# Tasks you hate doing



## chefintraining (Jul 29, 2006)

This forum will give us industry professionals a little time to vent about tasks in the kitchen that we generally hate doing because it is time consuming and monotonous. Or any reason is fine.

I personally hate breading anything (the flour to the egg wash, to the bread crumbs Ugh!!), peeling pearl onions, cleaning baby brussel sprouts, cleaning kale and chard, fine dicing raw butternut squash, ummm what else......


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## kuan (Jun 11, 2001)

Inventory.


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## cacook (Jan 18, 2006)

Grill-marking 400 chicken breasts.


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## sushigaijin (Apr 12, 2005)

that's interesting, I really like the monotonous tasks - it's kind of a zen moment for me, the calm before the storm. 

Erik.


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## nantzie (Dec 11, 2006)

Thank you for posting that SushiGaijin. I really like that. As a SAHM (stay-at-home-mom) home cook, I need to be reminded of the zen of a lot of things, not just cooking. 

My answer to the original question would be: Cleaning the kitchen. I actually really enjoy the cooking. It's the cleaning up afterwards that I can't stand. 

I used to say that if I won the lottery I would want a personal chef. 

Now, I've gotten to the point where I would rather have someone who would just clean up after me. 

Food-wise, I would say pre-cooking chicken for stuff like chicken salad and things like that. 

Nancy


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## foodpump (Oct 10, 2005)

Inventory....


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## ras1187 (Oct 3, 2006)

Peeling & Deveining Shrimp


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## miseinplace (Jan 18, 2007)

it used to be segmenting oranges, but now i really enjoy that now, as i do all tasks except:

Mussels-I don't know why, maybe trouble with them this summer (Maybe it was mating season, or maybe it was just the heat),but for some reason, I just can't stand cooking those lil bitches anymore...


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## aprilb (Feb 4, 2006)

Mopping...cleaning up after the dumb a's that can't figure out how to use a sharpie to lable and date stuff...and dribbles. Chicken goo, beef goo, egg goo...argh!

I can't think of a food thing that I don't like to do other than trying to prepare good eggs in bad pans over dirty hamburger grills.

Well, that and tearing my hands up dealing with crab and lobster.

Preparing food has always been my de-stresser. Give me a mallot and I'll just think of my Ex. That crustateon is toast.

April


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## salliem (Nov 3, 2006)

The task I hate the most is when you have to stop what you are doing to tend to another cook's job when they are a no call/no show...


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## chefintraining (Jul 29, 2006)

how about pouring the forty gallons of lobster bisque you've just prepared out of the steam kettle into five gallon buckets. What about cleaning the foot off of 40# of bay scallops.


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## jim berman (Oct 28, 1999)

Skewering shrimp/beef/chicken brochettes... nothing like the feeling of bamboo skewers running through your finger tips, 7 or 8 hundred times!


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## foodnfoto (Jan 1, 2001)

Cleaning squid.
There's no telling what kind of stuff you'll pull out of those tubes.
Yeaccch!


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## kuan (Jun 11, 2001)

So everyone here likes to clean the fryer?


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## blade55440 (Sep 9, 2005)

I have to say, I have having to clean up the kitchen after cooking a nice meal for a bunch of people as well. Thankfully the house rule is: "The cook doesn't clean."

Which is why I love it when friends go: "So what's for dinner?"

As for at work things I hate to do...

I'm gonna have to go with supreme-ing oranges.

I think it boils down to anything that would better fit somebody with smaller hands and better eyesight, nothing annoys me more than trying to pay attention to a fine detail with my horrible (and quickly getting even worse) vision.


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## kuan (Jun 11, 2001)

_Hey change your font size will you please?_


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## chefintraining (Jul 29, 2006)

oh definately not, cleaning the deep fryer is a pain in the as*!! Throwing out the grease in the grease trap under the flat grill, picking up kitchen mats, I have to second on skewering, absolutely hate it, cleaning the flat grill, also I hate having to work with a group of people who work in this industry just for the check and don't give a sh** about the business


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## nentony (May 7, 2005)

I'll 2nd peeling and deveining shrimp.

Tony


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## jackbutler (Jan 11, 2007)

I'm the boss. I haven't had to clean the fryer in 10 years.


I hate peeling and deveining shrimp.


