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Unpopular opinion: watching the line during a Friday rush taught me more than any culinary class
Last Friday at the bistro I work at in Austin we got slammed with 90 covers in 45 minutes and our lead cook Marcus just stood back and watched instead of jumping on the line. I thought he was being lazy until he pointed out that our garde manger station was backed up 8 tickets deep while the grill had nothing coming for 6 minutes. He moved one guy over and we caught up in 12 minutes flat. I've been cooking for 7 years and spent thousands on classes but nobody ever taught me to just look at the whole board before touching anything. Now when I feel the panic coming I take 10 seconds to read the tickets and station flow first. Anyone else had a chef who taught them by doing nothing instead of by yelling?
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ben8271mo ago
Watching the board sounds great until you're the one cook getting moved to the station that's already drowning, because now you're stuck in the weeds too and nobody's watching YOUR tickets pile up. Marcus got lucky that one guy could float and fix everything in 12 minutes, but I've seen that exact move backfire when the lead just stands there "reading the flow" while the rest of us are getting crushed and burning food. Standing back only works if you've got extra bodies to shuffle around, and most kitchens I've worked are running skeleton crews where every single person IS the backup plan. Sometimes the guy who jumps in and gets his hands dirty teaches you more than the guy playing chess with the tickets from a safe distance. Real leadership is doing both, not just standing there looking wise while everyone else sweats.
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