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Skinny King Pimp posted:A place I worked got docked 10 points because the sous had the gall to finish off his bottle of orange juice while standing in the kitchen. Another place in town used to dump quarts and quarts of their really, really good house made ice cream anytime the call went around that the inspector was out and about because it's a pretty big violation to mix cream and milk without repasteurizing it (which requires like a million dollars in equipment to meet code or some stupid bullshit). Those clauses in the health code serve the same purpose as the regulations regarding the minimum decibel level of state radio broadcasts in North Korea. Its not that the DPRK government feels existentially threatened by inadequate propaganda volume or other trivial poo poo, but rather that if you're found guilty of An Thing, then upon investigation you can then get hit with a thousand other niggling little inconsequential things that all pile up to Buck Rodgers time in a labor camp for your entire family and their next three generations. So if a health inspector sees some doofus crack eggs on a dirty cutting board, or the sous chugging orange juice from the bottle when the inspector is right there they can be pretty confident that they can rack up a critical violation on a sterling operation if all the other poo poo is together proving to their higher-ups they're Tough On Health, or that there's easily twenty other points of some kind of nonsense going on if its a not so sterling operation.
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Feb 23, 2015 09:20
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Hobo Camp posted:I've never posted in this thread because I'm on the pastry side, but I wanted to comment on this. I hear you. My blood pressure still spikes 20 points when I hear the phrase 'gluten-free vegan', after a year out of the bakery. We ended up putting a large sign on the door at one point that said 'This bakery contains airbourne gluten, nut dust, and other allergens. Those with allergies are hereby warned of exposure.'
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Feb 23, 2015 11:06
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Secret Spoon posted:We do about 80lbs at once? Im kind of guessing. We would make about 240 lbs every Friday, and if memory serves we only had to do 3 batches. I get that's lovely and all, and regrettable, but is it really a fireable offense? I mean if the dude realized he dropped his cigarettes into the mixer and didn't say anything, that's one thing, and if he did it maliciously, that's another, but what if it was just an honest mistake and he didn't realize it? It's not like 80 lbs of potatoes are that terribly expensive.
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Feb 23, 2015 17:33
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The Midniter posted:I get that's lovely and all, and regrettable, but is it really a fireable offense? I mean if the dude realized he dropped his cigarettes into the mixer and didn't say anything, that's one thing, and if he did it maliciously, that's another, but what if it was just an honest mistake and he didn't realize it? It's not like 80 lbs of potatoes are that terribly expensive. I don't know the whole story but there's more to it than that. I mean if this was the only thing he had done then yeah it would be undue. I mean he's had some choice gently caress ups. A personal favorite of mine was when he took over making pizzas for me one shift and I moved to fry/oven. He made like 7 pizzas with cocktail sauce before it got caught. He isn't a bad dude, I just wish he could have gotten his poo poo together.
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Feb 23, 2015 17:55
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New owner at my place is going smoothly so far. He hasn't tried to change anything up yet. Thank god. I'm hoping he splurges a bit more on some food cost and actually get us some quality poo poo in some areas of the menu. We also accept Discover cards now!
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Feb 23, 2015 18:22
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Errant Gin Monks posted:I used to do garlic smashed potatoes in a giant Hobart for J Alexander's 20 years ago. And it would take a 50 lbs box easy with room to spare. We would also not have any left at the end of the day so... I guess what I mean is the volume produced at the end. Like how many third pans or whatever. I remember making mash for my college cooking job in a hobart and it would produce like four to six 600 third pans. We would reuse some the next day during lunch, though.
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Feb 23, 2015 20:01
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infiniteguest posted:I guess what I mean is the volume produced at the end. Like how many third pans or whatever. I've got an 80qt Hobart that can do around 75lb of potatoes at a time. Yield is about 3-4 full 600 pans depending on mashed or whipped.
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Feb 23, 2015 20:26
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Goons, need a little advice. Long story short I'm a Chef de Cuisine at a relatively nice restaurant in NYC, but all of a sudden I find myself now the executive chef for not only the restaurant, our bar(another property) and two different catering companies. I kind of didn't sign up for any of this poo poo. Also, the main thing is I'm not getting paid for any of this either. Or any benefits "I'll send you the insurance paperwork tomorrow k thx bye!" Is what I have been hearing for a year. I'm wondering about selling out. Private chefing/corporate, etc. I'm at the point now where the whole NYC chef thing isn't worth the ridiculous hours. I would like to see my wife for more than a few days, and I don't know... maybe have a day off every once and awhile. I was wondering what you guys know about these things. I was working with a girl last week at an event (oh, we will just have the chef do it) and she is a private chef, makes more money than I do, works half as much as I do, and just cooks for a rich rear end family and there friends. That's more my speed right now.
