The Chef's Page

"Why Can't I Yell at the Staff Anymore?"

Back in the day, I ruled the kitchen with an iron skillet, a look that could melt frozen butter and a voice that shook waitresses to their bones.  Around 1992, a District Manager brought me into my "office" (the dry storage area with the phone and a metro shelf full of clipboards and 3-ring binders) and asked me to read something he had typed.  It changed my life:

I have spent the remaining 8 years trying to control my temper.  I have bitten my tongue as servers non-chalantly toss away food from their mistaken order entry; gone into the walk-in to yell at the meat when bartenders saunter into the kitchen on a busy Friday night looking for their app order that's "been ten minutes already!"; taken a deep breath as I watch bussers throw ceramic ramekins into the garbage can as if they were empty McDonald's ketchup packets.

All this, and the kitchen I once ruled like a king has now become an assembly line of recipes, procedures, HAACP guidelines and QC checklists.  Along with my "inappropriate behavior", they also stole my creativity.

So, I stay quiet now, with my measuring spoons and ounce scales--doling platitudes alongside portions.  Transforming my old diatribes into "solution-oriented thinking".

A server says, "My customer wants her steak cooked more".
Old Me:  Take the steak back, toss it onto the hottest part of the grill, stack 5 cast-iron skillets on top and burn it to hockey-puck consistency.
New Me:  Smile, say let her know it will be a few minutes and re-make her a fresh steak to her liking.

A ticket is rung in with 15 modifiers ("no sauce, extra vinegar, easy butter, sub vinegar...")
Old Me:  "Here.  Take my pen and this piece of paper.  Go back out to your old lady friend and give it to her...(pause for effect while the hapless waiter shrinks in fear at what I could possibly say next).  ...AND TELL HER TO WRITE UP HER OWN GODDAMN MENU!"
New Me:  "No problem!"

It's not that I like the "old me" so much.  I am not so dense that I think screaming at everyone is such a wonderful personality trait.  But I also think the "new me" is a pansy, letting "food servers" (what happened to "waitresses"?), "guests" (customers) and "corporate executives" (a-holes) walk all over me and my kitchen, as if they had the slightest clue what it really took to serve 600 dinners in 3 hours, or any real understanding of how a steak should be cooked.

Perhaps I will find the right place in the sand to draw my line one day.  Until then, please, "food servers", at least try to get into the kitchen and pick up your food on time.  I promise, I won't yell at you. 

 

Manager	Server	Cook	Dishwasher
Bartender	Busser	District Manager	Corporate Exec

email: Dinersoft