Sous Chef or Monkey

I just had to laugh when wifey read this out to me.

A reputable business in CQ is advertising for a Sous Chef. A great job for a qualified chef to step into, well you would think so.

Firstly lets talk about the job of a Sous Chef.
The Sous Chef is second in charge of the kitchen which means he/she must have a considerable amount of knowledge to understand what is required to run the kitchen in the absence of the head chef.

This knowledge doesn't just happen, you need to gain experience in real kitchen life, and lets just clarify that a pub, sandwich bar, fast food outlet and any other place that thinks it is a classy food establishment but isn't, don't count. You come to me with your poxy 5 years in and out of the above you are just waisting mine and your time.

The Sous Chef will be the engine of the kitchen the person who cooks, checks, orders, beats, grills and gives you the bollocks before the head chef has to be disturbed. He is the Head Chef's lynch man and will generally have one objective and that is to become a Head Chef themselves. That means basically that they will be doing everything that the Head Chef does so that when the opportunity arrives they can slip right in and take over without any drama.

A good Sous Chef must not only have fine cooking skills and posses a great deal of ability in all areas of the kitchen, but must also be a motivator and a leader. It is with great leadership that one can motivate the team to reach better standards.

In very large kitchen brigades there will be many Sous Chefs, 5 or even 6, each with a particular area of control and from these will be one leading Sous Chef often known as the Executive Sous Chef. The lowest or newest Sous Chef would be known as the Junior Sous Chef, but even at this level one not to be messed with, as they will be wanting to jump up the ladder too, and will do what ever it takes to get there, lets face it, who wants to be called junior for a long time?!!

So to become a Sous Chef, a chef will need to have experience in a vast amount of kitchen knowledge. As the career of a young chef begins they will be an apprentice, this will span from say 2 to 4 years depending on country and establishment. Here I wish to point out that you want to be learning from, and in a good kitchen, not an Average Joe place where they buy in the majority of time consuming and hands on jobs, for example stocks and sauces, soups and vegetables, cakes and pastries. This will tell you something about the quality of management and also the chefs that are employed, once again do some research.

After the completion of the apprenticeship the next level is a Commis Chef. The Commis Chef is a chef that does a lot of work and gets grilled for everything. Basically the hardest years in the young chefs life. He is qualified and is expected to perform, that is where the pressure begins, a lot of basic work is done, but with greater ability and knowledge to be learnt. Again the larger the establishment the more levels of Commis Chef you will find 1st commis, 2nd commis, and sometimes even 3rd commis.

The next promotion will be to a Chef de Partie, or if its a large place they will sneak in a Demi Chef de Partie. This is where you get to shine as a chef, it is where you are in control, or not, as the case may be, of a whole section. The kitchen is broken down into sections, I will leave the great detail to another post but for now they are larder, sauce, fish, grill, veg, pastry, butcher, and so on. The smaller the kitchen the more the sections become one, for example, the grill and fish will join, the sauce and veg will join. The butcher will be omitted, you get the picture. So you see that the bigger the establishment hopefully the better the kitchen will be set up with the chefs and sections for all to learn.

As a CdP it is your responsibility to have your area in control and set for every service. This is your opportunity to shine as an individual leader of a team, generally the CdP will have his own DCdP and commis that will work with him to run the section. It is here that the future sous chefs are born, only with determination, readiness and drive will you outshine your opponents, the other CdP's, to get chosen as Sous Chef, am I building a picture of how it all works, can you see that a Sous Chef is not just a general chef from some average hole, he/she is, and should have worked bloody hard to be given the title and gain the respect of which a Sous Chef should have?

Now with all this experience and knowledge, you would probably have been working hard at your chosen career for a minimum of 5 to 7 years and even then you are becoming a young Sous Chef. After 7 years of grafting and slaving your hours behind the stoves of many kitchens, you would hope to break into some better pay level, especially as Sous Chef with the responsibility of the kitchen in your hands at some time or other.

With the minimum wage staying at $543.78 per week that is $14.31 per hour based on a standard 38 hour week. Now I don't know any chef that does a 38 hour week, you've got to be dreaming, right? I also find it very confusing all this bullshit award system for each different hotel, motel, cafe, resort in each different state and so on, so lets cut the crap and get to the point, which is for $40-45,000 per year I won't get out of bed and nor should you if you have good background experience and knowledge. For a start you'll probably be expected to work about 50-60 hours a week, now you do the math, are you willing to work your arse off for about $14.90 per hour with all your talent, surely you're worth more than that, I know I am.
So back to the advert, a Sous Chef for $40-45,000, or a monkey, the choice is yours.
I understand that the industry pays poor but that is a joke. Especially for a place that charges customers $12 or $14 for a bowl of soup of the day, what the.....

If we charge the customers more for the product that's fine, we all know that commodities are not cheap, and restaurants need to make money to stay open, the question is, how greedy do some need to become?
Go and feed your monkey you moron, I'm going back to bed....................

image credit:dannyboyster

Read more...

Are You Really Sick?

