i’m a line cook who saw this in our office. am i cynical or is it kind of bleak?
"For better or worse, being a chef has a lot more to do with keeping schedule, hiring & firing, training, ordering, and doing & controlling inventory than it does with cooking or experimenting with food."
by pleaseyosaurus
46 Comments
thisismetrying12345
If you’re a owner/manager, it’s cynical but true
potstillin
If you don’t do the first list well, the second list won’t matter. Doing the daily grind well lets you have the opportunity and resources to do the rest.
voodooape
It’s the truth. Especially if you work in the corporate world.
ASpitefulCrow
Operations Manager: For better or worse being a FoH manager has more to do with keeping the waitstaff in line than bothering the chef.
GhettoSauce
It’s true except that those things don’t have a “lot more to do” with being a chef. I was also busting my ass cooking and experimenting while managing that other shit. It’s even more than this list, it’s all at once and it never ends. Yeah it’s bleak but there’s an even-lower level of blander bleakness you’re not seeing here, lol
That_One_WierdGuy
Success as a cook is making great food. Success as a Chef is making a great restaurant.
JaceBearelen
What’s bleak about it? That all needs to be done to keep a business running and it’s a lot of work. If you want to cook then be a cook.
isabaeu
I mean, yeah. That, or you go the less traditional route and become a social media chef, which obviously has a similar dynamic where the cooking matters even less & it’s kinda just a marketing job.
Traditional cheffing has extraordinary little “experimenting with food” – people want what they know. If you put a traditional cheeseburger on a menu alongside some incredible, unique, burger you put a ton of work into, the normal burger will outsell your fancy bullshit 10 to 1. Everything is like this. Get used to it.
Mitch_Darklighter
This is something everyone who gets into the business because they “just really love cooking” needs to read. It’s all just spreadsheets and scheduling and deescalating worker disputes while watching the actual worst people you’ve ever met make more money than you.
mchewy
There is truth there but I don’t consider it bleak. I enjoy those things. At this point hitting my budget and getting orders down perfect are much more challenging and rewarding than working a line.
TheManOfOurTimes
There is a world of difference between being a chef, and restaurant operator. Operating a restaurant revolves around managing loss in a capitalist system. It’s tiring, draining, and mostly unrewarding.
You can indeed be a chef for a restaurant owner. Yes it’s harder to find a good fit, and the odds of the owner stamping on your ideas is high.
But knowing this can help you find the roll that doesn’t kill your passions. There is no shame in being the best sous chef ever. And a life spent doing that you love isn’t a wasted life
Cthuloops76
“Sometimes, I think I’d be happier if all I had to do was cook.”
Two Chefs I’ve had the privilege of working for have said that (or something similar) over and over and over and over…
There’s times I say it now, too.
It’s not bleak. It’s the progression of a career.
When food is all that’s required, you have cooks. Pretty much the corporate model in a nutshell. Actually running a kitchen and growing the next generation requires a whole lot more.
pleaseyosaurus
feel like i should clarify i don’t think the note is inaccurate, 10 years in the biz has shown me that it’s very true. just felt like someone had good intentions for a nice note to my chef and maybe worded it differently than i would have if it was supposed to be encouraging for lack of better term lol
Party-Independent-38
Oh! It’s a magnet. It’s on a white board.
chefsteph77
It’s just facts
TimelySheepherder939
This, sadly, is the way.
LillyH-2024
That’s why I got out of the industry. 20 years of doing all of that on the first part of the list was going to kill my love for experimenting and creating in the kitchen. So now I solely do it for myself and the people closest to me. Running a restaurant is not for the faint of heart, that’s for sure.
Rialas_HalfToast
It really depends on how the business is set up, this can be real sometimes but sometimes this is total bullshit because those jobs belong to roles like ops manager, kitchen manager, inventory, or HR.
The smaller rhe gig, the more likely all the higher-level jobs are to converge on head chef.
Some operations start small and get big but don’t divest these tasks out to other people for whatever reason. Some big places will be staffed by people who only know the small venue format and scale it up. Some small places don’t put all those on the chef because the owner handles pieces of them, maybe HR, maybe the inventory management, etc because the chef is hip-deep busy backboning the kitchen.
ReturnofSaturn615
Ask the Head Chef what he thinks, it’s his reality
M0ck_duck
Chefs write menus and run kitchens. Cooks cook.
Houdinii1984
>For Better Or Worse
It’s explicitly in the eye of the beholder. What’s bleak to you might be life goals for another.
Ok-City-4107
Is that a pill?
RaccoonCreekBurgers
Consdidering “Chef” is just a french word for “Boss”, this is accurate.