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Feb 24, 2015 02:21
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Go corporate, I work for Omni, have full benefits, paid time off and whatnot, making 40k a year in Austin as a kitchen manager with 4 whole years of experience.
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Feb 24, 2015 04:34
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cods posted:Goons, need a little advice. Long story short I'm a Chef de Cuisine at a relatively nice restaurant in NYC, but all of a sudden I find myself now the executive chef for not only the restaurant, our bar(another property) and two different catering companies. I kind of didn't sign up for any of this poo poo. Also, the main thing is I'm not getting paid for any of this either. Or any benefits "I'll send you the insurance paperwork tomorrow k thx bye!" Is what I have been hearing for a year. Hotels in New York are union shops, they're a tough game if you want to run the show, and everybody else is by seniority.
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Feb 24, 2015 04:57
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I got into high-end retirement homes a few years ago and haven't looked back. The bits of my soul that I sacrifice when cooking well done racks of lamb are more than balanced out by rarely working more than 45 hours per week, almost never being at work past 8pm, having paid vacation, sick leave, health benefits and a 47k salary as sous chef.
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Feb 24, 2015 05:45
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Do it. And stop calling it selling out, that's bullshit. Don't work for scumbags, that's stupid. Someone else will say it better than I will, but I read this thread and listened to advice and took a job at a hotel. Full benefits after a month, pto, real money, never getting hosed on hours, ect. I spend more time with my fiance and our kid than I do with my coworkers. And hey thanks to whoever called me an rear end in a top hat for thinking I needed to work two jobs. You were right, I quit the bartender job. Now I'm happy, which feels weird but thanks.
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Feb 24, 2015 14:00
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Hobo Camp posted:I've never posted in this thread because I'm on the pastry side, but I wanted to comment on this. I had a party (private function, 18 people in our upstairs room, doing dinner then some art bullshit and then dessert) this last saturday where a women from the group contacted us more than a week in advance with her list of allergies. SEVERE ALLERGY (in capitals) to dairy, gluten, olive (including oil), red wine, red colourings/dyes of all kinds, and some other poo poo. I dunno, I've rage drank to forget at this point. But anyway, she contacts us a week in advance so I have plenty of time to change my menu up (menu changes weekly anyway) to poo poo that will either work for her or can be modded to work for her. I spend twice as long doing most of the prep to make sure that everything is super loving sanitized and no olive oil has touched anything, etc etc. She has her meal, loves it, all is well, they start their art class bullshit. Then dessert, which I had a couple meringues and some compotes and poo poo, was just gonna make her a simple pavlova, easy peasy. She doesn't want that though. Not because she doesn't like meringue. Or because she just didn't like the dish I had offered, nothing like that. She just really, REALLY wanted one of our white chocolate mousse tarts, the ones that are loving pure dairy stuffed into pate brisee and covered in a whole bunch of (dairy-filled) ganache. "Oh, I can have it sometimes, I just try to avoid those things!" oval office.
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Feb 24, 2015 20:40
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^ Nice. Those are the worst. I was having a poo poo day yesterday, woke up feeling better, then one of my cooks called out (third person in three days) so I'm prepping for three events right now, plus poo poo for specials and working garde... over it. Also, personally for me when I was in culinary school, I wanted to be a "real line cook"(lol), and after I did that for awhile I was like ok, next step sous chef. After that, of course the next step is chef. I was super lucky to have the opportunity I had, and to have that on my resume, but what's next? Being another head chef and working myself to the bone for a few thousand more a year? No thanks. New York is an amazing place, but a poo poo place is a chef without some kind of upper habit. After a really loving long day of babysitting, all I want to do is go home, eat something because I haven't eaten poo poo all day, and drink bourbon before I have to wake up early as hell and do it again the next day. And on that one scarce day off everything hurts, I sleep for about 14 hours, and then I order some something off of seamless. Not a fun life right now. I'm only 28, too. I'm sure a lot of you feel this way too. I love cooking, and it's what I will always will do, it's the only thing I know how to do, but at some point I think there should be some kind of shining light at the end of the tunnel, or some sort of pay off for all the bone grinding work that we all do. I don't know, I'm just in a weird place right now...
