"Culinary"
of or for cooking
"Grimoire"
a book of magic spells and invocations
Culinary Grimoire
The Goal: Provide a conceptual lens to food education through video media. I have always had a strong desire to teach, tinker, create, explore and provide hospitality ever since I as a kid. In 9th grade of tech school I came up with the idea of a master document or archive. Something that held all my knowledge of cooking. From stocks and sauces to butchery and plating I wanted to catalog it all and I did for a time. Unfortunately I lost that entire document. I had other ideas and trials with similar different formatting about nothing felt good enough or right to me. Now almost a decade later I am ready to try again. This time I want to build something that is stable, tested reliable. I have divided my knowledge into 4 question and 4 categories: Concept Index- This index features: concepts on philosophy and terminology. Concepts are the building blocks of knowledge, understanding and a strong starting point for your own ideas. The goal of the concept index is to answer the question why. Ingredient Index- This index features: ingredients. Ingredients are anything used in the kitchen from food to cleaning chemicals and tools. The kitchen itself is an ingredient. The goal of the concept index is to answer the question what. Technique Index- This index features: common skills, unique skills, methodology and variations. Techniques are the active part of the cooking process including: knife skills, cleaning, smoking, baking etc... The goal of the concept index is to answer the question how. Recipe Index- This index features: Recipes. Recipes are a combination of all the other indexes that lead to a definitive result. The goal of the concept index is to answer the question when. For now the Culinary Grimoire is an Idea, a goal to chase and a diary. A place I can gather updates on my projects and gain feedback. I still have a burning desire to teach tinker and create, the only question is how?
Basics
of
Basics
The Goal: The Basics Of Basics is a pocket companion reference book, designed to help you gain confidence by educating you on objective techniques and safety practices, while giving you the conceptual knowledge to cook as freely as you decide! I want to empower you. It helps your mindset change from only understanding how to make a soup to how heat works with food. How water content effects cooking, how different food groups generally act. How to cook vegetable types as a whole versus how to cook a carrot. I want this to be in everyone's knife bag, to be given out on the first day of work or class. In an world where reliable information is becoming harder to find I want this to be a sold foundation for anyone wanting to learn how to cook. The current plan is to develop the book, companion video media, launch as an ebook in black and white for free and a color version for $5. Then raise crowdfunding for physical release to quantify demand.
Scholaris
The Goal: To build a mobile test kitchen/studio and host pop ups to teach myself a variety of skills and trades in preparation for my first restaurant. In tech school the idea of owning my own test kitchen was firmly planted. That idea evolved into converting a vehicle into said test kitchen. I figured I would start this project years in the future but at 22 I moved into this retired firetruck command center from 89. This was the only vehicle I found with zero compromises for my vision and it was within budget! Every time I design a system I find new challenges and solutions. It's my first restaurant concept I get to build from the ground up in a very literal sense. I only have about 165ish sqft of body space, the creativity and skills needed to see this through will push me beyond my limits. I can't wait for more! My dream mobile test kitchen will be ridiculous, stupid, expensive, performant, cool and worst of all rational. Worse for my wallet and sanity that is. I plan on fitting a wok stove, wood fire grill, deck oven, at least 4 burner gas stove, 2 burner induction stove, tandoori oven (yes), massive sink, garden, fermentation chamber, dehydrator, combi oven (sort of), lots of counter space, dishwasher, natural lighting, and much more. The layout is still in development and won't be finalized for a while but I hope this gives you some idea of what I want to build.
