Only as good as your last dish...

Keeping your cutting board clean

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Mon, 05 Sep 2011 18:37:00 +0000

For one moment, in the chaos, could you have a second of two of total control and comfort, where you owned yourself, your product, your expression?

When I started working at the sushi restaurant a few years ago I had a spot in front of customers right next to the head chef. As orders would come in, I'd take a dinner ticket and work on it as quickly as I could. This cutting board was about three feet wide and about a foot and half deep so presumably there would be lots of space. As dinner service progressed I found myself making mistakes, not being able to find things even though I knew where I had placed portions of people's dinners. The master chef would always pull me aside and tell me to keep my cutting board clean. He wanted me to wipe off the board completely in between each order so there was nothing but the board, your knife, and your hands. Being someone who likes to work on many things at one, I thought that it made sense to keep certain items ready on my cutting board, hoping they'd be used as part of service.

I relented and started making a habit of immediately wiping down the cutting board quickly after each plate had passed. I think I just trusted in the judgement of the head chef. Presumably after a few thousand repetitions, I didn't think about it anymore and just did it. What did I realize? My pace didn't slow down. My pace of cooking improved. I didn't understand why. I figured that if I had ingredients ready on the board as opposed to on the side of the board, I'd be able to grab them quickly.

I did a little research and talked to a few folks. Someone told me, that your cutting board is a representation of your mind. Your mind needs to be kept clear and ready to execute. But I was ready to execute. I could have all my materials on the board ready to go. Theres a subtle difference between having prepared materials on your board, and at hands reach nearby. The cutting board is an outline. If you see items within the outline, they clue you into what you need to make of them. What if I had items from other dishes in this outline, this box? They would tell me that they belonged in the dinner plate when they didn't. As I quickly looked at the contents of the cutting board, I'd have to discern which ingredient belonged in the dish and they would tell me wrong things. I thought about how I pulled ingredients from the refrigerated glass case and from my box of prepared vegetables and put them down on the board. Then when I began assembling, the ingredients would remind me where they went and I could focus on perfect placement. As I plated the dish and sent it out, I'd wipe the board down clean, and symbolically told myself that I was ready for the next dish. The time I had saved because I didn't have to cut through the confusion of rogue ingredients, translated itself into faster plating and execution. While this sounds exacting and unfeeling, this also allowed me to have enough mental runway to take a few moments and express myself creatively on the dish with final plating.

The customers out in the front would be ordering items, the waitstaff feverishly sending out your creations, someone in the back kitchen might have dropped something, but for a moment, you owned yourself, your work and it's a feeling you could duplicate every single time. Treating every dish as if it were your last.

Improving Upon Setbacks

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Mon, 20 Jun 2011 19:52:00 +0000

Most of my blog articles discuss my thoughts on improvement etc and relatively positive topics. I haven't really discussed setbacks and how I try to handle them. While being driven has it's upside, it can take a toll emotionally, and every once in a while you hit a slump. It just so seems that when I experience disappointment, it happens in multiples. Everyone's disappointments are relative so I can't say mine are worse or less than someone else's.

Here are a few things that have just burnt me lately:

My general competition performance for the last month

Some issues at work

Making some poor choices socially

Not spending enough time with friends

So why is this important to me? I should just wipe the memory clean like I've done before and move on right? It could be my ego. It could be my expectations of my performance completely misaligned with my actual skill. How did I realize this was becoming a problem? A few things. My mood was changing. I was jumping to conclusions. My sleep was off.

Usually I'm pretty good about getting into the right state and starting fresh. I noticed lately that while I could get into the right state quickly, it didn't last. It would be like that last cup of coffee that only keeps your eyes open because it's hot. Something was wrong. I didn't know why. When your best tools don't work for you anymore, I had to start asking questions.

I had some really good tools available to me that I built using NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming). Simply put, they're thought sequences you can put together, that can have a very strong effect on you. If you haven't heard of NLP, you still know what I'm talking about. Think about biting into a big juicy lemon. Do you start to salivate? Well what if you could build a thought that could trigger the physiological conditions you wanted? NLP can help you with that. Whenever I was nervous, I would think of a blue column of light, and it was enough to make me feel immediately relaxed. You can really use any image you want. That's the pain med, but what about the cure?

I guess I really have none. Just constant improvement. Here are some things that are top of mind.

Being a true professional

Clean, repeatable delivery

Taking responsibility

Putting together solid apologies

Each one of these is an article in itself and I'll follow each with a question. This tends to guide my thinking if I end it openly.

On being a true professional, I feel it's the insulation between what the client wants, and what you want to do. My idea of a true professional is delivering the best possible value for the client while improving the business position of your firm. The insulation is from the emotions, the inner workings of yourself, and your organization, so that your client only gets to see the results and in a form that's easily consumable by them. Am I providing a cushion with my clients so that my work is easily appreciated, understandable, and delivers real value?

On clean, repeatable delivery, it's important to be able to repeat success. I was reading an article in Harvard Business discussing how only failures are studied. Maybe I need to spend more time reviewing our wins, and how we can duplicate them?

On taking responsibility, I've seen folks who point the finger, and pass the buck. I've seen others who openly take responsibility. I think that people don't take responsibility because it may imply guilt. This may be a self imposed judgment, since many situations simply require a decision and not a scapegoat. You can go left, you can go right, doesn't matter. The question is how do we improve the follow through? What can I do to take more ownership and improve my follow through?

An addendum to taking responsibility, is ownership of the situation. If you messed up, or the situation itself is messed up, it might be worth taking ownership. And send out a good apology if necessary. A half ass apology is worse than no apology, so it's worth putting together one that's well done. Some good suggestions I got from Randy Pausch's book is to acknowledge the hurt done, offer a way to remedy it as well. Am I making good, solid apologies that I stand by? Am I owning them?

Those are my ideas on how to improve things and I'm working on them.

Should I Have the Conversation? by Darius and Bryan

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 07:08:00 +0000

Here is a piece I coauthored with Darius C, a successful friend of mine, on when to have a difficult conversation versus letting it go. Hopefully there will be more tag team posts to come!

Imagine during one night, you and your friend are out drinking. You’re talking and then he says that there was something about the girl you’re dating that he didn’t like. He’s usually observant but perhaps he had a little too much to drink tonight. You want to say something, but are getting an uneasy feeling about it. Have you ever felt this way before?

This is a tough decision point. I would be thinking...do I bring it up with them? Do I let it go? If I bring it up, how do I keep things smooth? On this post, we (Bryan and Darius) thought we’d would share some thoughts and questions that race through our heads and how we’ve seen our skilled friends smooth things out with us.

“I don’t want to appear as too cool or indifferent”
“How do I preserve the relationship, get details I want, and not appear nitpicking or indifferent?”
“Whatever, maybe he’ll feel different tomorrow”
“Did he really mean to say it like that?”
“I’m not sure we’re going to agree on this anyways”

So why are we spending time on this? Because we feel that now, relationships feel transactional and it’s too easy to disconnect with people close to you, causing unnecessary stress. We do feel the good news is that dealing with difficult topics as they arise, is a matter of skill, rather than personality. Which means that we can learn how to handle social issues well and hopefully receive good treatment too.

Frequency and intensity can be clear signs. Is this the first time you’ve heard this or do friends often bring it up? Does the person look in your eyes and raise their voice when they say this or do they look away and speak softly. We’ve noticed higher intensity or frequency of these indicate the issue probably needs addressing while lower amounts indicate that the issue is either minor or the speaker is scared to bring it up.

To put yourself back in the moment, imagine the situation fast forwarded one week. Would it still bother you? If you look at this picture, do you feel it likely that it would happen again? How much does it bother you? What sensations are you getting? If you feel angry, excited, dismayed or any feelings you wouldn’t want to experience for more than a few moments, it’s probably worth considering raising the issue. Question is, how will you bring it up? This isn’t easy stuff, but below are some approaches that we try to stick to, when sober.

“I can’t help but get the feeling that you’re upset with me. Here are a few things that I saw. Did I pay attention to the wrong details?” In this approach, I’m acknowledging that I’m feeling less than well, I haven’t come to a conclusion, that my observations are open to adjustment. Can you help square me away? Can I make you feel comfortable enough that we can talk about the issues, rather than just the observations? If I saw things incorrectly will you just let things go? A comfortable way we find to raise the topic, is to try to gain understanding, rather than find facts, or draw conclusions.

Sometimes not bringing something up is the right decision and that’s a skill too. Focusing on the positive aspects of a situation or relationship can help you move on from a minor issue and keep it from gnawing at you. We’ve found that the goal of balancing the stability of a relationship with clarity in where each stands is key. Another justification for not bringing up an issue is the fact that research has shown that people seem to need a ratio around 4:1 of positive comments to critical interactions.

In some studies, it shows you have to have at least 80% positive feedback and 20% negative, so make sure you use the 20% you have for the most important things and back off when your positive % drops below 80! Below are some questions that go through our heads when we think about bringing up an issue.

What clarity do I need? How can the other person help?
Are their actions something that may repeat itself and too difficult to reinterpret?
What is the path of least resistance?
Am I concerned with being right, or what is right?
How do you accept what’s happened?

Think of all the great things about the relationship, all the times you do agree and support each other and realize that every relationship has minor disagreements. Try to reinterpret the issue. It’s almost like googling something before going to ask about it. The key we feel is to not come to a conclusion before reaching out to them. Your observations need to be confirmed first. And if they aren’t accurate, then it may not have even been an issue. But if it is, choose to bring it up, after you’ve looked at a few angles and need some help understanding it.

Working Through a Recipe - Wider Meaning

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 20:17:00 +0000

I wanted to spend some time and talk about working through a recipe, or really, being successful with cooking off someone else's instructions. I'll also tie it back to more general topics and to their sources. And I'll incorporate this into a narrative on the dinner party I hosted last night. On the menu were oysters, wild boar, sea urchin, salmon etc. Now wild boar isn't something I've cooked before. Another issue is that this was real wild boar, which means that they were free roaming feral hogs, that were harvested. I got a leg of one fedexed in from Broken Arrow Ranch. Check em out. Now I do know that wild boar tends to be leaner than the "wild boar" that is sold in markets in the area which are probably more fenced in pigs than anything else. Having no shortage of recipes via Google, I wanted a classic American preparation and not try to do some asian-y rendition of it.

So, I saw suggestions on using a classic pan dripping, onions, carrots, mushrooms sauce and felt that would do it right. How do you select a recipe? Well if you have more than one recipe, odds are that they're different for different reasons, and they all worked for a test kitchen at some point. So they're all right to a degree. Will it be right for you? I'll try to walk through how I think when I approach a dish that I haven't done before.

