Losing it

Crying, Red the Robin, Restaurant books...just read it.

This morning I finally lost it. It’s been 20 days in lockdown and I’ve been calm and productive and motivated and oftentimes happy. But today I cried, broke down sobbing into my French toast, for the hundreds of thousands dead, for watching from afar while the country I love succumbs to carnage and economic chaos, for the people in Wuhan who have been fighting this for what feels like forever. For migrants walking hundreds of miles without water in India. For Italy. For the places on earth that cannot handle this, for the people who will suffer the worst and get little to no attention or be shunned. For the loss of democracy in Hungary, the rise of surveillance, the erosion of press freedom. For the healthcare workers enduring stress and fatigue and emotional trauma, working endless hours and saving lives even as the president goes as low as he possibly can to discredit their work. For restaurants, and the dozens of people who have helped and fed and employed me over the years, now unable to feed themselves. For bookstores. For parents trying to hold it together. For what this will do to social interaction. For friends who’ve had to cancel their weddings, and others who can’t be with ailing family members. For gig workers who are barely surviving and still going to work sick. For the fact that billionaires could donate tens of millions, but instead ask for donations from others. For everyone trying to get by and baking bread and watching Tiger King and telling themselves “I’m fine!” while logging into another Zoom meeting and trying to stay productive in the middle of humanity’s biggest crisis since WWII. For selfish things too: trips planned and cancelled, for being stuck inside without a yard, for my precarious to begin with career now more precarious than ever. Because I don’t know when I’ll see my family or friends again, because regular work seems pointless, for feeling guilty for being sad because really I am so lucky, and I know that. For the general awfulness of everything, and the overwhelming feeling of dread and the unknown.

If you haven’t done it yet, crying helped. There’s so much wrong in the world right now and so many ways to assist, but I’m going to focus on the two industries I know best: restaurants and magazines. 

Restaurants 

God I love restaurants. My first job in a restaurant was at a Red Robin in Madison, Wisconsin. It was terrible. I was a hostess and had to dress up as Red the Robin once a week on kid’s night. It involved neon yellow spandex and a bird head so big I regularly stabbed kids with the beak. As soon as I was 16 and old enough to serve food, I moved across the street to Pizza Hut. This was a Bistro location (do they still have those?) so there was table service and wine. Fancy. Say what you will about Pizza Hut, but it was one of the best jobs I’ve ever had. It was always busy, and customers ranged from families to businessmen on lunch break to couples on dates to obnoxious groups of teenage boys. I learned time management, people skills, poise under pressure, how to multitask, teamwork, how to operate a massive oven, and much more. 

In college I worked at the Angelic Brewing Company. This is where my service industry career really started. By that I mean the behind the scenes, off the clock part of the career. The staff shots of Jameson every 30 minutes even in the middle of a rush, the after-hours parties in the bar, how to talk line cooks into sneaking you dinner, or which bouncers would let your underage friends through the door. There’s a reason the Angelic eventually shut down, but it was fun while it lasted. 

My food education started at Peppino's, a family-run, fine-dining Italian restaurant where everything was made-from-scratch and the Sicilian owner shared stories and cooking tips over limoncello. The staff of eight was almost all related, and those of us who weren’t were made to feel like family. Here, I also learned hospitality. No one was turned away, no matter how busy. Peppino (as we called him) would find a way to squeeze tables in no matter what. It was exasperating for those of us on the floor, but inspiring. Guest requests were always accommodated (though if he really disagreed with a substitution he would go to the table and explain exactly why, and in the end they would happily try the dish and usually love it), and we gave away endless glasses of grappa and slices of cassata cake to regulars (almost everyone quickly became a regular). It was a magical little place.

Since then I’ve worked in about a dozen other restaurants, from casual to Michelin stars. Corporate restaurants, family-run restaurants, restaurant groups––they have big differences of course, but the service industry is the service industry and in every kind the staff hustles, tries to deliver a good experience, and gets by on tips. Smaller restaurants and those that are chef-owned are the ones I’m especially worried about now. These people pour their lives into providing meals and memories for others. (And this doesn’t just affect them. It’s also hurting butchers, farmers, cheesemakers, winemakers, linen services, liquor distributors, and many other suppliers). We all have great memories at restaurants. The food, company, experience as a whole. Birthday celebrations or family vacations or great first dates. People in the service industry work to bring others joy and new experiences. They expand your mind of what food can be, and introduce you to flavors you can't always travel to taste. 

“We want to be able to do that at the dinner table, because we recognize that before people could fly across the world at a moment’s notice, when we didn’t have access to all the things we do now, we had one thing that has been consistent, and that one thing has been the opportunity to commune with one another and to share something as little as the breaking of bread. And for a moment, if just a moment, nothing else matters.” - Erick Williams of Virtue told David Hammond in New City. 

“People are taking their time and money to come in, so the menu should be fun, and that’s really important to me because I fell in love with food by going to restaurants that were fun,” said Trevor Teich of Claudia. 

Last month, which now feels like a million years ago, I spent time chatting with chefs in Chicago for New City’s Big Heat issue, which honors and profiles people doing big things in food and drink across the city. This is one of my favorite things to work on each year and always gives me ideas for other stories. The chefs (and distillers and brewers and cheese shop owners) never speak about just the food. They talk about community and healthcare and appropriation, about moving food conversations forward, and educating Chicagoans, and creating new types of restaurant experiences. Their passion is intoxicating and they always make me think.

