rant: fine dining

[lukethedrifter]

shrimp scampi

[33anda3rd]

The company that runs our cafeteria at work claims to have 'chefs' and an 'executive chef' but either they are full of it or the definition of 'chef' is really low.

The chef would probably be more aptly called 'kitchen manager.'

[tlombard]

Oh, I forgot about this one. A few weeks ago they had some special thing after the normal lunch hours where everything was peach based deserts. You could get a peach shake, peach cupcake, peach empanada (which was really good actually) or peach cobbler.

My boss decided to buy our group desert. I was the only one who got the empanada. The others got the cobbler... only it wasn't peach cobbler as advertised, it was apple with maybe a piece or two of peach sprinkled in with the apples for a couple of the servings.

Really?

[Maclowery]

33, did you read about Danny Meyer attempting to convert all his restaurants to service (oops, I meant Hospitality) included? Apparently they're going to try to increase prices by 30% (gradually), to give back of house employees a raise (which they absolutely deserve, hands down), and then some kind of revenue sharing for front of house. It's a very long and fascinating read.

http://ny.eater.com/2015/10/14/9517747/ ... estaurants

I'll politely say that they are fighting an uphill battle if they want their bartenders at a swanky place to be happy with $20 dollars an hour in Manhattan. Our industry is pretty nuts in that the line cooks work crazy hours (I do also, and until much later at night, in my defense) for significantly less pay. While I agree with the general idea that tipping culture is pretty stupid, I've staked my career on it. I make a career out of establishing long-term connections with regulars, and the ability to make the most out of short-term interactions with one-time customers. One joke here, a corny flirtation with the older lady there, some football banter with the alpha male dudes knowing I'll get an extra 20 out of them. This Uber-ization is kind of scary.

[haltz]

Luke sent me that link yesterday. Sorry for the length, but I have a few thoughts here. tlombard is jealous of this one.

Meyer is trying to get ahead of the wage increase and around the cook shortage. He's robbing peter to pay paul and doing some massive PR spinning of a price increase. He and his investors are making tons of money, enough to pay cooks more, but he is scared of his bottom line shrinking (I'm basically plagiarizing a comment I read, which I'll quote below). At my restaurant we routinely pay cooks $16/hr because they're good and we want them to stay. That's in St Louis not Manhattan.

There's no way he pays the $25-30/hr that the good FOH people here make, let alone whatever the NYC equivalent of that is. He's going to be dealing with defections from all of his top people. I'm sure he knows this and is willing to absorb that hit. He basically admits this when he says that it will benefit 80% of his FOH staff. That's everyone but your best servers and bartenders, who of course will take a huge hit and get the [expletive] out. He probably thinks it's worth it to make this move, and he's probably right. Make the sections a little smaller and move on.

Making it to where a sleepy Monday afternoon lunch is the same as a busy Saturday night is also hysterical. He wants to eliminate "shift-chasing," and I think he should be scared of the opposite, but times ten.

A lot of the high-end cooking industry is basically run on cooks making peanuts for the experience, prestige and chance to work for the best people in the industry. Paying their dues and padding their resumes. Our chef de cuisine cooked for Jean-Georges and went to CIA etc etc, and his last job for a very well-known restaurateur he was making $27k as an "executive sous chef" working his dick off. It's a joke, but that's the culture. If the laws change it won't matter what sort of abuse people are willing to put up with since it won't be legal.

It's not worth it to cook in SF and NY because it's too expensive to live there. You can't get anywhere close to Manhattan at $10/hr. Especially since the talent is no longer consolidated and you can go work for well-known chefs in a city where you can have a pot to piss in. Chicago is the best eating and drinking town in America. There are James Beard recipients in Cleveland and St. Louis for [expletive] sake.

First off, he has investors to answer to, and the new labor wage laws are going to cut into their bottom line. ... Yes the disparity of pay between the front and the back is flagrant, but this move is nothing more than robbing Peter to pay Paul. Their are large companies out there that pay their cooks well, it’s not hard to do, it just cuts in to the bottom line, something that USHG is unwilling to do.

This is an opportunity for a restaurateur to open the doors to revenue increases of 30%, none of which were in the hands of ownership before, taken from the hands of hourly employees—unevenly distributed as that money may have been—and funneled to the top, where ownership decides how that money is redistributed. While it is certainly within the rights of ownership to do this, to unblinkingly hail Mr. Meyer as a labor champion may be a bit premature.

It's really the tipped minimum that's driving this, talked about in that eater article. I haven't gotten a paycheck in 5 years, because my paltry $3.63/hr doesn't even come close to covering the taxes on the money I make. If my restaurant had to actually start paying me real money, they'd raise the prices, try to cover that cost by telling customers they didn't have to tip, and I'd leave for greener pastures.

StL city is going to have to deal with something interesting soon, where they raise the minimum wage but the county does not. I think it'll be a good thing for a variety of reasons, but small businesses having a hard time turning a profit are understandably concerned.

the increase, which will incrementally raise the city’s minimum wage from the current rate of $7.65 an hour to $11 an hour by January 1, 2018.

“If this was for the county or the whole state, that would be one thing,” says Pat Rutherford, owner of Dogtown’s Sugaree Bakery. “But what’s going to happen? People are going to go across the street to Maplewood.”

[tlombard]

Eh, I'm not jealous at all... other than at least the people working at places with great food have access to it at work as opposed to my crappy cafeteria and lack of time to go elsewhere to get better options!

