It’s never actually worth it, the perfectionist life of a chef.  It’s not worth the money, the back aches, the missing out on having an outside life, not seeing your friends, skipping every holiday to work in a hot kitchen for no extra pay or appreciation, cutting vacation short, skipping the summer tan.   It’s not worth the countless extra hours, the extreme attention to details that no one will ever see, all the subtle nuances that just end up get covered up with decoration.  Yes, there are short cuts, and people who makes these hacks tend to do well, because it’s not very often that the customer notices.  It’s not worth cooking for a living- it’s hardly making a living or having a life of your own.  It’s choosing to be a servant when you don’t have to be one.

The truth is that it is compulsive, it is a personal trait to make everything perfect to present something in a dimly light dinning room, to make every edge smooth and perfectly flush on a cake that is then covered with a border.  I have to make everything perfect, just to smash it.  Why?  So that I can sleep at night, so that I can feel good about every single thing I make time and time again- whether it’s a once in a life time wedding cake, or any one of the countless numbers of labor intensive penguin shaped ice cream sandwiches that go out on daily basis to the masses of diners.