In your
assignment take a concept or idea from the guest lecturer and define how that
concept or idea is relevant to your growth as a good clean and fair chef.
Mark Trealout & Mario
Pingue
Hearing Mark Trealout talk about his
farm and the love and passion that goes into the production and growth of his
vegetables is incredible. Hearing how much time and love that goes into it
makes me want to purchase his products and take part in it. If I owned a
restaurant I would purchase my produce from him knowing it came from a place
where the gardeners love what they do. The sheer amount of time to wake up
early and be on your knees or hands and feet and thinking about the nutrient
level in the soil is not something I myself would see myself doing. It seems
like a lot of tedious work and back pains. Hearing Mark talk made me be more
consciencious about food waste and keeping it to a minimum. Whether it is
taking an apple or even a red pepper and using as much of it as possible.
Ideally, someone out there planted it and took the time to grow it and tend to
it. That vegetable deserves the same amount of attention required as it does to
prepare a piece of meat. There is a lot of time and dedication that goes into
it. Even though his products are a bit more expensive than you would find at a
Metro, it is worth it. IT is worth paying the extra price to get something that
is made local, to be able to get something that actually tastes good and is in
season, to be able to meet the person that actually grew it themselves!
Mario Pingue I was very interested in
hearing talk. I myself make my own sausages and cured meats during the winter
months and I like to see what other products are on the market that are
considered some of the best and seeing
how I can improve my meats to get to that level. I knew of Niagara specialty
foods because the previous restaurant I used to work at, Gusto 101 they order a
lot of their cured meats from them and I
knew their dried salamis were really quite something. I always considered
Niagara specialty foods expensive but it wasn't until Mario started talking
about the costs and expenses that I really understood and saw a different side
of their business. Even though their meats are expensive, the pigs are raised
in a humane environment, they care about how the pig is treated throughout the whole process. He used the comparison of
how much a package of hot dog is and what percentage of meat is actually in the
hot dog and how even though there is a small percentage of meat, it's the bad
parts of the animal that no one wants or can sell so they grind it small and
place it in with a lot of fillers. His products are all naturally raised and
used the traditional Italian way of curing meat. Since they have the proper
procedures and methods of doing it well, restaurants can serve these products
proudly knowing it is all done naturally.