First, what is the focus of the dish? In this case, it's the wild boar. Everything else needs to support this. I make this distinction because most American feedlot steaks have very little flavor on their own. Which is why people sauce the hell out of it. And I don't blame the general public. I would do the same thing too if I were to make it palatable. If I were to serve something at a dinner party, it needs to stand on its own with perhaps a touch of salt and pepper. It needs it's own innate flavors. So buying good stuff is key.

So we have the boar, the focus of the dish, and the sauce that goes along with it. Next or at the same time, I consider the end result. How are my guests going to enjoy this? Individual plating? A single plate with that and other items? Family style? I chose family style because I was working solo and wanted to do individual plating for the oyster shooters, so this was left for convenience and to not make it a fussy dish. I also left this towards the end of the menu because the flavors were more intense; a good trailer for sashimi and more delicate bites. What I came up with, was pre sliced, bite sized pieces of the boar, in a long plate, with sauce covering the top. It was intended for a minimum amount of fuss for the guests.

The boar was originally intended to be roasted which would probably have been great too, however because I can cook sous-vide with the Polyscience, which allows for superior moisture retention, I chose that. So choose the method of preparation well. Play to your strengths when friends are coming, and to your weaknesses when you cook for yourself. Don't follow recipes to the T unless you're baking. If you get a sense that amounts are critical, use a kitchen scale. Don't even mess around trying to guess amounts. Usually the recipe will say if amounts are critical. Knowing how you're going to cook the dish is important, but knowing what tools you have available is even more important. Which is why if I teach a friend how to cook, we focus on individual techniques. My goal is not to show them how to work a recipe, but to give them tools so they aren't glued to a recipe.

Now for the sauce, I had to consider whether I could get all the ingredients. None of them were hard to source, but what if they were? Look at each ingredient and ask yourself what they contribute. This is really important because it's rare for me to be able to get all the ingredients for a recipe. Look at each ingredient in it's generic form. Does it contribute saltiness, sweetness, bitterness, sourness? If you miss one, what are you going to do? Cancel dinner? =). Shit no, you're going to ball it up and crush things.

Within the sauce, I had guidance for varying amounts. And remember, it's worked for someone before, but ask why it WON'T work for you this time? That's important because natural ingredients are all different, contributing different amounts of flavor. Take salt for example. If I want to put in bacon, which I did, I have to consider how much saltiness that's also contributing. So, I have to hold off on any additional salt till the end when you would adjust before sending the plate out. Red wine was also another ingredient, which I felt was important, but the amount is incredibly variable. Wine in this sauce would contribute liquid volume, as well as lots of other flavors. Rule of thumb is to add it slowly, taste, and stop when you get the right taste. If you don't have enough volume, add a neutral broth like chicken broth (without added salt).

Some recipes will call for thickening of the sauce. To reduce risk, I like to isolate steps and thickening is a good example. If I know I will serve immediately, I'll just use a quick aggressive thickener like arrowroot starch. If it needs a glossy texture, I use tapioca starch. When the sauce's taste is pretty much to your desire, and you're close to serving time, do the thickening. The point I'm making is that you want to highlight each process in the recipe see what it's trying to accomplish. Do you have the skills to do so? If you don't, can you replace it with something? Is learning it something you can do right now?

Now for what I call "connected flavors," a real easy way to make sure your sauce supports the main dish, is to use the drippings from the cooked primary ingredient in your sauce. You can get technical and look up the "Flavor Bible" which is an outstanding reference. But just use the drippings in your sauce. Taste the drippings first to get a sense of how intense that flavor is. If you need more support, which I did, use some concentrated stock. If you need more savoriness which is tossed around with the term "Umami," know your heavy hitters. Mushrooms, anchovies, parmesan cheese, and others. These can be used in small amounts to increase the presence of glutamates. Savoriness was important here, because this dish was intended to be comfortable/homestyle, which I know I'm making it sound like it's not, but I have to break down the process for you.

I take my guests preferences very seriously and this is why I spend a lot of time thinking through each dish. While I love the fact that guests come to hang out with me, I want to make sure that I respect their prime real estate on their calendars, Friday or Sat evening. My way of doing so, is to build something that respects their sensibilities but places it's execution in my hands. And it's got to be done in a way that's friendly, and also demonstrates personality with it.

So as a review, I'll give you a few questions I ask myself when I cook:
What's your focus? What's the main ingredient?
Who's coming?
Have I tasted everything? Have I checked all components?
What's google say about it? Who are the pro's that are working with this? Can I find out how they think?
Is this fashionable? If so, are you really doing this for the right reasons?
What's my end result look like? Will I know when I get there?
Am I lacking in skills, equipment, ingredients? Do I really have to do things that way?
What can I do to use assets I already have?
Am I doing this with heart? Will friends look at what I've done and know it's unmistakably MY work, but with their guidance?
Will I screw up royally and love the fact that I tried?

Funny enough, while I write this, trying to wait out the effects of overindulgence while sitting by my window, I realize once again, the above has less to do with cooking, and more to do with general approach to doing stuff. And so my way of saying thanks for the guidance is to reveal those who have helped me. Who knows if it will change next year. I hope it does and I hope someone takes the time to correct me.

Focus comes from my executive coach, Michael Ker, asking me what my purpose is. Ingredients came from the Master Chef, Jason at Okoze who taught me the importance of the plate and the customer.

The audience comes from working in sales and the sales professionals I love working for.

Checking all items comes from practical pistol. Did I double, triple check that my gun was unloaded before putting it in the safe? Did I double, triple check that a round was in the chamber when I wanted it loaded? Did I have to think about this? If so, it's not second nature and it may need to be.

Studying the pros comes from hanging out at the archery store when I was small, never really having a formal coach, being forced to imitate. Doing things for the right reasons. Funny this comes from wearing cologne. Wear what smells good on you, not what's the latest. I love Bulgari Blue.

Recognizing a win comes from working in various jobs. If we don't know a win when we see it, is it even worth doing? The skills inventory comes from being forced to learn new stuff all the time from awesome, unorthodox internships I had in school.

Doing things with heart comes from violin teacher Lee Snyder. Someone else obviously wrote the piece, but are you playing passionately like it were yours?

And the last, screwing up royally but still loving yourself comes from girls I've dated and are still fantastic friends =). I'm just that jackass sometimes.

One of the things I find most important and satisfying is finding out how people that do things and act the way that I like, think for themselves, and from where they got their help. And so, by sharing how I think and got these questions, I'm hoping that this will humbly of course, be useful to someone.

Planning My Competitions for 2011

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Thu, 16 Sep 2010 05:35:00 +0000

I thought I would put together a writeup on how I'll build myself an interesting year of competitions. Instead of just diving headfirst and losing, I figure I'd do my due diligence which hopefully will lead to mild domination =). I'm also excited to share this with readers for feedback.

Purpose:
To compete in practical precision rifle on a national level and devise a training program for practical rifle shooters with an athletic emphasis. To set a positive example for both shooters and to the general public for safe and enjoyable marksmanship.

A little background:
Practical precision rifle requires shooters to shoot distances from 100 yards to 1000 yards and past. The practical aspect of this dictates that not all targets will be same. In fact some will not be marked with distances and others may even move. Handguns are often used for short distances which stresses the versatility of the shooter and requires training on multiple platforms. Because the terrain and environment are often challenging, this requires shooters to have excellent mental focus, and expert knowledge of their equipment in adverse conditions.

Approach:
Compete at club rifle matches, and selected national matches. Combine this with sprint and olympic distance triathlons for the fitness component. Maintain competency with handgun at local action pistol matches as pistol shooting is important at some multi-gun matches. Select equipment that fits me exactly and maximizes value at its price point.

My Reasons:
I have not competed at a national level since my archery days in high school and I miss that, as marksmanship is something I'm innately good at. I seem to have half-assed shooting for the last 7 or so years. Showing up to matches, doing decently only because of talent, not practice. Now that I have the resources, I want to compete at a high level for a year. Why one year? It's manageable as a plan, and if I develop other commitments in the future, I may have lost my chance to do this now. I will leverage my instinctive shooting abilities and combine it with solid practice. I will also take any opportunity to coach new shooters in safe and enjoyable shooting. I owe it to myself and my sport to perform, and serve as an ambassador to the general public.

Why this specific discipline:
Shooting long distance rifle while solving shooting problems under both time and athletic pressure is a test of my skill, practice regimen, equipment, and discipline. Because these events combine rifle, handgun, and some degree of movement as well as problem solving, it's a shooting discipline that has kept me interested.

Why I feel I'll do well:

My friends/family understand the demanding nature of my training and will encourage me to succeed
I love what I do professionally which gives me mental energy to come home and focus on practice
I am detail oriented, which lends itself to a math intensive activity like precision rifle
I have a history at high level shooting competitions, with solid mental control
I can perform athletically which will give me an advantage during multi-day rugged terrain events
I have selected the best equipment there is and am confident in it's precision and reliability
My comfort with technology will allow me to use laser rangefinders, ipads to quickly build firing solutions
I have dexterity probably coming from violin and sushi chef-ing, and this will allow me to quickly manipulate equipment under time pressure

What challenges I may face:

My professional career is still my primary focus, and this will come first at any time
If I'm in a relationship, she will also come first
No access to local long distance range (1000 yards), 120 miles to closest range
Live fire limited to weekends when I can get to a range
Handgun magazine capacity limited to 10 rounds, per CA regulations
Possible injury from athletic events
I am not as strong as larger competitors, and may struggle to carry heavy gear
Ammunition shortages
Getting cracked on by friends and encouraged to pick a more socially acceptable sport =)

How I'll overcome them:

Work efficiently in the office, work with my executive coach to improve my productivity
Communicate openly with significant other and skip a practice here and there to spend time with her
When I'm in Sacramento, I'll go to the range, stay at a hotel and use the downtime for triathlon training
Use airsoft gun simulators where I can for handgun, to practice safely indoors
Spend money on ultralight equipment
Deal with lower magazine capacities and relocate magazines onto chest rig for easier access
Reload ammunition or have it custom made. I selected the 6.5 Creedmoor round for factory availability

How I know I've succeeded:

Place in top 10 consistently at club level matches
Place in top 30 at national level competitions
Build a training plan to be shared with other shooters

And my match schedule for 2011 (subject to change of course):

Athletic Races:
Oct 2010 Tough Mudder
May 15, 2011 Morgan Hill Sprint Triathlon
June 12, 2011 Silicon Valley International Triathlon
-more to be selected

National Level Rifle Matches:
Dec 9-10 2010 Shooters Bash, Kingsville, TX
Feb 10-11 2011 Phoenix, AZ, Tactical Precision Rifle Challenge http://www.thetprc.com/
March 2011 - Snipers Hide Cup, Kingsville, TX
May 27-29 2011 Tactical Bolt Rifle Challenge, Folsom, CA (Invite Only)
June 2011 Steel Safari http://www.steelsafari.com/ (If I get in)
August 2011 International Tactical Rifleman's Challenge, Gillette, WY (If I can find a teammate)

Handgun Matches:
Oct 24 2010 - Bay Bridge Charity Classic

NCPPRC Club Matches:
Jan 1-2 - 1k
Feb 5-6 - 1k
Feb 20 - Steel
March 5-6 -1k
April 2-3 - 1k
April 17 - Steel
May 1 (match only)
(Can't, Steel Safari) June 4-5 - 1k
June 19 - Steel
July 2-3 - 1k
Aug 6-7 - 1k
Aug 21 - Steel
Sept 3-4 - 1k
Oct 1-2 - 1k
Oct 16 - Steel
Nov 5-6 - 1k
Dec 3-4 - 1k
Dec 18 - Steel

Affiliations:
NRA Certified Instructor
Richmond Rod and Gun Club Member
Northern California Practical Precision Rifle Club Member

How the Triathlon Went Down

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 05:23:00 +0000

Thought I'd detail out what was going through my head during this weekend's olympic distance triathlon in Pacific Grove, CA, and some items that I felt helped me out during the training and race periods.

