Wow, sorry. I pretty much missed a whole week there. A consolation Friday entry coming up, but first, if you enjoyed Breaking Bad, you might enjoy Trampled Underfoot, the autobiographical blog of Todd Hall, a chef in the Southwestern US. His career oscillated for years between some dizzying successes and crippling substance abuse problems.
He was a rising star in Phoenix for awhile, even won a James Beard award, and was repeatedly profiled in the local indie rag. He ended up in jail in California for awhile for bad checks, and out of this came perhaps the funniest story about him.
He offered to help out in the kitchen, and the food was, by all accounts, great. Even the guards were amazed at what he managed to turn out using institutional products. While an overbearing chef might be an asset at the French Laundry, it wasn't in a jail kitchen, and the honeymoon was soon over:
By Monday, though, the excitement about Hall's food had turned to disgust with his personality. Over the weekend, Hall started to become imperious with the kitchen's civilian staff, McIntosh says. He also was using up too much of the kitchen's resources for each meal, McIntosh says.
On Sunday, Hall was removed from kitchen duty.
"Oh, man, it was good food," McIntosh says. "But the fact is: He's a prisoner and it is not his kitchen. I guess he's used to treating people like that. Maybe he forgot where he was."
Check out Confessions of a Scottsdale Tweeker, read the rest of his old press, and get started on the stories here.
Back to molecules: if you missed the Breaking Bad entries, check them out:
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