The hospitality industry is one of those environments where it can be detrimental to other peoples health if you are sick and you work. Just the thought of someone sneezing into your plate of food, or not washing their hands after smoking or visiting the toilet, or even just touching their face is bad enough. We all must be very self conscious of our behaviour. Personal hygiene is of the upmost importance.

The thing is, where is the line between just calling in for a sicky and letting your team down, or not allowing the restaurant to take full advantage of what could be a busy night. But do you really care? I mean if you are (just) an employee, why should you care. I guess you don't have to, I mean we are one of the lowest paid professions out there hey. Funny that I have always had a thing for not taking a sick day even if I was sick, I guess that's just my nature, some may find it hard to believe and think how stupid of me but that's your opinion. I do it because I feel that I let my fellow team down and that I need to be there, just because.

The sad thing is that so many staff are just not like me and will take a sick day just like that, if the sun's out they will be sick, if the girls are going out they will be sick, if they drunk a bit too much they will be sick, mind you, the majority of staff are casual anyway and don't get sick day allocation, that means they won't get paid for it either, do they care, I don't think so. The cash must be rolling in for them some how. I reckon if I add all my sick days allocated to me over the past 20+ years, at 10 a year I would be able to take a very long paid break, sick of course!

Anyway the other day I had a slight tickle in the throat, I thought not much of it, sucked on a strepsil and kept up my usual 3 litre and more of water a day. I am generally quite a sick free person, touch wood, so I went to work and got on with my tasks. My body started to ache all over, I must have gone about 6 times for a pee, now that's not normal for me, so I knew something was up. By about 8pm I was pretty fucked. My fellow Chef said that I should go home, me being me was very resistant to that idea but eventually gave in and home I went.

Home to wifey who herself was a bit under the weather. I said that I think I might be coming down with something. My temperature reading 38.7 clarified the thoughts.
A double panadol and 'essig wickle' in German I guess you can translate them into vinegar socks, it is tea towels soaked in ice cold vinegar water and then wrapped around my feet, covered in plastic bags then wrapped up in thick towels. Then I was asleep.

After what I can recall as a good nights sleep, I woke with aching pain all over, the temperature had gone and my throat was already better, my voice however was very strange. I don't like to go to the doctor or dentist for that matter anyway, and this was again going to escape my wish list, as I had promised my fellow Chef that I would go and I do keep up my word. An appointment was made for the following day as they are so busy. I guess with everybody running to the Doctor for the most trivial of things I guess it's no wonder they are booked out. Not so good for the person who really needs to see them, ever thought about that people, I guess not.
The day progressed and I started to feel slowly better, less pain, better voice no temperature. I did spend all day lying down doing sweet FA, but that's what you do when your sick, you don't go shopping or visit friends or whatever you fakers do.

Today I saw my Doctor. The practice was like a train station, people everywhere coming, going, paying, the phone ringing, boy I thought my job was mad, the only difference being that they had staff everywhere!
I had the stick in my mouth ready to gag and all the other prods and pokes, lights in the ears and eyes, questions about this and that, after about five minutes I was out of there. $65 bucks lighter and a packet of tablets to swallow. No findings from the Doc though, he reckoned that what I had I had got rid of already, I thank the 'essig wickles' for that.
Considering how I felt the other night I am glad to be over it. A phone call to work to let them know that I would be in the next day if I stay the same.

Later that afternoon my Sous Chef in charge called and said that I could take the next day off to recover more, he has it all under control, that's great news and a little good Karma coming my way. Thank you.

Read more...

The Restaurant Award Wage

How can it be that getting a pay rise is bad for you and puts your job on the line.

Well it seams once again that the good old hospitality industry is just about to get screwed over.

How? Here is the spiel.

So called hospitality Industry representatives have met to discuss the increase in wage and overtime rates for full-time employees and impose a 25 per cent penalty loading for casuals.
For the majority of the hospitality industry staff this is a much needed and richly deserved award rise.

New Award Raise to make things Worse

Apparently Sydney restaurateur Peter Doyle, who is the national president of Restaurant and Catering Australia said the recession has already resulted in a 10 per cent drop in bookings this year and a new award would make things worse. From the ABC news.
Once again a big bod thinking about his bottom line and not yours.
He said quote "I think if this new award does come in you will see some job losses, we're probably predicting in South Australia alone probably 2,000 job losses, probably 8,000 nationally,"

So Here's The Thing

We all get a pay increase and some will get to lose there job, now that's just great. I think that they are missing the point.
For a start it is one of the lowest paid industries out there, and we all deserve to get a raise regardless of the state of the economy. I bet every thing around you still goes up doesn't it. I bet those big nobs still cash in just fine, you can be sure they certainly don't take a pay cut.

Get Paid what we Deserve

The bottom line is pay the staff in the hospitality industry what they deserve, if you cant do that then pay them the award with the raise. You will still need to keep open to trade. So you will still need staff. Don't cut back on what the workers rightly deserve, but increase the cost of meals and beverage to cover for this. Some restaurants in other states already impose a 10% surcharge on weekends, once again a bit like a luxury tax.
Maybe you still want to charge top dollar, and also cut back on the quality of food and service.
Don't forget the old saying "with peanuts you only get monkeys!!"

Read more...