The question is
Are you “Le Chef”
or
Le Chef de Cuisine
Reasonable-Truck-874
Mixed take-it depends on where you are. If, to the owner, chef means “stability and predictability, with a focus on cutting costs,” then yes. This is obviously how restaurants don’t shut down. If you put in the time grinding, though, this list becomes second nature, and you can end up somewhere that you do get to express yourself. It’s taken twenty years, but I finally have work life balance (I’m off more days than I work and I make more money than before). Being good at what she says is most important is what earned me the trust of owners along the way. You may respect a cook’s ability on the grill, but you might not be able to trust them to make decisions for the business.
Background-Chef9253
It needs more backstory. Like who wrote this, and who was the intended reader?
MjrAdvntg
It’s correct and why many people burn out.
External-Scallion923
30yrs pro chef fine dining here, it’s the truth, accurate, no more no less.
The Restaurant Business meets at the intersection of Art & Commerce. (Batali)
Great handwriting btw, I’m curious- how old is the person who wrote that?
doiwinaprize
Nah these are facts. I’ve worked with tons of creative and talented chefs who have almost immediately pissed off everyone else in the kitchen and failed to order on time or accommodate staff scheduling. Most places close because there’s some sort of fundamental management issue that goes unaddressed for too long IMO. The food could be fine.
electr1cbubba
I absolutely love cooking & food. Quitting being a chef was the best decision I’ve ever made.
Jeramy_Jones
Accurate but they left out making sure cleaning and food safety are prioritized.
BootsOfProwess
Only executive chef has most of those responsibilities. There ARE chefs whose major concerns are just cooking and helping other people cook better. Tho frankly, as a chef myself, I feel like my job is 90% cleaning up and dishes.
Graybeard_Shaving
Cooks cook. Chefs run a kitchen. Sad fact of life. It’s a generalization but you’ll find it to be mostly true.
Vivid-Fennel3234
This is exactly why I’ve never done management even though I’ve been offered the position at almost every job I’ve worked. I didn’t get in to cooking just to sit in an office and write schedules or stand on expo looking at ticket times. This *is* true for the vast majority of kitchens.
Raise-Emotional
This is a factual statement. And many Chefs need to hear it. Especially if they graduated from some prestigious Culinary School.
notcabron
Theoretically, this is true of an *executive* chef’s work life. Now, I’ve been an exec for a little under 10 years. Only about 2 of that has been a job where I had those responsibilities front and center.
The lie they tell you in the interview as an EC is always the same. “There’ll be very little cooking involved.” The reality is that you spend about 80% of your time, as a salaried employee, doing work that the employer should be paying hourly people to do, but it’s cheaper to make you the biggest cog in production AND be able to hold you accountable for the financials that you get to at 8pm.
The EC should be finding a balance between the administrative duties, coaching sous chefs, planning/experimenting for future menus, and yes, some basic restaurant tasks. My next interview is going to be them explaining to me what they’ll do to make sure I can do all that in l45-50 hours a week. And asking what my maximum yearly increase is. If it’s not 10% or more, I’ll move on.
rumbletown
That’s the way of it. I would also say that cleaning has been left off the list. I guess depending on how the job works, maybe the executive chef doesn’t have to clean that much.
1993xdesigns
this is 100% accurate, your cooking skills may have gotten you to the chef spot but your leadership for ppl and budget management will keep you there. i was lucky my chef mentor taught me this very early on and its helped me since.
Percpie
Nah that’s just being a manager
parkerm1408
No thats entirely true. You have any idea how happy we’d all be if all we had to do was cook?
RainMakerJMR
I prefer to think of it a bit differently, however it’s the same message ultimately.
Being a chef is more about building and maintaining a successful system that allows you to execute your vision and menu without being tied to the cooking of it. Your job is to train and inspire the team so that you don’t need to do the nitty gritty of it, and then you’re there to support the team and give them the things they need that they can’t do themselves – financial stability for the business first, then all the things they need from schedules, menus, ordering product, teaching on how to execute the menu. If you do it right, you should be able to take 6 weeks off without anything falling apart, between menu changes. If you can’t do that, you need to rethink a bit. Usually it means giving the team MORE responsibility for the day to day operations so you can improve the weak spots on the overall business.
blurtside
Lads passion is in business,,any business!!. My love to make people happy and smiling through the dishes they wish i can create for them.
You need customers to spend money on quality food before that weak departure He will be an inventory supervisor. Shazzam!!
upbeatmusicascoffee
I think it’s also personality type. Not a chef, but ex-waiter turned floor manager turned operational general manager here. Even when I was a young waiter I was always drawn to the ‘admin’ and ‘business’ side of things so my goal was always to get out of the floor, albeit subconciously maybe. I didn’t realise it when I was younger, but because of that my career in hospitality had more longevity than my peers.
