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I thought it was great that I put my notice in last night and the owner hadn't contacted me at all. Then he called the gm, and they talked for a minute, and she told me the owner wanted to talk, but before that she mentioned that the owner might want to cut my salary in the remainder of the time here! Nice! Then I got on the phone with the owner, I let him poo poo on me. And I assured him I wasn't going to let things go to poo poo. Didn't mention anything about a pay cut. Also said something about wanting me to stay over a month if they haven't found anybody. Get real dude. One month and I'm out bitch. So next week when I get my check(he is too cheap to do direct deposit lol) and it's short, can I just loving leave? There isn't anything in my contract about leaving/how long of a notice I have to give. Ughghgj stress.
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Mar 10, 2016 01:54
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JawKnee posted:frankly I'm not certain why you haven't yet apart from the innate desire to be professional in an environment where no one else is? I'm way too nice, which has hosed me a million times before. I literally cannot tell you the last time I have had a vacation because I haven't, six days a week for longer than I can remember, etc. But I'm getting over that because I do realize it just fucks me in the rear end, but it can work in my favor, luckily my reputation got me my next gig. I used to work with some guys and they actually found me/sought me out. Also the whole chefing thing I'm pretty decent at. Have a tasting tomorrow with the owner. Gonna be awkwaaaaaaard. But I think after that I dont have to really see him anymore. Tore down dry storage and reorganizing to clear head. Stress headache yo. cods fucked around with this message at 03:26 on Mar 10, 2016 |
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Mar 10, 2016 03:18
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My next spot isn't open yet, but if in a couple of weeks holmes wants to gently caress with my pay I'll totally walk out.
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Mar 10, 2016 04:02
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Vorenus posted:Honestly your posts come across like you're someone who has a really hard time standing up for yourself and if that's the case people are going to walk all over you until you change it. I don't mean to be rude and it's quite possible I'm misreading text on an internet forum but that's the impression I'm getting. No, I'm terrible at it. It's my biggest flaw, and I know that. Part of eating poo poo and saying yes, for me, was part of my journey, or whatever you want to call it, to head chef. As a cook I ended up always being the guy to rely on when someone calls out. Then when I was sous I was always there for my chef when, again people called out, or when the chef didn't have time to do ordering, or would I would stay late, or come in on my day off, whatever. And in my current situation , I just realized it was poo poo, was never going to get better(talked to the gm today and she said this has happened several times in the past because the owner is such a douche) and I said gently caress this my life is too short. I would never, especially as a head chef, quit after four months but my Bullshit meter is kind of short after years of eating rear end from owners. At least I've worked with the people that I'm getting involved in and they are level headed and let the chef do his thing. Also my current owner hates me. I came in as an experienced chef and I walked into an episode of kitchen nightmares, it was a complete poo poo show. Like the worst kitchen I had ever seen. But he really only cares about the bottom line. He really doesn't give a poo poo about what we serve as long as it hits 25% food cost. The chef before me was just doing really rear end backwards weird stuff to make food cost. I was mortified. Cutting every corner you could think of. He liked her because she made cost, even though she served poo poo he was still making money. As soon as I came in I started ordering real(not nice, or extravagant) normal products from reputable sources, but it raised food cost by a few percent and he freaks out. He doesnt realize 25 percent is not attainable unless you do ghetto poo poo. He would rather have ghetto poo poo instead of actually having the products advertised on the menu. Also our menu is protein heavy. Steak houses run high cost because steak is expensive, and they make money on sides/booze. A vegetable heavy restaurant runs great food cost(as long your doing everything yourself) because there's nothing crazy expensive. A regular place runs around 27-29(again this depends on a lot of poo poo). This is a regular place, 25% is just ridiculous and I refuse to order Swiss and sell it as gruyere and a bunch of other poo poo like that. That was our big battle. Dry storage looks good though, I'm sure it will be hosed up by morning.
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Mar 10, 2016 06:00
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Was supposed to have a tasting with the owner for new spring menu stuff, which was going to be awkward as gently caress. But hes 45 minutes late, no call or text. Made all this poo poo... This is the second time this has happened. Edit: aaaaand saute cook called out. Niice cods fucked around with this message at 22:14 on Mar 10, 2016 |
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Mar 10, 2016 20:50
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Just found out, owner was going to cut my pay and not tell me, until the Gm got into fight with him and reminded him that A. I would just leave and B. That's illegal and lovely. Only four more weeks of this poo poo!
