# Kitchen Humor



## discgolfjoe (Jan 9, 2010)

I've worked in a few kitchens, and so far, I've seen all kinds of jokes and pranks pulled on the proverbial 'new guy.' You know the one. Doesn't really know his way around a kitchen, can't really pick up a knife, and can't tell cayenne pepper from pepper corns. So what have you guys asked this guy to find? What did you make him do?

I've made this guy drain the hot water from the coffee maker that's got a tap in the wall. He got through 16 qts of water before we told him to stop running up the water bill. I've also asked him to get plastic bags and collect air samples from the refrigerators to send off to the CDC. I've had one find me cooking water, and another looked for a bacon stretcher. 

I know I'm not the only A-hole that pulls these shenanagins, so what are you stories?


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## welldonechef (Sep 28, 2008)

I once sent a guy running around the resort property looking for the souffle pump. That one was a classic.


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## mark l (Jan 18, 2010)

Find the left handed steak knive for the lady with the cast on her arm


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## mark l (Jan 18, 2010)

our steamer is broken sent a new guy next store to borrow some steam.


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## coulis-o (Jan 23, 2010)

i sent a trainee-commis to the local butcher to buy 2lb of Chicken Lips for a parfait that i was making


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## chefray (Sep 29, 2009)

I once sent a guy to the butcher looking for Kendoslavian Sausages. Called ahead and had the butcher play along. 
Another time, I had a young Commis working to make sure that he removed the teeth from a Cornish Hen. 
The classics are the search for things like the bacon stretcher, the noodle stretcher, the pickle slicer, the jar of steam, the butter clarifier, and such.


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## foodpump (Oct 10, 2005)

It all depends...........

If the newbie is well mannered and not a jerk I tend to avoid all practical jokes--usually the kitchen needs grunt work done, and not an hour wasted looking for a sky-hook, a stove extension, or the special seasoning salt for the steam table.

Now, if the new guy is a blithering jerk, a know-it-all, or a brown-noser, I tend to get a bit, uh..."creative"

To knock the guy(or gals in a few instances) down a few notches, my favorite is to get an egg, blow it hollow, run a length of butcher's twine through it, and attach it to the back of the schmuck's apron. Nothing funnier than someone with a swollen head giving orders to Sous and line cooks with an egg dangling between his legs...

If they're truly gullible you can get them to make electricity: When boiling eggs in slighly acidulated water in an aluminum pot, you place a copper wire in the water with the other end on a light bulb, and the butt of the lightbulb on the pot. Betcha didn't know that!

An for the truly space cases, the ones you know won't last the week, I get them to clean out the fryer "The easy way"

Now you just need two lighly beaten eggwhites, but the schmucks almost always figure on more is better and get a dozen's worth. You clear a consomme with eggwhites, right? So, use the same priciple to clean the oil in the fryer. And the schmucks dump the whole thing into the smoking hot fryer. Within seconds, "Swamp thing", a huge eggwhite souffle, crawls out of the fryer, inflating at incredible speed and dribbling hot oil all over the place. The terrified look on the schmuck's face is indescribable, but then, so is the clean-up.......................


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## maaron (Jan 19, 2010)

Ok I always do this to the new dishwashers.....it is called a "pepper bomb". Take a dry saute pan and place it on high heat and add whatever spicy items you can find in the kitchen....I usually just use cayenne pepper, black pepper, ground cumin, and whatever other spices I think will work. Put them in the pan and let the mixture cook until it starts to burn and gets nice and smokey. Make sure the pan is extremely hot and immediately take it to the dishwasher and ask him to spray the pan out (get away as fast as you can.) As soon as the water hits the pan all that steam carries the mixture in the air and into the poor kids nose and throat. It sounds mean but it is quite funny to watch as long as you don't get hit by the cloud too! Just to be safe I always make sure he doesn't have asthma or anything before I do it! I would love to see some videos of people doing this to their kitchen staff!:lol:


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## discgolfjoe (Jan 9, 2010)

A friend of mine made a nice pepper pan for the server station one day. It's a really affective way to get the servers to check on their tables instead of hanging out in the kitchen.


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## treehugger057 (Mar 6, 2009)

Send them to the walkin in search of the tortillas glue in the blue tube top shelf on the right and hurry up I need it right away. The ones that come back with a puzzeled look on their face are priceless.


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## greyeaglem (Apr 17, 2006)

Stop it! I'm laughing so hard my back hurts about making electricity. I thought I heard 'em all. My favorite is still the guys who gave an ice sculpture to the new dishwasher after a wedding. They told him to run it through the dishwasher (3 section Hobart with dry cycle) and then put it in the freezer so they could use it for another wedding. The guy almost walked out because he was afraid they'd fire him when it melted.


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## leeniek (Aug 21, 2009)

That is funny ... I can see our dishwashers looking at it and saying.. you do it I refuse!


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## fryguy (Sep 2, 2009)

we roast whole pigs for our labor day lua so I always make sure I save the head and put it in the fryer for the next days line cooks.....thats always a nice thing to see first thing in the morning......I think of it as a tradition....


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## left4bread (May 8, 2009)

I would feel honored to have your hog head welcome me in the morning, wherever it would make a heart stop.

I'm sure that there is a thread on here somewhere, but...

mop the walk-in freezer and smell the "is the balsamic reduction ready?" are classics.


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## tonyc (Feb 13, 2010)

My personal favorite was sending the new guy to get the patio furniture de-icer from the basement, except there was no basement and we didn't have a patio. There was also the standby which is use a trash bag to take the air out of the walk-in, hey something in there smells bad,.... take this trash bag. And there's my "you're pissing me off and I want you to get out of my hair" fall back, which is go inventory the straws.


