November 2014
Executive Chef, McMurdo Station, Antarctica 2014-15
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| The Galley Crew, Chef's and DA's next to the McMurdo sign on Ross Island, Antarctica |
Thanksgiving;
a term very familiar to the United States, or anyone in the world that is
friends with an American. If you don’t know about the holiday, you have at
least heard of it, or you have most likely been invited to a Thanksgiving
dinner if you again know an American. Since 1621 when the English Pilgrims
first traveled to North America, Thanksgiving has been a mainstay, of coming
together as family or with friends to feast and to give thanks. In Antarctica
there are several stations where Scientists from around the world and the
support staff contracted to help them live for 6 months or one year on the ice.
At McMurdo Station on Ross Island, the largest of the stations on the continent also
has the largest grouping of Americans, so Thanksgiving is a big day for everyone
here.
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South Park Thanksgiving of Killer Turkey's
- Picture courtesy of Comedy Central |
To learn more about Antarctica, read the full story from my perspective by following this link:
(A Taste of McMurdo - 8 Months On The Ice)
Thanksgiving is always a large affair no
matter what part of the world you’re in, and it’s an even longer affair if
you’re cooking it for over 1000 people. Add on to that if you’re cooking on the
coldest place on Earth. In prior years when I was in Afghanistan the chefs and
I prepared many large holiday meals from Christmas, Marine Corps Birthday, and of course Thanksgiving, ranging from 300 to 4000
people depending on the facility, so being in Antarctica was a real treat. With
7 billion people on this Earth, I can say that I’m one of the 100,000 in all
time to be in Antarctica, and one of the even fewer, less than 300 that has
prepared a special holiday meal for those that work or visit here.
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| Prep for the meal, volunteers that helped, Justin prepping, Chris & Betsy, baking, Lisa taking a nap, me making Foie Gras |
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| Prep, and the Turkey Trot run (turduckin), Victoria carving garnish, Amanda having fun in pots, Claire & Justin cooking |
The Facility and Station:
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| Cooking on Thanksgiving |
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| Rick prepping the crepes, Kate cooks the stuffing, DA's having some fun, Victoria preps Brie
en Croûte , Kristen preps vegetarian items |
McMurdo Station is Antarctica's largest
community. It is built on the bare volcanic rock of the Hut Point Peninsula, on Ross
Island, the farthest south solid ground that is accessible by ship in the world. Hut Point
is named after Scott, the first explorer to set foot on Antarctica, and build a
hut that still stands to this day. It is now in trusted to the Antarctic
Heritage Trust for preservation and tours believe it or not. (See Trip Advisor Reviews) McMurdo was established in 1956, and has grown from an outpost
of a few buildings to a complex logistics staging facility of more than 100
structures including a harbor, an outlying airport (Williams Field) with
landing strips on sea ice and shelf ice, and a helicopter pad. There are
above-ground water, sewer, telephone, and power lines linking the buildings.
NASA has a Long Range Balloon Facility or LDB research site used for scientific experiments, as
well as Scott Base,
the New Zealand Research site. McMurdo during the summer months houses over
1000 people who either are involved directly with science working at the Crary Laboratory or the support staff of workers which include the food service staff. Outside of McMurdo there are over thirty small
camps run by foreign countries that are also here to conduct science. Scott
Base is the closest to McMurdo only two miles away.
