Hong finally got it, and he finally finished his fish course.
He said to himself that he wasn’t happy with the original dish because of the feedback he got while running it as a special. So what he finally did was let me into the game to play with him. All this time, he made me be the play by play commentator on the sidelines; now he finally gave me the ball. All I did was play with the same ingredients he had.
We made a total of five different presentations and he chose one, did it on his own, liked it, and so now it’s his. He also had gotten together with me the night before to talk me through his dish, and also wondered what mise en place he could gather to play with. His lightbulb came on and so he was eager to plate his beef course—-that was a lesson in saucing a dish.
~~AW