Ploomy Girl #7: Hot Mama’s

Felicia, Ploomy Girl #7 is San Francisco’s premier pancake queen. She basically grew up in the restaurant her family started (Mama’s). At this point in her life, the 27-year old has done everything from wait tables to flip pancakes. And for the record, she prefers flipping pancakes. She can hold her own in Mama’s kitchen, which means she’s speedy with a spatula and can swear coherently in English and Spanish. You don’t see too many female line cooks out there, so we love the fact that she’s mixing things up. She starts her days early, hopefully getting all the baking for the restaurant done by the time they open at 8am, then, a couple of days a week she cooks in the line. Between that and pastry school, she spends most of her time in an apron, covered head-to-toe in flour (it gets messy). We recently caught up with her at the restaurant to see what was cooking. We fed her a few lines to get her to take off the apron…but yeah she wasn’t having it.

Tell us a little about Mama’s.

Felicia: My grandparents started Mama’s in 1951, and we’ve been on the same corner in North Beach for that long! It’s this tiny little place, definitely nothing fancy, but we have a line out the door every day of the week. We serve breakfast and lunch, but we’re best known for our breakfast, and our menu is huge…full of all the breakfast favorites, but done really well.

What’s your favorite thing on the menu?

We have 8 different kinds of French toast, all made with breads that I bake every morning, and served with homemade jam. Plus a million different kinds of omelettes and a pancake recipe that has been handed down like some families hand down heirloom jewelry. My favorite thing on the menu is probably the Monte Cristo though. It’s a sandwich made with turkey, ham and two kinds of cheese and then it’s dipped in egg and grilled like French toast. I know it sounds sort of weird, but it’s absolutely delicious. I swear, people die over it!

How is it like working with family?

Felicia: It’s an experience and it’s definitely not for everybody. My dad is a baker, my mom deals with a lot of the business end of things, and my brother, well my brother is 22 so we’re not so sure what his specific calling is yet. But we are all constantly in each other’s faces. We work in the same space up to 6 days a week and when we’re not actually working, we’re sitting around a dinner table – at Thanksgiving for example, talking about work! I would say the best part is that it keeps us close, even if we’re fighting about something, we’re at least talking to each other! And the worst part is that my mom is my boss, so every request feels like I’m 14 and she’s telling me to clean my room.

Do you ever have any unruly customers at the restaurant?

Felicia: Yes. Waiting in line for breakfast for over an hour often makes people unruly. It’s amazing how worked up people can get over how crispy their bacon is or how many blueberries are in their pancakes. The trick is to not let people walk all over you, but not to send them home to yelp.com to rant about how horrible that girl in the apron was. That old “customer is always right” thing is about 80% true. I will smile and nod and accommodate someone as long as things stay within reason, but I won’t let anyone be an asshole. After all, I’m the boss…and I know how to use a knife.

Any weird restaurant stories?

Felicia: So many weird stories! Anyone who works in a restaurant has fantastic stories. I’m sorry to tell you that we all stand around in the kitchen and talk about the weird things you do when you’re a customer. I once served a table full of guys who worked the door at a local strip club. Every time I brought them another round of mimosas they threw dollar bills on my tray, until I politely (or maybe not so politely) reminded them that they weren’t actually in the strip club anymore. North Beach is especially interesting I think, because it’s a neighborhood full of characters. There’s the lady who comes in every Wednesday in her sports bra and booty shorts and orders pancakes and a nonfat, double shot, decaf latte extra hot with no foam…and THEN without fail, sends it back because it is too hot, not hot enough, too strong, too milky, or too brown. We actually had to ban her from ordering espresso drinks because it got so ridiculous. There’s the fedora wearing director, whose horrible little purse dog has special “mental health” tags so it can come into restaurants. The miserable little thing eats off the plates and licks the table so when they leave, everything has to be tossed out and sanitized. I’m not complaining though. I love weird. Weird gets me through the day!

We know you used to have a pretty cool office job at Dreamworks. What made you trade in the cubicle for the kitchen?

Felicia: Because I once had a meeting where my manager told me that she felt like I wasn’t “engaging in my spreadsheets.” I hate cubicles and I hate spreadsheets. I don’t really think I belong in an office environment. It was a good experience and I met amazing creative and talented people. If you wait a really long time you will even see my name in the credits for Shrek 2 and Shrek the Third (My mom was super excited about that). But I don’t like office politics and meetings and yearly reviews. In the restaurant, we’re casual and we’re honest. If you have a problem with somebody you lay it out, maybe you yell a little and you get it over with. There’s no human resources department. Plus everyday presents something new. I’m not coming in and staring at a computer screen for 8 hours with my butt glued to a swivel chair. It’s always crazy. Like one day I’ll come in and the oven is on fire, or the bottom floor is flooded. Maybe its not always good crazy, but it’s always different.

How are the teachers at culinary school? Are any of them assholes like on the TV shows?

Felicia: Well, it’s not like Hell’s Kitchen. Nobody is red-faced and screaming at me…and I’ve never cried! The chef who teaches the pastry course is actually very nice and she does really funny impressions of Julia Child. I think sometimes chefs get the reputation for being tough because they’re incredibly diligent and strict about the way they run their kitchens. But there are reasons for that, kitchens are scary places. There are knives and fire and men in clogs! Within the chaos, there has to be some order so that people don’t get hurt.