The Crew:
Working in the food service field for
nearly twenty years all over the United States, Afghanistan, and my various
military posts from Korea, Egypt, to Haiti, have to say without a doubt that
the crew here in Antarctica is one of the best crews I have ever worked with,
which made this Thanksgiving even better than any other thanksgiving from the
past. “The Galley” as it is known from when it used to be run by the United
States Navy, is a medium sized kitchen with a cafeteria style serving area with
grills run by Rick Schioldager, pizza station controlled by the pizza god Jeremy
Landreth, serving lines that include a vegetarian line ran by a variety of very
talented folks and a menu created by Sous chef Karen Duey. The dining room
holds about 280 people, and the kitchen itself has close to 30 cooks running
the bakery, assorted shifts, salad room, offices, and warehouse. The Sous
Chef’s that make up this dream team are Karen whom I mentioned earlier, James
Lund the rock star morning Chef from Pennsylvania, Lisa Minelli-Endlich also
from PA, in charge of the lunch meals, with over twenty years’ experience in
multiple foreign countries, and a graduate of the CIA, so massive talent from
her end. Erin Grimes who runs dinner with Karen, Betsy Rosengarden the Lead Pastry
Chef, Sarah Swan who is the Chef in charge of the salad, deli, and catering,
and not to forget Brandon McDearis, the Chef who runs the night shift. Our Boss
Todd Eanes not only is the Culinary Manager for McMurdo, but also has to run
the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station, and Palmer station
on the opposite sides of the continent. Under the Sous Chefs are their very
talented crews of young up and coming individuals who will be the future
leaders of the food industry and I can see them making very positive changes
wherever they end up after they leave Antarctica. Some are prior military like Justin
Nedrow and myself, others have been in the industry for as little as a few
years like Katelyn Christensen, or up to twenty, as well as former restaurant
owners like Sam Mengel, and all of them bring to the table a great diversity of
ideas which adds to the facts said earlier about this crew being the best I’ve
ever worked with. Put all these facts together, and we help to create not only
a fabulous Thanksgiving, but a fantastic daily menu for the people here at
McMurdo. All of this came together with the help of the DA staff or Stewards as
some of them prefer to be addressed. If it were not for them, the daily meals
could not happen. They are the ones that run the Dining Rooms, dish and pot
washes, and helping with food deliveries. Dana Carlson runs a great crew.
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| Sous Chef's Lisa & James, Sous Erin Grimes and Karen Duey prepping, Max Miller sets the line, the dining room, and Charmain deliveries tray of party food to the Air Force |
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| Todd Eanes preps the carving station |
The Meal:
The menu had been hashed out and planned
several weeks in advance of the main meal, as well as placement of where
everything would go. We began preparations four days before with the help of
volunteers from the community that helped us peel potatoes, cut carrots,
celery, onions, and a slew of other items. Now remember folks this is
Antarctica were talking about here. You can’t just go to the local grocery
store and buy some fresh produce. All the “Freshy’s” as they are called here,
are flown in by C-17 from Christchurch, New Zealand on a weekly basis for a
period of two maybe three months for the entire year. That is it, after were
out, they were out, and you miss out. The frozen meats, vegetables, and all
dried canned goods or flour for baking are brought in once per year by a vessel
that loads up in Southern California, then follows the “Polar Star” a Coast Guard
Icebreaker ship into the Ross Sea and McMurdo Sound, because the ocean it
buried under six to eight feet of ice. The ship docks, and then the off load
begins, followed by the reloading of all the trash and waste from the entire
year since the last ship left. This is another amazing thing about this place.
90% of everything is saved or recycled, then brought back on the ship, leaving
the land free of our waste. I was never a big recycling supporter, because I
thought it was BS, but seeing it and having to do it here, I know that it
works, and it is amazing what we can do to reuse versus waste. Now I’ve not
turned into a peace-loving hippy bead, stoner Liberal, but hell if something
works I’ll acknowledge that it works. Once the ship gets back to California
with the recycled and regular trash, who knows if it continues down the recycle
path, or just ends up in another landfill. All I know is, we do our part here
to preserve this beautiful land, and from there its up to other folks to take
care of it.
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| Thanksgiving Salads |
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| The Pastry Table |
The menu consisted of normal Thanksgiving
fare, the main item of course being turkey, to which the warehouse supervisor
Jamie Lyon’s pulled to thaw 600 pounds of whole, netted, and cooked turkey’s,
and 200 pounds of Country Ham to be carved. Other typical Thanksgiving fare
included macaroni and cheese, potatoes, stuffing, giblet gravy, and so forth.
This assignment also afforded for the first time for me to work with more
Vegetarian foods then I had worked with in previous jobs, as roughly 15% of the
McMurdo population is Vegetarian or Vegan. On a daily basis for lunch and
dinner, the Vegetarian menu would consist of a main entrée, bean, vegetable,
and soup, so for Thanksgiving we wanted to be on an even grander scale. Not
only did we cater to the Vegetarian, we wanted to cater to those who were
watching what they ate by making the vegetables with little amounts of sodium
and fat as possible, plus this meal catered to the Gluten Free, Vegan crowd on top
of it. The earlier rendition of the menu before we decided what to make,
jokingly had the title of “gluten free, fat free, vegan, tasteless, and
flavorless Thanksgiving Entrée.”
