[chef] Knife search shows attributes but cannot find same attribute in recipe

[M G < >]

Hi

When i do 

knife search node name:devwsgw20150130113529 -a tomcat.user

1 items found

devwsgw20150130113529:

  tomcat.user: tomcat

I see there is an attribute called tomcat.user

In recipe I am using,

tcuser=node.attribute[:tomcat][:user]

log "tc user is #{tcuser}"

When I run the chef-client on the above node, i see the following line printed

Compiling Cookbooks...

Converging 14 resources

Recipe: update::deploy

  * log[tc user is ] action write

Why can knife search the attribute and the recipe cannot?

Please provide pointers/suggestions.

Regards

mg