When the horn gave us the go signal, I started running, mid pack in my wetsuit down the sand and dove into the water. The water was quite cold and I immediately felt its chill on my feet. My goal for the swim was to maintain impeccable form and save my energy for the run/bike. I remembered what my instructors at Total Immersion swim clinics told us. High elbow, spear the water. Use your opposite foot to initiate the thrust of your hand into the water. Front quadrant hand positioning. Truthfully I wasn't really thinking that, I was just doing. I had updated my swim practice to be less about fitness, and more about form by doing drills nonstop. This paid off as I finished the 1 mile swim not tired at all, at about 31 minutes. Not as fast as I wanted, but with plenty of energy to spare.

As I ran up the steps out of the water and to my bike, I realize I had made a critical error in preparation. I didn't mentally rehearse my transition so I'd be figuring out where to run with my bike after I changed out of my wetsuit. This was inexcusable for me, since I'm accustomed to mentally playing through songs on the violin before the bow hit the string. And so yes, I made a wrong turn out of the transition area, probably costing me 30 or so seconds. Hopping onto the bike, I paid attention to two things while I pedaled which would be displayed through my Garmin 310XT training computer. That my pedaling rate or cadence would be around 90 RPM, and my heart rate would be around 168 BPM on flats or downhills. 168 BPM appears to be a sweet spot for me, for races like this. I know that at 170 BPM, my body goes anaerobic and my time is therefore limited before I begin to fatigue. My plan was to stay aerobic, manage my energy accordingly, and reassess on the run.

During the last quarter mile of the bike portion, I changed gears to increase my pedaling cadence, and loosen myself up for the run. After hopping into my running shoes and taking off, I aimed to keep my running cadence, through the sensor in my shoes, also at 90 RPM. With 6 miles to go, the first two miles would be held at a heart rate of 168 BPM, to see how I felt. After which I would decide to increase heart rate, or maintain at 168. According to the Garmin, my first two mile splits were sub 8 mins/mile, and I decided to increase to 172-175 BPM. The last two miles were spent at near max heart rate ~185 as a broke out in a sprint for the last half mile. I wanted to be completely spent by the time I crossed the finish line. I was pleased at my performance, and also had plenty of information on what needed to be improved. I finished 24th out of 68 competitors in my gender and age group.

If I had to detail what I felt helped me out the most, obviously still being a beginner, here they are in no particular order:
Racing with the intent of performing for your friends and supporters
Digital monitoring of your heart rate, location, performance (Garmin 310XT)
Online records of your training progress (Garmin Connect, and Training Peaks)
Some kind of vain motivation (I wanted my six pack back)
A real training plan (Joe Friel's 12 week Olympic distance plan)
A well organized bag (Zoot tri bag)
Technical swim training (Total Immersion)
Social media (I've gotten a lot of help through friends on facebook)
Friends who support you and love what you're doing (Thank you all)

That completes my 3 month foray into triathlons, and hopefully becomes something I continue to love doing.

The Beginner's Mindset - Triathlon Training

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 07:47:00 +0000

I've been training for triathlons for the past two months and while working out has been a casual part of my activities in previous years, a few months ago, I wouldn't have even considered training for triathlons. A goal of mine for this year, when I turn 30, is to complete a fitness week, 7 days of exercises that would really test me. The wrench that was thrown into this was the repetitive stress injury I received which ended up in surgery. The surgery was the easy part. Not being able to lift for several months was a real drag. I wasn't much of a cardio person either, running 3 miles tops at a 9 min/mi pace and swimming about a mile at a time. At least not like others I knew.

A few people at work suggested that I do triathlons, as all that I was missing was the bike portion. I was on the fence about getting into cycling and I wasn't sure why. I don't know what possessed me to follow my own advice about immersing oneself into an activity. I soon found myself reaching out to friends that I knew were fast in some way. They agreed that I should find a triathlon to train towards and a training plan to match it. Pacific Grove Olympic Distance tri (1.5k swim, 40k bike, 10k run) was a few months away and I desperately searched for a 3 month training plan. One of my friends recommended The Triathletes Training Bible by Joe Friel. I started reading, and tried to get a sense of what it would take and if I were getting in over my head. I probably was but who cares. I suppose that's what the beginners mindset is all about. Not worrying about crashing and burning, not worrying about finishing in what place. Asking anybody for help. And just going nuts about it. For once, my prior competitive experience as an archer did not translate. Before, I could call a sponsor up for more stuff. Now, I had to figure out how to keep my shoes tied.

10 weeks later, and close to tapering for the Pacific Grove Tri, I'm feeling really good about things. I just want to finish respectably. There was a lot that I learned a long the way, and I'll try to put them down here. I tried to apply my experiences from shooting, cooking, and work to reduce the risk of getting beaten by a turtle while looking like an ass.

Before training:
500 yard swim - 12 mins
5k run - 27 mins
Bike - I didn't even own one
Exercise frequency - 2-3 times/week
Resting heart rate - 66-70 bpm
Blood pressure - 120/80
Weight - 128 lbs

Now /10 weeks later:
500 yard swim - 8 mins
5k run - 22 mins
Bike - 19 mph average on flat terrain
Exercise frequency - 2 times/day except Mondays
Resting heart rate - 54-60 bpm
Blood pressure - 110/70
Weight - 121 lbs

The individual lessons I learned:

Warm up properly
Your actual bulk of exercise should count after you've warmed up through the heart rate zones. I found that it takes me a 20-30 mins to warm up well. From there you can apply the right intensity. If I don't warm up properly, I peter out early and I waste a workout.

Pace yourself
If you don't manage your energy properly, you won't finish your workout. If you are trying to burn fat, and you end up spending most of your time breathing heavy, you're in the anaerobic zone. What this means is that you're using more stored carbohydrates than fat as an energy source, when you're trying to burn mostly fat. However, there are some very intense, but shortened time workouts that are effective at reducing fat. Do some research but make sure you understand the intent of the workout before you start.

Eat poorly, perform poorly
I used to eat anything I wanted, relying on my metabolism to keep me slim. It's slowing down for sure. Being in good physical shape has three components in my opinion: looking decent, being functionally useful, being healthy. Focus on the last two, and the third will come, your ultimate reward. If you want to break things down and eat to be fit, reverse the mindset. Think about the things you could eat, to improve your health and performance, instead of counting calories and stressing over each meal. You don't need to eliminate or drastically reduce carbs. That's just ridiculous. You need to eat the right ones for the right reasons. Look over the glycemic index of common sources of carbs and eat those kinds of foods at the right times. I would say, the more you know the better off you'll be, however packaged foods companies have been giving us "knowledge," implying that because something is low fat, it's healthy. I'm generally suspicious of packaged foods. What I might touch is a packaged snack within an hour of a workout. Usually, the worst that it could be is a high glycemic index food which makes sugars available immediately for use which I'll be using shortly anyways. Otherwise, just skip it and eat something whole or real, like fruit, or meat. If you want to eat pasta, bread or other high GI foods, do so right after your workout when your body is more inclined to reload your muscles, rather than pack the unused energy on as fat.

Another item is that if you work out intensely, you need to refuel immediately your workout. A rule of thumb is a workout > 1 hr, or an intense workout, is one that you should use some sort of recovery drink immediately after. Chocolate milk is an excellent choice. I'll leave it to you to research. If you don't refuel immediately, you could compromise your next workout, or feel fatigued the next day. If you miss that workout, and you overeat, you're setting your clock back. I made the mistake of not having a recovery drink or eating immediately after a workout several times. Without fail, I was fatigued and did not perform well the next day. Some workouts were skipped. You are doing yourself a disservice by not eating right after an intense workout, in hopes that you'll keep the caloric intake down.

Perform for your friends, not just for yourself
While I strongly believe that one should follow the beat of their own drum, your friends want you to do well and get in better shape. You'll be more pleasant to be around, and have more energy. Obviously if your friends are discouraging, find new friends. If you had a ball and chain attached to your ankle I would hope you'd be looking for some bolt cutters rather than finding a better way to carry the ball. Whenever I feel like quitting early, unless I feel actual joint pain (listen to your body), I imagine friends are watching. What would they say if they saw me wuss out of a workout? This works for me because obviously if I listened to myself only, I'd be calling it quits and watching some movie.

Besides you're setting a good example without saying anything. One of the most difficult parts for me is getting through the warmup. If I'm not careful about warming up really slowly, the lactic acid burn will increase, and I then think I need a rest day. What usually cures this is thinking the above, slowing down, giving it a good 20-30 mins of warmup while peaking once into the anaerobic zone (breathing heavy) for 20-30 seconds, and slowing things back down. Use what works for you, but a nice kick in the pants usually comes when you imagine your most fit friend looking over your shoulder.

Hope those points helped. It took a bunch of trial and error. The shortened training plan wasn't exactly forgiving, and I hope that you can use some of the above in the fitness plan you choose.

Managing Stress - Part 2 - Managing Your Day

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Fri, 13 Aug 2010 08:44:00 +0000

Not so much a food pic, but rather a snapshot of the bags for my different sports/work/activities. Being able to transition quickly between triathlon training, range practice, cooking, and sales engineering allows me to enjoy more of my day flexibly, show up prepared and feel less frustrated.

On the last post, I discussed some sources of harmful stress, the main one being meaningless actions or work. Meaningless work could also include a meaningless day. I thought that instead of talking conceptually, I'd change it up and offer some tips together that you can use to improve your day, if appropriate. A lot of these are not original thoughts, I'll be the first to say. However, the specific combination in which I use them is unique to myself. I'm not special, but we're all a little different. Use what works. Make it your own.

