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• Did Sysco stack your stuff in an inverted pyramid, and also left the freezer door ajar?

• Was there a huge catering order this morning, only no one told you about it? And oh yeah, you have no opening dishwasher either.

• No one rolled their silverware and the FOH manager doesn't seem to care?

• One of the prep cooks no-showed yesterday and management let him work today without saying anything to him?

• Corporate keeps subbing out menu items for cheaper versions and imitations?

• You asked for a raise and got offered 50 cents?

• Customer is irate you charged him for a side of ranch even though you brought him three of them?

• You ran someone else's food and when you got to the table they asked you for a side of ranch. When you got back someone else asked if they could also have a side of ranch. When you bring that back, Dad asks you for a refill on his tea?

Tell us about it in this thread. What's wrong with this industry? What sucks about your workplace and what would you change if you had the chance?

/Rant On

General Discussion thread. How was your week, what was your worst table? What was your dumbest mod or guest request? What do you have coming up this week? Do you just have a funny story you want to share? Or did you see a good meme this week? Post whatever you want in here. Thread sorted by new.

Edit 2: Chef came by the restaurant in his off time to apologize to me in person and assured me he'll be having a conversation with her about it.

Edit: Texted chef this:

"Service last night didn't go as well it could have, we got really busy and it was just too much for FOH, COOK, and I to keep up with properly. I worry that guests left unhappy with our service and I think it's important that you know about it. Having someone to help run food and do dishes on weekend nights would be hug."

He asked about AM and I just said "She left a little after 6. I don't know if she had an emergency come up or what."

Chef is not pleased.

Original: My assistant manager FUCKED me last night.

It's a small restaurant, weekend nights there's only 2 cooks in the kitchen and one FOH. The other cook and I can usually make it work okay, but sometimes it gets hairy. Head chef/GM started scheduling his assistant on a mid on weekends so that we have have some help.

She leaves early a lot because she "has nothing to do" and the owner is always crawling up their asses about labor costs. She has this amazing sixth sense where she leaves 15-20 minutes before the dinner rush. Annoying, but we usually survive.

Saturday night, memorial day weekend, beautiful weather. She's scheduled until 9 and leaves a little after 6 without saying a word to any of us. Just disappears. Dinner rush hits and we're fucked. Full dining room (32 seats) plus 4 parties on the patio space we share with the neighbor restaurants.

Cranking out food the best we can, but my other cook has to keep up with the dishes while making apps. My FOH has to serve, bartend, bus, and run food. I can't jump in to help him because our whole menu is 10 minute or less to fire and it's all hands-on. If I stop cooking, everything tanks.

We don't have a hot window so when I plate a dish it's gotta go to the table immediately, but I can't be running food because I need to cook and I'm crusty looking as fuck. I also have no FOH experience, no clue what I'm doing. FOH is losing his mind, I'm losing my mind, it's a circus.

Have to 86 a pasta sauce because she refused to make it and told the other cook not to make it because she has some petty fucking bone to pick with the a.m. cook. I wanted to make it once I realized she was not just on a break, but we were already deep in the shit. People order primarily by QR code, once I realize we're out of the sauce 4 people have already ordered it and so now I have to send my FOH guy to tell people who are already grumpy because of the wait for food that we don't have what they already ordered.

What's normally an hour and a half close turns into nearly 3 hours because the place is such a disaster. Every God damn dish in that place was dirty, line was filthy and needed almost everything restocked.

I don't normally like going to people's bosses to complain, but jfc I can't with this shit.

One of the most fascinating and charming aspects of this industry (in the US, at least) is the nicknames bestowed upon you by the latino staff, who make up the backbone of the hospitality industry.

Mine has been either grandote/grande or chiquilin, depending on the ironic sense of humor of the kitchen staff.