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## panonthefire (Jan 15, 2007)

Funny but I was just thingking about that know.

to understand the task I hate doing right know, it is better if I describe you the envirement I work in.

I work for this really old hôtel, with very poor quality equipment, and lots of no show/ no call employee, regularly late cooks, not motivated employee... you name it this place as it...(this is why I will change Job soon).

So here it goes... ( I hope I will not sound like a whinner now)...

I hate comming in and have to wash the steam pots because the dishwashers are busy talking somewhere in the hôtel or working at a turtle pace untill their shift ends.

I hate comming to work and to start my shift when there is no prep and the cook who was responsable for that prep left 1hr early.

I hate working in the kitchen of this hôtel because the hood does not work, their is no ac, their is coucarachas everywhere and I my boss told me they wont put any budget for that kitchen in 2007.

Finally I love cooking but I hate this job.

Thanks for listening, I feel a little bit better now.:lol:


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## aprilb (Feb 4, 2006)

Gutting fresh chicken...wretch city.

April


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## free rider (May 23, 2006)

Okay, so it's been many years, but I still remember how I hated making the steak tartare as though it were yesterday. ugh. Maybe that's why I'm a vegetarian. How could people order such a vile thing? (sorry to all you steak tartare fans)


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## kuan (Jun 11, 2001)

Cleaning the hoods/vents. Yeah that's about a PITA as much as cleaning the fryer.


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## jayme (Sep 5, 2006)

So Blade does that put you in the over 40 (years) category???
LOL sucks huh? your eyesight is fine- your arms are just too short.

My worst job- detail cleaning- the nooks and crannies that always seem to be full of c#%7p!


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## blueicus (Mar 16, 2005)

Hah, cleaning fryers wouldn't be a tenth as bad if we didn't fry things that didn't have a lot of breading or flour... it's a greasy brown sludge at the bottom every single night.

I didn't like having to prep chickens for tandoori while at the same time being the dishwasher... it got very annoying and I constantly washed my hands.


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## blade55440 (Sep 9, 2005)

Sadly, I'm only 22, but going blinder by the day. I wouldn't be surprised if (even with the ultra-high index lenses) that I would have coke bottle bottoms by the time I hit 40+. As for arms being too short... I could possibly agree with that, I'm just short in general compared to most of my co-workers.

Detail cleaning by the way, I hear yah on that. I'm just glad I don't get stuck having to boil out the fryers.


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## fledgling (Jan 13, 2007)

Putting away the inventory in our walk-in freezer which is about 15 times the size of my apartment.

Wearing nothing but a short-sleeved kitchen shirt and chef pants and my non-slip shoes that slip easy on ice.

Usually takes about an hour to put away the inventory.


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## jayme (Sep 5, 2006)

Blade-
Only 22?? wish I had gotten intothe culinary world when I was young (instead of now as a change of career) Sorry to hear you have vision trouble-- I guess if your vision gets real bad you can go work in that "dark diner" discussed on the "dining experiences" forum...LOL


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## ras1187 (Oct 3, 2006)

Cleaning the deep fryer isnt that bad... we have one of those self-filtering ones, and even changing the oil is preferred over peeling & deveining shrimp.

Organizing the endless piles of fallen boxes in our undersized freezer ranks pretty high on my "I dont wanna do it" list.


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## rivitman (Jul 23, 2004)

Peeling of all those darn stickers they put on every piece of produce these days.


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## chefintraining (Jul 29, 2006)

good one rivit....i hate peeling off those darn stickers too...


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## chefontheloose (Dec 28, 2006)

I hate having to usher the inpectors around during the busiest part of my working day when i could be doing something else like ummmm COOKING.

Also dislike prepping african pumpkin...you need like the biggest , meanest, baddest cleaver to get through the skin...

Ill also second the skewers thing, nothing hurts more than bamboo pricks every two minutes or so...its a perfect torture method.

Steam burns suck to....your hand pulsates for like 3 hours after it and if you try wash your hands in water that is 1 degree higher than you body temp...you cry like a baby...ive been steam burnt twice...never again i hope.


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## powers (Dec 7, 2006)

So I have a few odd tasks I used to have to do that I hated:

-Fluting mushrooms: I had a chef that just thought they were the coolest thing, guess he was about 100 yrs behind. I was the only one in the kitchen that could do it, so I became the expert. I'll NEVER do it again.