A little review before we start and I'll ask some questions so we can get thinking and look for answers along the way. How often is it that when we learn something new, it feels awkward? How often do we get good and fast at something when we don't practice it? How often do we practice something incorrectly do we actually do it properly? What I'm hoping for you to consider is that making your day efficient and unfrustrating relies on good habits. Good habits form with doing things correctly. Doing things correctly results from reviewing what you did, not just doing them. It's that simple, but because it's that simple, we often ignore these basic concepts, myself guilty as charged. A famous chef once proclaimed that he was only better than others, because his basics were better. That chef was not me =) I was only reading about him.

Let's go through some basics and I will draw from my activities for examples and stories. I will try to keep them potent and well described.

Assuming that you get 8 hours of sleep, you still have 16 hours left to do whatever with. What do you think might happen if you were to write a few things down that you want to get done? What if they were really important? What if they were things you just wanted to get done? Great. And this begins the concept of the "Five Big, Five Small." I got this idea from my exec coach, Michael Ker. Write down 5 things that are the most important to do. Underneath, write down 5 things that are less important, but you still should do. Now this is typically applied for a week's time. But you can do 2 big, 2 small for a day's worth. How do you act on these items? Work on the big items first. The reasoning is that mental energy is NOT limitless, at least mine isn't. Another assumption is that you may not finish all of them, so work on what you need to first, and take breaks by doing the small items. The big items are the rocks, and the gaps are filled in by the little tasks, almost like sand or pebbles. Why is this effective at reducing stress? Well it gives me a sense of accomplishment, and is very efficient for what it brings. I am perfectly okay spending even a half hour doing this, although it usually takes a few minutes with practice. To give some meaning to your 16 hours, a half hour is very little overhead. Do this routine in conjunction with your calendar. My work calendar runs my life. I get booked for presentations, requirements calls, and other customer activities. Any downtime I have in between, I use to prepare for appointments, and to mentally recharge. Notice that email clearing isn't a big task. I don't get paid to clear emails unless I were a support rep, and even then I'd be paid to retain customers. But...there are usually less than 10 emails in my inbox at any given time.

Here's an example of one of mine...
(4 hours available today...meetings, presentations filling the rest)
Big:
Prepare Service Cloud/Entitlements demo for manufacturing prospect (2hrs)
Outline competitive strategy for Customer Portal small (1 hr)

Small:
Clear inbox
Enter notes into salesforce
Make haircut appointment

If you don't get everything done, don't beat yourself up, just mark down what you did, and carry stuff over to the next day. If you realize that you dont' "want" to carry it over, it should never have been written down because it wasn't all that important in the first place. Learn from this.

The list ends up being:

Big:
done-Prepare Service Cloud/Entitlements demo for prospect (2hrs)
not done-Outline competitive strategy for Customer Portal small (1 hr)

Small:
done-Clear inbox
all in-Enter notes into salesforce
not done, first thing tmrw - Make haircut appointment

So you're thinking why am I not using my master list of tons of things to do? Because of a few things. One, it's a big list. It's hard to look over. After all you do have 16 hours which is a lot, but it still is only one day. Focus on what's in front of you. Secondly, most of the things that people ask me to do either get trashed or get put in my someday list (which is almost as good as the trash). If I did everything that people asked, I would be unprofitable to the company. And I would have no time to do quality, meaningful work. Both suck. Besides people ask for things in a knee jerk reaction most of the time.

Most importantly, having a concise workspace allows you to work rapidly. I write this down on a sheet in Evernote (evernote.com) that covers one week, and have one section for each day. Clean and easy. I learned the importance of a concise workspace working at the restaurant. That workspace was the cutting board. It's always to be kept clean, your knife ready. If you're not working, you're cleaning your board. Why? Because while you're working on a larger dish, smaller fires are creeping up and you might need to help another chef out. As soon as I plate and send out the dish, cleaning off the board is a second nature reaction, and I can take on someone else's work. It's good for the restaurant. If my board weren't clear, I'd be using someone else's cucumbers in the current plate, and then send out the dishes in reverse order, creating an issue for the servers and then mayhem ensues. What can you do to get yourself ready enough not only to cover your work, but to help out some colleagues and be good to your organization?

Another major annoyance, is email. Having adopted GTD, or Getting Things Done by David Allen, email is no longer a headache. Having not found any good simple explanation for it's email use, I'll give you the summary here. Look over everything in your inbox, delete all useless items. Create folders called Next, Action, Someday, Waiting. Starting at the top of your inbox, look through your emails and respond to emails that you can within a minute, and file them if it will take longer. File them according to these rules:

Immediate action items go to Next
Things you still have to do go to Action
Things that are nice to do go to Someday
Things that you're waiting on a response for goes to Waiting

This is a very simplified version of GTD. What you want to practice is being ruthless about protecting your Next, and Action bins. Don't overcommit yourself by thinking things must get done. From your Next and Action boxes will likely come material for your 5 Big 5 Small list. And so that's how they're connected. Feel how much less stressed out you'll be when you know what needs action and what doesn't. It can help you focus on what matters and spend less time poring over meaningless stuff.

Another aspect to consider is working rapidly when you need to, especially during those firedrills or "all hands on deck." The faster your pace of work, the narrower your field of focus or the more people you'll need to help who can work quickly and make up for lost visibility. As long as you recognize that relationship and not try to exceed your limits, I feel that you'll be able to work rapidly, and relatively stress free. Let me provide an example outside work, and I'll use action pistol shooting which involves shooting many targets on the run, through obstacles like the Steel Challenge on ESPN. It looks fun and it definitely is. Let's consider the following relationship. You can only hit what you see. You can only hit what you're aiming at. Basically your eyes are looking for targets, but your body must be aligned with your eyes to actually hit anything. Now if you have ample time, you can look around, find the bullseye, get set, and squeeze off a well aimed shot. What happens when you get a few seconds, to draw, hit three targets, reload and hit those same targets again? Your head and arms holding your handgun need to move as one unit, the downside is that moving that way is much less agile than if I just turned my head. What can I do to get the best of both? Admit that this seemingly simple problem isn't that simple first of all. Next, figure out your range of motion, which in this case is less than 180 degrees (for safety in competitions). This helps you figure out how many targets you can take on at a time. Third, identify where you will reload to have enough ammo for the next set of targets, and allow enough extra ammo for any misses. Then combine target acquisition with reloading, kind of like waiting for the laundry to finish while you go shopping. With practice, you can shoot faster, but you really can't increase your range of motion, despite the above being a game. What can you do here to go after fewer, but faster, and transition quicker? Even in actual tactical situations you can't widen your range much because your team is close by and you don't want to hit them. What's the solution to this? Either figure out your transition area, or have a team member supplement your field of fire by adding their own. In matches, all my spare ammunition is neatly arranged in magazines along the left side of my belt, also angled in the direction of my hand. What if I had my spare ammunition loose in my pockets, not loaded into the magazines, mixed in with my phone, loose change, car keys? I'd probably be told to choose a new sport.

How do you apply this competitive methodology to your day if you know that you'll be busy? Check your calendar for appointments that you must attend. These are the items you must be prepared for. Look at gaps in your calendar, this is your chance to regroup and prep for the next appointments. Find out how much unreserved time you have. Look at your Next/Action lists, choose a few and write them on the top of your sheet of notes for the day. Next, write a header for each appointment you have with the subject, and people you're talking with. All on the same sheet. This sheet will guide your day. If your guidance itself is in multiple locations, it's like using two sets of directions. Very frustrating. I want everything in my field of view, same screen. As you move from appointment to appointment, you take notes underneath each header. When you're not in meetings, you're instinctively writing down the next actions from your previous meeting. This is like cleaning off the cutting board without thinking right after I've passed the plate to the server. If at any time, someone calls you for some ridiculous fire drill, you'll feel a lot less stressed out going into it and coming out of it, because you know you'll be able to jump right back into the rest of your day. And...you're not paranoid about forgetting things because you're writing important notes down. This lets me hop from meeting to meeting relatively stress free. What stresses me out is not being able to find things and the last status of items, but with the above, is now easily taken care of. And from there, I have plenty of juice to go bike, swim, or get dinner with friends.

A few final thoughts on working rapidly:
Slow is smooth and smooth is fast
You can't miss fast enough to win

Managing Stress - Part 1

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 07:48:00 +0000

I was reading my iPad today and came across a wired.com article on stress; link at bottom of this post. Oh yes, the picture is of a steak quesadilla with bourbon sauce I made at a bachelors party. Trying to get my wrist back in shape as far as food work goes.

Back to the article; it's worth the read. While it brings up development of a vaccine for stress, it's main focus is on what causes harmful stress, and challenges the notion that being busy and operating intensely results in stress. The condition that doesn't kill you outright, but aggravates other conditions such as the risk of stroke.

I want to share a few points that hopefully can help friends and readers approach their activities (profession included) with some additional vigor and prevent some of the bad stress. I'll do this in two parts. First, I'll talk about harmful stress as a result of unmeaningful work, and then the proposed stress reduction points from this article, as well as some of my own.

I'll also pull in a small story from an unrelated activity to show you why it's worth another look at this played out topic. A few months back, I went to precision rifle school having been a competitive shooter for some time, and recently an instructor. Above the door to the class room there was a sign that said "Rifles Only. Fight Smart." For a little background, the rifle training focused specifically on long distance shooting, not the classless up-close "spray and pray" you see on the movies. This was my way of taking my competitive abilities to the next level. The rifles used, are generally no more than upgraded hunting rifles (simple stuff), a far cry from machine guns even dating back to WWI. Why then, are military sharpshooters one of the most requested and feared tactical units at a commanders disposal? It's not the weaponry, it's the brains behind the trigger. They fight smarter. They're what is referred to as force multiplier, or in plain language, true leverage. What are you doing to exploit leverage points?

Hold that thought and let's move onto meaningless work. An example of meaningless work would be anything you don't know the purpose behind, is not fascinating, or is obviously not going to be used. An example of meaningful work, for me would be crafting a product presentation that ties nicely into requirements from a prospect. I know why they're looking at their product. I know why my work is important. I know they appreciate my effort. I recognize I don't win every deal. I did choose this profession and enjoy what I do. Obviously there are times when I doubt this. When I doubt this, it begins to bug me, and I mentally check out ... start thinking about vacation. When I don't doubt any of this, I forget what time it is. What I didn't understand was that I was experiencing a stress model that was articulated in this article.