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Mar 10, 2016 23:59
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Hey cooking goons, in light of my recent poo poo show I've been experiencing which has been going on for the past couple of pages, I decided to type up a little "what not to do/when to not accept a position/when to GTFO" as far as if your job hunting and looking to start somewhere. Background: Head chef in NYC, born down south, went to culinary school, got an Internship across the country, got the hell out of the South, cooked in the mountains, then on the west coast. Then I moved to NY. The majority of the places I have worked were really nice places, but then there has been some poo poo holes along the way. The goal here is to give you younger folks some warning signs that will save you lots of frustrations/headaches and most importantly save you from wasting your precious time from something will suck your soul out and leave you doubting why you ever got into this business in the first place. A lot if this will seem like common sense, but sometimes whether it be money, a convenient location, or a good spiel it can be easy if you are in a tight spot to be suckered into something you will regret later. Alright, enough bullshit. 1. The place doesn't have a (real) Vitamix or robocoupe. This one sounds silly but I will never ever not follow this rule ever again. Although in the UK do you guys have some called a thermo mix?Not entirely sure if that translates 100%. This one has screwed me over a couple of times. If the place doesn't have those, then don't do it. When did my interview/tasting at my current pisshole, the sketchball owner told me he had just purchased a brand new Vitamix, and robocoupe. Great, I thought. Then I did my tasting, and the only thing I could find was some lovely bar Vitamix with no hi/low, but a broken pulse switch that was barely chugging along while I was making lumpy parsnip puree. I thought because I had never been there that I couldn't find the real blender, but no, that was it. And the brand new robocoupe was a Cuisinart that clearly said for home use only. All of the lovely places I have ever stepped into did not have the two basic pieces of equipment. 2. The place does not have an A on their health inspection score. No excuse for this. I got suckered in because the place I was at hadn't had a chef for a month, and the inspector came, and poo poo happens. Then I looked it up and they had a B for a whiiiiile. And it turns out they were shut down for rodents in the past, even when they had a chef. After spending my first week in the walk in trying to fix it, the inspector came and we narrowly got an A, but. I realize this place is always going to be a disaster that's hard to keep clean no matter what you do. No A, go home. 3. Come in for a trail and the walk in is a disaster. No dates, labels, poo poo without lids, things on the floor. Fishy smell. RUN. Like I said I made the walk in my job for weeks, but the old chef had done such a lovely job training the staff they just pull poo poo out of the box, leave the box, prep, put poo poo everywhere, no sense of organization. It's always been a thorn in my side. And the problem was all these guys had been here for like 3 years and I couldnt teach old dogs new tricks. I've replaced most of them, but usually I get the walk in nice and it's hosed like an hour later. Then I yell, they don't understand, and then I have to fix it. 4. It's old/looks dirty. Old buildings, especially in large metropolitan areas, can be plagued with problems. Rodents, bad plumbing, lots of nooks and crannies etc. All these things can make it really hard to keep a place nice, organized, and clean, in terms of not only food safety, passing inspections, but also your loving sanity. If I walk in to a dry storage and it's all hosed up, Ocd kicks and I can't leave until it's fixed. If it's like that everywhere it makes it hard to function. And if they know they have a trail coming in, and it's still dirty, bad sign. 5. I'll think of more but I have a lot of monkfish to butcher.
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Mar 12, 2016 22:25
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Fleetwood posted:Something quick and easy you can do is to take a look at the fryers. I worked at one place where the flueboxes at the back of the fryers were so ill-maintanted that they had completely bowed inward from gunk and debris building up in the caseback. Maybe someday I'll post pics of all the gunk I chiseled out of them. Yeah, my first cooking job was at this lovely bar in Georgia. The boss never changed the oil. Like the poo poo would be in there for a month. Black and smokey all the time. I didn't really know any better as I was young and retarded. Place ended up going good out of business. We also bought half of out poo poo from the grocery store. Should have seen the signs...