-Breaking buerre blans and sving the butter: Chef said that's what you have to do when you use plugra and have 20 DIFFERENT BUERRE BLANCS on the menu plus usually one for the special. I have an idea chef "Change the F-in menu!"

-Cleaning new equipment in an open kitchen- can't even use nylon scrubbies, just rags and elbow grease. I guess it pays off, the place is 8 years old now and I went in for dinner, same equipment looks BRAND NEW

-Grinding freshly toasted peppercorns- Like 20 pounds at a time, didn't have time to let them cool down first, so grinding pepper while it's still hot. I had abs of steel from the sneazing

-Cleaning grease traps: Miami....middle of sumer 105 plus 100% humidity. outside, reaching in the underground grease trap (through all of the flies) to scoop gooey goodness from the drain water grease trap YUMMY!

-Putting together walk-in coolers, if you haven't done it, don't bother! 

-one last one: I worked in a restaurant about 5 yrs ago that burned down in the middle of the night. The new compressor on the walk-in set the fire. The only thing that burned totallyt was the walk in(just the roof part mostly) The rest of the restaurant was totally smoke damaged. Anyway, the fire marshall wanted to investigate so we couldn't move anything from inside or around the walkin for 2 weeks. We watched on a daily basis the mold, maggots and smell getting riper and riper for us. Then after 2 weeks we were allowed to clean. Every single one of us spent all day cleaning and throwing up, and covered in maggots. Did I mention middle of summer in mississippi heat? haha

-


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## mead (Jan 24, 2007)

That and having to triple-time it to catch up after the previous shift was a no-show or just a lazy bum. Which is likely what I'll have to do this evening. Just like yesterday.


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## katbalou (Nov 21, 2001)

yup, the grease traps under the sink, doesn't matter where you're located. can't think of anything that makes me want to gag more. i'm so glad i don't work in kitchens any more.  
kathee


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## nicko (Oct 5, 2001)

Not that I had to do it often I always hated letting people go.


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## greg (Dec 8, 1999)

Good one. Inventory is tops on my list of things that have to be done regularly, but overall it's firing people.


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## someday (Aug 15, 2003)

Not too many jobs that I absolutely hate...though I'm still at a point where constant improvement is necessary. 

Besides all the nasty cleaning stuff (like grease traps, etc), I HATE picking thyme. I think that if I had a ****, it would be me and an endless pile of thyme that needed to be picked. Ugh. ANd I love thyme, just not picking it like that. 

Does make my fingers smell nice though


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## panonthefire (Jan 15, 2007)

Grease traps?? I never had to clean a grease trap. And I will never clean one. Same thing for hoods.

I am a cook, I work with fresh food, I dont want to start to contaminate the food I make. Sorry Boss :talk: :lol:


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## salliem (Nov 3, 2006)

Have to agree on the grease trap...have never done it..will never do it...


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## firiki03 (Oct 20, 2006)

In my opinion, grease traps are best left to the professionals to do.


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## katbalou (Nov 21, 2001)

sometimes you just have to do what you have to do. never liked pearl diving either, but if i needed plates or pans or whatever i would always jump in to help out. bottom line was getting the food out in a timely manner.:smiles: 
kathee


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## tsblo (Jan 19, 2007)

I hate cleaning the flat top after a long day of orders.


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## erik (Jan 23, 2006)

I was a donut fryer long enough that cleaning fryers doesn't bug me one bit.

What really just kinda gets to me is getting a container from the dish pit and having to peel old labels/day-dots off of it. Just one of those pet peeves I guess....


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## ras1187 (Oct 3, 2006)

I don't have a problem doing dishes... but leaving at 1 am sobbing wet when it is -0 outside is not the ideal way to end my shift.


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## miseinplace (Jan 18, 2007)

eric, 
the soggy, half stuck-on labels I have to peel off, bug the sh#t out of me too!

The flat-top is easy, but why can't anyone invent a good frey tool?


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## chicken_dog (Feb 4, 2007)

I hate doing inventory i print off 23 pages from optimum control and if you have this program it is a pile of stuff to count. I also don't like having to clean the grease trap when it overflows.