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Feb 25, 2015 01:00
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Go corporate. Hotels are great, but there are tons of opportunities in corporate dining in the city. I have one friend who runs an executive dining room for a bank, and another who runs the executive dining room of a university. I have a similar job and pretty much match their salary at the end of the year and only serve 3-50 people a day. It's great pay for not a lot of work and I've gotten to meet some pretty cool people.
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Feb 25, 2015 02:48
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After working for the past two years in what must be the easiest kitchen on the planet (hospital with 40 beds max capacity + a cafe for staff and visitors) I've accepted a position at a new place set to open late Mar/early Apr, and it will be my first job in a "real kitchen." Is there anything I need to know about working in a place where having your own knives in the kitchen isn't considered bringing a weapon to work? I know it's going to be faster paced and more stressful, but the "I'm so busy that I can't move fast enough" moments in my current kitchen are my favorite part of my job, so I don't fear that sort of stress/intensity too much, especially since I'm usually the only cook in the house at my current job, but I imagine there's a lot I just don't know about working in a busy restaurant. Also, I'm staying on part time at the hospital because 16 hrs/wk still gets me full health+vision+dental+401k and my new employers are aware and OK with it. How much will I hate my life by the time I'm a week or month in?
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Feb 25, 2015 04:12
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Oldsrocket_27 posted:After working for the past two years in what must be the easiest kitchen on the planet (hospital with 40 beds max capacity + a cafe for staff and visitors) I've accepted a position at a new place set to open late Mar/early Apr, and it will be my first job in a "real kitchen." Is there anything I need to know about working in a place where having your own knives in the kitchen isn't considered bringing a weapon to work? I know it's going to be faster paced and more stressful, but the "I'm so busy that I can't move fast enough" moments in my current kitchen are my favorite part of my job, so I don't fear that sort of stress/intensity too much, especially since I'm usually the only cook in the house at my current job, but I imagine there's a lot I just don't know about working in a busy restaurant. Also, I'm staying on part time at the hospital because 16 hrs/wk still gets me full health+vision+dental+401k and my new employers are aware and OK with it. How much will I hate my life by the time I'm a week or month in? This is one of those situations where the devil you know is probably better than the devil you don't. First, this may be premature, but good job on staying on with the hospital to keep your benefits. That becomes increasingly important the older you get. Hopefully since they're corporate, you'll have 2 stable, 8 hour shifts per week and the other place can just schedule around them. As for the rest of it? It really comes down to your coworkers, your employers, and being happy with the food you're making more than anything else. A great work environment can make up for low wages, backbreaking work, and a longer commute - but even with great wages it's possible to get burned out if you just hate everyone you work with, or you start getting non-stop split shifts. What you need to figure out for yourself is just how far you want to push yourself, and just how long you want to be doing it. Simply put, you don't see a lot of 55 year olds working the line in busy restaurants - this industry, FOH and BOH are hell on your body. Plan accordingly.
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Feb 25, 2015 05:21
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cods posted:^ Nice. Those are the worst. I was having a poo poo day yesterday, woke up feeling better, then one of my cooks called out (third person in three days) so I'm prepping for three events right now, plus poo poo for specials and working garde... over it. Yep, all of the above is why there's a lot of folks kicking around here with bum knees and desk jobs in IT making double what we used to in the kitchen and calling it a day at 5pm. 
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Feb 25, 2015 09:46
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Naelyan posted:I had a party (private function, 18 people in our upstairs room, doing dinner then some art bullshit and then dessert) this last saturday where a women from the group contacted us more than a week in advance with her list of allergies. SEVERE ALLERGY (in capitals) to dairy, gluten, olive (including oil), red wine, red colourings/dyes of all kinds, and some other poo poo. I dunno, I've rage drank to forget at this point. But anyway, she contacts us a week in advance so I have plenty of time to change my menu up (menu changes weekly anyway) to poo poo that will either work for her or can be modded to work for her. I spend twice as long doing most of the prep to make sure that everything is super loving sanitized and no olive oil has touched anything, etc etc. She has her meal, loves it, all is well, they start their art class bullshit. Then dessert, which I had a couple meringues and some compotes and poo poo, was just gonna make her a simple pavlova, easy peasy. What I really don't understand about situations like these is why cooks don't just follow them through to their logical conclusion. You've received a written list of SEVERE LIFE THREATENING ALLERGIES from a customer, and already done your best to abide by the list. You do this because you mostly don't want to get sued for negligence or killing a person or maybe you just don't want to receive bad press or something. If someone says they're allergic to something, there should be NO loving INSTANCE in which you serve them the thing they're allergic to. I mean, if you're trying to abide by their restrictions and all. Seriously, it just seems like it's lawsuit bait for someone to come in and say 'wellllllllll I'm not really *that* allergic' to the thing I just told you I was deathly allergic to. Seriously, 0 loving tolerance - for liabilities' sake if nothing else. You can only play it one way or the other - either you take the allergies seriously, or you don't.