My mom's the one toiling away in the industry. The only thing I know about the industry is what I've heard from her over the years and that's only with regards to the kitchen side of things. With what her previous employer paid, she had a hard time keeping good people and the only reason she kept them is because they loved working for her. After she left the place emptied out. Her sous chef didn't even want to take her job and was going to leave too but they eventually bribed him to stay somehow.

[Maclowery]

Agreed with everything you typed out there haltz. My turn to ramble! All your back of house stuff is spot on. The $15 minimum wage thing is making it weird as hell out here for non-fast food joints.

His plan makes total sense, if you pull all the humanity out of the interaction between a customer and a service employee. Uber maximizes efficiency with their terrible GPS app and a bunch of casual drivers who have no incentive to know where the hell they are going beyond what their driver phone app tells them to. Experienced cabbies stake their lives on their skill at going from A to B in an efficient way - and maybe even have a nice chat with their fare.

It works the same with the service industry. Many people are completely happy to go to an Olive Garden, never even look up at their waitress, only eager for their 11.99 rigatoni, with plans on an eventual 15% tip. Good on them. Send for an Uber. Like that 20 year cabbie, I stake my career on my ability to bring in a crowd (regulars) and keep a crowd (randoms) beyond what my establishment can give - pricing, ambiance, location. In baseball terms, I want to be far above replacement level for my position during my shifts. This is partially because I really love what I do. It's also the way I pay my rent.

That company is going to do fine. I really want back of house guys (and gals) to make tons of money, because everyone deserves to eat awesome food, and we should reward the people who love to make it. Their business model might keep some quality cooks back there, but every two months they are going to have to train a new waiter with little experience. Anyone else worth their salt will have kindly departed to go work elsewhere. And I absolutely think a whole lot of devoted, knowledgeable diners will choose to enjoy their night at a place they can expect a waiter, bartender, and eventually cabbie to truly know their [expletive], and treat those people as they expect and hope to be treated.

ie a tremendous over-tip. Thanks, lonely but well-spoken British business guy. I did not over-stir your Plymouth, and I enjoyed both our conversations about Hillary Clinton and your 20 dollar tip.

[Molly]

Anniversary coming up. May try Tony's. I'll let Jim know how it goes

[lukethedrifter]

[33anda3rd]

I did read it. My good friend Adam, who worked for Danny at Gramercy, actually beat him to it, eliminating tipping at The Radler in Chicago. They did not raise prices, they instituted an 18% "service charge" on all tabs. I don't like that. He's insisting on a set tip. Then sharing it among the house. We can get into the nuances of what a tip is legally (a gift from guest to server) and what a service charge is legally (can be spread around), but it's moot, IMO.

$20-30/hr, big deal. Servers in a good place can serve a 4-top for 2 hours with a $200 tab and a 2-top with a $70 tab and another 2-top with a $100 tab over two hours and get tipped 20% on that for $74. That's over $35/hour. And the best servers don't average 20%, they average 22-23. Bad servers average 18-20%. When I am behind the stick I'm closer to 25, because I'm affable and charming and funny and remember your name and your drink. I've cashed out servers at the end of a service who have worked from 4:30-11:00 and who in that 6.5 hour shift made $450 on a Saturday night. Not as an outlier, as a rule. That's $70/hour. If it was a slow Saturday and they only made $250 in tips they still were pulling $38/hour. Good servers in good restaurants do very well. Good bartenders do even better.

This is gonna sound crappy, but here goes. I know a lot of people who work kitchen jobs who say they outwork the FOH, for little pay, and that sucks. And it does. But I know a lot of people who work in kitchens who could not work anywhere else except peddling a pedicab around Wrigleyville or on a garbage truck, and that's because there are very few other environments in which a culture of working yourself to death, screaming at each other, showing up to work hungover from abusing yourself all night with drugs and booze is the norm. They're not people with the drive to be chefs and feed people. They're punks who need jobs and the kitchen is that rare environment in which they fit. They'd tell you that FOH people couldn't hack the kitchen, and that's not true. I could hack the kitchen, and I bet haltz and Mc could too. We just don't have to because the truth is that it's not a thing of "servers can't do cooks jobs"--servers could learn to be a line cook in six months, I know this because I know a lot of dumbass line cooks--it's really a thing of servers don't have to do cooks jobs with long hours and low pay because they are the ones with more skills. They can interact with guests. They are more professional in their appearance and demeanor. This doesn't apply to all cooks/chefs, but it does to most. The line cook guys. The guys we're stumping for to make more money. Yes, they should be paid more. But they should be paid more by raising prices and minimum wages for their job, not by taking tips from servers, who are skilled professionals who do earn what they make via wine education, spirits education, beer education, and their senses of awareness and sociability that make guests feel welcome and have fun.

I go to places that are fun. Places I have a good time. That's first. After that is food and beverage. I'll return to a place I have fun with a PBR and a good burger more often than I will to a sterile place that's less fun but has a deep wine list and precious restaurant food. Servers and bartenders are as responsible for that as anyone, probably more responsible than anyone, including ownership and the chef.

Meyer is going to lose servers. Here in Chicago at Alinea and Next and Aviary, the Achatz/Kokonas joints that are ticketed, everyone is on salary and there's a service charge and the servers don't get tips. There are a few weirdos who work there because, hey, it's Alinea, but they're weirdos. People are not clamoring to go there. I've never lost a server because they got a job at Alinea. Good servers will go to Blackbird instead, where there are tips and they make a lot more money. I love Meyer, his book is fantastic, his restaurants are great, my pal Michael has some skin in Shake Shack and I've met Danny a couple times recently and like him and admire him. But I wouldn't, were I a server or bartender, go work for him.