“There are a lot of things out there that should be talked about more, business plans and contract negotiation, or knowing how business works, how taxes work,” Diana Davila of Mi Tocaya Antojeria told me this year, speaking about new chefs and owners.

Jason Vincent of Giant, Chef, and City Mouse got heated about seafood.  “If you run a restaurant and the seafood that you bring in does not say ‘sustainable’ or have a good ranking, don’t buy it.” Some things are more important than the bottom line. We’re talking about the planet,” he said.

The issue came out last week, into a completely different restaurant world than when the pieces were submitted. Many of these people are now in serious trouble. Many are also still working hard to feed their communities. 

Here are a few ways you can help. 

In Chicago: Eater has a very comprehensive list. So does Thrillist. And look at this adorable t-shirt.

In Milwaukee: OnMilwaukee has a long list of funds and other ways to help. 

In Detroit: Lots of options.

In D.C.: Donate to this relief fund, or check out this Washingtonian article.  

In New York: So many ways. 

In San Francisco: Order takeout, support GoFundMe campaigns, donate to SF New Deal. 

In Los Angeles: Follow advice from the LA Times. 

In San Diego: Order takeout (and check out the nationwide tips below)

In Houston: Donate to any of these relief services and/or the Southern Smoke Foundation. 

In Charleston: Charleston City Paper has you covered.

Nationwide: 

Louisville-base chef Edward Lee launched a relief initiative with Maker’s Mark. They’re serving meals to currently unemployed restaurant workers around the country. 

Through Service Industry Tips you can venmo individual employees. 

Check out Restaurant Workers’ Community Foundation

Donate to the RWCF COVID-19 Relief Fund

Support Workers In Crisis

Contribute to an emergency tip fund

Become a member of Women In Hospitality United

And of course, call your representatives and senators. The most recent stimulus package included restaurants–hooray! There’s going to have to be another one in a few months. Start calling now. 

Travel and Food Magazines

“Not a great time to be a food and travel writer, as it turns out,” my friend Leigh tweeted last week. 

Publications including Delta Sky Mag and Southwest’s magazine have shuttered. Here in Dubai, Conde Nast Middle East laid off staff and salaries were cut at Architectural Digest Middle East. Many publications have stopped accepting freelance pitches (this document from Study Hall is tracking them), while others have cut rates. 

Some places are still taking stories, but most are publishing recipes and coronavirus news and if that’s not your beat, it’s not so easy to switch. It’s all understandable, but sad, and scary for those of us who have built a life thinking that writing for various places was stable because even if you lost one job, you wouldn’t lose all of your work at once. 

“Pitching seems pretty pointless,” writer Lola Mendez said on Instagram. 

Yep. It was already hard to get stories placed, and with so many staff writers laid off there’s more competition than ever, plus lower rates.

“Several stories are being delayed because reporting requires travel. Certain pitches have been rejected because they require on-field reporting and visuals. I'm taking a break from travel writing and shifting focus to my other social media gigs,” said Zinara, a freelance writer. 

Aside from pitching I have two steady gigs: I write a weekly Chicago roundup for AD PRO, and newsletters for Technomic, which provides insights for foodservice companies. I’m not sure how long either will last, and have taken on a few copywriting projects to supplement. It’s not ideal but it’s fine. Others aren’t as lucky. 

Here’s how you can help: 

Donate to the Freelancers Relief Fund

Subscribe to magazines. 

I’m typically gone about 50% of the month, so it’s been weird to be home. Nice, mostly. It’s also made me realize more than ever that the way many of us travel, and the way it’s written about, needs to change. But that’s for another newsletter! 

Links I Love 

Empty, beautiful public spaces

What it means to stay home when you travel for a living. See my Instagram stories to hear from more travel writers sharing what it’s like to be home. 

The making of a 100-point wine.

Eight lessons in creativity from The Oatmeal

How the pandemic will end (This is one of the best articles I’ve read on the pandemic so far). 

What traveling to every country in the world taught me about race

There’s nothing I wouldn’t do at this point

Marijuana edibles and pounds of pasta: Jia Tolentino on writing and cooking

How Italy is inspiring the world

Small Kindnesses

Recommendations 

Read: Since we’re on the theme, these are some of my favorite books about restaurants: Kitchen Confidential (duh); Sweetbitter; Down and Out In Paris and London (the Paris part); Heat: An Amateur Cook in a Professional Kitchen; Setting the Table; Ten Restaurants That Changed America; Garlic and Sapphires; Life On the Line; Soul of a Chef; Burn the Place; Yes, Chef.

Eat: Keep clicking on those food magazine recipes so they can hire freelancers again in the future! Make sheet-pan dinners, sour cream and onion biscuits, and try some of these cookbooks

Drink: In BIG, breaking news, the UAE legalized alcohol delivery. (Alhamdulillah!) I’m drinking whatever wines The Tasting Class tells me to and joining her virtual happy hour tastings, which you can do from anywhere, not only Dubai. 

Dreaming of: In D.C., I worked at Rasika for about a year and I still dream of palak chaat weekly–if you know you know. 

Ok, I promise next week this will be shorter and non-coronavirus related.  Stay safe, read books, feed others however you can, and cheers to better days ahead. 

P.S. Some favorite restaurant memories.