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Sweet Potato, Assorted Cranberries, Vegetarian lie, Turkey, Foie Gras &
Brie
en Croûte, and Crepes |
Of course we made it into something much
better than how that sounded, but it gave all the Sous Chef’s a nice laugh,
considering that in the past few months we had put information out to the
community to ask or address their concerns with food, and we got back some of
the strangest answers known to man, but catered to them anyway. I never ran
into more people in my life that claimed that they were allergic to something
or another beyond the common things like gluten and shellfish. Here we have people who are or claim to be
allergic to soy, onion, garlic, ginger, but even funnier people who would tell
us they were deathly allergic to alcohol, (I can’t make this stuff up folks). Funnier
even more would be if they didn’t recognize the dish, or just didn’t like that
particular cuisine, they would say it was processed, or they were allergic,
especially the “meat and potato” only crowd. Sorry but LMAO. All in all, we did what we
could to cater to their “special needs.” But then again, a famous saying that
goes around here when we ask or need things is a simple answer, and it is a
great response to give back to all of the people, and that is, “Antarctica…It
is a harsh continent.” Or my personal favorite from a fellow chef is, “This
isn’t the Four Season’s.”
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| Jason pours the wine, Kelley helps, and Jan eats |
What is a good meal without desserts?
Betsy and her crew knocked it out of the ballpark with assorted pies, cakes,
and breads that were the best seen all season. See the full menu below:
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| Original menu rough draft before editing and final publication, (see the vegetarian) |
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| Line setup rough draft |
For the three full days prior to the
main event we didn’t just have to prep for this meal, we also had to do the
regular breakfast, lunches, and dinners for a normal day, so we greatly
appreciated all the volunteers that helped us along the way. The day started
early with a continental breakfast for a few hours which included a dinner meal
for the night shift since they were finishing up and getting ready for sleep as
the day shift was waking up. James Lund and I started off early putting in the
turkey’s, and getting some of the sides going, while also getting ready for a
breakfast that would be set up after the continental breakfast. The main
obstacle that we faced was lack of space and equipment to cook such a large
meal, so timing was everything when you only had four working convection ovens
and one combitherm oven, three
working steam kettles that were 50 years old, and the one good thing, three new
Electrolux tilting pressure skillets. All I can say is thank god for the combitherm &
skillets as they saved us on this day. Nothing against the traditional
convection ovens, but we didn’t have enough, and the rest of the equipment is
ancient, so all in all, a miracle was accomplished with the perfect execution
of the meal, along with the talented staff that executed it.
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| Speech and the toast before family meal |
There were four seating’s for the
Thanksgiving meal after the main breakfast had ended. Before the first seating
at 3 PM would be the family meal where all the cooks and DA staff along with
those that were invited would eat as a group before everyone else was let in.
This family meal had about ninety people, and was designed for us, as not only
a time for us to get together, but to also eat what we had created before everyone
else did. Normally whatever we prepare, we eat after everyone else at the close
of every meal. Today the cooks came first. A project manager had also purchased
a glass of wine for every person eating that day, but of course wine was also
brought in for those that wanted more. The two wines offered were Turning Leaf Chardonnay and Caliterra from Chili which is a partnership wine to Robert
Mondovi which says it all right there, a bad wine lol ……… Now, because we were
in Antarctica it is not easy to get a hold of some finer things, and wine fell
into that category like Mondovi’s Caliterra listed above. There were a few good
selections, but for the meal, the worst wines by taste were offered. I’m not
complaining considering someone else bought them, so I’m glad the Ravenswood Zinfandel was brought in by someone for us to enjoy
with the family meal. Granted it wasn't a Jonata, Eagles Nest,
Kamen Estate, Emmolo, or Hoopes vineyard but still nice all the same.
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| The Family meal, Sous chef Brandon, DA's toasting, Kate & her Sister Brit Ann, Dave and friends |
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| Marc & Kristen, Sous James 7 me before main meal, Jeremy in Bakery, Sam and DA's |
The main seating’s were at 3 PM where
270 people had confirmed a reservation, 5 PM where 300 had reserved, 7 PM where
330 were reserved, and the final seating at Midnight where 60 people had
reserved. The fun part was logistics. Not only did the food, salads,
vegetarian, and dessert platters have to be made for each seating, we all had
to make sure that the food would be ready with the limited space. The DA’s had
to breakdown the serving lines in between each seating so that the cooks could
put out all new food, desserts, and salads. The carving stations had to be
cleaned in between each, and the most difficult job was for the DA’s to
breakdown the dining room and reset it, and all of this had to be done in less
than thirty minutes, since the seating times were 90 minutes each.
