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Chef De Cuisinart posted:The hotel refuses to put in proper refrigeration, so they fill an old hot well with ice 3 times a day. It may be the most mismanaged property in the company, but has almost 100% occupancy year round, so nobody in corporate seems to care.
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Mar 9, 2015 03:14
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bowmore posted:wouldn't that cost more? Ice/the energy to make more ice would be more expensive in the long run And I pointed that out multiple times. The upper management at that place just doesn't care.
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Mar 9, 2015 03:46
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Chef De Cuisinart posted:And I pointed that out multiple times. The upper management at that place just doesn't care. not sure how many times I've run into that in my working life, it's depressing
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Mar 9, 2015 03:47
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CommonShore posted:I had a regular customer once who wanted his steaks well done to the max. He was never happy until one time, out of spite, we microwaved and deep fried his steak before throwing it on the char broiler. He never found out what we did, but he asked us to do it like that every time, so we did. Add it to the menu, call it "The Atrocity."
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Mar 9, 2015 07:42
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Republicans posted:A dude in my school's baking program did that too. He managed to drag his molten caramel-covered finger across the side of his mouth when he realized this was too hot to put in it so he ended up with kind of a glasgow half-smile scar on his cheek and one gnarly finger. I have those scars on my wrists from flipping hotel pans full of caramel rolls and getting splashed with 375 degree honey brown sugar caramel. That half inch between the cuffs of the jacket and the bottom of my heat pads was apparently incredibly attractive to molten sugar.
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Mar 9, 2015 07:49
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We spent about 7 hours making Mediterranean lamb chili for our chef's chili cookoff and it burned in the last 10 minutes. I was so certain I was getting canned for it. Next morning "chili" was on the prep list, my sous had stayed and made more, and it was joke status. Moral of the story is I loving love this industry.
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Mar 9, 2015 18:23
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Willie Tomg posted:Was going through my phone just now while telling stories and came across this gem: I got a pan seared salmon order (side spinach only, hes watching his figure) sent back because it wasn't "well done enough" except it *was* well done. It was too well done but whatever I remake it and gently caress that fish up, burn it so hard that the sear doesn't have any texture beneath the slimy smutty layer of albumen so thick I may as well have whipped out my dick and jizzed on it. That got sent back too. So we flip poo poo, and put our heads together on how to deal with this because now we're getting creative while being loving pissed off. We take ANOTHER entree portion and microwave it for four minutes, then we cover it in oil and throw it on the grill to bask in a mighty flareup for three minutes a side, then we finish it under a loving creme brulee torch. It is the only time in my career I have purposely hosed with a customer's meal because of emotions. It looked like this going out: If you wrote a book I would buy copies for myself, my family and the friends I care about. Maybe even the ones I don't.
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Mar 9, 2015 19:52
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Chef De Cuisinart posted:"Professional Kitchen" My prep space at Panera loving Bread is larger than this kitchen.
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Mar 9, 2015 23:58
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infiniteguest posted:What is going on with the 9th pans behind that counter? Some of them are just partially wrapped and on ice? Is that asparagus jammed in the ice? Hey. Hey. Hey, listen, you can't just throw money into the trash everytime you get some wild fine-dining coastal elitist whimsy like "lets serve product that has definitely been refrigerated at safe temps until its fired." That kinda thinking is profoundly untexas. If it worked yesterday, it'll work today and continue to work tomorrow, and as long as its not failing in the most catastrophic of all possible ways, its working. Now stop whining. And the asparagus is in a six pan in the ice just FYI. We're not savages, here. We actually got walked through by the health department a few days back and came within a cunthair of being shut down on the spot. We got fifteen points off for not having a handwash sink at the omlette bar out front (  !!!!???!?!?!!) and a handful of points for dangerous temps on the hot-held food, and a bunch of points because the inspector insisted that seven day marking meant a six day shelf life since the day the product was put by didn't count--to the point of an all-but screaming argument with the F&B director. Guess who won the argument. We were 2 points north of having to shut the doors indefinitely, as it is we have 7-10 days to get our poo poo together. The hotel owner was briefed as I came on for the afternoon and was chuckling, blousy-faced, and sanguine. Oh, those scamps in the kitchen. What'll those boys get up to this week? At no point was refrigeration mentioned by anyone, even though the walk ins were running a touch hot. And maybe its because I was fussing over one of the dozen oil-free sauteed proteins I'd have to do that night on account of South by Southwest checkins (bless your heart, inventor of the paper towel) but I realized in that moment that I wasn't a cook, really, because nothing of what I do is anything more than a signifier in a Saussurian sense. I put on some chef clothes as is culinary ritual, throw the asparagus on ice for lack of a better place to put it, and cook food for people who either don't like food or are performing an Opus Dei style catholic pennance on their gut but in either case order it because its dinner time and thats supposed to be what you do. I wear a symbolic coat to cook symbolic food to be sparsely picked at by symbolic customers who probably don't even exist except as figments of a fevered imagination. And y'know what? It's kinda neat, because when nothing matters you can do anything you goddamn please. Cook whatever, use whatever, say whatever, because its me and 170 degree midrare steak guy (who, for all my quibbles, is showing some loving admirable leadership right now) carrying the entire second half of the day on our backs. Its extremely liberating even though freedom ain't worth a whole lot when everything else is unbelievably hosed up. I could walk in twenty minutes late tomorrow, pants around ankles, a Big Boy up my rear end, cock and balls pulled taut strumming them like a ukulele as musical accompaniment to my off-key rendition of Liz Phair's whitechocolatespaceegg and as long as nobody records the poo poo to show the GM and offend his delicate goddamned sensibilities it'd just be another Tuesday. We can't afford a tighter discipline than that. We can't even afford refrigeration. And I can't afford to stay.
