As some of you will doubtless be aware, in my professional life I work as a chef. It's not something I tend to write too much about, as the industry can be arcane and opaque, and as the inner workings of my kitchen are of little interest to anyone other than other chefs, so I have tended, in the past, to keep details of restaurant life away from the blogging beyond the occasional inchoate howl of tiredness and desperation. But, two days out and suitably calmed from Mother's Day, one of the most fraught days in the catering calendar, there is one aspect of the trade which I would like to share with you all, if only as a cautionary tale, and possibly an injunction not to do This Sort of Thing.
Because Mother's Day, you see, is Amateur Hour. By which I mean it's one of the three days of the year, the others being New Year's Eve and Valentine's Day, when you can be certain that you're going to be packed full of the dreaded tribe: People With No Idea How To Behave In A Restaurant. Every area will have some others as well, round here the Grand National can be relied upon to fill the gaff with drunks, but those three are the Unholy Trinity. The days of chips with everything. the "I don't like that" days when you can guarantee a host of requests to leave much-loved garnishes off the plates, the days when there's absolutely no point putting any fish other than Sea Bass or Salmon on.
Now, I'm not here to menu shame, I'm not one of those chefs who sneer at well-done, I'll tut and eye-roll, but it's a service industry, it's my job to ensure that the customer enjoys their meal. I will confess to getting a little bit annoyed when grown adults ask for no vegetables with their meal, but that's largely because that's behaviour I wouldn't tolerate in my own children, I'll still dish it up how they want it. They're paying, after all. And no, you're not getting any money off because we've taken the watercress salad off the plate.
Some places (mine definitely not included) simply shrug their shoulders and take it as an opportunity to fleece the gullible, jacking up prices and knocking out easy, crowd-pleasing menus. But for those of us who take a little pride in their work it can lead to a lot of agonising and head-scratching as we try to square our principles with the realities of a crowd who don't come through the door for the rest of the year. The standard line is to go with classics, reliable dishes that don't scare the horses but still have enough class to avoid making you feel like you're working the line in Frankie and Benny's. There's still a few requests for chips instead but you've just got to take it on the chin and move on. but that's not really what I mean by Amateur Hour, you get fussy buggers every day of the year (one day I'll do the gluten-free blog post, and lo there will be a wailing and a gnashing of teeth).
No, the bad behaviour which particularly exercises me on these days, the mark of the amateur, the rube, the doesn't-deserve-to-eat-out, is the no-shows. The vacant tables in the middle of service. the people who thought, nah, fuck it, can't be arsed, let's get a Dominos and watch the football (is it a coincidence that all our no-shows clashed with the Liverpool game?). The people who don't phone to cancel. Because if they'd just done that, we could have done something about it.
We could have sold Mother's Day out three or four times over. The amount of people we have to say "no" to in the run-up to the day is staggering, and some people have the absolute fucking nerve not to turn up. Three tables this year, thirteen covers in all. You might say, what's the big deal? You had a busy day, didn't you? And that's true, we did, but it misses the point as to why the no-show is such a heinous act. It's a sin of omission, next to that booking sheet is a long list of reserves hoping we'll call them. One phone call to say you can't make it, and somebody else's day is made. But if you can't be arsed, we lose the table, and a punter loses the opportunity. Those thirteen covers, at our spend per head, have robbed the restaurant of north of three hundred quid, they've robbed me of a few points on my GP, they leave stock unsold which I'd accounted for, but they've also robbed someone else of the chance to celebrate their day in the place of their choice, all because you can't be arsed to make a quick phone call and cancel.
And I think that that's what irritates the most, the not being arsed, the lack of regard, the sense of it being unimportant, the sheer thoughtlessness of it. It might be unimportant to you, fucko, but to some of us it's what we do for a living. So please, honour your reservations, or call to say you can't make it, because if you don't then you, make no mistake, are an amateur, a no-class rube, not fit to dine with the generally excellent restaurant-going public. And we've kept those phone numbers.
Because Mother's Day, you see, is Amateur Hour. By which I mean it's one of the three days of the year, the others being New Year's Eve and Valentine's Day, when you can be certain that you're going to be packed full of the dreaded tribe: People With No Idea How To Behave In A Restaurant. Every area will have some others as well, round here the Grand National can be relied upon to fill the gaff with drunks, but those three are the Unholy Trinity. The days of chips with everything. the "I don't like that" days when you can guarantee a host of requests to leave much-loved garnishes off the plates, the days when there's absolutely no point putting any fish other than Sea Bass or Salmon on.
Now, I'm not here to menu shame, I'm not one of those chefs who sneer at well-done, I'll tut and eye-roll, but it's a service industry, it's my job to ensure that the customer enjoys their meal. I will confess to getting a little bit annoyed when grown adults ask for no vegetables with their meal, but that's largely because that's behaviour I wouldn't tolerate in my own children, I'll still dish it up how they want it. They're paying, after all. And no, you're not getting any money off because we've taken the watercress salad off the plate.
Some places (mine definitely not included) simply shrug their shoulders and take it as an opportunity to fleece the gullible, jacking up prices and knocking out easy, crowd-pleasing menus. But for those of us who take a little pride in their work it can lead to a lot of agonising and head-scratching as we try to square our principles with the realities of a crowd who don't come through the door for the rest of the year. The standard line is to go with classics, reliable dishes that don't scare the horses but still have enough class to avoid making you feel like you're working the line in Frankie and Benny's. There's still a few requests for chips instead but you've just got to take it on the chin and move on. but that's not really what I mean by Amateur Hour, you get fussy buggers every day of the year (one day I'll do the gluten-free blog post, and lo there will be a wailing and a gnashing of teeth).
No, the bad behaviour which particularly exercises me on these days, the mark of the amateur, the rube, the doesn't-deserve-to-eat-out, is the no-shows. The vacant tables in the middle of service. the people who thought, nah, fuck it, can't be arsed, let's get a Dominos and watch the football (is it a coincidence that all our no-shows clashed with the Liverpool game?). The people who don't phone to cancel. Because if they'd just done that, we could have done something about it.
We could have sold Mother's Day out three or four times over. The amount of people we have to say "no" to in the run-up to the day is staggering, and some people have the absolute fucking nerve not to turn up. Three tables this year, thirteen covers in all. You might say, what's the big deal? You had a busy day, didn't you? And that's true, we did, but it misses the point as to why the no-show is such a heinous act. It's a sin of omission, next to that booking sheet is a long list of reserves hoping we'll call them. One phone call to say you can't make it, and somebody else's day is made. But if you can't be arsed, we lose the table, and a punter loses the opportunity. Those thirteen covers, at our spend per head, have robbed the restaurant of north of three hundred quid, they've robbed me of a few points on my GP, they leave stock unsold which I'd accounted for, but they've also robbed someone else of the chance to celebrate their day in the place of their choice, all because you can't be arsed to make a quick phone call and cancel.
And I think that that's what irritates the most, the not being arsed, the lack of regard, the sense of it being unimportant, the sheer thoughtlessness of it. It might be unimportant to you, fucko, but to some of us it's what we do for a living. So please, honour your reservations, or call to say you can't make it, because if you don't then you, make no mistake, are an amateur, a no-class rube, not fit to dine with the generally excellent restaurant-going public. And we've kept those phone numbers.
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