The "Demand-Control" model of stress proposes that the damage from stress is significantly increased through a lack of control over your work, rather than the sheer amount of stress itself. An example would be being forced to generate meaningless reports that no one reviews, and yet you're required to do them. If you know that much of your work feels meaningless, there are a few paths to take. One, try to remove all the why's from your current tasking. Fortunately at work, it's very much encouraged that I always ask why. If you can't remove the why's, try to build a sense of pleasure from doing something well. If reducing the number of WTF's per day isn't something you can control, try NLP.

NLP or Neuro Linguistic Programming has a good application here, in that one can trigger specific physiological responses by thinking an unrelated thought. This is almost like a mental drug. Call it up when you need to. A loose comparison would be your "Happy Place" however, you can program in more specific responses and feelings other than just being happy. Basically you relive a situation with the qualities (or modalities) you want to feel on command, relink them to another thought. Then you can call up those qualities on command. It takes a little practice though. Use it whenever you deal with someone you don't like. Richard Bandler, as an author/researcher is a good place to start.

Another good reason to use NLP when you don't have all the why's answered is because you can't answer all of them. It's been stated that humans don't deal well with uncertainty. You could approach this by being okay with not knowing things, which I do do sometimes. But at that time there needs to be trust. Either you know all the whys, or you trust in the direction, leader, strategy etc. Fighting smart here would be to increase the trust between you and whoever else has a hand in what you do.

For managers, it's understandable that you don't have answers to all the why's. May I propose that you ask your reports if they at least trust in the direction. If they don't, it's probably not you, it's just that they haven't seen around the corner, and that's the role of a good leader. Be one and help them see what's coming ahead. Share with them some of the executive conversations you've had. It might even be a good topic for a regular team meeting. Instead of status updates, invest in a good CRM tool and buy your time back for meaningful discussions. An example would be the classic "We need to tighten down on expenses." Everyone hears that. At your executive meetings, ask for the reason behind it. If I'm one of your reports and you tell me that we're conserving cash because we're picking up companies or looking to hire more people, I'll be more likely to spend it like it were my own. And this whole discussion of why is, in my opinion a cultural shift with the abundance of information. Before, few people had the answers and if they did, they harbored them. There would be little incentive to ask why. Now, it's important to know why, and why that reason is authentic (one step better than truth on paper).

Now in the interest of fighting smart, if you've already tried to figure out why what you're doing is important but are stumped, ask your manager. This is a way of building trust. The point here to managers is to not breach that trust or at least be upfront about mishaps. Ultimately we all work for someone, whether that's directly for the customer, or for your manager. If you deal directly with customers, ask them why they're requesting something. Just be respectful of the "give-take" principle. You might say, "I'm happy to do this for you, and if you can give me a better sense of why this is a big deal, perhaps we can find you some additional help." (If you can give me more, I'll give you more) Worse case scenario is that your work specifies repetitive activities that don't allow for innovation. However I'm hard pressed to believe that a good manager or leader won't be receptive to your ideas on improvements. Run the idea by a select coworker first to make sure your pitch doesn't suck. If your manager is not receptive without explaining why, make a mental note. But you have to be fair and make sure you're addressing both the give and take with your pitch. "Here's what we should do. This is why it makes sense. I can get this done because. Now this is what I need to do so."

There are a variety of books on managing upwards, helping your manager provide you with better objectives and tasking. A lot are just plain cheesy. To sum things up, you have an obligation to let your manager know what you're good at and what you're inclined to do. You need to ask for what you want, and have to be ready to offer up things in exchange. If you are a manager, you have an obligation to your reports to help them improve their work, by reducing the WTF's per day, and increasing their understanding behind the work they do. If there is a generational gap (if you're 20-30 yrs old), know that a sense of entitlement is a huge dislike of senior management, as expressed by my exec coach. They love our sense of charity and recognition of causes outside our own. But entitlement seems to be a pervasive negative theme. Be smart, don't sound like a brat. Sell yourself. You can get what you want. Just show some skills first.

Now on to ways to prevent harmful stress. I'll comment on those in my next blog post =) I figured I'd start with the "why" first. Till next time.

Referenced article here:
http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/07/ff_stress_cure/all/1

Working with an Executive Coach - An Intro

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 06:34:00 +0000

Involved but not intense
Relaxed body language
Listen with all your senses
Great eye contact
Be close but don't invade

Obviously these are not my ideas, but how many times have we been caught up in the moment, and neglected these qualities in both our personal and professional dealings? How many times have you been in a situation in your career development where you felt you needed a sounding board for why you do what you do? These questions and others drove me to work with an executive coach.

Now the title implies that I'm management, and I'm not. Why then would I chose this type of instruction? Let's face it, at some point, many of us will move to management. When you get there, will you arrive ready? What if you want to own your own business someday? Will you come up with a great idea, fall short on execution and mismanage your resources such that your organization goes bankrupt or gets picked up at a fire sale? Certain events are inevitable; what will you do to minimize risk or improve chances of success? Will you become a manager or leader similar to one you've disliked, or that you've admired? Like I commented on in my post about knowing your limits, your skills help you win, your overconfidence makes you lose.

So what does executive coaching look like? I meet every other week for an hour. For the first part of the session, we discuss items I need immediate help with. For example, I might have a few sales presentations to executives and I need to review their fundamental concerns. Is my assessment of their business accurate? Can I estimate whether this organization is profitable based on employee count and revenue? This helps me in putting our technical strategy in perspective when making recommendations to the account executives I support.

As far as the products I position, especially anything related to metrics or intelligence, I want to offer recommendations that improve the chances our software will be used throughout our customer's organization. For example, we know that experienced managers I present to will grade their employees and make attempts to move the middle 70% upwards. Am I positioning our dashboarding or reporting capabilities in this way or am I simply saying that we can measure performance?

For another portion of the session, we discuss personalities, and how best to relate to them. You may have heard of Myers Briggs, and other models. We do something similar, however the methodology we use, Social Styles, I feel is much quicker and practical when you're on your toes. We choose people we know, try to fit them into a personality profile, and build methods for addressing their needs appropriately. We all like to be communicated with according to our preferences. And why wouldn't it make sense to study these groups, and help adjust your interactions according to their preferences.

For example, someone with a Driving style like myself, is characterized by someone who responds best by being given your best recommendation, rather than options. An Analytical style is the opposite. If you hadn't at least studied my body language, the objects in my office, and phrasing, you might have proposed too many options to me, and I'll likely ask you to whittle down the choices. Thus requiring another meeting or at least introducing some delay in your engagement.

Usually towards the end, we discuss business problems and set todo's for next time. This involves some reading and general observations at meetings. Did I quickly estimate the personality styles on the key decision makers of the deals I'm working on? Can I articulate the organizational reasons for purchasing?

This is all incredibly interesting to me, but how does it benefit the organization I work for? By putting someone in front of decision makers who understands operationally how a manufacturing organization reconciles its build plan against the sales forecast, or how a multichannel support organization is measured by, is more likely to build rapport, and gain confidence with our business partners in a variety of engagements. I also have articles and books to read, organizations to research, and business problems to study at home.

How do you get the most out of an executive coach? Have a clear understanding of what you're looking to get out of it. After all, it's your time. Ask yourself what else you're doing to work intelligently and exploit leverage points. Ask yourself what you're naturally good at, and also what you're inclined to do. Your coach should be able to help you identify your shortcomings, recommend an improvement plan, and help you see around the corner. I've been working with Michael Ker from Acceleration Leadership for the past 5 months and it ranks up there with the best calls I've made this year.

Relationships, what to look for?

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 15:00:00 +0000

This topic gets old, but it never really gets old. Let's count the number of top lists of "I wish the other gender did this, or knew this about me" and we'll have enough points, reasons to build a clearly unattainable list. I suppose if I can't articulate what I'm looking for, I'll act truly as young as I look. I had cleaners come and remark that I was doing pretty well for a kid fresh out of school. She apologized, unnecessarily of course, and I was happy that I had fooled another Cantonese person, someone who might have had the scoop on the age tricks we play. I will now stop hiding behind my usual veil of marginal humor and sarcasm.

Less of logic, and more of emotion is the tone of this posting. And perhaps a list is not the right way to discuss this. It's not an audition, nor a tryout. It's just some thoughts I feel like sharing. And so onto business, I think one of the most important things to me is that I look up to her, and that she respects what I do. She's gotta be doing something, or has done something that I admire. I have to ask myself, "Is what I'm admiring, a durable quality?" I've definitely taken a little heat on this because it seems like an unfair standard. But is it really? I have my own definition of what I admire. For example, do all her friends look up to her as someone who takes care of them? Was she involved in a sport that she now teaches to others? Did she have a rough upbringing and now she works as a counselor? These are all things that get and hold my attention. I want her to look up to me as well. And this is in the interest of not assuming entitlement, which I'm sure my generation can be better about. Not so much as a criticism but more of a, "Who's going to step up, and show the other generations we're doing things better, faster, and yet are more fulfilled...and produce more than what we ask for in return?" This is not some hallucination. I know some folks I really admire that are high performance and emotionally fulfilled. What can we be doing here to enjoy more of that? Because the relationship is now a team of two not some solo act, I have to ask myself, am I asking for any qualities that I can not bring, or are unwilling to develop? If so, I've got to take it off the table. I'm not entitled to anything. I need to earn what I ask for.

Another sticking point for me is a passion to learn new things. And this is an authentic desire to learn. Come on, you know it when you see it. My brother once asked me, how do you go all out and learn something the way you do? And I said, I don't need to know jack about what you're actually doing, but once I roll into your place I should be able to tell how into it you are. For him, it was salsa. I said that I should see your dancing shoes on the floor, dance magazines all over the place, you watching salsa videos on youtube, and hearing about private lessons. A year later, I watched him dance on his birthday for the first time. I was blown away. All those private lessons, hard practice really paid off. And so the point of that story is less about how good someone actually gets, but how into something, someone can be. And it's for no reason other than that it satisfies you. If you fulfill yourself, it communicates itself. And so as it relates to the person on the other side of the dinner table, it's incredibly fulfilling going out with someone who is incredibly passionate about what they do, and is willing to share. And, wants to make you good. I have to say you learn the funniest stuff sometimes. I dated someone once who taught me all about women's shoes. Before her, I could care less. She didn't say "he wouldn't care about that, so I'm not going to bother teaching him." I forgot what skill I traded her, but ever since then, I can't help but pay attention to how shoes really put together an outfit. On a related note, it is nice to see that flats are being worn more often at work. They look good and I'm glad girls are able to feel more comfortable. I know I am sometimes critical of guys not paying attention to things, but I have to be fair. Guys love it when girls are interested in the things they do. Have you seen how excited some dude got when he found out a girl he liked was really into cars? I don't know if it's always the same in reverse though. An example, "A guy can dress well, but not better than me?" Give us a break sometimes. I am not at all saying I dress well either with my collection of silly t-shirts with slogans such as "Massive, Area Man, To The Pub." But, it's equally as ridiculous as the collection of stuffed animals in the back of some Asian girl's Civic. Don't forget to buckle up Hello Kitty.

