Restaurant: The Movie
A little exercise to boost morale: imagine your restaurant scores a movie deal, a heavy-hitting screenwriter and goes on the silver screen. Who's going to play you? My last restaurant would have put a whole new spin on Veal Oscar. First choice is obvious, but we all know how Hollywood and budgets work. Some names have been changed or omitted alltogether to protect the incompetent.
Tattoo Tony: Kevin Smith
Valet: Jason Mewes
Pasta Dropper : Elijah Wood (Seth Rogan, Rory Cochran)
Me: Jason Lee
Passive-Aggresive Dyke GM: Eddie Murphy (* Kevin Spacey, Edward Norton, Jr., William H. Macy)
Owner: Shaquille O'Neal
Bipolar Bartender: Steve Buscemi
Gay Waiter/Host(ess): David Hyde Pierce
Guadalupe: Angeline Jolie (Rosie Perez)
Pony: Robert DeNiro (Herve Villachez)
Rita: Penlope Cruz (Salma Hayek)
Bill: Jared Leto
Oscar/Luis: Georgo Lopez
Donna: Cameron Diaz (Phillip Seymour Hoffman)
Taylors: Vince Vaughan, Will Ferrel
Mr. Battaglia: Abe Vigoda
Brian Growney: Michael Richards
Takeout Taxi: John C. Reilly
(* the budget and actor availability really is a factor here, but I don't need to tell you that we're talking about a fucking Academy Award for this role.)
Tattoo Tony: Kevin Smith
Valet: Jason Mewes
Pasta Dropper : Elijah Wood (Seth Rogan, Rory Cochran)
Me: Jason Lee
Passive-Aggresive Dyke GM: Eddie Murphy (* Kevin Spacey, Edward Norton, Jr., William H. Macy)
Owner: Shaquille O'Neal
Bipolar Bartender: Steve Buscemi
Gay Waiter/Host(ess): David Hyde Pierce
Guadalupe: Angeline Jolie (Rosie Perez)
Pony: Robert DeNiro (Herve Villachez)
Rita: Penlope Cruz (Salma Hayek)
Bill: Jared Leto
Oscar/Luis: Georgo Lopez
Donna: Cameron Diaz (Phillip Seymour Hoffman)
Taylors: Vince Vaughan, Will Ferrel
Mr. Battaglia: Abe Vigoda
Brian Growney: Michael Richards
Takeout Taxi: John C. Reilly
(* the budget and actor availability really is a factor here, but I don't need to tell you that we're talking about a fucking Academy Award for this role.)
Because it is Slow
I would like to think I am forgiving. Today's lunch service was one fuck up after another. Both the front and back of the house were fucking up left and right. Courses were misfired. Food was being forgotten. Things burned. Things were rung in with a modifier, "on the fly plz." I about lost it on several occasions. How could one thing after another go so wrong? I heard 3 times, "It is because we are having such a slow day." Is that what I am supposed to tell the unemployment department when they ask why their line is out the door on a Monday? Is that what we are supposed to tell our guests who did make it all the way out here today. "Sorry for the long wait for your chicken sir. The cook forgot about it because it is a slow day. Sorry for the wait on your soup sir, the food runner was too busy talking and forgot about it because it is a slow day."
I get it. It is easier to get distracted when its slow. It is more difficult to stay focused. I will however not accept such an excuse. If you only have half the amount of work to do for all of the pay, then I expect the highest quality possible. Needless to say I am a bit annoyed right now and trying to cool down before I head back into the kitchen. The second half of service was me constantly reminding everyone of the obvious so they wouldn't "forget because its slow." I felt like I was helping a group of Helen Kellers.
I get it. It is easier to get distracted when its slow. It is more difficult to stay focused. I will however not accept such an excuse. If you only have half the amount of work to do for all of the pay, then I expect the highest quality possible. Needless to say I am a bit annoyed right now and trying to cool down before I head back into the kitchen. The second half of service was me constantly reminding everyone of the obvious so they wouldn't "forget because its slow." I felt like I was helping a group of Helen Kellers.