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## sucrechef (Sep 1, 2005)

The only thing I really hate is cleaning soft-shell crabs...they're still alive and squishy -- makes my skin crawl. The rest of it ... well I might gripe about doing it, but can handle it ok.


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## kyheirloomer (Feb 1, 2007)

Reading this thread there seems to be a large number of you who listed peeling shrimp. I'm curious as to why that's troublesome for so many of you.

When it comes to prepping seafood, I would list oysters far above shrimp, and skid at the very top of the hate-to-clean list.


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## ras1187 (Oct 3, 2006)

Peeling & deveining shrimp gets repititive, dangerous (watch those tails), and nasty (ever silently screech to yourself when you discover a shrimp with a densely packed tube) all too fast.

For our restaurant, we only serve oysters on special occasions (New Years, etc.), so I can take 3-4x a year, while shrimp is a year-long deal.


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## oldschool1982 (Jun 27, 2006)

Ditto on that!  

Answering the phone! On Saturday's 4 hours of my morningjust to do this because the FOH mgr didn't schedule a host/hostess to take reso's and about 10 minutes after arriving at the property in the morning the phone rings and it's either a vendor saying he was out of whatever I special ordered for that days party 3 weeks before or one of any number of folks that couldn't remember to get out of bed to come to work.:lol:


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## panini (Jul 28, 2001)

The ONLY task I truly hate is, chasing money. 
Whether it be chasing customers/contracts that owe monies. 
Younger years, chasing some overtime, back pay, etc.. Actually, having to ask for something that is blatently owed to me or my business.


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## jeebus (Dec 1, 2005)

I worked with a chef who just loved his skate wing. Parties of 240 with skate wing as a main. I hate the sight of it now. Talk about dozens of tiny little cuts.


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## firiki03 (Oct 20, 2006)

Panini, it is better to chase after people for money than to be chased!!:lol:


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## cacook (Jan 18, 2006)

It's not that the actual task is bad...but when you're doing 300 shimp almost every day...it becomes tedious and boring.


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## ras1187 (Oct 3, 2006)

Agreed, I tend to not count the actual shrimp, but I just go by bricks. Especially if its 26/30 or smaller. 2 bricks or more qualifies as repetitive for me.


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## eda de leche (Apr 3, 2005)

hah, i love supremeing oranges. its so satisfying to get a good, clean segment out. i've only started cooking professionally though, so my opinions will change quickly, i'm sure.


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## iggygirl35 (Jul 15, 2006)

I hate peeling shallots, pearl onions, (pain in the a**) and sweet potatoes! (turns you orange EVERYWHERE when you have to do cases of them:lips: )


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## cacook (Jan 18, 2006)

Most the time we get those peeled shallots with a slit already in the skin so it's easy to just take the peel off. It's awesome.


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## kuan (Jun 11, 2001)

Pearl onions are the easiest. You're just not doing them right.

Here's one you may or may not like. Doing the whole catering tasting and presentation menu once a month for people who have booked functions. One presentation plate, one buffet style.


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## psycho chef (Feb 1, 2007)

Tomatoes concasse. Just the feel of the grainy pulp underneath as the waxy skin slides off, the mucus encased seeds and their insipid juice everywhere....for about 6 weeks every year they are a divine pleasure. Now with 100 moules provencal a week hitting the board they seem like a never ending pain in the ***.

And I can identify with about 90% of the other posts too...Although I've never met a dishwasher that refused a six pack of heineken or corona to clean the grease trap. Total cost to me $6.48 Actual value: Priceless!


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## cheri (Apr 5, 2006)

Shrimp, HATE IT. And, for some reason I cannot stand to grease and flour ANY type of pan, I spray the heck out of 'em and PRAY. I'll also line the bottoms which is also a PITA but I would rather do that than flour them. Guess I just wanna get to the good stuff! When I teach I make others do the grunt work for me!


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## entropy (Nov 11, 2006)

Picking herbs, especially thyme.

Frenching racks of lamb.


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## kuan (Jun 11, 2001)

Frenching racks is easy too. Cummon people!  Chop faster!


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## entropy (Nov 11, 2006)

Its very easy (actually most cooking is pretty easy imo), its just not fun after the 150th rack and your fingers are numb, thank god nerves regenerate.


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## jerryg (Feb 14, 2007)

I wish a private **** on whoever decided to start using these things.