Since we're on growth, the relationship ought to be a learning experience. Does she genuinely want to make you better? It goes back to my experience with teaching/coaching. Do you teach people things with the intention of them becoming better than you? Think back to some of the best teachers you had. Were they the best at what they did? We need to justify that question. Are we asking if "what they did" means, play that instrument, or rather make the student better than themselves? I'd say the latter. Why is teaching and learning so important to me? Because it also covers all the other attributes that I find important. Rather than just say I like people who are patient, why not just discuss it in context. Thinking a few more steps down the line. Will she be able to raise a kid well? Will she be able to help our child differentiate between right and wrong, and allow him or her to make good calls when us the parents aren't around? Will our kid end up learning lessons parents typically don't want to expose their kids to by going for overprotection at the expense of a rich childhood experience? With our support and nurturing, I want our kids to not be afraid to come to us for help or protection for them or one of their friends even when they've totally deuced themselves. In the end, our kid will do whatever the hell he or she wants. But along the way, can we convince them that they're not the only ones that matter and if they take care of themselves well, they're in a better position to watch out for their friends too?

Another point I often ponder, is "will she play nice with my friends?" Will she take a genuine interest in them? Does she feel comfortable enough to reach out to them to include them in dinner parties or whatever? I don't really believe in all the imaginary barriers between her friends and my friends. When I'm not around, I want her to feel free to grab dinner with any one of my friends, especially the guys. This is really important to me because I know that I can have an intense personality, and a major goal of mine is to keep up the pace of activity, but come off as more casual about things. That being said, I know my limitations and if she feels like she doesn't want to talk to me, she will then have another set of friends to talk to about me. I love my friends and I trust their opinions of me. Especially when I act like a jackass and need to be straightened out. Another aspect of all this is how nurturing she is. Does she take care of her friends? As in really take care. Not just "partied" when they came in from out of town. Does she have the understanding of how to take someone who isn't doing well, and get them back to where they were. This implies that she's detailed, knows how to reach out to someone emotionally, and also recruit help where necessary, while being gentle and supportive. But also knows when enough is enough.

Obviously no one has a perfect track record with all this, if this is what you value too. But the best part about all this that your past does not dictate how passionate you can be about something, how into learning or sharing you can be, or how well one will accommodates others. It's not like an endurance sport where you need a solid cardio base to be able to compete well. When can you start or improve on these things? Right the F now. In fact I don't think much of this is gender specific, as one friend of mine pointed out. She says, "You know, girls are into those things too." So turning it back to our generation rather than gender, can we take more ownership of how we're perceived, set some solid examples, and build that in culturally as part of who we look for in a long term relationship? We usually perform according to how we're measured. If you dating someone you like is a measurement, and they look for these things, I've gotta imagine you're going to be more like that, even if you're very physically driven. You're probably wondering where I am in all this? I am very happy about my situation. I feel quite fulfilled, yet never completely satisfied. I'm surrounded by people better than me in many ways but don't also wear it on their sleeves. We have access to more usable information than ever before. I feel confident that at some point I will meet someone that I click with really well. In the meantime, it's fun to talk about this stuff.

As a final note, I'd have to say that cooking without incineration, unpredictable, likes 80's music sans big hair, is mildly attractive, and tolerates stupid t-shirts are things I personally won't complain about.

Engineering your life

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 19:56:00 +0000

So I had a conversation with my dad this morning. He's in the US for work for a little bit. A topic that came up, was what I've been doing with my life lately. I guess as I'm getting closer to being 30, it's a topic that comes up with more frequency, at least more so internally.

Funny enough two words come to mind. Balance and engineering. Even though I have an engineer in my title, I don't consider myself in the same league of engineering as my dad or my brother. That being said I never really thought what engineering was all about. A professor I was listening to put it this way: It's not about perfection, it's about getting the most out of what you've got. In other words, achieving a result given many constraints.

What does balance have to do with this? Balance is probably the word used when describing how one engineers their life. Everyone's balance is different but it's the maintainable, yet flexible mix that I'm discussing here. If you were the CEO of your life (which funny enough, many people don't act like they were), what are the big problems you'd be trying to solve? Are they worth solving? What would things look like when you solved them? Would you even recognize it when you solved the problem? Are they big enough for you? No insightful thought here, most of this comes from the CARVER decision making matrix used in the military.

As the year is drawing to a close, it's probably worth highlighting some items I've tried to engineer a bit while keeping in mind that my ultimate goal is getting the most out of what I've got. And again my usual disclaimer, this is less insight and more just personal observation. The motivation for writing this is because I had a few friends ask for some thought around this topic.

Sleep. I bought a Zeo and use it every night. 5 months later, I have gathered enough data on my light, deep, and REM sleep cycles to know what is a reasonable amount of sleep. It's a light headband that wirelessly transmits my sleep patterns to an alarm clock-like device. Why is this important? Because between sleep and food, I feel that these are two areas that have some of the highest ROI for time/money spent on it. If I can get really good sleep, and make it repeatable, I've dealt myself a better hand for tomorrow. How will I know I got really good sleep? The Zeo tells me. Obviously I can feel it, but now with the Zeo I can game the system a bit. There are things that I can do before sleeping that will make 7 hours almost as good as 8 hours. Not only is that engineering, that's changing the game. Everything else I do that next day will likely be better.

Second part is eating well. Everyone thinks I eat a lot. I eat frequently, but not a large quantity. Why? Because that means I have more money to spend on higher quality food. What boggles my mind is that people think that if they eat nutritionally meager, poorly executed food, they'll be able to perform at a different quality level than the fuel they just consumed. My proposal is this, cook for yourself more often, buy local foods. Take responsibility for what you eat. There are absolutely nights where I don't want to cook for myself, but most nights I still do, even though I've either worked at the restaurant, or did multiple presentations. Learn a few basic cooking skills, and use them frequently. The whole "foodie" movement boggles me too. Anything that goes in your mouth, you should probable be knowledgeable about and involved with. Just saying. To have to label interest in such a fundamental part of living? What's next, the "Life-ist" who is really into living life well?

Why am I so hung up on these fundamentals still? Because they remain the highest returning areas of my life. And I believe most people have the time, to dedicate some effort to improving them. There are few people I consider truly "busy" and I am not one of them. It's just a state of mind. Productive yes, busy no.

You don't have to look far

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 18:10:00 +0000

I think everybody has a moment where they don't know where things are going, what things mean. And this doesn't mean that you're undirected, or unguided. It just means perhaps that you need some perspective. This can take the form of wild success and massive failure. Perspective can usually be found around you.

Despite the lack of direction, the last few months I've had, have been the most meaningful I've had in a while. And this comes from being able to fully appreciate both a job well done and getting a fat kick in the nuts. Most importantly though, are people who help you bring some clarity to the situation. The can come in the form of mentors who go out of their way to make you better, and those who just inspire you to do your best. And just from what I've seen, you don't need to look far. You can usually find them within your existing circle, both personally and professionally.

On the professional end, there are many things I need to work on. I've been very fortunate to have a manager and colleagues who have taken significant time to coach me on soft skills that need tuning. My manager has gone far and beyond to help me take lessons from working as a chef and apply them to working as a sales engineer. Specifically, it's how to build the same satisfaction one gets from a great meal, into a sales engagement. There isn't a text for this.

Great lesson, but what's more important is the opportunity I have here, to prove to him and the team, that time spent on me is time well spent. Taking this back to music lessons, one of the saddest things is when a teacher has given up on a student. Now reversing that up, the opportunity to keep practicing and performing so your mentor won't give up on you is one of those unspoken promises that I think can be fully appreciated at work as well. Perhaps it's this aspect of work that provides meaning. And it has for me for the past few months.

On the personal end, every once in a while you'll meet somebody, usually through another friend who just by what they represent, inspires you to step things up and make good decisions. It could have been their experiences, it could be what they say, it could be just how dialed in they are. This time it was a combination of the three. This weekend he'll be moving to the east coast to take up an incredible job opportunity, mentorship being a key component. It's very well deserved.

It's important to highlight here a few aspects that might be overlooked. One, I've only known him and his family for a few weeks. He's got a great wife and kid, and as one friend pointed out, is genuinely appreciative of his situation. Two, he was introduced to me by another friend who I look up to, who visited last month. Both their accomplishments are impressive. Both are incredibly humble. And so when I'm trying to figure out what this all means, I don't need to look far. Just have to appreciate the situation for what it is, who is around you, perhaps the key to living meaningfully. And that's what has been going on the last few months. It's a nice change.

Sashimi, Fish Filleting, Sharp Knives

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 18:46:00 +0000

As much as I've been working on Japanese cuisine, it's been difficult to find the time or the audience to do an entire Japanese meal from start to finish. Usually I'll blend concepts and do some kind of mix. Last night I decided to put the individual skills together into a well formed tasting menu. What you're looking at on the left is Japanese Medai, sliced for sashimi, plated on a hand painted plate. The point of the plate...we eat with our eyes too.

I had the Medai auctioned for me at Tsukiji Market in Tokyo, through my dealer. It's such a pleasure to gut and fillet such a fine fish. I just read on some blog that one of the worst considered tasks of kitchen work was gutting fish. Yes it sounds bad on the surface, but it is one of the most critical parts of precision seafood work. I'll explain. In order to keep the fish fresh, and to prevent the enzymes in the gut of the fish from deteriorating the rest of the fish, you need to remove the gut and gills as soon as possible and in a proper way.

I'll put up a video shortly of how to do it, but here are the key takeaways. First you don't want to rupture the internal organs. Second, you don't want to cut into the flesh close to the spine without properly rinsing and then drying your knife. The prerequisite for this is a very sharp knife and a knowledge of the cutting pattern. And you have to care about what you're doing. Do most sushi bars do this properly? No. Does their food taste good? No. Do most customers demand properly prepared sushi? No. And thus the cycle continues..."Hey I want a roll, the one named after myself." Bet it tastes like a cheap corndog too.

If you do want to break the cycle, order sashimi. This will highlight knife technique. Look for glassy surfaces (on most fish). This will tell you that the chef understands the cutting stroke and how to sharpen a knife. If you push cut, you'll smash the fish. If you don't know how to use the length of the knife, you'll have a smooth surface but jagged edge. And if you don't have a sharp knife, then you have far greater problems. I'll post a video on how to sharpen a sashimi knife soon as review for peers in the industry. I don't mean to sound extreme here, but it's to emphasize how important your primary cooking knife is. Primary, meaning for home cooking friends...don't buy knives in sets even though the stores want you to.