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Mar 13, 2016 23:50
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Tender Child Loins posted:I cut my beignets beforehand and keep them cold til I fry them. Do it man. Life is too short to have a Bullshit job, especially if your cooking. That's hard enough right there. Theres so many good jobs for good people it's not even worth it to stay at a lovely place. What's your current situation? Also there was a tasting for a new chef this morning at my place and it didn't go well. Lol. Dude either choked or wasn't very good. Basically hosed everything. Owner(who is a dick) put down fork after first bite. The guy kept talking about foie, and other expensive poo poo that the owner doesn't like. Told my sous today I'm leaving, he was totally cool with it. And understands completely. He's still fine where he's at because his salary is good and this place is really close to his apt. Also just found one of the assistant gms put in her notice yesterday too. She found an amazing job and is taking it. Gm is freaking out. Three more weeks...
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Mar 16, 2016 02:50
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Tender Child Loins posted:I'm an exec chef at a place that's been struggling since long before I got there a few months ago. Some of the telltale signs you wrote about were there: no working kitchenaid, no robocoup, a household blender, no dates or labels on anything, really. Also, super high turnover: I'm the third chef in a year. The owners do the exact things that make my anxiety flare up, like not communicating big events until right before they're happening, not being forthright about what they want. And you can kind of tell from the restaurant space, which looks and feels unfocused. And obviously they're paying me well below the mean salary of chefs in my region. I thought I would be able to make it work but they treat me and the rest of the staff like servants on the rare occasions they show up to the place. I like the rest of the staff, and I don't want to put them through more turnover. But ffffffuck, it's so draining being there. I know I deserve better than this. Ruuuuuun. Not worth it. Short enough not to go in your resume. You'll feel so much better. If they don't care, you shouldn't either. Personally I realized I can't work in a disorganized place. If it's older and hosed up and nothing works, and there isn't the money or the team to have it taken care if properly go to a real place.
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Mar 16, 2016 05:02
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Tender Child Loins posted:I guess a large part of it is that I ended up being like that frog being slowly boiled to death. I just jumped in too fast and didn't notice how bad the situation was. It's absolutely on me for being naive about the whole thing! Yeah, sometimes your so desperate to leave to place your at you will take anything. My last place I left for totally different reasons(OK we are going to become a catering company now and a restaurant now, and we don't need a separate space for anything, we will just use the restaurants line for everything. Also you're in charge of all that catering poo poo too k thanks) I took a job that was much closer to my apt., more money, andseemingly more chill. It just turned out to be a poo poo show. In the back of my mind I think I kinda knew, but I denied it. I mentioned before there was a tasting yesterday at my place to replace me. Apparently the first thing the guy saw was a rodent scurry across the kitchen. Lol. I shouldnt laugh but this is after two day of serious beginning of the week deep clean that we do and everything was clean as gently caress. Its just the ghetto building full of holes . So nasty. Three more weeks!
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Mar 16, 2016 18:07
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Ouch. That's gotta be rough. As a chef the standard is about a month. Longer if your are nice/leaving on good terms. Because to hire a chef you have to interview them, do a tasting, and then they have to put in their notice, which is usually a month. It takes a lot of time.
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Mar 16, 2016 20:05
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Today's highlight include: 1. Half rear end Puerto Rican handy man came to fix more holes/cracks in the walk in. This is like the fourth time. The holes and cracks are where the rodents Come from. You would think this would have been taken care of properly by a professional like the first time we noticed a HUGE loving HEALTHCOdE Disaster like this. But no, let's send this guy multiple times to slap some bondo on the poo poo and call it a day. 2. Had to throw out about 4 dozen oysters because the drain pan under the walk in fans is full of holes and gross walk in condensation bypasses the drain and leaks onto everything. We keep a bus tub underneath it, but still. HAPRHM(half rear end Puerto Rican handyman) has attempted this repair several times. Today was the third, but it's still hosed and leaks. I've suggested just to by a new loving piece but no, slap some silicone on that poo poo and call it a day. 3. On my day off someone tried to butcher a pork rack, and they really loving butchered it and it's all hosed up and I can't use it. 4. Remember how I said HAPRHY came and tried to fix the cracks, instead of doing this early in the. Morning, or late at night so it could have some chance of drying and not getting hosed up, he did it at about 1pm and put up a bunch of wet cement signs, and all this poo poo runs right in the middle of the walk in and is full of foot prints. And then my cooks are retarded and this happened. White stuff is wet Concrete. Lol. 2.5 more weeks! https://imgur.com/nBq7gcF
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Mar 17, 2016 02:45
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Highlights today: Stopping dishwasher from washing oysters because he was going to wash them in the dishwasher. Talking down sous chef from quitting, because I am quitting, and so is another manager. Too much crazy. Dishwasher called out because his testicles hurt. Trail didn't show up. 2nd one this week. Edit: service hasn't started yet.
