Time to regroup...

The process has gotten into somewhat of a rhythm; We take some time to research "the next step", then we gather the pieces of the puzzle, put it together and it doesn't quite fit, go get a few of the pieces corrected, then all in a rush a bunch of movement happens and we are done with that step. Last week, we were figuring out how to do the Peddler's Faire legally (what are the health department requirements, City of Martinez etc), this week we tried to get all of the pieces of that puzzle put together, plus ongoing relationship building with clients and potential clients, AND still keeping tabs and monitoring the progress on the restaurant and encouraging that where we can.

So now that we have a kitchen, the NSF tent/canopy and feel relatively confident we can put out a safe delicious product... what is NEXT on the agenda?

Making sure the booth is visually attractive. To this end we bought a very nice lightly used all black enclosed canopy ($350), 10 lexans (used $10 each) to showcase food in ice, a laminator ($20) to make signage, some printable stickers ($12) to label food, a banner ($150) and the clear plastic food containers. We already had a few things too. I don't expect to make a lot of money this time because of all of the initial expenditures, but hopefully we can start doing a regular thing at local farmer's markets and other street fairs that will be worthwhile over the longer term while we wait for the kitchen/restaurant to be completed.

I still need to finish all the signage, call Weaver and order coffee, call Semifreddi and order bread and nail down my purchasing/product needs before next week. We will only be in the kitchen for about 8 hours so we really have to nail it. We will hit the farmer's market on Thursday night for produce.

I need to stay on top of the restaurant thing... I think we are going to go ahead and build out the kitchen while Stan figures out what to do about the ADA and earthquake retrofit. At least then I can use my own kitchen and start prepping my own products for sale to the wider public. I found one more piece to the equipment puzzle (A vacuum sealer) yesterday, now the only hard to find item I need is a smoker. My teachers had been willing to let me buy theirs, but it is a complicated process for them to sell it to me and I don't think it will be completed before the school semester ends and they go home for the summer (CURSES!). So now that piece of the puzzle is a question mark again and I really need a smoker.

I put a ton of stuff up to hang and dry yesterday, including hot beef American Wagyu coppa and hot capicolla. I also put the pastrami into cure for next weekend. Stein and I need to prep the chicken sausages for T-rex next week. We were going to do it Sunday but I have a client who wants some for Saturday so I may do at least one today or tomorrow. I also need to make some croutons with the copious amounts of bread given to me by Semifreddis, plus the cherry mostarda for next week (need candied citrus).

So on the agenda today:

• Prep all of the signage for the booth
• Make a purchase order for all items on the menu
• Call David about progress on the restaurant
• Try to organize some of the equipment in the front room and see if any of it can go to storage
• See if I can find vacuum sealer bags
• Decide which salumi is going on the Charc platter for the fair
• check out cheeses for the platter (maybe be naughty and hit Berkeley with Wendy today and check out the cheese board)

I am sure I will thin of more stuff I need to do... but it is a good start!

Found a kitchen...

It is in Hayward, but it will totally work and we can store stuff on site. WHEW! It was a really interesting set up. Like 6 individual work stations with their own ranges etc. Plus... apparently there is this guy who makes sausages there and he has this ginormous grinder and mixer... it can do like 50 # of sausage in like an hour. And I can use it if I need it! Pretty cool!

We also went by Semifreddi's for a bread tasting, which was hysterical. Wendy meets us at the back with a full on hairnet and has racks and racks of bread for us to try... whole loaves! We came home with this much bread. Like four giants bags full of bread, four whole sliced loaves of bread and a giant box of pastries. I have the most amazing Carb-haze going on right now... it is hard to really fathom the depths of it....

We also stopped by this place that said they had some restaurant equipment for sale. I thought it was the place we tried to hit in Hayward last time (but the guy wasn't there), but it ended up being a different place. A dad and his son... they had the biggest pita baking oven I've ever seen... it was bigger than my suburban! He said it could cook like 5000 pita breads a day...