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## cacook (Jan 18, 2006)

On that note...the purveyor we use for beef started individually wrapping the fillets a couple months ago which wasn't great but we got used to it...but I just noticed today that they started putting inspection stickers in what seems like 1 out of every 8 packages. Not only is it more time consuming...but what if someone misses that when they're unwrapping 250 steaks and somehow it ends up on the plate?


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## mikeb (Jun 29, 2004)

The task I hate doing most - making any sort of a garnish for a dish that people never really eat anyway. It's against my culinary philosophy, and is a colossal waste of time. I've worked in restaurants where 80 percent of the time was spent preparing 10 percent of the food. **** pretentious fine dining nonsense...


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## kuan (Jun 11, 2001)

How about deliming the combi oven? One place where I worked the water was so bad we had to delime every week.


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## entropy (Nov 11, 2006)

I love cooking professionally. And mulling over this topic a little more I think that all the manual labor, cleaning, paperwork, dealing with purveyors, suits, etc.....all seems easy compared to getting cooks to do their work properly and consistently every single day without compromising the food in any way. Esp. in a union kitchen. "That's not my job," has got to be my most favorite hated phrase of all time.


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## ras1187 (Oct 3, 2006)

I never really gave this one much thought, but you do bring up a good point. I can pretty much agree with you 100% on this.


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## kuan (Jun 11, 2001)

What do you call those little bundles of herbs? Pluches or something? What's the proper name?


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## ras1187 (Oct 3, 2006)

I also thought about this, though it is a minor gripe since the customer is entitled to have their food the way they want.

I really dislike having to cook anything past medium (unless its chicken)


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## guinness_stout (Jan 16, 2007)

I really dislike breading anything. That or waitstaff that doesn't tell you about big tops in the restaurant. Griping servers....Slow workers...blah.


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## sleepy_dragon (Aug 30, 2005)

In fact, I'd say of the closing tasks I least mind, cleaning the fryer is one of them. I'd volunteer to do it if it means someone else will deal with all the fiddly organizing elsewhere. A big task which requires total attention is perfect for me after a day of multitasking, it's a chance to mentally calm down and not have to worry about anything else, and there is no running around on tired feet involved.

I do mind cleaning the hoods and filters, but only because of the climbing and squirreling aspect. If someone will fetch filters down for me and put them back later on, I'll be happy to scrub them to a mirror shine.

Citrus supremes are fun, very satisfying task. Same for tournes.

When I worked catering gigs, the task I liked least was the constant setting up and tearing down and setting up and tearing down, repeat ad nauseum. No amount of superior pay compared to restaurant kitchens could get me to choose that profession for full time.

But any task can be made unpleasant if you're teamed with a co-worker who's sloppy or otherwise uncaring and/or not mentally present. That kind of thing affects my own morale. Of course I do my best not to let it affect me but it sucks and is distracting to have to fight it anyway.


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## cacook (Jan 18, 2006)

I agree with you 150%...but let's not forget lazy...chatty...dissappears all the time.


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## the_seraphim (Dec 25, 2006)

ok as a commie... ill tell you what i hate..

now depending on who im working with depends on if i get yelled at and no respect (i dont care if im bottom rung... i work hard too)

heres a 40lb bag of mussels... clean em, check em, once youve done that, theres 50kg of spuds... peel em, chop em, steam em... and by then there should be sufficient mess and low stock to hand for me to keep you busy all day while i chat and drink coffee around working...

or theres the guy who helps me peel, helps me wash the mussels, gives me real food to cook... sometimes i get left on the grill taking main courses all the way through from fresh to plate while its quiet and its a great confidence booster


fryers = easy... get yourself some industrial strength de-greaser, whack more than it says your supposed to in water, fill the fryer (over the max level and over the mess) turn your fryer on and up...

just dont let it boil over !!!! boss tried my way once, left it boil over, fire alarm, an hour of cleaning... what a twat.

cleaning enourmous pots that have had gravy simmering without stirring for 9 hours.

day dotting and cling filming i hate that... cleaning things you KNOW are gonna get dirty within 5 seconds of...

breadcrumbs... i hate them.. not as a task so much as they get everywhere you move some bread 4 inches and the whole table has crumbs on for an hour.

cleaning the char grill, the hood, i dont think we have grease traps... or if we do they are cleaned proffesionally. how do i know if we have grease traps?