the master prep list and thensome
I had a great talk with cornstarch the other day and one of my favorite topics of all was a good portion of it. We discussed the masterpreplist, whether it is scrawled in a looseleaf notebook between those first sips of crackaccino or meticulously formatted the night before (preferably before 4:20) complete with a diagram of the kitchen and who will be working where. I have seen it done many ways and by many levels of staff. My first job treated the preplist like gospel and it was done by the closing FOH manager without any fudge factor. If there were six pounds of crab imperial portions, there would be six more on the next day's list (twelve if it was the weekend). Since prep was pretty heavy there and it had to be done between 8:00 and 4:00, it had to be set in stone and there was no BS about getting slammed at lunch and not getting around to breaded oysters. The chinese lady with the chemical engineering degree would knock it out every day and be done her share by 4:00 on the dot whether there were 22 items or 12. And she still had time to sit @ table 201 for lunch @ 3:00. It fascinated me. Once the kitchen evolved to the point that there were salaried guys on at night, the prep list was put into the closing AKMs hands. A very wise move save the fact that I was one of those guys. We had recently put chx parm on the menu and I saw fit to par them at 5 and include that with the rest of the day shift's list. You might have thought I asked her to tar the roof or make me a pitcher of iced coffee. That restaurant no longer exists, but it taught me a lot about putting systems in place and taking the guesswork out of the equation. My next restaurant had a system as well, but most of that involved only the day shift and they only did what their leader forced them to do. I started there as an overly ambitious line cook and tried to fix everything I could on my way to KM. I knew better than to have anything to do with the ghetto preplist, so I came up with my own....the infamous "4:00 list." Now, this place was high volume with the same menu day and night and things would occasionally get missed. That's where the four o'clock list came in. If we only had 8 orders of wings because chx wasn't coming until to-morrow, I just wanted to know instead of looking like an asshole @ 8:15 with a full restaurant and my night crew scrambling around the 4x6 basement walk-in looking for product thay didn't exist. There was pineapple salsa for the tuna that wasn't on the day preplist, because I refused to continue serving a #2 can of diced pineapples mixed with our house salsa on a $14 seared tuna entree. Putting it on the 4:00 list was the solution and that didn't mean remembering that we had a full 1/6 pan yesterday so you mindlessly checked it off. Eventually, I forced them to actually taste it to make sure it hadn't soured, but that took months. The lucky person given the daily burden of correctly completing the list made it known what a huge hit he was taking for the team, even though it took all of five minutes to do and there was NO physical work involved.
In any case, I've been in charge of the preplist @ every job since and I make it the same whether I am part of the prep team or not. It is a recipe for successful service with no room for excuses and it deserves all the attention you have time to give it. It doesn't fix lazy, but it covers your ass and eliminates the dreaded, "So, what else do you need me to do?" Those especially lazy specimens secretly hope you'll grow tired of this question and incrementally finding them something to do. There are still the holes that are created by busy chefs that don't think of everything. The counterpoint is that something not written is something not done.
I just heard the best reason ever for writing a prep list yesterday: "I like crossing things off."
That's work ethic, sense of urgency and passion in five words.
[This post was originally written many moons ago in a kitchen far, far away. The only new advice is not to use a Sharpie(TM).]
In any case, I've been in charge of the preplist @ every job since and I make it the same whether I am part of the prep team or not. It is a recipe for successful service with no room for excuses and it deserves all the attention you have time to give it. It doesn't fix lazy, but it covers your ass and eliminates the dreaded, "So, what else do you need me to do?" Those especially lazy specimens secretly hope you'll grow tired of this question and incrementally finding them something to do. There are still the holes that are created by busy chefs that don't think of everything. The counterpoint is that something not written is something not done.
I just heard the best reason ever for writing a prep list yesterday: "I like crossing things off."
That's work ethic, sense of urgency and passion in five words.
[This post was originally written many moons ago in a kitchen far, far away. The only new advice is not to use a Sharpie(TM).]
ps here's his resume
throughout the day we left offerings of crackers and ketchup packets under his picture, in hopes that his spirit will fill it's cargo pockets and be on it's way.
the legend of andy jong ill
ok. i've worked with probably close to a hundred different dishwashers in my time in kitchens, and very few of them stand out. those who do, usually stand out because they rock the fuck out of the dish pit, or because they're hot high school chicks. but you've never met andrew.
tragically, andrew has already quit. i only got four shifts with the guy. but he's legendary. i will NEVER forget andy jong ill...
ok, first off...the attire...andrew's outfit of choice consisted of a LONG SLEEVE THERMAL TURTLENECK, (seriously...in a kitchen...), cargo pants with full cargo pockets (of what? who knows?), male nurse white velcro lowtops, and a hat with a montana pin that was taped on. yes. a PIN that was TAPED on. yep. also the hat was just slightly too big.
and then there was the gloves...he wore, and i shit you not, like, grandma style dish gloves. the blue rubber ones with the yellow insides. always. he never took them off. he washed his hands with the gloves on. the only time i saw him with his gloves off, he was standing in the dining room looking at posters on the wall, flapping his hands like wings. see...i knew that he had gloves on all day and was drying his damp hands, but...none of the customers did. or the bartender. all they saw was this wierdo standing with his face literally six inches from the wall flapping his hands like he was trying to fly away...it's already become a kitchen joke.
