At one of the Escoffier dinners I had the honor of cooking for we had Turtle soup for the soup course. An old Swiss chef, chef Charles Finance, came to me after the dinner.
He said " When I was a young chef in the Bahamas I had to cut the head off of a turtle to make the soup. I looked into his eyes while I held the blade. He was crying. Tears were running down his cheeks. So I could never again no more cook the turtle soup"
So I asked him "Did you not eat the soup?"
"Oh yes, I ate the soup. It was delicious"
I was first exposed to Turtle soup when I was 5 years old in Detroit Michigan. Dad had been transferred to Detroit and for a few months we lived in the Whittier Hotel. I was fascinated by Turtle soup, and ordered it often. Years later, working at Luminarias in Fort Worth, I found that my chef Billy Ray had been a cook at the Whittier when I was up there. I had been eating his Turtle Soup.
Image- Chef Finance, Houston, 1964
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