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## fledgling (Jan 13, 2007)

I HATE unedible garnishes. I also hate mint and parsley sprigs. Unappetizing, unappealing, waste of money! And YET every day I must finely finely chop parsley, to the point my wrist becomes sore and I have to hit my knife to the stone again after I'm finished, and all that just to sprinkle on a salad plate. I HATE IT. I HATE...IT...

We do oysters at my restaurant, too, and those bastards take so much time. Especially the kumo motos! When you already have to roll seven rolls of sushi, make fifteen different items on the menu, and then receive an order for twenty oysters... well, let's just say I've gotten really really fast at shucking oysters!


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## bizkit (Feb 6, 2007)

HOW ABOUT THE GUY OR GIRL THAT NEVER DOES THEIR OWN PREP BECAUSE THEY ARE TO SLOW AND (OR) CANT EVEN DO IT HIM SELF. BECAUSE THEY HAVE'NT LEARNED HOW, AND YOU'VE ALREADY TRIED TO TEACH THEM BUT THEY CAN'T, THEY DO'NT KNOW, THEIR TO SLOW AND BESIDES YOU DO IT BETTER AND FASTER. SO GET IT DONE AND KEEP HAVING THEM WATCH OVER YOUR SHOLDER AND ONE DAY MABE YOU'LL GET A SUPRISE.


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## breton beats (Feb 21, 2007)

Peeling shallots and cleaning crab and baby artichokes(down to the hearts)

Piping pate a choux

Organizing the walk in freezer and cleaning the relief mats (old school style with the holes in them).
Oh yeah and mopping/cleaning etc.. up after the wait staff just because they don't want to get dirty.


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## katiebour (Mar 14, 2007)

Coming in two hours before the start of my shift on Sunday (for which I am not paid) so that I can get those 6 trays of chicken breaded, those 3 roasts cut into single servings (fat removed), 2 pans of gravy and 3 pans of mashed made, 1 pan of southern-style taters cooked, eggs, sausage, french toast sticks, white gravy, cleaning all the pans/trays/wire racks that these items get cooked or prepared in/on, oh yes, and preparing 4 lbs of pasta, dicing 16 tomatoes, setting up for waffles (waffle irons weigh 50 lbs- think cast iron), getting all the veggies set out, buffet completely set up, kitchen mats/utensils all put out, everything turned on, line restocked, items for the catered jail meal set up, more dishes, prepping salads, restocking the bags of chicken in the cooler, making 2 lbs of our wild rice/white rice/veggie mixture, more and more (that's about half of my assigned tasks on Sunday)...

And getting yelled at when I get behind.

Or getting yelled at because I forgot to put a ladle in the salsa- go get it yourself, you friggin' lazy kitchen manager! It's a ladle! You've done nothing but drink coffee for 15 minutes since you got here!

I love the tasks, I just wish people would stop saying "well, it didn't take ME more than 3 hours to get everything done..."

And I wish I could get paid for those extra hours.

Other than that I hate washing all the buffet pans.


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## cookie mama (Mar 6, 2005)

Cleaning graters after grating citrus peel and rind. 
Burnt suger in the oven when forgetting to protect it from a spitting pie.
Cleaning bowls too big for the sink.


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## mattyb (Mar 10, 2007)

Hey there, 

I have to say its cleaning mussels because they just take so long and some of them are just so dirty grrr  lol

But I know its worth it but oh my god


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## bigblue250 (Mar 27, 2005)

I didn't read the whole thread, but I despise potato baskets(if you have ever made them you know what they are). I was 16 working the broiler at a CC and we were doing a wedding tasting. The Sous got these pot basket makers(basically juffrett pots arranged in a basket shape and fried, piped full of mashed) and we were using it with the Fillet and Lamb. To make a long story short we sent one out to the bride, and she had to have them for the wedding (250 people ). I got stuck making them one at a time over a hot fryer, and my hand is still numb to this day from 2 boxes of pots on a mandoline(cris cross cris cross, etc.....)