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Feb 25, 2015 10:33
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This is where working for a private club where you know absolutely every member by name, allergy and drink preference by heart (or by database) makes a huge difference. There are very few unknown variables when you have only 600 members and they must reserve in advance. They like having someone just give them what they want without asking and we like knowing well in advance so we don't have to talk to them more than the minimum. Guy comes in, I make him a drink and nod, he walks away happy without saying a word. Or guy comes in and his wife gets a special gluten free bread basket without him even having to ask, or his stupid table has no ice in his water or whatever. It doesn't eliminate problems but it certainly makes them less painful when they're known quantities.
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Feb 25, 2015 15:27
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mindphlux posted:What I really don't understand about situations like these is why cooks don't just follow them through to their logical conclusion. You've received a written list of SEVERE LIFE THREATENING ALLERGIES from a customer, and already done your best to abide by the list. You do this because you mostly don't want to get sued for negligence or killing a person or maybe you just don't want to receive bad press or something. It's the waiters job. If a ticket came in for table 4 with finicky poo poo and then 30 minutes later dessert gets rung up on table 4 I don't remember they were allergic to poo poo, 100 meals went out in between them.
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Feb 25, 2015 18:03
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mindphlux posted:What I really don't understand about situations like these is why cooks don't just follow them through to their logical conclusion. You've received a written list of SEVERE LIFE THREATENING ALLERGIES from a customer, and already done your best to abide by the list. You do this because you mostly don't want to get sued for negligence or killing a person or maybe you just don't want to receive bad press or something. What I do is just inform the guest that I have absolutely no way of making my kitchen 100% sterile against their allergen. 99.9% of the time, the server comes back and lets me know they aren't really allergic they just don't like/are on a X free diet/etc. We also have a little disclaimer on our menu that says we cannot guarantee that anything will be allergen free, even if you request it.
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Feb 25, 2015 18:22
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My lunch cook asked if he could leave early today, and even though I'm covered up to my neck in poo poo to do for parties/tastings/specials for the restaurant today I said yes so I can cook lunch by myself and if any of my higher ups want to have a meeting they can come talk to the kitchen and talk to me while I work/birch about why we don't have a catering chef. Spite lol.
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Feb 25, 2015 18:44
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I would like to apologise for the one time as a teenager I said I was allergic to carrots, because I really loving hate carrots. I cant do 'em. But it was Cracker Barrel, and there was no other way to get salad without those rediculous little shready carrots. Again, I love and apreciate you guys. This thread gives me great insight into what happens behind the curtain. I hope I have become a more curtious diner.
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Feb 25, 2015 19:13
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mindphlux posted:What I really don't understand about situations like these is why cooks don't just follow them through to their logical conclusion. You've received a written list of SEVERE LIFE THREATENING ALLERGIES from a customer, and already done your best to abide by the list. You do this because you mostly don't want to get sued for negligence or killing a person or maybe you just don't want to receive bad press or something. While I agree in theory, when the guest is ordering dessert and the conversation literally goes Guest: I'd like the dairy thing stuffed in the gluten thing Server: I'm sorry, but we have no way to make that dairy free or gluten free, we have something else prepared for you if you'd like dessert. Guest: Oh, I can eat dairy and gluten sometimes. I really want the thing. Server: Oh... Ok. you can't really send the server back and have them just say "CHEF SAYS NOPE, SORRY ABOUT YOUR LUCK" without expecting that to either start a confrontation with the guest, or make the guest look like an rear end in a top hat in front of everyone else at the table. While in a perfect world I'd gladly welcome either of those outcomes, the fact remains that we're in the service industry and the general public are loving asshats who don't know what they want, but we give it to them anyway. Yeah, I could have made a big deal about stuff, instead I was mildly pissed off for a while and the guest left happy. Them's the breaks. Also I'm in Canada and we're a lot less litigation-happy up here. I've never heard of a first- or second-hand account of a restaurant being sued for anything other than poo poo they should have actually been sued for.
