I stopped mise en place for prep and my ticket times dropped

For 9 years I was the guy who had every single component measured and portioned before service started. Last March I got slammed on a Saturday and ran out of prep for the special, so I started cooking with basic station setup and grabbing things as I went. Turns out I spend way less time re-washing containers and labeling random stuff, and I can adjust seasoning on the fly when the expo calls for a mod. I still do full prep for sauces and braises, but vegetables, garnishes, and proteins get set up loose on quarter sheets. Anyone else ditch strict mise and see their crew move faster during rush?

1 comments

1 Comment

taylor_mitchell8011d ago

Take that loose setup even further and treat your station like a line cook's toolbox instead of a pantry. Have your proteins and veg prepped but not merged into one giant pile on a sheet, keep them grouped by dish so your hand knows exactly where to grab without thinking. The real time saver is not having to dig through a labeled sixth pan for pinch of this or that, you just reach and go. If a ticket comes in with a mod, you're not stuck with a pre-measured batch that you gotta break down, you can just adjust the handful or spoonful on the fly. Honestly, once I stopped treating every single component like it needed its own little home, the rush became way less about managing containers and way more about just cooking.