Word: chef
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Necessity may be the mother of invention, but accident is the midwife. Take penicillin. Nobody could, if Alexander Fleming's staphylococcus culture hadn't spoiled. Crepes suzette would be only soggy pancakes if Chef Henri Charpentier's sauce had not caught fire. The X ray, vulcanized rubber, LSD-even America, for that matter-were all discovered by accident, and people might still be wondering why their feet are attached to the ground if an apple had not conked Isaac Newton on the head...
...Valley Stream, N.Y., recalls Franey, "I was furious." His gall was on account of Gallic upbringing. Born 46 years ago in Burgundy, Franey began an apprenticeship as a kitchen boy at 14, learned to cook at Paris' Drouant restaurant (two Michelin stars), reached his culinary peak as chef of New York's Pavilion (which would undoubtedly rate three stars if Michelin graded U.S. establishments). Like Friend and Fellow Chef René Verdon, who quit the White House last year after he was ordered to use frozen vegetables, Franey had always had a Gallic horror of anything surgel...
Profitable Freeze. Yet he is also a reasonable man. In 1960, Franey left Pavilion to become vice president and top chef for the Howard Johnson chain of restaurants (785, plus 18 Red Coach Grills). Howard Johnson has been carefully moving into the profitable field of quick-frozen "gourmet" foods for its own dining rooms and for retail sales in supermarkets. Franey, therefore, forgot his French fury long enough to think about improving on the TV dinners his wife had bought...
Franey's workday in his commissary kitchen at Queen Village, N.Y., would make a traditional French chef goggle. Howard Johnson mainstays are still the frankfurter (20 million served last year) and the hamburger (15 million); Franey not only approves the quality of the ingredients for these French-frightening delicacies but has added his own touches to them. Principal touch: less fat, more lean. He also oversees the clams and the steaks. Last week Franey was busily processing 100,000 lbs. of Thanksgiving turkey...
Still, a Pavilion chef would shudder at the Johnsonesque proportions Franey uses. His beef-burgundy recipe calls for 2½ tons of cubed beef, 60 gal. of burgundy wine, 600 lbs. of mushrooms, 700 lbs. of onions and 465 gal. of sauce. It serves...