then there was his voice. at first, his nationality was suspect. he's some sort of asian (i heard he's actually vietnamiese), but the first week i didn't think he even spoke english. then, when he did finally talk to me, his voice is very high pitched, and he barely whispers. which is totally creepy. he asked me for a "hero sandwich", which i made him repeat like five times before i realized he meant a gyro. and he had a wierd habit of standing directly across the window from me, with a drink and a fork in his hands (gloves), just...staring at me. seriously. not like casually holding the fork either...holding it up at shoulder level, like the pitchfork guy from that painting....just wierd.
and he was a shitty dishwasher. he was slow, and he put stuff away wherever he felt like. but he was such a wierdo that his mannerisms are now an inside joke in the kitchen, as is his voice. plus we all thought he was a serial killer. he was creepy. those gloves, that really quiet squeaky voice, the full cargo pockets...nobody knew what to make of him. we decided he was probably a rapist and murderer. today i spent most of the day walking up to the other cooks and whispering really creepy things in their ears in andy's voice.
"this pill makes you forget"
"i'm going to bite your tounge off so you can never tell anybody what i'm about to do"
"it only hurts until you pass out"
"i'm going to wear your face like a mask"
"i'm going to eat your fingers first, while you're still alive"
my boss says he quit but we all think he got extradited back to cambodia for war crimes and/or multiple rape and homicide charges. we'll never know for sure. and we can only speculate on what was in his cargo pockets...was it trail mix? extra gloves? the hearts and eyeballs of his most recent victims? the other half of his hero sandwich?
ahh, andy jong ill, we're gonna miss you. but your voice will never leave us. i'll hear it in my nightmares for the rest of my life.
"you can only scream rape until i eat your windpipe"
tragically, andrew has already quit. i only got four shifts with the guy. but he's legendary. i will NEVER forget andy jong ill...
ok, first off...the attire...andrew's outfit of choice consisted of a LONG SLEEVE THERMAL TURTLENECK, (seriously...in a kitchen...), cargo pants with full cargo pockets (of what? who knows?), male nurse white velcro lowtops, and a hat with a montana pin that was taped on. yes. a PIN that was TAPED on. yep. also the hat was just slightly too big.
and then there was the gloves...he wore, and i shit you not, like, grandma style dish gloves. the blue rubber ones with the yellow insides. always. he never took them off. he washed his hands with the gloves on. the only time i saw him with his gloves off, he was standing in the dining room looking at posters on the wall, flapping his hands like wings. see...i knew that he had gloves on all day and was drying his damp hands, but...none of the customers did. or the bartender. all they saw was this wierdo standing with his face literally six inches from the wall flapping his hands like he was trying to fly away...it's already become a kitchen joke.
then there was his voice. at first, his nationality was suspect. he's some sort of asian (i heard he's actually vietnamiese), but the first week i didn't think he even spoke english. then, when he did finally talk to me, his voice is very high pitched, and he barely whispers. which is totally creepy. he asked me for a "hero sandwich", which i made him repeat like five times before i realized he meant a gyro. and he had a wierd habit of standing directly across the window from me, with a drink and a fork in his hands (gloves), just...staring at me. seriously. not like casually holding the fork either...holding it up at shoulder level, like the pitchfork guy from that painting....just wierd.
and he was a shitty dishwasher. he was slow, and he put stuff away wherever he felt like. but he was such a wierdo that his mannerisms are now an inside joke in the kitchen, as is his voice. plus we all thought he was a serial killer. he was creepy. those gloves, that really quiet squeaky voice, the full cargo pockets...nobody knew what to make of him. we decided he was probably a rapist and murderer. today i spent most of the day walking up to the other cooks and whispering really creepy things in their ears in andy's voice.
"this pill makes you forget"
"i'm going to bite your tounge off so you can never tell anybody what i'm about to do"
"it only hurts until you pass out"
"i'm going to wear your face like a mask"
"i'm going to eat your fingers first, while you're still alive"
my boss says he quit but we all think he got extradited back to cambodia for war crimes and/or multiple rape and homicide charges. we'll never know for sure. and we can only speculate on what was in his cargo pockets...was it trail mix? extra gloves? the hearts and eyeballs of his most recent victims? the other half of his hero sandwich?
ahh, andy jong ill, we're gonna miss you. but your voice will never leave us. i'll hear it in my nightmares for the rest of my life.
"you can only scream rape until i eat your windpipe"
Friday night
Guess who was to sick to work last night? And has already said he won't be in Today either. He then has Sunday and Monday off. I call that a fucking vacation or a good way to get fired. I should have known something was up when I was asked to work Friday day shift which then turned into a 15 hour double.
