountville, he gave the chef no more attention than that. He called out the time to Guest. “Thirty-four minutes.”

  “Thirty-four minutes, Chef.”

  Henin collected the sacs of roe from the scallops and pureed them with salt, delivering the blend to Hollingsworth.

  Hollingsworth made a quenelle of the scallop mousse, quick-cooked it in simmering water, chilled it in an ice bath, and tasted it. He reseasoned the mixture, and set it aside.

  Henin approved. “By doing that, the quenelle, you get five points extra from the judges, if they see you. For the testing.”

  “Yeah?”

  “You damn right.”

  Hollingsworth replied that he had to test the mousse because the ingredients didn’t taste quite like the ones back home.

  “It’s different,” he said.

  “Yeah, everything’s a little different here,” said the coach.

  Guest meanwhile had started her Silpat work, baking bacon chips in the oven under foil-wrapped bricks.

  Hollingsworth went through his usual routine with the mousse, Cryovacing it in a bag, then flattening it with a rolling pin. He spread the pureed roe over one section of the mousse, then set the cod pieces in place, applied the Activa, and rolled two cylinders, one with roe and one without. This would be the one and only time he’d get to test the addition of the roe, but everybody was pushing for it, even the usually demure Jérôme Bocuse, feeling that the addition of some color would benefit the platter, so Hollingsworth was willing to give it a shot.