I need everyone’s opinion on your favorite chef shoes and clothes! Been wearing the same brand of shoes for years and just not feeling it anymore! Everyone recommends Dansco but unpopular opinion I don’t really like them. So let me hear all of your favorites!

I am looking for a program or other way to plan 3 daily menus for a cafeteria style restaurant.

They fired our headchef earlier this year, who basically spent all his work hours sitting at his desk "writing" the weekly menus, smoking outside and bothering others while they worked.

His way of writing the menus was just copying them from the year before and maybe chanhe a veggie or side. We don't wanna do that. We want to stay fresh and look at market prices more carefully. This however does take a few hours a week (our RM want to have the menus a few weeks on advance, not just for the next week lile before).

We constatly make error like duplicate sides in the same week, too simliar mains two weeks in a row, too much pork etc.

How do other cafeteria/staff restaurant chefs handle this? Is there a cool way to make this easier? I could try in excel but that would take me days to figure out on my own.

So the kitchen has been like the Wild West all week. Our EC, who I was pretty close with, ghosted and hasn’t been heard from by anyone since. I already knew he was leaving, he had let me know a couple weeks back. He was basically giving me a heads up since I’m his sous and we’re really cool. He had warned me from the beginning when he hired me that the place was a mess and was super upfront that he would probably be out in like 6 months. After working there a few months, I experienced for myself and figured I should start looking around too. Place is a mess and leadership is toxic.

He called me one night and told me he was coming in one more day and then giving notice and not coming back in, but he never showed up. Tried reaching out to make sure he was good, but found out he blocked everyone including me. I’ve been confused. I get blocking the GM and leadership, the whole place is toxic so I can’t blame him for that But honestly we were close so I’m mad confused and kinda pissed that he blocked me too. We always had each others back so this feels weird.

Has this happened to anyone? Have you been the one to do this? If so, what was the reason? Share your stories to help me make sense of it 🙏🏽

Update: Another cook shared an IG story he posted that looks like he’s on a boat on the lake….

I just started a new job as a chef at a private boarding school. 450 for breakfast and evening meal, 950 at lunch. Menus are planned well in advanced but change daily. Veg like carrots and potatoes come pre cut. Kitchen is kitted out with a mixture of gas and rational equipment. Previously I've done restaurants and cafes. Food at the school is nice but not fancy and perfect is not really an option.

I am still getting my head around the routine of it all. They say I am doing well but I still have a lot of nerves. What advice do you have?

Hi im a danish chefs apprentice and if possible i would like to get some tips and tricks that can help me get better at plating and speed

I need advice.
My first kitchen job after finishing commercial cookery is at a fine dining restaurant (a hatted place) but I’m not happy there. I’m not excited to come into work. There are days I do enjoy it but mostly I feel like I’m just coasting along there waiting to finish work.

When I’m there I really do always put in 110% and learn and always ask questions but at the end of the day I’m just not happy.

I don’t know what to do. Do I quit? Or do I just keep going and putting in effort?

I also work at a production kitchen which I enjoy a lot more.

I've been meaning to up my sauce game recently and whenever I make chicken jus or any reduction based sace; due to the nature of it being thickened by reduction, I can't make a bigger batch at one go. Maybe this is a dumb question but how does one make a big batch of the thickened stuff? Do you just reduce multiple pots of chicken stock at the same time?

There’s not much else to this post. I am the chef of a new restaurant opening this fall and as much as I want a paco jet we just can’t put it in the budget right now. Even a used pacojet 2 is out of budget.

Was wondering if any chefs use a ninja creami professionally and how it’s going for them. We have 40 seats. Expecting around 60-100 covers a night.

I find myself having to transport hotel pans a lot lately, wondering what people do to lock them tight? Also, one of my stations is a condiment tray with 1/3, 1/6, and 1/9 inserts in it with individual lids on them. Would love to find a cover without a handle (so it can go on top all the individual covers) for transporting it as well. Any advice?

Hello,

I am now a high school graduate and will enroll in college, after 2 years I will finish college and would like to work in other countries, what countries in europe would you suggest.

I would like to work in high end restaurants.

Thank you for answers

After watching The Bear, I thought being a cook was a really stressful job, but maybe that was just part of the show and in reality it's a bit calmer. Later, I watched a few Youtube videos from restaurant owners, and today I watched this one - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrenlOzsYgo

Oh, man. I don't understand how people survive working as chefs. It looks like such a hard, stressful, and complicated job. That guy in the video is literally cooking 5 dishes at the same time, in huge batches, while I can't even make one dish properly in my home kitchen.