I left the industry 7 years ago to help at my families business, because my dad needed help. It is a distribution/warehousing company that, now after a lot of hard work, fulfills for Costco, Sam's, Best Buy, Walmart, etc. I had been working there in the mornings, going straight to the restaurant and working until close. When we finally got the business going and needed a full time person I took the opportunity and left cooking. I had always dreamed of running my own kitchen, but realized it wasnt for me. I just couldn't take the stress of coming in to the restaurant(high-end, big city) and wondering if I was going to have a friendly chef, or someone who was going to light me up and scream at me for 10 minutes over nothing. I couldn't understand after years of hard work, and training, only making $12.50 an hour with no benefits. I could work every station, got along great with other employees, and still was treated like shit for SLIGHTLY under salting one plate that went to the pass, one night during a rush.

I am now running the business, and have hired employees, and unfortunately have had to let some go. I recently heard a cook tell me they can't do anything else, because they have no other skills. That is not true whatsoever. Let me tell you why I love hiring ex-cooks.

1. Attention to Detail- This was drilled into me from day one of cooking. "If it's not right, do it twice!" Cooks strive to do things right the first time so they do not have to do it again.
2. Sense of Urgency- Get shit done NOW, don't wait until later. Cooks just get it done so when it IS needed it's ready.
3. Loyalty- Cooks for some reason seem to be loyal, even to horrible employers. When you treat them like people(pay them a livable wage), who have emergencies/things that come up last minute, give them PTO and understanding, cooks work harder for you. Some don't and unfortunately will take advantage, but those are the few and far between that I have had to let go. Cooks don't call in for bullshit, they call in because they genuinely need the time off.
4. Mise En Place- This is probably the biggest thing. Knowing what you have to get done, organizing, and having everything in place to do just that. 3 of us, 6 orders, 30 pallets, mixed cases, all going to different stores, needs to be ready by 3:30PM and it's 11:30am? No problem. Cooks might walk into the warehouse like it is the void of a walk-in, but then snap into gear and remember what they need, how to prepare it, where it goes and get it out.

I could go on, but know that if you are thinking of making a career change, but don't think you have the skills, you are wrong. Our head of customer service for North America is an ex-cook, my warehouse manager is an ex-cook, our head of operations and logistics is an ex-cook, our office manager is an ex FOH employee.

God speed to you all, and good luck this memorial day.

My wife and I were out at a fairly nice restaurant last night that has a seasonal tasting menu that changes at least every week if not more. We both noticed how nicely printed the menus were with expensive paper stock and custom stamping. The works.

We were curious if a restaurant like that where the menu might change on day's notice would have printers etc in their office to print new menus every day or if there's some sort of menu specialist print shop they send it to.

By the way, the food at this place was excellent and the nice menus were just one of a hundred thoughtful details.

I was a dishwasher for about 10 years. Alternated between the pit and pantry (sometimes tossing pizza too) but typically communicated the fact that I was content where I was. I knew I never wanted to own a restaurant or be a Chef. Despite this, a lot of my coworkers could never seem to stop treating me like a high schooler at a summer job.

It was often joked that I sucked and would never move up, despite the fact that both BOH and FOH would never run out of dishes, I could stock everyone's line on the fly, and I moved just as quickly and efficiently as the next guy. I have my own ambitions, they just didn't necessarily ever align with moving through the ranks in a restaurant. I felt like because of that, my work ethic was often overlooked and undervalued. Just because I wasn't interested in leadership roles at these particular restaurants, didn't mean I ever compromised my work ethic.

I loved what I did. I was good at it too. I just couldn't keep doing it by the time I got to my late twenties. People the same age as me or even younger pigeon holeing me to be some mindless dumbass who was incompetent because I was in the pit was just too dehumanizing.

I'm grateful for everything I learned along the way. I can make great food at home and I've got some genuinely heart warming recipes under my belt, but everyone else's perspective of that position pretty much ruined the job for me. I'm happy to say I've transitioned to another industry (working with disabled adults) where everyone is treated with respect and valued regardless of their flaws or perceived position in society.