More on sashimi later. If there's anything I can convince you to do, that would be to take your main chef's knife that you own, and get it professionally sharpened. You can get it done at your local food store, or they'll know where to go. For home cooking, using a sharpening steel is recommended each time you use the knife. There are plenty of videos out there on it. If you told me you wanted to learn how to sharpen it on a stone, I would probably say that unless you had a bunch of time on your hands, or you used high performance Japanese knives, to just get it done at a store but use a steel to hone it each time you use the knife.

Note though, if you use Japanese carbon steel knives, know that you're getting into the high performance, high maintenance realm of cutlery. You can't, shouldn't use a steel on them, and need to use water stones to do your sharpening. If you're in practice, you can do a knife in about 10 minutes. For reference, I use three knives for Japanese work. A yanagi (sashimi slicer), a kiritsuke (combination sashimi, vegetable knife), and a deba (fish butchering knife). Total cost was about $2k. The first two knives were forged by hand, by Keijiro Doi. The deba is by Masamoto. I'm looking to put another sashimi knife into the collection of the stainless steel variety, likely by Nenohi, another popular japanese brand.

Random...I was thinking, am I being too extreme about this, at the risk of alienating the readership? Perhaps, but as I was making salsa with my brother tonight, the need for a sharp knife was apparent when dicing a tomato. I pulled out one of my work knives that was very sharp but not razor sharp and it gave me a little difficulty when taking it through the skin. But when I polished Ambert's chef's knife, the work was very quick. Dicing a tomato is probably something that most home cooks have done. So yeah, get your knives sharpened.

Menu for Ambert's Birthday Dinner Party

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 03:38:00 +0000

Ambert, my brother wanted a birthday dinner party with friends. "Yeah I'll give you a dinner party," said I. So I called my guys at IMP Foods, and they called their guys at Tsukiji Market, Tokyo, and sent over some stuff via JAL Air Cargo.

We have over 25 people confirmed for tomorrow, standing room only. Glad that my boys are backing me up in the kitchen or someone will be ordering pizza and looking like a total fool. I'll be taking off early from work (salesforce) tomorrow, trading in smooth demo skills, for badass knife technique. Here's what we're doing...

Western compositions:
Arugula + endive salad with mustard vinaigrette and shaved ricotta salata
Cannelini bean chili with ancho beef cubes
Applewood smoked ribeye with Maldon salt, red peppercorns and green beans

Eastern compositions:
Marinated, cold smoked Japanese mackerel, with grated ginger, scallions, on a baguette
Oysters with ponzu granita, chives, grated spiced daikon
Poached Canadian lobster and albacore rolls with yuzu, shiso and soy paper
Live sea urchin with fresh wasabi, yuzu
Shiitake miso soup, with first dashi of kushiro kombu

Sushi, Sashimi, Nigiri:
Japanese albacore sashimi from Tsukiji market
Atlantic mackerel, spot prawn nigiri sushi
Salmon roe gunkan nigiri
Hokkaido scallop handrolls with shiso, gobo, tobikko

A lesson from before - slowing things down

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 04:34:00 +0000

This is probably more about personal operation in general than it is about cooking. But I think cooking is a perfect way to get my point across.

Ideally I'd like more time to build dishes at work, nigiri, rolls, sashimi...but we need to move faster. A few weeks ago, I felt like I just reached my max and yet I wasn't at the clean, smooth operation that I wanted to be at. It was getting really frustrating, because I just couldn't keep up, at least to my own expectations. To everyone else, it was business as normal.

My violin teacher used to stress playing things slowly and in irregular patterns, like clustering notes together, and playing them in odd patterns. This would help in an overall increase in the upper speed limit. Obviously I didn't appreciate it at the time, being in high school and busy resisting change in general (aka being a nerdy idiot). Taking this back to food work, I reexamined all my roll and nigiri techniques, asking myself if each movement was absolutely necessary. My goal was to reduce the overall movement, losing anything of little value. After that I'd practice in parts, each remaining movement. Ideally when making nigiri (fish piece on rice cluster), you'd touch the fish as little as possible. Real professionals do it around 3 contacts, depending on how you count, with a perfect arch and a well defined head and tail.

After a lot of practice, and visualization when not around fish and rice, I was able to get it down to three contacts. While this last part happened inside a month, the overall technique has taken a few years. Some might think it's stupid to work on something as simple as a piece of fish on rice. And yes sometimes I get bored with it too, but then if I weren't willing to spend time on a critical technique as nigiri sushi, I'd be missing a key point of Japanese cuisine and it's draw to chef's of different backgrounds. The key point being simplicity. Another being, the respect of "original flavor" as our master chef, Jason calls it.

I realized this had more significance than just for nigiri. Frequently I find myself confused, sitting down, not knowing what to do next. So then I default to urgency and recency, which of course may be an effective way to sell, but not a great way to run your life. I realized that while I spent all this time on my hobbies, I wasn't spending enough time with friends. I had to tell friends that I could see them in a few weeks. It's taken me far too long to realize the shortcomings of this. And now looking at my activities, I've begun to dial down activities that use a lot of time but aren't the most important right now. For example, I used to go to the rifle range a good bit, now I've had to reduce it enough to just maintenance sessions. I wish I was still active competitively since it's so much fun. But, food being the focus now, I opted for reducing the practice.

Obviously there are systems that can support decision making; I will go into the various methodologies I use, GTD, Carver Matrix, Mind Mapping, at a later date, but all these methodologies tie back to simplicity and ease of comprehension. The Carver Matrix assists with deciding which targets to pursue, Mind Mapping assists with understanding the root issues, and GTD (Getting Things Done) assists in execution.

Now being able to prioritize among only a few things, it's much easier mentally and on my schedule. With the extra time on my hands, I'll be able to do the things I'm used to doing, but with more time, and more intensity, which for me results in more quality, and satisfaction. And surprisingly it does wonders for speed too as your technique and behavior become cleaner, faster, and tighter.

Credit for the photo goes all to Brad Herman, who stepped up some black and white game at a recent dinner party.

The Impromptu Dinner Party

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Sun, 31 May 2009 08:01:00 +0000

So I took a Friday off of Salesforce to do some food work. I had a dinner party planned for a colleague, Neil so I needed that time to really think through the plan and prep.

A friend of mine, Juan had the day off of work from the restaurant so I called him up to see if he wanted to practice filleting on some fish from Tsukiji Market. Then I realized this could be a great time for an impromptu dinner party. I called a few girl friends up and the pitch was simple: Two guys are cooking for you. Professionals.

So I told Juan about this and we rushed down to Whole Foods downstairs, scoring some ribeye steaks, bunch of vegetables. So you know, this was the first hour of 7 hours of mayhem. We first got to work by setting up our workstations, a board for each. I sharpened my Nenox S1 Gyutou for Juan since I wanted him to rock the best. I sported my Suisin Kiritsuke.

Anyways we took apart the fish, got some scallops out and then got to work on the vegetables. Juan took apart a pineapple, and braised it in some juice, with a variety of spices. It smelled so good as we were working on the other stuff. He even took us to Morocco with a spiced sauce that we at the last minute, used with the giant botan shrimp heads, some well structured fusion. I worked on some sashimi, plated that to start, and then did some stuff with dashi. I wanted Juan to learn how I did dashi so he could experiment with it at work. I think after course 8 or 9, we slowed down a bit, and relaxed, since it was now 3am.

Juan served up the braised pineapple on top of a rose granite. I served up, um scotch. Seriously though, such a great night. Juan is probably one of the better chefs I know. Working as the Exec Sous Chef at Luce under Dominique Crenn is no small accomplishment. It's definitely a privilege to cook with him and I know the friends we invited all had a great time. Him and Dominique served me and my friends one of the best tasting menus I've had. Story another time.

What you read, was the first of 3 dinner parties of that weekend...

"My Night Off" dinner party

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 17:23:00 +0000

It's nice to be able to cook for pure recreation. Last Saturday night I had a few friends over, 3 to be exact, to have some hotpot. Having been working 6 days a week for the past year, I suppose you really value your one day off, for me it's Saturday. But many weeks I throw a dinner party on Saturday where I'm probably harder at work at home, than I am in the restaurant.

So last night I figured I'd have a few friends over, spend the day relaxing, work on a pisco sour, research things. Basically food I'd love to eat myself, was served. Had two friends I haven't seen in a while, as well as a neighbor who is awesome. Here's how the night turned out.

I decided on a few courses. First we did a gravlax nigiri, made the gravlax a few days ago, love the texture of it. It was firmer, so I sliced it thinly...2mm in thickness, put it on rice. The top arc at the highest point of the nigiri was very elegant, nice. It's the small things. Made a cucumber salad, 1mm thickness per piece, knife cut.

Next we did some hotpot. Made a dashi for it, with some new bonito fish flakes I got from IMP foods. Extracted the glutamates from the kombu kelp at 140F for one hour, raised to 180F, dropped in the flakes, settled for a few mins, then through a chinois and into the pot for the hotpot.

Had some lamb and beef slices and moved onto Nigerian spiced short ribs. I had similar versions when I worked in Ghana, and it's made an impression on me ever since. Then made a caterpillar roll, with Hokkaido scallops. The avocado was from my CSA. Good quality. All the while drinking lots of pisco sour, wine, beer.

Total prep was about 2 hours, much of it idle time though. It's nice to be able to cook for 4 people, and have things be relatively relaxed.

Knowing Your Limits

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 19:43:00 +0000

What's nice about not working full-time as a chef, is that I have no choice but to take out of context lessons and make them relevant, otherwise I won't grow at the rate I want to. I've got to try a lot harder to catch up. One observation is seeing many of chefs trying to operate outside their skill levels perhaps in the name of experimentation. I see that a lot too just in general.

So for some background here, I've been competing in shooting sports since I was young...I love it. In the current discipline (distance rifle), under timed conditions, high winds, distances from 100 to 1km, we take shots at targets very precisely. There is one game in particular we play, called KYL or Know Your Limits. I'll try to describe it as if you were there.

Here's the game: there are 5 circular steel plates out a ways, last time it was around 400 yards, 4 football fields. You have 5 shots. Each target is worth 20 pts. There are a few problems though, they each get smaller, starting at 10 inches, ending at 4 inches, don't forget the high winds and the need for computed ballistics predictions. Also, you have 45 seconds for all 5 shots, AND, if you miss a target, you lose all your points. Which means that you could have plinked 4 out of 5 targets, and miss the last, only to be beaten by someone who hit the first target, and stopped shooting. Hence, knowing your limits, or skill level. Also people are egging you on to "go for it."

