DENNIS ODA / DODA@STARBULLETIN.COM
Leeward Community College instructor Stanley Ikei, left, braces himself for words of criticism from restaurateur Michel Martin on a dish of Canard Roti a l'Orange (duck with orange sauce). Behind them, culinary students who prepared dish also await the worst. Martin liked the dish, but said the sauce needed a touch of Grand Marnier, and he suggested a bit more wild rice on the plate.
The legendary Michel Martin
is recognized for his career
devoted to French cuisineSoufflé flares anew By Betty Shimabukuro
betty@starbulletin.comStanley Ikei has his fingers in his ears, his face is squinched up, his feelings are braced for the inevitable.
Taste of the Stars
The annual Leeward Community College gala is an outdoor "grazing" event offering unlimited tastings of dishes from 19 chefs, plus wineFeatured chefs: Alan Wong, Roy Yamaguchi, Sam Choy, Philippe Padovani, Hiroshi Fukui, Chai Chaowasaree, Russell Siu, D.K. Kodama, George Mavrothalassitis and more
When: 6 to 9 p.m. May 3
Place: Leeward Community College lawn
Cost: $80 until April 30; $100 after that. Proceeds benefit the LCC culinary program. Charge tickets on American Express for a $15 discount.
Call: 455-0298 or 455-0475
The honorees
Leeward Community College has inaugurated a Hawaii Culinary Hall of Fame with these first members:Lifetime Achievement Awards: To restaurateur Michel Martin and chef Martin Wyss of the Swiss Inn.
Outstanding Educator Award: To Jimmy Sueyoshi, who began the LCC food Service Department in 1971. Sueyoshi died April 11.
"This is wrong! Who did this?" barks his tormentor, a white-haired gentleman, none too gently.
Ikei rolls his eyes as if to say, "It's always like this," although it hasn't been for more than 30 years.
From 1961 to 1970, Ikei was sous chef at Michel's at the Colony Surf, where the brigadier general of unquestioned authority was the legendary Michel Martin.
Martin always called him "Pupule Okinawan," Ikei recalls. "Every day we fought. About everything."
On this day, April 3, the two are assembled in the kitchen at Leeward Community College. Ikei is an instructor here. Martin is a guest, to be honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award at next month's LCC gala, "Taste of the Stars."
But first, the college is putting on a Hall of Fame Dinner of classic French cuisine, featuring many of Michel's signature dishes, to be prepared and served by culinary students. Martin is here to critique the food, and while he is ever gracious, he's not worried about hurt feelings.
"The idea is good, but the recipe is wrong." That was the escargot.
"This dish is not right" (the onion soup).
"Eh! Is this béarnaise?" "Stan! That's not béarnaise!" (the chateaubriand).
The serving dishes aren't right, either. He wants proper crocks for the soup and real escargot dishes -- "with the pukas" -- but the school doesn't have such luxuries. Martin shrugs. "You're losing the effect."
Finally, Martin allows that the strips of beef over which the béarnaise sauce will be served are "very good." The kitchen breaks out in relieved applause.
It turns out that the day of this tasting is Martin's birthday. He's 96. A good day for reflection.
Martin was born and raised in Nice, where he grew up with an appreciation for good food, tempered by the deprivations of the first world war. "Of course, during the war I didn't have anything. I ate chestnuts until they were coming out of my ... And bread salad. A little bread and dressing -- dinner!"
He left France as a teenager, making his way to Hawaii via San Francisco. When World War II began, he took a job with the Army, feeding soldiers. Then he learned of a small restaurant space available in Wahiawa.
Chez Michel opened in that unlikely location in 1942, starting with burgers. But soldiers from nearby Schofield Barracks started asking for dishes they'd tasted overseas. Frog legs came first. "I started from that."
Martin was the cook and the waiter in the beginning, keeping the menu simple out of necessity. But soon his onion soup, with its lush topping of bread and cheese, his frog legs and other French signatures were drawing the well-heeled diner out to the country. "I got bigger and bigger," he says. "I used to get the Castles and the Cookes and the Dillinghams."
After 17 years, though, losing business to a growing restaurant community in town, he gave up Chez Michel's and migrated to Waikiki. "I sold that for bananas, practically nothing."
Thus began his near-mythical stewardship of Michel's at the Colony Surf. Martin continued to hold sway over the kitchen, but his chief responsibility was to meet and greet. He set the standard for front-of-the-house service islandwide.
More classic dishes became associated with the Michel's name -- duck with orange sauce, soufflés -- but he left the Colony Surf after 11 years for his own place, Chez Michel at Eaton Square.
Semi-retirement came nearly 20 years ago. Both restaurants remain open under the Michel's name, but Martin no longer has a part of either one. He is instead a partner in the Patisserie chain of bakeries.
He divides his time between homes in Hawaii and Nice, and takes two salmon-fishing trips to Alaska every year, even as he approaches the century mark.