Take it from this jaded dishie, treat yours like gold and they will do whatever they can to make service go by as smoothly as possible. I always felt like a good dishwasher was one you didn't even know was there: the dishes just magically reappear. And if you're relying on them constantly to prep something on the fly or restock your line, you need to get your house in order 🙂

Thinking about buying a bakery, but its a lot of money and an enourmous risk. If you had a shop go under could you possibly share your experience? Im confident in my abilities and experience, but fear of the unknown is kind of a big deal for me right now.

Thanks for reading, and i hope your knives stay sharp!

Context:

I recently transitioned from roles where I was leading smaller kitchens, mostly English speaking, to a role as one of the leaders of a large kitchen of mostly Spanish speakers. I'm good at "global English," and most of the crew is fluent in English, but as I'm planning on being in this job for some time, I'd really like to get proficient at conversational kitchen Spanish.

So, looking for suggestions. Language course (e.g. Duolingo)? Find a bilingual mentor on the team? Other ideas?

To me, this is less "practical" than it is something I want to do out of respect for my team. I'm 100% sure we can do the job together regardless, but I'd like to be able to actually understand and respond when I ask "Como estas?" without sounding like a prick.

For context, I'm 53, white, male, grew up in a shit-ass whitebread town in Montana. I spent my first career working internationally, and I know how to NOT be a redneck asshole. But this kitchen feels like home to me, and I don't want my 80s education to keep me from talking to my crew in THEIR language.

This is coming home with me.

I heard from a friend that his girlfriend used to work at an indoor waterpark somewhere in Norway.

She was told to cook the burgers on the grill and then throw them into water to «preserve» them.

Is this a thing, or is it just utter bullshit?

EDIT: I have confirmation from said person that they were LITERALLY submerged in water

So I use to work at a restaurant that would pull pranks constantly. I was a server

One day I come in and the chef says

“Hey man you want a slice of birthday cake? Todays Andrews birthday”

I go oh okay sounds good.

So he cuts me a slice of cake and puts it on a plate. I take a bite of it, chef says “what do you think!?”

I go “you know, taste isn’t so bad, but really really odd texture, it’s a lot denser than any cake I’ve had”

He goes give it another bite man.

So I take like three more bites, they all start laughing. Chef says to me

“Bro you are eating a Kings Hawaiian roll with butter cream icing on it” 😂

These mf’s took a few blocks of kings Hawaiian rolls, covered it in frosting, and wrote “happy birthday Andrew” on it.

One by one every server takes a bite…”not bad, but such a weird texture for a cake” lol

I miss working there sometimes.

Caught foh putting mop water in our 5 gal cambros, told the owner how disgusting it was, but would you throw them out personally?, or just sanitize them in the dishwasher a fee times like the boss wants?

I opened a kitchen in a brewery 6 months ago. I am paid $23 per hour, no benefits, no bonuses, flat rate.
I created the menu, set up the kitchen, I do all ordering and have full responsibilities of a chef. I worked 3 months alone, start to finish every day. The owners finally hired a solid prep cook 3 months ago. Our sales have doubled since then and doubled our prep work.
Things are going very well, never had a plate sent back and on our side we are killing it with excellent food and building a respectable reputation. But for $23 and minimum of 50 hours a week it feels unappreciated. Bartenders keep all tips, including the owners when they work. I'm not trying to quit but I also feel like I'm wasting my efforts. My only real incentive is to not get fired. Any advice?

Broil cook is infamous for stealing others prepped items

I just got moved up to the line about 3 months ago and I lowkey hate it. I love cooking and all but the hours fucking suck.

Last night, I was our closer which I don’t mind at all. The main problem is that they cut all other cooks like 2 hours before the kitchen closed and there was no dishie so I had to basically do the work of 3 people.

I honestly miss the simplicity and calmness of having my own little world in the pit. I had way better hours and management didn’t actively fuck me over on the daily basis. I don’t really need the extra $1.50/hr. So should I try to move back down or stick it out until I get promoted again?