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Mar 10, 2015 08:31
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live video of me trying to keep a lid on SXSW service with the staff we got: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rm9dzLxLvxc
Willie Tomg fucked around with this message at 08:36 on Mar 10, 2015 |
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Mar 10, 2015 08:34
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Goddammit, I am so sorry you work in Austin. At least we don't have to deal with tourists in Houston. Or giving a poo poo about people with money. Or anything at all. You want real food in this town you go down the street to the restaurant owned by immigrants that don't give a poo poo if you like their food. I just did a "power breakfast" for a 90+ politicians, their wives and scientists from NASA and the only note we had before service was "make sure the mimosas never run out". I made enough shirred eggs to kill an army and had to deal with multiple glutenevil bitches, but that was the worst of it. I'm starting to think all the chefs that crap on breakfast service are assholes that don't like an easy day at work. I was also drunk by 7am, but I blame the bartender.
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Mar 10, 2015 14:30
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Your bartender is a Good Person and deserves a good solid someday soon.
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Mar 10, 2015 16:47
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Splizwarf posted:Your bartender is a Good Person and deserves a good solid someday soon. Good dick joke, 10/10
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Mar 10, 2015 16:58
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fizzymercy posted:I'm starting to think all the chefs that crap on breakfast service are assholes that don't like an easy day at work. Breakfast/brunch is fine and awesome until it's not and then you're making hollandaise on the fly with a full board and a yolk breaks in your poaching pot and you run out of baked bread and are slicing peameal to order and Old Miss Suzy Shitsherpants is allergic to salt. I do breakfast a couple days a week at my place and do a 2-person brunch service every Sunday where we flip our entire restaurant over at least 4-5 times and I love those services until poo poo goes bad because then it goes AWFUL.
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Mar 10, 2015 20:16
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Yeah pretty much. Brunch/breakfast can get so hilariously crazy in the poo poo so fast. It doesn't help that something about brunchfast seems to bring out the worst/pickiest in people. By far the most mods and head-scratching requests you'll see of any service.
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Mar 11, 2015 00:06
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I love FoH breakfast service in a popular joint it's the busiest most insane service can get besides a nightclub and it owns and I have my afternoons off
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Mar 11, 2015 02:07
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Austin, eh? I have currently in my fridge: torchy's hot sauce, many flavors of deep eddy (love the grapefruit).
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Mar 11, 2015 04:38
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Turkeybone posted:Austin, eh? I have currently in my fridge: torchy's hot sauce, many flavors of deep eddy (love the grapefruit). No Tito's or El Milagro, GTFO
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Mar 11, 2015 04:57
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Thoht posted:Yeah pretty much. Brunch/breakfast can get so hilariously crazy in the poo poo so fast. It doesn't help that something about brunchfast seems to bring out the worst/pickiest in people. By far the most mods and head-scratching requests you'll see of any service. Sure, I'll make your egg white omlette with no oil! Just bring me your own personal pan you don't mind never using again and sign this waiver saying you're willing to settle for frittata.
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Mar 11, 2015 06:34
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Uuuuuuuuuuggggggghhh, those are the absolute worst. Especially when they want ham and bacon in it too. Because egg whites are healthy, therefore
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Mar 11, 2015 08:42
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That's when I go, "Enjoy your scrambled egg whites!" as I plate it for them.
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Mar 11, 2015 09:19
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My boss at the greek/italian place I used to work at had a real hard-on for starting a breakfast menu. He didn't want to open early for breakfast, mind you. He just wanted to offer it during lunch hours. All because I made him a breakfast gyro one morning.
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Mar 12, 2015 00:18
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Republicans posted:My boss at the greek/italian place I used to work at had a real hard-on for starting a breakfast menu. He didn't want to open early for breakfast, mind you. He just wanted to offer it during lunch hours. The breakfast gyro is the ultimate evolution of greek cuisine, so I can't really blame him.