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## breakfasteatre (Feb 23, 2007)

lobster, lobster, lobster

hahahaha, i have no problem doing the killing, cooking and removing of shell, but since im the new guy learning, i have everone else asking me to do even the smallest things while im in the process of doing the lobster, wherein i have to take my gloves off, wash up (dont want cross contamination) just to fetch some eggs, or a litre of water, or something like that.

no wonder all the lobster piles up, im never given the opportunity to just get at it and finish it all in one go


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## blueicus (Mar 16, 2005)

Teaching and supervising people who don't want to learn or too stupid. I'm sorry, but for two consecutive nights I just wanted to scream at this one person who just didn't seem to get it... I felt I was being very patient and understanding and trying to guide her through everything and she disappears every hour to God knows where... but when you feel like you need to hold their hand while telling them how to check food temps and they can't spell lettuce correctly... well, it really got to me. Fortunately, she admitted that she couldn't handle it and will be quitting, and since I'm neither the chef nor the sous, I felt powerless.


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## headless chicken (Apr 28, 2003)

I hate doing other people's jobs as if I didn't have tasks of my own to do.
Much of my staff are aging and can't reach certain things, or do things outside what they've done for the past 10+ years. I mean, cookies are easy to do especially when we order them already in 2oz portions, all you gotta do is tray them, bake them, and time it, then take them out to cool. Or how about cutting your own **** vegetables. I don't know how many times I have left my station partially unattended because I gotta look up onions and peppers for the pizza station, gee how about not chit chatting so much and DO YOUR FREAKING JOB! 

I pulled a double today training in the new chef and as usual, I have to cover everyone's break without having my own. Well, the 2 manning the pizza station always go on break together...don't ask me why. Because they couldn't go on break earlier together, they went late, at the same time other people go on break, when I look after their job...so now I'm doing 3 people's jobs instead of 2. Well instead of hiring more people, heres a cheaper and much simpler solution...GO ON BREAK SEPERATLY!


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## i_can_c_u (Feb 27, 2007)

Cleaning.....


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## powers (Dec 7, 2006)

People who don't respect food, they just cook as a job and there's somehow at least one everywhere I go. The rest I love, even if I hate it at that particular time, at the end of the day, when I'm reflecting, I know that I got better, and someday someone will come around that thinks they can pop oysters faster, clean garlic better, or even down to scrubbing the floors better....well I beg to differ :smiles: If my chef can't do MOST things better or faster or whatever, I want to go somewhere else.


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## stella23 (Mar 22, 2007)

I hate to clean that thing it's really sick and nasty!!

Stella,
http://radical.glogster.com/


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## girlcook (Jul 10, 2015)

Cutting 30 lbs of onions, deveing shrimp


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## phaedrus (Dec 23, 2004)

I'll play. I dislike cleaning and portioning farmed salmon. I dunno why, just don't like it. We get sides already pin boned and everything, not much too it. But I don't like the smell (not that there's much) or the scales. Mostly I just won't eat farmed "Atlantic salmon" but the customers love it so I have to serve it. But when I can pawn it off my Sous I will do so./img/vbsmilies/smilies/lol.gif

It's long been my practice to take at least one task that no one likes to do and do it for my staff. Maybe that's slicing a bag of onions, maybe it's cleaning and portioning saute chicken. To it it's a show of respect for the staff that (generally) makes me look good. I like them to know I'm not an office chef or a guy who won't get my hands dirty. Same reason I make it a point to help the dishers out sometimes.


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## katbalou (Nov 21, 2001)

10 years later........


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## chef oddball (Jul 5, 2015)

Hate to have to:

- Correct Restaurant's managers spelling... It's Riesling... NOT Reisling... now go reprint wine menu!

- Ask veteran staff (10+ years) why they made bad decisions especially when ordering produce.... yes I let the staff order produce & dairy...

- Correct Restaurant's managers spelling... It's Pinot Noir .... NOT Pinto Noir... now go reprint wine menu!...... yes again!

- skewering....

- De-boning turkeys

- Listen to the Banquet staff trying to justify why they think that their way is right.... it isn't!

- Listen to Restaurant staff justify why the Kitchen should set up & break down any buffet set up in restaurant or lounge... teamwork anyone?

- Correct Restaurant's managers spelling... can you please use spell check? I mean seriously... change spelling on button...The guests will see this on their bill.. It's Quesadilla   not Quasadilla

- Listen to staff explain why they are late.... or calling in to say they are not coming in


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