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Feb 25, 2015 23:18
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I really, really enjoyed working at a place that only did a 12-16 course tasting menu where you had to reserve a few days ahead of time because when you reserved your table, the front of house staff made you absolutely confirm any food allergies/dislikes/restrictions and made it absolutely clear that if you missed one you just weren't going to get that course. Cooking a 12 course tasting menu for vegans owns when you have a week's notice and they're polite enough to come in on Monday night for the first seating.
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Feb 25, 2015 23:54
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I've done that before... server comes back and says that the customer wants shrimp tacos, but she's allergic to shrimp unless it's fried, so make sure we fry it. I told him I won't serve shrimp to someone who just said they're allergic to shrimp under any circumstances and she got a burger instead.
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Feb 26, 2015 01:19
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Naelyan posted:
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Feb 26, 2015 04:27
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I sincerely wonder if these people actually know what "allergic" means. I do remember as a kid it seemed like a magic word to get out of eating things - perhaps these people don't understand that allergy means food = death.
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Feb 26, 2015 05:54
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CommonShore posted:I sincerely wonder if these people actually know what "allergic" means. I do remember as a kid it seemed like a magic word to get out of eating things - perhaps these people don't understand that allergy means food = death. They understand that at lovely chain restaurants there's a 50/50 chance that if you ask them to not put pickles on your burger, the server will forget, but if you claim to be allergic it'll work 90% of the time.
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Feb 26, 2015 06:07
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Shooting Blanks posted:They understand that at lovely chain restaurants there's a 50/50 chance that if you ask them to not put pickles on your burger, the server will forget, but if you claim to be allergic it'll work 90% of the time. They could, I dunno... pick off the drat pickles if the cook forgets?
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Feb 26, 2015 18:09
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Wroughtirony posted:They could, I dunno... pick off the drat pickles if the cook forgets? I'm not justifying it. Take me for instance. I cannot eat raw tomatoes. A very small amount will give me horrible acid reflux, a full bite will generally make me puke violently. I don't claim it as an allergy because I haven't been diagnosed. I ask for no tomatoes and it generally works out, and I can think of twice in the last 5 years when I didn't ask and had to send something back because I just didn't expect them to be there. Faking an allergy is lovely but some places just do not give a drat, which is how we got here.
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Feb 26, 2015 18:21
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Wroughtirony posted:They could, I dunno... pick off the drat pickles if the cook forgets? Or the cooks and servers could do their jobs correctly so my bun doesn't taste like pickles. Saying your allergic to something just because you don't like it is bullshit though.
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Feb 26, 2015 20:15
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Special orders: the bane of everyone.
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Feb 26, 2015 20:38
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nuru posted:Special orders: the bane of everyone. Absolutely no substitutions: if you want it your way go to a Burger King. That's actually one of the reasons I took slider trios off my menu. "I want the three sliders. But on the bacon cheese one I want cheddar or american instead of what's listed. And no greens on the pork one at all with the BBQ sauce on the side, also I don't want any blue cheese n the buffalo one but I would rather have goat cheese from the pizza I see listed here. Also make sure there is no mustard on anything but I need a side of mayo and ketchup. Oh and can I have the buns toasted very lightly?" "NO! We no longer do sliders as of now," Errant Gin Monks fucked around with this message at 23:58 on Feb 26, 2015 |
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Feb 26, 2015 23:56
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Nyc goons. I'm in manhatten. What's good? I'm sure yall are working though
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Feb 27, 2015 21:12
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I wish someone would come up with something to say to the couple who has been sitting alone in the restaurant drinking coffee for an hour when they ask if they're keeping you there other than "oh no you're fine *big smile* ".
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Feb 27, 2015 21:48
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WanderingMinstrel I posted:I wish someone would come up with something to say to the couple who has been sitting alone in the restaurant drinking coffee for an hour when they ask if they're keeping you there other than "oh no you're fine *big smile* ". "You are my last table, so I hope you don't mind if I start my side work while you are here. I will check back in a little while to see if you are still okay. Would you mind if we settled your check now so if I am occupied when you finish you don't have to wait for me?"
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Feb 27, 2015 22:11
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Errant Gin Monks posted:"You are my last table, so I hope you don't mind if I start my side work while you are here. I will check back in a little while to see if you are still okay. Would you mind if we settled your check now so if I am occupied when you finish you don't have to wait for me?" That's way more suave than "We're closed, get the gently caress out".
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Feb 27, 2015 22:18
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Uncle Lizard posted:That's way more suave than "We're closed, get the gently caress out". Which is what you should be able to say.
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Feb 27, 2015 22:39
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