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Mar 12, 2015 00:57
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Alright men I need to make some drat money this weekend. My lunch shifts have been dog shot and I've been blowing all my earnings trying to chase tail around the city and spending tons of money on Uber rides home. Time to get down to brass tax and make loot to spend on bills. Here's to my 40 hour work weekend coming up!
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Mar 13, 2015 16:05
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Is the brass tax high where you live?
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Mar 13, 2015 18:21
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Can't find a strumpet, gotta play trumpet.
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Mar 14, 2015 13:54
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What about that poor dog?!?
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Mar 14, 2015 14:07
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Hello fellow kitchen goons. I finally got my transfer- new store, new city, new home. Same company but its different like night and day. On the bad side, I now work with one of the meanest, rudest old-school cooks I've ever met. Been a manager for longer than I've been alive, now works as an hourly and takes the Paula Deen approach to making cobbler - if it isn't the consistency of Campbell's potato soup, add more butter. I wish I were exaggerating. Doesn't stop her from speaking as if she were the instrument of God Himself. Seriously so much butter I thought about getting some cardiologists' business cards and asking the cashier's to hand them out with cobbler orders. I'm now privy to a lot of what is and has been going on above the store level in the company and it's not good. I could write a short book but I don't know I could make it nearly as entertaining as tragic so yeah. If y'all read the BFC corporate thread, it's like Sundae's place but with food instead of pills. On the plus side, I get 40 hours a week in 4 1/2 days, soon to be 4. Sundays are always off for me, and I'm experiencing new things like being able to take a weekend off and not lose half of my weekly income, or working in a building where the AC unit is actually rated to handle more than 1/2 of the actual square footage it's servicing. I can bust my butt, and if we do get super busy and a customer has to wait more than 60 seconds for their $10 sandwich while I'm doing a two-man job I don't have to hear about how much I suck or how little I care about my job. I have gone two months without a manager telling me to STFU or otherwise cursing at me, which is roughly seven weeks and six days longer than I ever managed at my previous store. I'm also no longer responsible for the failures of peers whose actions I have no control over, and I'm now certified to train new hires to do the positions I work which means that not only do I have a hand in making things run smoothly, my efforts and skills are appreciated and I have more value to the company which means more money for me. In short, I absolutely hate this industry and cannot wait to get a degree but this store makes me actually proud to be there. Amazing how being treated like a human being can affect a person's attitude towards their work.
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Mar 16, 2015 03:12
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The owner of the diner i work at left for the weekend and won't be back for a few days, so of course we're super busy and everyone wants to be a gently caress up. On the plus I think I've achieved a level of frustration so pure that I've pass through the other side and achieved nirvana.
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Mar 16, 2015 15:41
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Rage is power. Well-banked deep fury is galvanizing motivation that is always to hand and requires no reaching, no digging. A very angry person, under control, is extraordinarily productive.
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Mar 16, 2015 19:07
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Splizwarf posted:Rage is power. Zen and the Art of Being The Hulk
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Mar 16, 2015 22:51
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Hey guys, is there an easy way to peel a ton of raw shrimp?
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Mar 17, 2015 00:01
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bunnielab posted:Hey guys, is there an easy way to peel a ton of raw shrimp? Make someone else do it.
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Mar 17, 2015 00:52
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MErrant Gin Monks posted:Make someone else do it. My girlfriend wants more then $10 an hour. 
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Mar 17, 2015 01:28
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bunnielab posted:My girlfriend wants more then $10 an hour. replaceable unskilled labor strikes again 
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Mar 17, 2015 01:34
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bunnielab posted:Hey guys, is there an easy way to peel a ton of raw shrimp? Be really good at it, or hire someone who is. Alternatively, buy PUDs.
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Mar 17, 2015 04:10
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We did 400+ on Friday and 500+ on saturday. Probably new records for us. I love being the anchor at the bar. I was expo for some gnarly months in the back and now I loving love expoing and bartending. Printer busting non stop, 8 bridesmaids at the bar before dinner, glass breaks in the well, gently caress it that's the life E: ran out of backups for our backups - limes, basil, mint, muddled berries, blueberry shrub, strawberry puree, god I love being in the weeds and finding oxygen The Maestro fucked around with this message at 09:32 on Mar 17, 2015 |
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Mar 17, 2015 09:29
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Chef De Cuisinart posted:Be really good at it, or hire someone who is. Alternatively, buy PUDs. What's a PUD?
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Mar 17, 2015 12:49
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bunnielab posted:What's a PUD? Peeled Undeveined
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Mar 17, 2015 12:58
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EAT THE EGGS RICOLA posted:Peeled Undeveined I don't know if I've ever seen such a thing for sale. My only recollection of seeing peeled shrimp are those sad little frozen ones you buy at the big bags.
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Mar 17, 2015 13:52
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