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| The 3 PM Seating |
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| The 5 PM Seating, Amanda with H.R., Anne & the other Doctors, Chaplain Jerry volunteers to wash dishes |
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| The 7 PM Seating |
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| The 7 PM Seating |
All in all the day went very well, and
the crew both cooks and DA’s out-shined themselves, and it was a pleasure to be
around such talent on this day and all the others. For this day, the 3 PM crowd
was our personnel favorite group. They were the only group of the four spate
seating’s, 270 people of the 1000 served that day that got onto their feet and
gave the cooks a standing ovation for the job that they had done. When they
started clapping I was near the dining room with one other cook, and it took us
by such a surprise that we both wet to the back to gather everyone up and bring
them out. As soon as the cooks exited the kitchen to be seen by the crowd,
roars and cheers exceeded the applause. This was the first time where the cooks
really felt appreciated by the community for the jobs they do every day. The
following day we also received several emails and personnel letters thanking us
for the hard work and job well done. One of those letters is attached below,
hand written, and my personnel favorite. This one day now came to an end, and Christmas
and New Years are next.
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| The night Crew: Doug & Marc, Cat and sous Chef Brandon, K.C. with DA's, and more pics of the Turdukin run |
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| Relaxing after a long work day with crew and friends, with me and to the left: Susan, Kate, Betsy, Lisa, Justin, Claire, Sous Chef Ed Wilroy, Brittany, and Charmain behind me. |
Letters from the Community:
To all the Chefs, Cooks and Crew of the Galley,
It’s hard to be away from home and loved ones at any
given time, and one feels it most during the holiday season, but you have made it a lot less unbearable.
I sometimes take the galley for granted by complaining
about the food and the service, never realizing until recently, the effort it really
takes to do your job.
I wish to thank all of you for your hard work and
pride, in making my thanksgiving dinner, one of the best I have had since
coming to the Ice.
Stay warm
You’re humble Machinist
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| A nice hand written letter from a community member |
Tasting Notes:
Wine & Grape:
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Nose (Bouquet):
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Palette Experience:
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Medium-bodied; has aromas of tropical fruit, and
butterscotch
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Layered flavors of pineapple, peach with hints of oak.
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I don't remember the tasting notes, must have already been drunk
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76% Zinfandel, 24% Petite Sirah, full-bodied aromas and
flavors of raspberry, blackberry, warm spice, and vanilla. This vintage in
particular low yields per acre led to high-quality,
Ultra-concentrated fruit.
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Wine Regulatory:
Picture below was taken at McMurdo station
Thanksgiving Day, 2014
About Sean:
I am based out of St. Petersburg, Florida working in the food service industry for the past twenty years, and am currently with the American Embassy as the Executive Chef in Basra, Iraq. Formally I have worked with groups contracting in Afghanistan, and Antarctica, also working in restaurants in and around Atlanta, Georgia prior to the wars. I have also owned a catering company and served proudly in the United States Army Food Service Program. The idea for Wine, Dine, and Play started in late 2012 after a trip to Jordan, when I was asked by friends to write down the experiences from a few Jordanian restaurants, wine from the region that I tasted, and locations of interest such as Petra. Since that time, over 250 articles have been written on restaurants, including fifteen from the worlds top 100 lists of San Pellegrino and the Elite Travelers Guide. There are articles on exotic world locations such as Victoria Falls, and South African Safari’s; food recipes & Grand Food Dictionaries; ethnic country cuisines such as Afghan, and Peruvian; tasting tours of world cities like Charleston, Cape Town, and Dubai; and of course wine from vineyards in California, Oregon, the Carolina’s, South Africa, New Zealand, and Australia, with much more to see and write about.
Who is John Galt?
“Culinary perfection consists not in doing extraordinary things,
But in doing ordinary things extraordinarily well.”
-Angelique Arnauld (1591-1661)
TTFN