While in Hawaii he's awake by 5:30 every morning, Martin says. He works serving customers at the Kahala Mall Patisserie through lunch. "I stay until 1 o'clock and go home. Then I don't move anymore."
BRAD GODA / COURTESY TO THE STAR-BULLETIN
Michel Martin met with old friend John Lind at the April 11 LCC dinner.
So it has been a long day by the time Martin is finished in the LCC kitchen. "Don't expect to please everybody," are his final words to the students. "You'll never make it."
The six-course French dinner takes place on April 11. Martin is in place in the dining room, prepared to greet many old friends, just like in the old days.
He has asked for flowers on the tables -- "it gives a little bit of prestige" -- but nothing so weighty that diners can't see their companions. He also wants water served right off, so no one has to ask for it. "I think this is embarrassing, to ask."
Tommylynn Benavente, the instructor overseeing table service, assures Martin she will make sure of the details and that she will be there with him to maintain standards in the dining room.
He gives her a smile. "Do we get along, you and I?"
It is only the beginning of a long evening for Martin, and it has already been a long day for a man who rises at 5:30 a.m. But as guests arrive, he has charm to spare.
Many of the diners are old patrons of Michel's, some go all the way back to Wahiawa. Others just know the legend and are here for a good French meal.
John Lind booked a table for four as soon as he read about the dinner in the newspaper. He and his wife, Helen, were Martin's customers long ago, and he was theirs. They owned Honolulu Restaurant Supply and helped Martin outfit his restaurants.
BRAD GODA / COURTESY TO THE STAR-BULLETIN
Martin Wyss, center, met with chef/instructor Richard Wagner of Oahu Country Club during the LCC Hall of Fame Dinner April 11. In back is Wyss' wife, Jeanne.
"He was very meticulous about the glassware, chinaware, silverware, anything the customer touched," John Lind recalls.
Helen remembers Martin calling their house on Saturdays when he needed something and the office was closed. "He would say, 'I don't want to talk to a machine!'"
Alan and Martha Peterson visited the Wahiawa Chez Michel as children -- Alan would infuriate Martin by ordering fried chicken every time. As a couple they followed him to Michel's, and Alan learned better eating habits.
"I think it was his presence at the table," Alan says when asked what made Martin such a success. "He'd circulate around the tables, checking on how everyone was doing."
"Besides the cooking," inserts Martha. "And I like his accent."
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DENNIS ODA / DODA@STARBULLETIN.COM
Many spoons dig into a chocolate soufflé in the Leeward Community College kitchen.
Soufflé flares anew
as a Michel treat
By Betty Shimabukuro One of the most memorable dishes from Michel's was the soufflé. Unfortunately, it was a dish without a written recipe.
betty@starbulletin.comCooks baked the puffy desserts -- flavored with chocolate or Grand Marnier -- to order, using a memorized formula.
But for Leeward Community College's recent French dinner, Richard Wagner, pastry chef at the Oahu Country Club and a part-time instructor at LCC, prepared a chocolate soufflé that won Michel Martin's blessing. The following is Wagner's formula for a classic Grand Marnier Soufflé that he said would approximate Michel's. A chocolate variation is included.
Soufflés are not for beginning bakers. Details such as the temperature of your kitchen and the peculiarities of your oven will affect your results. It will take some trial and error to get the outside perfectly crusty and the inside soft and mellow. The most important thing, though, is timing. A soufflé must be served immediately, while hot.
Work flour and butter together to form a paste.Grand Marnier Soufflé
3 ounces (3/4 cup) bread flour
3 ounces (6 tablespoons) butter
4 ounces (1/2 cup) sugar
1 pint (2 cups) milk
2 to 3 ounces (4 to 6 tablespoons) Grand Marnier
10 large egg yolks
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
>> Meringue:
10 egg whites
2 ounces (1/4 cup) sugarDissolve sugar in milk and bring to a boil over medium heat. Remove from heat. Add flour paste and beat vigorously with a wire whip to remove all lumps. Return mixture to heat and bring to a boil, beating constantly. Simmer several minutes until very thick and no starchy taste remains. Transfer to a mixing bowl and cool 5 to 10 minutes.
Beat in Grand Marnier, egg yolks and vanilla.
Batter may be chilled at this point for baking later.
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Butter insides of 10 to 12 individual soufflé dishes or 2 7-inch soufflé or casserole dishes.
To make meringue: Whip egg whites until they form soft peaks. Add sugar and whip until firm, moist peaks form. Fold into batter. Pour mixture into prepared dishes. Smooth tops.
Bake 15 minutes for individual dishes; 30 minutes for larger dishes. Serve immediately.
Notes: To make a chocolate soufflé, melt together 3 ounces of unsweetened chocolate and 1 ounce of sweetened chocolate and add in place of Grand Marnier. To make a vanilla soufflé, eliminate Grand Marnier.
Approximate nutritional analysis, per serving (based on 12 servings): 240 calories, 12 g total fat, 6 g saturated fat, 200 mg cholesterol, 130 sodium, 24 g carbohydrate, 8 g protein.
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