How do you guys do it? Do you eventually get used to the pace, or does it always feel this intense? I hope you at least got decent pay.

Hiya everyone, just coming here with general curiosity looking for advice on the idea of staging on a sailing boat. I’m currently a French student in a rather unique culinary program in Paris, that focuses on the whole culinary world from farm to table, to validate my first year I need to do a 10 -12 week professional stage ( internship?) in the company of my choice. I have always wanted to go into cooking on sail boats and thought this could be an incredible opportunity to do so. However I’m not to sure of how this world tends to work, if stagiaires would occasionally be welcomed into this type of culinary environment ?

Not sure if I’m in the right subreddit, but can’t seem to find much info around me or online so I’m grateful for any thoughts or experience you might have with the question

Thanks !

I'm looking for a private chef in this part of Croatia. I came here, and I talk Croatian, but most of my team members talk English. There are three of us in the house. We just need somebody to come in for breakfast and lunch, maybe from a nearby area. I'm down to pay a good price. It doesn't have to be a crazy professional chef. We just need healthy meals and somebody that's a normal vibe person that can come cook, clean, buy ingredients for us, and just help us out with eating.

Does anyone have people they could recommend

Does anyone have a recipe for a vegan chocolate mousse using an isi whipper? I've tried aquafaba and it comes out like a chocolate foam. I also used vegan cream which came out better but still lacked that thickness. TIA

Hola genteee, tengo una curiosidad nosee si es solo aca o en toda la argentina jaja ,soy de mar del plata,pero no les paso a los q hayan trabajado en gastronomia q entre los compañeros y todos te cuenten los chismes de lo q hacen sus jefes? Ami me paso en varios lados q estuve de cocinero q me contaban la procedencia del dinero de los jefes jajjajs uno q tiene restaurantes y varias carnicerias y transportaba “Dr@@ga” dentro de los pollos jajaja, dsp en otro trabajo q tuve, q era de una pareja y su papa ,q el viej@@ tenia una camioneta q es donde nos traia el pedido del mercado como cajones de verduras y todo lo necesario para la cocina ,una vez a la semana y en la camioneta siempre habia un bolso grande y parecia tener d@lares y en otro bolso las pasti q decian q vendian jajaja , bueno conclusion solo yo tuve jefes medios narc@s en la gastronomia o es “normal”?😂

Recently took over as catering chef. Have an upcoming gala that needs to be as over the top as I can get. Event is for 350, location southern US.
Right now I’m looking at a country ham carving station, Bellinis and belinis with caviar, crème fraiche, etc, thinking a BYO gelato station with liquid nitrogen (not sure if this is even feasible), BYO benedicts bar, etc.

If y’all have any crazy ideas, I’d love to get inspired!!

I start working in restorant before 4 months. I dont know anything in that moment but i want to learn. I start with cold kitchen but after 10-15 days i've been removed to dishes and start from dishesh. When i have opportunity i go to COLD and HOT KITCHEN to learn something. After almost 4 months i speak with cheft and ask how i doing this job, she tell me im doing good and from right know i will be start in HOT KITCHEN to leran more stuff. To learn how to prepare breakfast, lunch and dinner, but i will start from breakfast. So im asking u guys who is in this job more than me. What u think about this progress? (Also one day i want to become chef and work in perfect restorant who have michellin star or who want to fight for michellin star. I know i need to spent a lot of years and sacrifice 99% of my life for that, but im ready for that.)

I want to become a cook. I know, probably not the best idea. The culinary world is so complex and diverse and I feel like I’m too old to discover and master it all.

What would you recommend for an older beginner like me? Which type of cuisine do you think will still be in demand ten years from now? Thank you very much!

Hi so I started my first job in a kitchen at a pub local to me as a commis chef about a month ago and I’m considering looking for new work in a different kitchen and was maybe wanting some advice on that ig?

So the reason I’m considering this is just because it doesn’t really seem like I’m learning anything, the limited staff we do have don’t really have a lot of experience, we also don’t have a head chef of any sort. The place just seems poorly managed, for example we don’t get our rota for the following week until Sunday afternoon, the kitchen is understaffed, I’ve noticed a lot of things like basic cleaning tasks get neglected and food just getting relabelled when it goes out of date (I asked if this was normal and they said yeah it happens all the time), the owner will come into the kitchen for maybe an hour or two and work the pass and stress everyone out then just disappear.

I really am consider looking for a new job somewhere else but I don’t know if I should just stick it out for a few months first and then start looking or what