DogPrestidigitator
Written like a true front of house manager who doesn’t know dick about kitchens.
Agheratos
Hey, I’m a food cost controller for a resort hotel brand.
Everyone I call “chef” is doing a lot more than cook. “Chef” is an administrative position.
MookiesMonkeyJuice
30+ years as a chef. It is what you make of it within and out of the parameters those above you provide.
More_Palpitation4718
i genuinely wondered what kind of pill is this and who the heck is your boss?!
46 Comments
If you’re a owner/manager, it’s cynical but true
If you don’t do the first list well, the second list won’t matter. Doing the daily grind well lets you have the opportunity and resources to do the rest.
It’s the truth. Especially if you work in the corporate world.
Operations Manager: For better or worse being a FoH manager has more to do with keeping the waitstaff in line than bothering the chef.
It’s true except that those things don’t have a “lot more to do” with being a chef. I was also busting my ass cooking and experimenting while managing that other shit. It’s even more than this list, it’s all at once and it never ends. Yeah it’s bleak but there’s an even-lower level of blander bleakness you’re not seeing here, lol
Success as a cook is making great food. Success as a Chef is making a great restaurant.
What’s bleak about it? That all needs to be done to keep a business running and it’s a lot of work. If you want to cook then be a cook.
I mean, yeah. That, or you go the less traditional route and become a social media chef, which obviously has a similar dynamic where the cooking matters even less & it’s kinda just a marketing job.
Traditional cheffing has extraordinary little “experimenting with food” – people want what they know. If you put a traditional cheeseburger on a menu alongside some incredible, unique, burger you put a ton of work into, the normal burger will outsell your fancy bullshit 10 to 1. Everything is like this. Get used to it.
This is something everyone who gets into the business because they “just really love cooking” needs to read. It’s all just spreadsheets and scheduling and deescalating worker disputes while watching the actual worst people you’ve ever met make more money than you.
There is truth there but I don’t consider it bleak. I enjoy those things. At this point hitting my budget and getting orders down perfect are much more challenging and rewarding than working a line.
There is a world of difference between being a chef, and restaurant operator. Operating a restaurant revolves around managing loss in a capitalist system. It’s tiring, draining, and mostly unrewarding.
You can indeed be a chef for a restaurant owner. Yes it’s harder to find a good fit, and the odds of the owner stamping on your ideas is high.
But knowing this can help you find the roll that doesn’t kill your passions. There is no shame in being the best sous chef ever. And a life spent doing that you love isn’t a wasted life
“Sometimes, I think I’d be happier if all I had to do was cook.”
Two Chefs I’ve had the privilege of working for have said that (or something similar) over and over and over and over…
There’s times I say it now, too.
It’s not bleak. It’s the progression of a career.
When food is all that’s required, you have cooks. Pretty much the corporate model in a nutshell. Actually running a kitchen and growing the next generation requires a whole lot more.
feel like i should clarify i don’t think the note is inaccurate, 10 years in the biz has shown me that it’s very true. just felt like someone had good intentions for a nice note to my chef and maybe worded it differently than i would have if it was supposed to be encouraging for lack of better term lol
Oh! It’s a magnet. It’s on a white board.
It’s just facts
This, sadly, is the way.
That’s why I got out of the industry. 20 years of doing all of that on the first part of the list was going to kill my love for experimenting and creating in the kitchen. So now I solely do it for myself and the people closest to me. Running a restaurant is not for the faint of heart, that’s for sure.
It really depends on how the business is set up, this can be real sometimes but sometimes this is total bullshit because those jobs belong to roles like ops manager, kitchen manager, inventory, or HR.
The smaller rhe gig, the more likely all the higher-level jobs are to converge on head chef.
Some operations start small and get big but don’t divest these tasks out to other people for whatever reason. Some big places will be staffed by people who only know the small venue format and scale it up. Some small places don’t put all those on the chef because the owner handles pieces of them, maybe HR, maybe the inventory management, etc because the chef is hip-deep busy backboning the kitchen.
Ask the Head Chef what he thinks, it’s his reality
Chefs write menus and run kitchens. Cooks cook.
>For Better Or Worse
It’s explicitly in the eye of the beholder. What’s bleak to you might be life goals for another.
Is that a pill?
Consdidering “Chef” is just a french word for “Boss”, this is accurate.
