Adam McKinlay’s awesome. I put out a call for help this weekend and he answered it. I called his cell to make arrangements to meet at the deli at 9 am to load in. Strangely (or not if you know me at all) I really wasn’t sure who he was and didn’t look at his profile on the Book of Faces which would have been the natural thing to do.
So when he said “I’m Jess’ friend” I heard: “I’m Jeff’s friend.” I totally zoned out on the “former chef at L’Unita” part. If you read my last post, you’ll surmise that I have a lot on my plate. Anyway, I know a Jeff and he has a friend who cooks. And that’s who I thought was meeting me on this cold rainy morning.
When Adam showed up I still had no clue. Maybe it was the beard or the 4 hours of sleep or whatever it was but I just whiffed on this one. As I said: I have a lot on my mind. We go about packing up the truck for the last day of the Roller Derby World Championships at Downsview Park. However, no one noticed that the fry baskets were left behind until we got to the park – a long distance away.
I asked Adam to go back to the deli with my car to pick up the baskets and a few more things. In his absence we were pretty slammed and poorly organised. Within minutes of his return a sense of calm and order overtook the three of us. Laughter was heard and we had a really good time.
“Where did you say you worked,” I asked. Clearly this guy is no journeyman cook. He’s the real deal. “L’Unita,” he said. “And before that at Lucien.” OMG. This was Adam. Adam! What an idiot I am. We’d hung out at Jesse Vallins’ place a few times and I’d seen him at Lucien a couple of times too. I started laughing almost uncontrollably. I was embarrassed and really happy all at the same time. Adam from Lucien. If he’d said that from the first… doesn’t matter.
The menu today was a little messed up because we ran out of smoked meat on the truck yesterday. It was busy. Very busy. To compensate we tried two new things: a grilled cheese sandwich and a grilled salami sandwich – both on rye. “Maybe we could do the salami on these onion buns,” Adam said pointing to the buns we serve the bbq brisket on. We had lots so I agreed. Whenever anyone ordered that sandwich I offered them cheddar cheese. It looked sooooo good.
After serving a few of these griled salami on onion bun with honey mustard and cheddar Adam got an idea. “Hence forth this sandwich should be known as ‘The Bingo’,” he said. I smiled. Totally. Every time a customer asked for a salami sandwich I offered them cheese. “Bingo” I called out. Adam would respond in kind and a sandwich was born.
Genius comes in many disguises and at its own pace and place. I believe we rarely recognize genius except in retrospect. Today this was not the case. Genius worked with me in the delimobile I named after my grandmother on a cold and rainy day in December as we fed the people taking part in the World Championships of Roller Derby. God bless us all.