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Mar 18, 2016 22:58
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Exactly, because I would have to deal with it. Also it would be really weird trying to hire a sous chef when im leaving/they haven't got another Chef yet. The sous would have no idea who he's going to be working with.
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Mar 18, 2016 23:54
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Sorry for double post. This is what happens whenever you put something other than liquid in the Hobart: https://imgur.com/Q46fAC0 Three seconds later the bowl flew off onto the floor. cods fucked around with this message at 01:22 on Mar 19, 2016 |
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Mar 19, 2016 00:59
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I know. I can't blame him or anyone wanting to quit in this poo poo hole. Anything that could potentially keep me here longer, or make my time here any more miserable I'm trying to cut down on. And yeah, the Hobart. It's a piece of poo poo. I've worked I lovely bars in bumfuck Georgia that have had a better Hobart. The thing about this place is that the dishwashers and cooks literally thrash EVERYTHING. it's like Vietnam. Also all the gears are hosed so it barely gets through simple tasks like pasta dough. The paddle will just sit in the same spot and whine for 10 seconds before moving. the dough hook is also missing. And I am pretty sure the bowl is not the original bowl so it doesn't fit right. About two months ago the sous broke the kitchen aid(thing that holds the attachments just split in two) and I had to chose between getting a new one of those, or getting the Bart fixed. What I'm talking about now is AFTER the owner got it "repaired". Before the (wrong size bowl that shoots off) had no nipple. All of the safety features were disabled. The grater attachment omg. There were so many pieces missing that to grind cheese, two people had to hold the thing in place and hope no one's arm got ripped off, feed it without a guard hope or the wrong piece wouldn't catch at take someone eyes out. Why everyone is retarded: Let me start by saying the pay here(except for me and my sous ironically) is soooooo bad. So the old chef just promoted dishwashers to cooks, because she couldn't afford real cooks. The dishwashers come from a guy that works here, whenever we need one we ask him, and he brings in a fresh off the boat dude from not even a good country, who has no idea what's going on. Vicious cycle. Also I was making pasta dough, something retarded happened, and I had to stop for 15 minutes and come back to it. Then I took the bowl off and saw this: https://imgur.com/hspoizl Niiiice. A little machine oil in your linguini? Jesus give me strength. So not only is it not mixed properly because the Hobart sucks, but I had to throw the dough out from the machine cumming.
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Mar 19, 2016 03:10
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The new restaurant I'm opening up isn't quite, we'll, open yet so I'm just riding out the remainder of my notice, having to deal with this poo poo for another week or two.
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Mar 19, 2016 03:58
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Yeah, I was brought in to fix the place up. But it was already too far gone. The old chef somehow dealt with this poo poo for 3 years. How I don't know. I think it was her first chef job. The thing is though, we are loving busy. Again, how I don't know. Hipsters will eat anything and say it's good. My first month I turned everything around and got the place good, even with the poo poo staff/equipment we had, but it just wasn't sustainable. Fix something one day, broken the next. Organize something one day, destroyed... Then, the main thing I was brought in to do, which was improve the food, became impossible. When I started the owner was like "yeah, good quality products! Organic stuff! Farmers market! Seasonal!" then he found out that poo poo isn't free, and I could only order scrub tier food from scrub purveyors. So not only did I have to deal with tards, but lovely food as well. That was a breaking point. Luckily on a lovely night where I had to deal with floods or rats or something I got a call from some people I used to work with and they were opening a new place. I know what I'm getting I to, I know the formula, and I know I'm only going to working with good product. Im going to leave, and this place is going to keep going, stay busy, do the same poo poo it has for years. I told the Gm the least they could do, which wasn't done for me, is to tell the new guy what he is getting into.
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Mar 19, 2016 04:44
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Believe me, if I dont my wife will. I'm just doing my best to get out of there. Also, most of my day is chaos/damage control so I make sure not of this wild stuff gets served to anyone. I have to spend the majority of my time throwing things away, actually babysitting like it were a five year old, and deep cleaning.
