Cornstarch in the Kitchen

Did you know cornstarch is highly coveted in professional kitchens?  Growing up, I can’t recall seeing my mother use cornstarch one single time.  Now I’m married to a chef, and have worked in several restaurants – bountiful quantities of cornstarch.  It’s a great way to thicken sauces without using dairy, has twice the thickening capacity of flour, creates a great crispy layer on proteins without batter, binds baked goods, and a secret purpose you don’t know – but I’m gonna share with you.  Because I like you so dang much.

Let me paint a picture for you.

Do you know how hot it is in a professional kitchen?  It’s too hot.  Just take my word for it.

Also, are you familiar with standard kitchen clothes?  A heavy chef jacket, coupled with baggy chef pants and some sexy non-slip kitchen clogs… folks, we are not talking about breathable clothing here.

What I’m trying to say is these are some sweaty bastards here.  Every night when Hubster came home from working in a restaurant, I would remind him that he carried the overbearing aroma of “a carnival” – which is to say, B.O. and fried foods.

Enter:  Cornstarch!

If you’re less than intuitive with these facts I’ve given you, let’s just lay it out:  sweating in baggy clothing leads to chafing, especially in high-friction areas.  Yo, that means the grundle.  Simple solution: pack your gooch full of cornstarch before your shift begins!  You can’t wait until after you’ve already started sweating, though.  Then you’re just making gravy.

So, time for the story.

Per request, names are being changed to protect involved parties, and the names requested are Chef T-Rex, and Jamal.  Can’t make this up.  This is a story told by Chef T-Rex to me, and I’ll try so hard to share it with as much excitement and glee as when he shared with a handful of us.

So, Jamal is the boss; he owns the restaurant.  He… likes to party.  We’ll just say that.  I don’t mean balloon animals and face painting.

One morning, Jamal comes running up to Chef T-Rex to tell him someone was “partying” in the banquet room, demanding to know who was in the restaurant late at night.  Chef T-Rex is baffled, and knows there wasn’t anyone in the restaurant late at night.  Jamal insists there is proof of illicit drug activity and brings Chef T-Rex to observe the evidence: a leather chair covered in white powder.

Chef T-Rex knows exactly what’s up.  “Oh, Jamal, that’s from my ass.  It’s cornstarch.”

Jamal turns REAL WHITE and books it out of the room.  You know why?  Chef T-Rex knows why.  Because Jamal likes to party.

As my favorite Jurassic chef tells me, “You KNOW he had to grab a taste of it!  AND MY ASS SWEAT IS UP HIS NOSE AND IN HIS MOUTH.”

Y’ALL.  This son of a bitch nabbed a sweet taste of cornstarch dingleberries and his employee KNOWS IT.  God bless America, that is some of the most awful grundle gravy you could possibly collect, marinating for a minimum of 12 hours.  AND HE TASTED IT.

Just say no to drugs.  And yes to tacos.