Anyway but we also found a Berkel vacuum sealer! YAY! It was kind of funny, the guy said it was $1200, then we grabbed 10 lexans with lids and he dropped the price (for all of it) to $1100. The Berkel sealers (new) are in the $5000.00 range. This one is an older model, but the chamber is huge, I will be able to make head cheese!

We also stopped by Del Monte Meats to get the product to cure for the Peddler's Faire. I also got all of the loose ends out of cure and hung up today, YAY! And I had one of the guests at the catering job in the city this weekend contact me for some personal chef gigs, plus another friend is getting a bunch of my sausages for a friend for her birthday this weekend... All in all not a bad week!

I still have not heard anything new on when the restaurant would open. But we did go drop off the final bit of paperwork at the ABC today, so (whew)... Tomorrow I should play with chicken sausages, we will go show them at T-rex next Tuesday (3rd Tuesday in a row that we get to go hang out in a super cool restaurant and talk shop and play with food).

I am so excited about the Peddler's Faire next weekend! I get to hang out all day with my beloved Brionator, Mr Galen and the Schwienstein (our new nickname for Stein) and sell my products and interact with my future potential customers.

Still frazzled from yesterday, but recovering...

Today was insane. I had three tastings, all of completely different products, in different cities. Plus we ran into the city to check out a potential vacuum sealer, which I desperately need.

I got up and Stein and I went to the farmer's market to find a bread vendor we'd seen last Thursday. He wasn't there but we had fun anyway. Today Stein's wife Alicia came with us on all of our errands, which was awesome (I am not sure what it is, but she has a very relaxing effect one me). We tossed her into a Compass Star T-shirt and drug her all over.

Trisha (from the Main St Martinez property/event management group) texted and said that Huge, the exec chef from Creek Monkey was interested in my charcuterie, so I texted her and asked if we could meet up with him at noon with a full charc tasting? So we ran home, sliced some meats, and ran into Martinez for the tasting. God it was a gorgeous day. The large rambling old house they are building into their brewery is full of charm and happy ghosts. The owner (and master brewer) Jim took us for a tour. I just loved the bones of the place and we chatted about our passions (beer and pig!). It was awesome to recognize a fellow freak, even if we freak about different things.

Huge (the Exec Chef) showed up and we talked and talked about meat. He is super interested in collaborating on some projects (like bring in a whole pig and bust that bad boy up and make some killer food). The funniest moment was when Jim (who is really cute) kind of did that thing where your eyes roll back in your head while he thought about this awesome beer that would go so perfectly with my cured meats. I live for those moments!

Then we dashed out to meet up at T-rex with the Sous there, Ryan. I happen to kind of love Ryan. Passionate, smart, personable and (the word doesn't really do him justice) capable. We took in four fresh sausages: Orange/Fennel (pork), French fin spice (Seafood), Andouille (pork) and the Compass Dog (all beef). My favorite moment of that was the kitchen manager trying the fennel orange sausage and the look on his face when he said, "That was the one I didn't think I would like... and it is my favorite!"

I got to hang out with Craig as well, who I adore and he got to try my stuff as well. I am catering his wife's birthday party in July. I can't wait to really pull out the stops for a guy who has bent over backwards to help me.

Then we hit the city to check out a vacuum sealer (that was not really a vacuum sealer, it was a shrink wrapper). Then back home and my final tasting of the day...

For a bridal couple getting married in September. I made them several items off their menu and we got to hang out an chat, which was also super awesome. When you can show a hostess/bride that you are excited to collaborate and make sure her guests are well fed, it can have a very relaxing effect.

ALSO today: found a kitchen! It is in Hayward but I can store stuff and it has a buffalo chopper so I don't have to drag mine around, which is super heavy. YAY! Also I think David has decided to just build out the kitchen so we can get started and let Stan work around us while he gets the ADA and earthquake retrofitting done. Thank God for that as well.