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Mar 19, 2016 06:03
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Oldsrocket_27 posted:How often do you guys get shorted by distributors on your orders? I've been noticing that we've been getting shorted or outed more and more over the past few months, to the point where basically every truck is missing or short on something, and one of our distributors never bothers to mention it, they just charge us for whatever we ordered and leave it for us to notice and file for reimbursement on the items they don't deliver. It's a huge pain in the rear end, but there aren't any other distributors in our lovely little part of the country, so we're stuck with it, unless they're doing something illegal, which I doubt. Just call and threaten to use their competition. Talk to your rep, and ask him if he really wants lose X amount of business a week, Month, year because someone over their can't get their poo poo together enough to even give you a phone call or text that something Might not come in. Also say their competition has better prices on X so they better beat that while they are at it too.
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Apr 2, 2016 06:23
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Verisimilidude posted:By 10pm tonight I will have worked 42 hours between Friday, Saturday, and today. This is how I spent my birthday weekend. Today is my birthday. It's also my 7th day in a row and a double. But I got the fall dinner menu organized/done/out of the way. Next week is brunch menu.
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Sep 18, 2016 16:26
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Hi industry goons. I'm a lurker and post in this thread every once in awhile. A little about me: from Georgia, went to culinary school, moved to Vail Colorado for my internship, and stayed for a couple years, then moved to Portland Oregon, didn't fancy that one much, and Now Im a Head chef for 2(at the moment) restaurants for a small to medium hospitality company. I've finally gotten myself to the point where I can finally enjoy some tiny fruits of my labor like a terrible but not absolutely terrible schedule for a Chef, where I can see my wife at least one day a week, an ok(still super broke its NYC) salary, a good track with the company I am with for the next few years,etc. I've felt a little lost lately, wondering what's next. Im a little older now, and this job doesn't get any easier, and i have been working like a dog for the past 10 years with few memories besides stupid kitchen poo poo that no one cares about. I still love what I do, but I think I'm finally started to get "over" Nyc and start thinking about what(or where) is next. I moved here just because it was hard going to be really hard. One lazy Sunday ago my wife had the Kardashians on in the living room, and they went to Vail for a vacation. I cant stand that show but i couldn't help but watch a little. I think it got some cogs moving. I then started to have a crisis figuring out whats next. San Francisco came to mind but thats like starting all over, and i moved from Portland because I found the people to be a little much for me. I somehow fit in here better in NY. Then I remembered my first real Chef mentor at the hotel i worked at in vail is still there and one of the most known chefs in town right now and hes killing it. He came to Vail in his early 20's, cooked for a few years, sowed his wild cooking oats elsewhere, and at like 10 years later moved back to Vail, got a sweet hotel gig, and has been killing it since he got back. Resort town life was fun and allowed for actual time off to do stuff. Its kind of a quality of life thing. I was just a cook then, but me and my chefs worked our dicks off during the season, and for sure took our sweet time off in the off season. Living in NY I have zero down downtime and I am lucky if i can get two days in a row, and working out a vacation is a loving nightmare. Also hotel jobs are clutch. Benes, better salary, stability,better hours, etc. So my wife and I have seemed to make up our minds set to either Aspen or Vail. I think this is still a ways off for sure, but it's a direction to put my head in. As i said earlier, i see a good future for me(more money better title, more restaurants) at my current company, so I am definitely going to ride that for a little while more and try and start building connections. I think the hardest part is getting back into the hotel game. It seems like a little bit more of an exclusive club after you've been out of it. I just wanted to share with you goons. Have any of you guys worked in aspen? How is the off season? Also if any one has any advice for getting getting back into to hotels/resorts it would be much appreciated. And if any of you guys have any questions for me on being a head chef in nyc, moving across the country, culinary journeys whatever, feel free to ask I would love to answer. cods fucked around with this message at 21:47 on Mar 2, 2017 |
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Mar 2, 2017 21:44
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Since I am headed the opposite direction (hopefully), I will say coming full circle has been good for me. I was making 14$hr as an intern! In Colorado at resort to 12$hr in a hotel in Portland. When I was tired of working for hotels, I quit that place and got a job at a little bitty place to make $10.50. But from that I was able to get my first sous job, worked around, ended up blah blah blah to head chef. But now I'm ready to back to like a 55 hour weeks, a better salary/quality of life.
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Mar 7, 2017 04:32
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