Chapter 34
I’m back in my kitchen within hours of landing. My staff is waiting for me, and once I arrive, we’re all automatically in go mode, jet lag be damned.
We have so much to do over the next ten days. We’re testing recipes, getting prep going for everything we know we’ll need, placing orders to get our suppliers back up and running.
It’s consuming. I let it be consuming. I don’t see Anita or any of my New York people outside of work. I don’t talk to Nico, other than a few texts checking in. For days on end, I don’t let myself think about anything outside of the restaurant.
I’m good. I’m getting over it. Manciano is an old photograph, the scenes vibrant but blurry, so I’m not going to focus on it.
And the part of me that’s been at rest is suddenly like a muscle flexed.
That piece of me feels good. That decisive leader, that bombastic creative—she was overworked before, but now she’s rested and ready.
I know I’ve got the tools now to not overdo it, but I’m not going to pretend that I’ve had some massive change of heart about who I am.
I want right now to be in a kitchen for fourteen-hour days.
I want to think constantly about how to improve a dish.
I want to be a cook on the line, living in that flow state when service starts and we’ve got to make a memorable night for every guest who walks in the door. I thrive on it.
But even though I’m not going to change my pace, I’m already starting to see the ways my time working with Gia has woven itself into me and made me stronger.
I’ve always mentored young chefs, but after having Gia poke and prod me, I understand how important it is to know them beyond cooking in order to push them to find new wells of inspiration.
(Did I know that my sous chef Kristen is a huge Giants fan?
Apparently I do now, and she’s super excited for some offensive lineman to be back from injury this season.
His name is Cal Durand, and I apparently am capable of caring about this for the sake of my cooks.) I’ve also let myself go further outside the box on products than I normally would—we’re trying out locally milled flours to see if I can replicate what I had in Italy; I let a line cook introduce me to a farmer he’s passionate about who’s growing specialty lettuces, and then I pulled back on tinkering too much with a salad that sang perfectly fine without adornment.
I’m also thriving on getting ready to announce the next restaurant.
Brian and his team have been stopping in, going over plans with me, and running the press release by me.
I’ve never had so much input and so much trust in my input.
The early renderings have been changed to my specifications, and all the details I’ve wanted were incorporated.
The early imagery is like looking at a dream—the space, the equipment, the view.
It’s a restaurant with all my fingerprints on it, right from the start.
There’s tangible energy connected to this new level of creativity.
And most importantly, I haven’t seen John.
He doesn’t butt in. He got the memo and is giving me space to run.
As much as he maybe had thoughts about us, he’s always thought of me as a chef first. An asset first. And for his asset to succeed right now, she needs to not have him around.
I’m glad to have him behind the scenes doing what he does best, but I’m grateful he’s kept his distance.
Ten days after hitting the ground running, we’re ready to reopen and we’re ready to announce. At 5:00 p.m. we open the doors, and the publicists hit send on the press release.
I know there’s a lot of chatting and glad-handing and talking to media outside my kitchen doors, but none of that matters once I’m in the zone.
We’re firing dishes and getting prepped for upcoming courses and I’m watching the pasta station like a hawk.
We don’t get in the weeds or fumble. We’re clear-eyed as we make the favorites everyone has missed, and we’re nailing the new dishes everyone is curious about.
For five hours we work nonstop. I’ve got water in a plastic container on the counter next to me, and I need nothing else. It’s exhausting, repetitive, and exhilarating. I’m filled to the brim with joy to be back in my space.
Some unwanted thoughts slip in. Luce hopping on Nico’s lap. Strong arms carrying my groceries to my door. Cackling laughter. Eyes memorizing me late at night.
My empty bed at home here.
But I let it all move through me. I’m not going to push Nico out of my mind, but I’m not going to dwell. I was lucky to have had him. I’m getting used to missing him.
I’m where I need to be, and he’s where he needs to be.
As the night starts wrapping up, I allow a few media people to come into the kitchen to chat and get some quotes for articles that will share the reopening and the plans for what’s coming next.
There’s genuine excitement over the new restaurant, especially over the scale of the project.
Most of the food journalists are women, and there’s something palpable about the tenor of their questions.
One of them mentions a comparative figure for investment in female-run restaurants, and while I hate questions that quantify gender accomplishments, I appreciate that she seems to relish the stride.
I walk outside at the end of the night invigorated, which the energy of New York enhances even more.
I could never live without this long-term.
I’m fueled by the high of the precision and creativity in fine dining, the limitless possibilities that come with having access to any ingredient and a large team to execute.
And everyone else in New York feeds off the same fuel, and it lights up the entire city. I belong here.
Even if my heart still, for the moment, has an undeniable outpost in Manciano.
The articles and social media posts about the reopening and the upcoming restaurant start coming out the next day.
They’re all glowing about the new menu and the renovations, but more importantly, they’re all filled with excitement for the future.
I make my morning tea, with a pang for my missing Belpagna pastry, and scroll through.
It feels good to have the confidence of my community behind me. But there’s a strange other something lingering behind it.
It’s not exactly a feeling—it’s almost .
. . the lack of a feeling. There’s no knot in my stomach, that need to prove something.
I don’t search every word in every post to see if there’s some room for instant enhancement.
I’m not looking for the expectations in the undertones of what they’re writing about the next project.
It’s not the same as it was when things started to change for rowing, because I’m not done with cooking.
Hardly. But it’s the first time in my career I don’t find myself craving the achievement for the sake of it.
I’m clearly still excited about the restaurant itself; I’m excited about the process of building, the freedom to cook what I want on my own terms. That’s been apparent in the days I’ve been back.
And I’m sure in a few years when the next restaurant opens, I’m going to want good reviews and for people to walk in the door.
But if it’s anything like now, what I’m really looking for in the stories of people’s experience last night is whether they had a good time.
Whether they felt fed and happy at the end of the night—that simple experience of sitting down for a meal and having it delight you.
Sure, I want them to be surprised and impressed—but mostly I want them to have a really great time with some delicious, well-executed food.
I’m mentally freer to enjoy the process than I ever was before.
Huh.
The answer to this unasked question, though, is staring right at me.
I try so hard not to think about Nico. I really do. But this shift in my perspective . . . it’s all him. The stillness he’s offered to me.
I can’t help but think about our conversation last month on the DNA of olives.
It’s the joy I remember most from that conversation. His joy at getting to be in a little bubble with another person who found fascination in the makeup of olives. How lucky we were to look up at the stars and have conversations like that.
But the words stick with me too. You can shift what you plant in the in-between spaces and fundamentally shift the olives.
At the memory, I put down my phone and step away from my scrolling because a realization has hit me hard. One thing’s abundantly clear in this moment.
He’s what’s altered my DNA.
He planted himself in all the empty spaces in between, and I changed because of his proximity.
I want so badly to be the same as I was before, just with little Italy-centric food-based improvements. But it’s more than that. I’ve absorbed him.
I haven’t changed completely. I’m not changed enough to want to run back and be the sous chef at an anonymous restaurant and leave my entire career behind.
I’m not changed enough to want to sit in a grove and stare at trees all day.
I’m not changed enough to not want the energy and life of New York pumping through my veins.
But for the first time since I’ve shut myself back in my cooking cave, I can see that the changes in me from Italy aren’t only what I learned from Gia in the restaurant.
I’m calmer. I’m more at peace with myself.
And somehow that shift in me is the most painful thing of all to realize, because those changes make it impossible not to miss Nico with an ache that seems unbearable.