I wish I wasn't PMSing... I still feel a bit anxious instead of euphoric. GAH! Hormones! But even in spite of that; today was just flat out awesome. I feel like such a kid when people like my product. And I love LOVE talking to chefs/brewers who are as passionate as I am about what they do... there is nothing quite like it. We are the dreamers of dreams. We are the alchemists making magic. As scary as my life is right now, I can DO this. It's worth it.

Some days you are the windshield....

other days you are the bug... Today I was the bug...

So I went to go check out the rental kitchen this morning with Stein. It was ok, not great, but it was licensed and that is really all that matters for our purposes. So we go check it out and the guy says it is $20 an hour... BUT... we have to get a million dollar rider on our insurance AND give a $1000 deposit. And he seems pretty shady. I can easily visualize my deposit not coming back to me. Crap...

So we talk to Mr. E and see if we can use the school kitchen, but it's graduation and the final for Garde Manger, so it is just not a good time for that. We call my old standby the Pleasant Hill community center and they are under construction. I am 0 for 3.

We also finally get a hold of Semi-freddi bread, whose Martinez route is booked. Acme doesn't deliver to Martinez at all.

Then a craigslist ad comes thru on a vacuum sealer for $900, I talk the guy down to $800 but only for4 today.. and it's 3:30, he closes at 4:30 and I am in the East Bay and he is in the heart of San Francisco. Not going to happen.

I also meet with Main St Martinez, the property management group, who are totally awesome and totally rock and make the mistake of bitching about how business UNfriendly the Martinez Business Department is... just as the Mayor walks in the door. So the ladies (who are trying to help me) ask me to recount the travails to the Mayor. I do it in the most diplomatic way I can, but now it is not a private venting... I am basically telling on them to their boss, which was not my initial intent at all. I have to still try to WORK with these people. I got an email (out of the blue) from my Building dept contact tonight that is I am sure a result of this conversation. I am usually pretty ok with my big mouth, but today I wasn't. Plus at the end of the day, I know they don't understand why they are the problem.

They just truly don't understand the connection between telling me my ADA plans for my bathroom are not right with out any guidance about what they thought was wrong with it, or making my landlord bring the building up to 2014 code before we can do anything, or not accepting anything I was told was "grandfathered in" (prior to signing the lease), or asking arbitrarily for things not required as being business-unfriendly. They truly feel they are doing their job to the best of their ability.

One of the Main St Martinez women made an interesting correlation, that when she worked for a major newspaper as a graphic artist, until she worked directly with the salespeople, she really didn't understand the financial constraints involved. I know these guys don't understand that in a few months my alimony ends and I will no longer be able to afford my house. Maybe the Cheesecake Factory can afford to wait a year to open a restaurant, but I can't. I literally cannot afford to pay my house payment after August and they have zero sense of urgency about me being able to operate my business. Why CAN'T I just go look thru the 700 pages of ADA code on bathrooms and figure out what he didn't like? Why can't we spend a year fixing every flaw up to the highest (and not even in effect yet) code?

It's not like I knew these would be issues going in to the lease. In all fairness, we did not decide to fix the bathroom and add a hood til after we leased the property, but the ADA issues have been around in the historic area of Martinez for some time. Bleh. I hope tomorrow is better.

Made two new Salumi today! A gorgeous fish (it's like a fish mousse inside with herb and shrimp garnish) one and a really yummy orange fennel pork fresh sausage. We also made the mortadella with no garnish inside a regular hog casing and more Andouille (I think it is our best yet).

We also found a kitchen to rent for about $20 an hour ($500 for the month) so we can participate in the Main St Martinez Peddler's Faire on May 21st. Stein and I decided to do cold foods and we have some cool ideas for presentation and marketing. I need to go to Kinko's next week and get a sign made. I already have the food booth/canopy/tent. After I am done with the private party for tomorrow in the City, I will be able to focus fully on the food booth idea.