What’s your favorite dessert to make?

Felicia: I make a mean cream puff! I’m constantly learning something new and complicated and interesting in school, so I feel like I have a new favorite every week. Baking is a whole different thing from cooking, it’s incredibly precise. You can make one little mistake and have to toss the whole thing in the garbage and start over again. But, at the same time, baking can feel like culinary magic. You use the same basic ingredients: eggs, sugar, flour to make anything from a souffle to a wedding cake. Actually, yes, souffles are a favorite, they’re spectacular because they puff up like magic and then melt in your mouth. Also, for whatever reason, people always find them impressive.

Do you ever bring the things you bake back to your friends?

Felicia: My guy friends love me right now. The ones lucky enough to live on the way home from school to my apartment are constantly getting deliveries. Cheesecakes, cupcakes, cream puffs: I think they’re all going to get fat, but they’re definitely not complaining. Everybody loves dessert so you’re a popular person when you’re in pastry school. It also works out better for me because otherwise all that stuff would be in MY fridge and I eat plenty of it already.

I see you have a blog. Tell us about it.

Felicia: It’s so all over the place! I mean, basically it’s about me, which means that you would have to find me terribly interesting to want to read it with any regularity. I started it more as an online journal type of thing, to force myself to write, and then friends started to read it and they were allegedly entertained. I suppose, like any blog, it’s my own little soapbox for spewing opinions and also for telling stories. I tell restaurant stories, Saturday night stories….dating stories. The dating stories are usually a big hit – don’t worry though, I always use nicknames, so even when I’m talking shit, I’m doing it anonymously! It’s funny how quickly things spread though…somebody sends a link to someone else and the next thing you know you’re at your best friend’s engagement party and the father of her future husband is saying, “Felicia, I love your blog, it’s great!” True story!

What are your favorite things to do in the city?

Felicia: I am absolutely in love with San Francisco, I always have been. This city has such a great culture and is, of course, an amazing city for food. Can you tell that food is kind of a theme? That’s what happens when you grow up in a restaurant family. I am definitely not the girl who orders a salad. I spend a lot of evenings checking out new restaurants or searching out some little hole in the wall I heard about from somebody else. Other than that I get cocktails with my girlfriends; I spend sunny days at Dolores Park; I wander around bookstores… and shoe stores. Two of my great passions in life: old books (I love the smell) and beautiful shoes.

What do you look for in guys?

Felicia: I generally look for a guy who is a mild slob with good taste in books and restaurants. Please don’t take me to the Cheesecake Factory and please don’t say the last thing you read was Maxim. Does that sound snotty? It’s not meant to be. I just mean that in a city like San Francisco, I’d rather go get a really delicious burrito in the Mission than sit at the top of Macy’s with a 25 page laminated menu. I also find that I gravitate towards guys who are involved in something creative, and like me, are not cubicle people. I rarely date investment bankers. Last, but not least, I have a reaaaally dry sense of humor. I’m sarcastic and I talk a lot of shit so I usually don’t last long with sensitive souls! I laugh at others, I laugh at myself … I need that in another person.

Whats one of the worst dates you’ve been on?

Felicia: Please see “dating, etc” on my blog. Really, I’ve been on some pretty bad dates. I think I bring it on myself though, because I secretly sort of like first dates…I like the challenge of getting to know someone new, oh and I like to flirt. First dates are usually good for that. If you can keep up a pretty consistent chat over a glass of wine, then it’s not all that bad. The worst dates are the ones where there is just straight up silence for days and you’re both searching frantically for some topic of convo! I was on a date once where the conversation became so strained that the guy started talking about his dog, which he had recently dressed up like an iguana for Halloween (not cute). The most exciting thing that happened all night was that in the middle of it, we had a small earthquake. And I said, “Oh my god, I think we just had an earthquake, did you feel that?” And he said, “No.” I’d have to say I go on a lot of first dates and very few second dates.

What do you think men need to know?

Felicia: Once I was at a bar (probably on a Friday night) and a guy had the bartender send me a shot of water and then he came over to talk to me like, “Hey, I’m the guy who sent you the water.” And I thought, why does it always have to be a gimmick or a line? Stuff like that gets so old. Imagine how many silly introductions the average girl experiences in one weekend and you’ll understand the appeal of a genuine, “hey, how’s it going?”

What are you doing this Friday night?

Felicia: I hate Friday nights!! Probably because my “weekend” is typically Sunday and Monday. So on Friday nights, everyone else is raring to go and I still have to get up and bake bread at 5am on Saturday morning. But in general I’d say that I prefer going out on non-weekend nights, the energy is a little different and places aren’t as crowded. I love Thursday nights actually, that’s when our little crew from Mama’s usually heads out together for cocktails and good music. We dance; we tell our fantastic restaurant stories; we make friends with the bartender.

Want more Felicia?

http://littlemissfi.blogspot.com

http://www.mamas-sf.com/

The real Mama

Editor’s Note: This Ploomy Girl was nominated by Katie in Portland, Oregon (grazie!). Are you a Ploomy Girl or know someone who is? Nominate her! Learn more here.