The question is
Are you “Le Chef”
or
Le Chef de Cuisine
Mixed take-it depends on where you are. If, to the owner, chef means “stability and predictability, with a focus on cutting costs,” then yes. This is obviously how restaurants don’t shut down. If you put in the time grinding, though, this list becomes second nature, and you can end up somewhere that you do get to express yourself. It’s taken twenty years, but I finally have work life balance (I’m off more days than I work and I make more money than before). Being good at what she says is most important is what earned me the trust of owners along the way. You may respect a cook’s ability on the grill, but you might not be able to trust them to make decisions for the business.
It needs more backstory. Like who wrote this, and who was the intended reader?
It’s correct and why many people burn out.
30yrs pro chef fine dining here, it’s the truth, accurate, no more no less.
The Restaurant Business meets at the intersection of Art & Commerce. (Batali)
Great handwriting btw, I’m curious- how old is the person who wrote that?
Nah these are facts. I’ve worked with tons of creative and talented chefs who have almost immediately pissed off everyone else in the kitchen and failed to order on time or accommodate staff scheduling. Most places close because there’s some sort of fundamental management issue that goes unaddressed for too long IMO. The food could be fine.
I absolutely love cooking & food. Quitting being a chef was the best decision I’ve ever made.
Accurate but they left out making sure cleaning and food safety are prioritized.
Only executive chef has most of those responsibilities. There ARE chefs whose major concerns are just cooking and helping other people cook better. Tho frankly, as a chef myself, I feel like my job is 90% cleaning up and dishes.
Cooks cook. Chefs run a kitchen. Sad fact of life. It’s a generalization but you’ll find it to be mostly true.
This is exactly why I’ve never done management even though I’ve been offered the position at almost every job I’ve worked. I didn’t get in to cooking just to sit in an office and write schedules or stand on expo looking at ticket times. This *is* true for the vast majority of kitchens.
This is a factual statement. And many Chefs need to hear it. Especially if they graduated from some prestigious Culinary School.
Theoretically, this is true of an *executive* chef’s work life. Now, I’ve been an exec for a little under 10 years. Only about 2 of that has been a job where I had those responsibilities front and center.
The lie they tell you in the interview as an EC is always the same. “There’ll be very little cooking involved.” The reality is that you spend about 80% of your time, as a salaried employee, doing work that the employer should be paying hourly people to do, but it’s cheaper to make you the biggest cog in production AND be able to hold you accountable for the financials that you get to at 8pm.
The EC should be finding a balance between the administrative duties, coaching sous chefs, planning/experimenting for future menus, and yes, some basic restaurant tasks. My next interview is going to be them explaining to me what they’ll do to make sure I can do all that in l45-50 hours a week. And asking what my maximum yearly increase is. If it’s not 10% or more, I’ll move on.
That’s the way of it. I would also say that cleaning has been left off the list. I guess depending on how the job works, maybe the executive chef doesn’t have to clean that much.
this is 100% accurate, your cooking skills may have gotten you to the chef spot but your leadership for ppl and budget management will keep you there. i was lucky my chef mentor taught me this very early on and its helped me since.
Nah that’s just being a manager
No thats entirely true. You have any idea how happy we’d all be if all we had to do was cook?
I prefer to think of it a bit differently, however it’s the same message ultimately.
Being a chef is more about building and maintaining a successful system that allows you to execute your vision and menu without being tied to the cooking of it. Your job is to train and inspire the team so that you don’t need to do the nitty gritty of it, and then you’re there to support the team and give them the things they need that they can’t do themselves – financial stability for the business first, then all the things they need from schedules, menus, ordering product, teaching on how to execute the menu. If you do it right, you should be able to take 6 weeks off without anything falling apart, between menu changes. If you can’t do that, you need to rethink a bit. Usually it means giving the team MORE responsibility for the day to day operations so you can improve the weak spots on the overall business.
Lads passion is in business,,any business!!.
My love to make people happy and smiling through the dishes they wish i can create for them.
You need customers to spend money on quality food before that weak departure
He will be an inventory supervisor.
Shazzam!!
I think it’s also personality type. Not a chef, but ex-waiter turned floor manager turned operational general manager here. Even when I was a young waiter I was always drawn to the ‘admin’ and ‘business’ side of things so my goal was always to get out of the floor, albeit subconciously maybe. I didn’t realise it when I was younger, but because of that my career in hospitality had more longevity than my peers.
Written like a true front of house manager who doesn’t know dick about kitchens.
Hey, I’m a food cost controller for a resort hotel brand.
Everyone I call “chef” is doing a lot more than cook. “Chef” is an administrative position.
30+ years as a chef. It is what you make of it within and out of the parameters those above you provide.
i genuinely wondered what kind of pill is this and who the heck is your boss?!