We went and checked out the Todos Santos farmers Market to see how other people set up their booths on Thursday night and got some great ideas. I will try to take pictures next week as we get stuff online. I go down on Monday morning at 9:00 am to fill out the paperwork. We also still have to go to ABC and I still have not heard anything about the unreinforced masonry, or what they are doing to fix the ADA stuff. It just seems like they have no sense of urgency... which is a little depressing.

But looking on the bright side, we will be able to explore the food booth thing without also having to run a restaurant and I did find a nice commercial kitchen for rent pretty cheaply where I can store items. It was fun to go to the farmer's market. I talked to local food artisans and got business cards... and had a great chat with this little bee keeper who will hopefully be able to get me some fresh local honeycombs (I should also ask Mark about that).

I know this all seems very disjointed, but things are as busy as I organize them to be and I am tired of sitting on my butt waiting.

So next week so far...

Monday

• Go fill out paperwork to be a food vendor at the Martinez Peddler's Faire


• Go to ABC and turn in paperwork


• Go to Semifreddi's breads and set up vendor account


• Prep food for Molpus Wedding bridal couple tasting

Tuesday

• Go to T-rex with the four sausage varietals for them to sample


• Meet with Molpus Wedding bridal couple for a tasting

Wednesday

• Get Compass Star food vendor signage ordered and designed


• Start prepping items needed for May 21st Peddler's Faire

Then we will need to put a bunch of pastrami in brine so it is all ready to go on May 21st... LET'S COOK!

Staying busy!

Yesterday we met with T-rex about our salumi, only we didn't realize they were looking for like SAUSAGE. You know, the kind you put in a bun, with condiments and stuff. LOL So we will do a couple of those this week and go back next Tuesday for more sampling.

The T-shirts came yesterday as well and they are SO cool! We met with Aloha POS today which was interesting but it was like a $3000 set up fee to RENT the equipment for another $350 a month (deepest sighs). This is WAY out of our budget. Then we met with Farmer's Insurance to see about catering and/or business insurance. It will be about $700 for the catering insurance and about $1500 a year for the restaurant insurance. We also got additional info on the worker's comp stuff.

THEN we met with this guy who was looking to sell his canopy for food booth activities. It is a really nice commercial canopy, which usually start around $800. He used this one (it's all black) a couple of times and it is really good condition. We got it for $350.

Stein and I decided we would prep this whole "Food booth" thing for the May 28th Peddler's Faire in Downtown Martinez and try to get everything together in time for that. We will just be doing cold foods (which we need to decide upon that selection), but it is a relief to have made the deiscion finally to do it. I was vacillating.

So now I need to get a nice banner and figure out how to best market my product in that venue. I will talk to Trisha of Main Street Martinez next week and see what she recommends. If you pay the $100 fee to join Main St Martinez they do all your permitting etc for you, so it is a pretty low cost event to start with and supposedly the Peddler's Faire is very well attended.

I am thinking for menu

• Grilled Tri-tip Salad with Romesco


• Smoked Turkey and Bacon Cobb Salad


• Pastrami Sandwich


• Tarragon Chicken and Apple Salad Sandwich


• Side Ceasar


• Side Pasta Salad


• Charcuterie platter with pickle and bread

Still in limbo...

Still have not heard anything on when we can get started in the facility. I am concerned that the busy wedding summer months will neccessitate a kitchen, so I may need to rent one. But I don't want to if I don't HAVE to. So if they can let us get in there and at least build out the kitchen and get it permitted, we can use it for all of the summer catering on the docket. Plus prep for salumi once we open, and for other clients.

Today Stein and I will go to T-Rex in Berkeley and do a tasting with our stuff, including the new stuff. I tasted them both yesterday and they are really good (the two smoked ones) but they taste a little similar, so I may only bring one (I will see what Stein says when he gets here). I also forgot to put the hot Coppa and Pastrami on the fax odering menu, so I should probably redo.