So at the competition, I guess the wind reading, 7 mph, dial in a few clicks into my scope, and press 5 rounds into my rifle's magazine. The timer starts, and I focus onto the first plate in the cross hairs. I even out my breath after the 2nd full breath. I squeeze the trigger gently and feel the gun kick pretty hard. The ref yells "impact!" and I quickly eject the hot brass. The bullet impacts a few inches off of center but was still a hit. Must be the wind, so I make a mental adjustment. I shoot two more times, and two more targets are hit with a center impact on the last one. Very encouraging.

Through the electronic hearing protection, I hear "GO FOR IT!!" quite loudly. I put the pad of my fingertip against the trigger, and begin my shot process, while watching the vegetation for a change of wind direction. I can feel my clear Oakley M-Frames digging into my brow as I focus. But then I relax the pressure on my trigger finger, and slowly open the bolt. I pull the live round out of the rifle, slightly warm. I hear the ref call time and yell "Unload your gun and show clear." After triple checking for safety, I place my rifle on the safe rack, and sat down to reflect. After a few moments of quiet time, I realized I hadn't taken that shot because I knew that under those wind conditions, I wasn't confident in my ability to hit the smaller plate, but I had done the smart thing. I wasn't dialed in and so I didn't go beyond what I practiced.

Turns out, 60 points was the high score. Not an overly risky strategy, but clearly good enough to win.

And now back to the kitchen, I see this manifesting itself with poor execution. A dish that comes out, with lots of complexity, a really busy sauce, sour, sweet, salty, but still missing the balance, the basics. I think you see this with sushi a lot. A piece of nigiri (fish on rice), with a strange topping. Interesting topping, but the rice is not seasoned, and the fish has a rough cut. Looking further, a dull knife. And this is not to say experimentation is unwarranted, but it's got to be appropriate and within your capabilities. Take for example what happened to Carla in this season's top chef. She broke out sous vide, it wasn't her game, or previous practice, and according to some, lost some of her previous credibility. She's a great chef, but in this case, went for the 4th target unnecessarily.

I think what impresses me is a simple dish, but with the ingredients, plating, concept, well thought through. It shows refinement. It shows discretion. It's one reason why I love Japanese cooking so much and I've just scratched the surface. Well done Japanese food does take other cultures influences of course, but it strips away the noise, the clutter. It transforms a dish, into an elegant idea, with a minimal number of ingredients but it's impact is much greater than the sum of the parts. And I think that operating within your skill level is key.

A really good shooting coach once told me, that under competitive situations, you will not rise to the occasion, but instead, you will default to your level of training, your skill level. I would love to see fellow chefs embrace that idea, and operate to 100% of their current skill, rather than 60% of a skill yet to be acquired. That makes for a great meal. Save experimentation for family meal and not on diner's checks =)

The story behind last night's party

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 18:16:00 +0000

What a night. Last night's dinner party was held at a friend's loft for 30 people. The highest rated dish was the beef ribeye with jus over a baguette. Also a little bit of sushi, Hokkaido scallops pan seared, roasted beet salad.

What made it interesting was how things came together and the people who made it happen. Let's do a timeline. So a month ago, we came up with the idea. Two weeks ago we built the guest list. One week ago we invited people. Chefs would be myself, Ben Grol, Jen Kibler, and Vinz.

I was really struggling to come up with a menu during the week, 30 people, not my kitchen...as well as having a really intense work week at salesforce.com. So I dived into cookbooks, asked friends, talked to Jason at Okoze (where I work). At that point as always, we have good idea of what we should do, but accept the fact that things will always change.

And they did. I went to the fish market (IMP Foods) on Friday morning. The cool sea smell of fresh fish is just mesmerizing at times, then I realize I have to snap out of it, finish the shopping, then head into salesforce for some customer calls. After work, I came home and did a few hours of prep, thought about the dishes, made myself dinner.

Saturday morning, Ben Grol came over to help prep, Ambert made breakfast which was fantastic (beef rib omelette with cheese and pepper blend). So after a very satisfying breakfast it was go time. Went to costco to score beer, vegetables, and cleaning supplies. Dropped off the beer at the loft, and then really sailed through prep. I filleted halibut while Ben roasted the beets, powdered the peppers. We got into the weeds a bit, and prep took longer than expected and we managed to get to the party when the first guests showed. We talked to Jen and she was rocking out a dessert which was very reassuring. Ben was like, Jen is a rock star, she'll make it happen.

Basically the kitchen there was unusable for our work, so we had to take all our gear. It included the immersion circulator for sous vide, Polyscience cold smoker, knife bags, foam boxes with food, two induction units, pans. Then we were told that because it was an old building, we couldn't use either of the range tops we brought because it would trip the circuit. Wow now we were all burners down, not to mention that we were 45 minutes out from serving.

Then that's when things actually came together. Skipping back, I think I was really in doubt earlier in the week that things would go well. But I think a quick talk from my brother Ambert basically along the lines of "There a lot of friends of yours who expect you to deliver a great meal, go make it happen," really sealed the deal and was what I needed. The next piece of inspiration was from Ben before we sent out the first plates. I don't remember what he said but again just basically "Let's get it done, the stoves don't set us back that much" and then I remembered I brought a butane gas stove as backup. And it was my high powered one. At this point, with one working stove top, we sent out the bread, and began with the salad.

The night gets better. Loren Trefethen of Trefethen Vineyards, one of my favorite wineries and a personal friend, sponsors the wine portion of the event. He sets a wine tasting of their premium whites and reds (the riesling is the best out there). And just looking over at the perfectly set glassware shimmering in the candlelight just made me smile while we were about to send out a total of 150 plates over the course of the night and the pressure was building quickly. Looking out there, people having a great time, friends stepping up to contribute what they could, really reassured me that we could do it. And at a very reasonable cost too at $20 a person. Also need to highlight Evan De La Torre's efforts to collect money. That was huge.

So salad is out, the wine tasting is going strong, but we're really backed up. Who shows up? My brother Ambert, who wasn't even supposed to come. He goes "what can I do?" It was amazing. I put him on the saute station, and he executed well. T minus 1 hour out from serving the beef, we tossed the vacuum sealed and seasoned ribeyes into the circulator, at 135F and I adjusted my watch to mark time. Scallops were sent out a few to a plate. I took a quick break and talked to some friends, made sure they were having a good time, tossed the chefs jacket and went to t-shirt. Sauce was heated for the steak, bread sliced, steaks came out of the water bath, rested, and then on the pans for searing. I gave Ambert my work sashimi knife (yes I trust him that much), and then he went to slicing.

We plated all the beef dishes individually. The sauce was very well balanced thanks to Ben. And I think some of the comments reflected that sentiment. At that point, I realized I had been cooking for about 16 hours and yes I was exhausted. But when I see everyone having good conversation, the wine glasses bright, the generosity of friends, the motivation of friends of family, I just think to myself that it's all worth it and I'd do it again...just without so many shots of Fernet at the end.

Precision

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 06:28:00 +0000

Without precision, it's impossible to have consistent results. At tonight's shift at Okoze, I focused on making sure that all my execution was precise and predictable, by slowing things down just a little bit.

For me, it allows me to drill in proper technique. For the exec chef, they have confidence in what I can turn out. A few reasons why I like this line of work so much is because there is a premium placed on technique, and there isn't much BS in terms of faking what you can and can't do.

So I was making dinner for my brother and some mutual friends at Okoze and while I was working on their omakase dinner, I realized my nigiri (fish on rice) technique was finally coming together. Basically I'm looking to touch the fish less and have it down to three compressions as opposed to the 5 or 6 you see at many restaurants. Within those three compressions, you should see a graceful arc, with a wider head. The tail should also look graceful as if it were the tail of a fish. This is just my opinion and style. But this all can't be done without an exact cut and portioning of the fish. Too thick and it won't round out properly. Too thin and there won't be enough taste and the proportions will be off.

Above is a lemon, sliced for some rolls. Even if we have enough made, I will still do a few just to warm up before guests arrive. I'll usually warm up on my dinner too because I'm not about to go half-ass someone else's meal. I need to go to bed, I have to give a customer portal training for my sales reps bright and early.

A Tour of Our Home Kitchen

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 20:24:00 +0000

Making black bean clams

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 15:52:00 +0000

Gone huntin!

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 23:00:00 +0000

So in a few moments I'll head out to the central valley with some friends to go boar hunting. If anyone has read the Omnivore's Dilemma, I believe they make some mention of that. Then on Sunday, we'll be meeting up for a butchering class where we drop the pigs off at if we're fortunate.

To be able to harvest some truly wild game, and cook with it is an amazing privilege. Fortunately I've been a competitive shooter since I was small so I can handle the marksmanship part. Either way, what most people miss about the whole aspect of hunting is simply to be outdoors. Having absolute respect for the animals you harvest, respecting and upholding game laws...are all part of it. I don't hunt much, but it's great to be able to take some responsibility for what you eat. I'll be able to apply handling principles on high grade seafood, to the handling of this game (should I get even anything), to make sure what we get has been handled with the utmost care.

It's also nice because I'll be going with some hunters who want to learn more about shooting, so I can help them with technique etc, and I'll be able to learn more about hunting and wildlife in general. For you gearheads out there, I'll be taking my Remington 700-5R in 308 Winchester with Leupold Mk4 LR-T scope (my competition platform). Thanks to Chris for letting me borrow his Benchmade fixed blade. I promised him some sausage or boar chops in return. Good deal.

Dinner Party Menu for March 7th 2009

noreply@blogger.com (Bryan Yeung) — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 08:01:00 +0000

Here is the menu for this weekend's dinner party. Of course I might change things up should I spot a winner at the market.

Shiitake miso soup with manila clam and leeks
Ankimo sunomono
Amberjack and tuna sashimi
Sushi...obviously (Engawa, ikura, maguro)
A roll or two
"Napa trip" scallops
Poached lobster with truffled mac and cheese
Black bean clams with fresh bell peppers
Rose-Raspberry Almond Tarts

Chef's notes:
There's a few guests that have had some of my main creations like the Ankimo and lobster. To keep things interesting for them, I'm going to prepare them in slightly different formats. On the sushi portion, I do want to get more into the nigiri and one or two rolls just to demonstrate technique and bring some depth to the Japanese portion. The "Napa trip" scallops has no real name but it's a round molded chopped scallop course with tobbiko and avocado. I made this for Serena in Napa on a trip there and she requested it. The poached lobster is always a hit, and I wanted to make it more accessible by pairing it up with a nice mac and cheese. Black bean clams this time again, but with more of an emphasis on the vegetables to offer up a fresh crunch. Knife work on the bell peppers will be important.

The dessert is what I will focus a lot of development on this week. It's a relatively technical dish and will take some practice runs this week. A paired dinner drink that we had in New Zealand may make it's way onto the menu too but we'll have to see as far as time/expense goes.

Food pic is a roll I made a few years ago.