Wow, My Daughter is a Chef!

Even though I have been working at my daughter’s catering kitchen off and on these past few years – I am constantly amazed at what she does. Yes, she is a Chef who graduated from Pittsburgh’s Le Cordon Bleu’s International Culinary Academy. She did an Internship in Vail, Colorado, where she worked at two different restaurants. Returning to Pittsburgh, she worked at a few country clubs before deciding to set up her own catering business, Erin's Fine Foods -  Catering and More.

 

At first, I watched her from afar as she built up her business. Slowly, I helped her out by being her decorator, and changing her seasonal decorations at her shop. Then I graduated to using my daughter’s dishwasher doing the dishes and spraying myself with the water along the way.

 

At first, her business started off slowly with small parties, lunches or whatever catering opportunities would come her way, no matter how big or how small the jobs appeared. Then she got her foot in the door as one of the caterers at the Great Hall. She began catering wedding there and at a few other places. Weddings would become a centerpiece for her business. When the weddings started coming in along with private and corporate catering, showers, graduation parties and other events, her work calendar started to fill up and this all kept her hopping.

 

As my daughter got busier, I started to help her out with a few more manageable tasks, like simple food preparations. My daughter in turn was able to hire people to serve at the weddings and sometimes to even drive her foods to drop off at other events. At other times when she would need another chef to help, she was able to hire one for a simultaneous event.

 

But the other day, I was in her kitchen helping, while she was preparing foods for a ‘wedding tasting,’ for a few couples. In between my work, I watched her prepare the foods and plate each one up for the couples to sample. The food presentation brought a compliment from my mouth. The dishes looked artistically arranged on the plates…Beef with a Bourbon Sauce, along with friend onion strips; Rosemary Pork Loin with Apple Brandy Sauce; Chipotle Cashew Chicken, and Chicken Piccata. All were accompanied with a fresh vegetable and a potato dish.

 

When the tasting was over, my daughter packed up the extra food and gave it to me to take home for dinner. When I arrived home, the food was still warm, so I sat down and ate it. I delighted in every morsel until there was nothing left on my plate. That was when I thought – Wow, my daughter is a Chef!