Michael Ruhlman is not a chef.
He has however, experienced rigorous classes at the Culinary Institute of America (CIA), worked alongside numerous professional chefs, and has become one of the preeminent food writers of the century.
The Making of a Chef is the documentation of Ruhlman’s experiences floating around the Culinary Institute of America. He isn’t exactly a student, but he’s not on the sidelines either. He is essentially conducting very thorough participant observation, but he’s not an anthropologist, or an ethnographer; he’s a journalist... But if this isn’t the beautiful ‘auto-ethnography’ I’m building it up to be, then I am crazy (but it is, at least I’m claiming it is... so I’m not crazy, I promise!). He documents the experience of going through the CIA with such detail and depth, that you feel as though you are there yourself; experiencing the shame of a burnt parsnip chip and the satisfaction of sending out a pristine stuffed quail on a bed of wild rice.
One of the most interesting aspects to The Making of a Chef, is Ruhlman’s interactions and observations of the instructors. All the instructors are extraordinary chefs and all have unique intensities; Every ‘block’ of each semester was with a different chef, so students et to experience a great variety types of master chefs, and gain much knowledge from each.
Being an anthropologist, I wish there had been some sort of foreshadowed problem, other than simply documenting the experience of culinary school. The ‘rite of passage’ of it, rituals involved, chef-student relationships, or simply ‘the student experience’ (with more interviews of other students, to break away from the ‘auto’ part of auto-ethnography) are just a few anthropological angles I can think of off the top of my head that would be extremely fascinating. But again, Ruhlman is not an anthropologist, so although he does not focus on on of these angels, he touches on nearly all of them through his narrative.
This book has made me both excited and terrified for my upcoming culinary school experience. Although I will not be attending the CIA, I know I will have many similar experiences detailed in Ruhlman’s narrative. Culinary school is not only where one becomes a chef, but it is where one discovers and builds an identity; an identity that perhaps had always been mulling deep down inside, just waiting for the means to be released.
-Holly
Citation:
Ruhlman, M. The Making of a Chef. New York: Henry Holt and Company. 1997. Print.
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