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## pembroke (Sep 26, 2009)

I like the old ones. Count 500 leaves of gelatin or chop the flour for half an hour.:chef:


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## chefray (Sep 29, 2009)

Pulled this one on someone who asked me what a dough blade was for. It's for chopping dough ingredients, obviously. Could you handle that for me?


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## coulis-o (Jan 23, 2010)

one of the restaurants i worked at had a daily carvery sun - sat. 

there was a hot carvery unit out in the restaurant itself and right beside it was a bain marie for all the veg and potatoes, so that people could get their preferred cut of roast meat from the chef at the carvery and help themselves to veg, potatoes and gravy at the bain marie.

we usually had 2 different types of potato, 4/5 different vegetables and gravy for the carvery veg. one particular day a staff member from the front of house said to me that my deep fried baton parsnips were going down well with the customers and could she have some more because people were piling the parsnips on their plates thinking that they were chips :lol:


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## theages (Feb 7, 2010)

We had one know it all kid. We were doing live maine lobsters for a special. We told him how expensive they were and that he was to cook them off for the Chef, and of course the Chef would be very upset if they were cooked improperly. We then told him that he had to add a few to a large pot of water and stir vigorously because if they turned red then they were over-cooked and the Chef would have his a**! Precious.


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## chefray (Sep 29, 2009)

Something along the lines of, "Saute these shrimp but, dear god, don't let them go pink."


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## theethical chef (Jan 29, 2010)

I need you to get me a can of elbow grease, or a bucket of steam have always been my favorite. I once got duck eggs at a local asian market, I didn't know they had unborn ducklings inside of them, I brought them back to the shop and was going to make myself a nice duck egg omelet for lunch, imagine my horror when I crack the egg open and find the baby duck inside. I of course didn't want to be the only one of my staff to experience this so I had four different people on four different occasions crack one of the eggs for me. It was a really fun day.


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## theethical chef (Jan 29, 2010)

Also another prank I like to pull is to take sour cream and smear it on the back of a handle to a reach in or a deli unit, I then watch my cook or sous open the reach in or deli unit ending up with the sour cream all over their hand I then ask them "playing with your meat again?" or something wise to that effect. 

I once had a server who was always trying to upsell to get a bigger tip I took a quarter and threw it on the grill for about 10 minutes, then took a pair of tongs and threw it on the ground, the server walked into the kitchen a moment later at which time I pointed out the coin on the floor, it was really funny and very cruel watching them burn their finger picking up the coin. 

I once got a server to eat a cod fish eye after making fumet telling them that I had gotten in beluga caviar for a special and I really wanted them to try it so they could sell it to the guests, it was funny but having to mop up his vomit and getting it from my boss later was not so fun.


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## theages (Feb 7, 2010)

Pouring vinegar into someone's drink left sitting around. A paste of cayenne pepper spread over cookies which have been pilfered. Chocolate dipped garlic or crisco left sitting on a plate for someone to steal.


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## just jim (Oct 18, 2007)

Still love the espresso puck with chocolate sauce and whipped cream.
Also, a cider vinegar "iced tea" is sure to get a laugh....from those that watch.


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## coulis-o (Jan 23, 2010)

one of my favourite tricks is to hard boil some eggs in the evening, cool them and then put them back on top of the tray of eggs ready for the breakfast chef in the morning


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## theages (Feb 7, 2010)

The night crew would occationally put a few of the metal mixing bowls up high on a shelf so you have to reach up for it, and they would fill it to the rim w/ water. You naturally tip the edge when taking it off the shelf.....Splash!! Also, they will fill w/ water the 6 oz ladels which hang high from the utensil rack. Very nice.


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## foodpump (Oct 10, 2005)

Take a hunk of puff pastry margerine, and flatten/shape it to resemble a cutlett/schnitzel. Bread the sucker.

Give the "special" schnitzel to a noobie and ask him/her to fry it up for you for lunch.....


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## peaceful (Jan 30, 2010)

Oh Lord, those were so funny to read! Some of these really cracked me up.


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## chefboyarg (Oct 28, 2008)

First of all I think the screenname "Coulis-o" is epic. 
At one places I worked at we sent a new cook to get a bacon stretcher. We called the other guys ahead of time to let them know he was coming and the cook returned with some sort of pulley-like device asking us how he supposed to use it. We laughed. Then laughed. The laughed a little more. He left a couple of days later.


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## maaron (Jan 19, 2010)

We used to fill 4" hotel pans with water that had a few sheets of gelatin in it then take orplea knif kits and dump them in the lab and let it set up before they got to work...that's always a funny one. If you have a bathroom in the kitchen... Fill the toilet up with gelatinized water and wait for someone to go in there and get a nice splashing!haha.


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## lordbacon (Feb 16, 2010)

Many classics here, especially the cleaning the fryer one. One I like is rubbing butter on the earpiece to the phone, then calling it from my cell and having the FNG answer it.


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## nick.shu (Jul 18, 2000)

Well, i worked in a place and one of the FOH dudes did a good job of doing a number of me.  So I flattened out a piece of scone dough into a heart shape and crumbed it up.  Served it up as a chicken schnitzel on salad with gravy.  What surprised me, was that the fact that 2/3rds of the alleged schnitzel was eaten and it wasnt until I told the guy that it was scone dough that the penny dropped. What worries me, is that someone can eat sweet dough and not tell the difference between that and chicken breast.

But anyway.


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## chefray (Sep 29, 2009)

Nick.Shu said:


> Well, i worked in a place and one of the FOH dudes did a good job of doing a number of me. So I flattened out a piece of scone dough into a heart shape and crumbed it up. Served it up as a chicken schnitzel on salad with gravy. What surprised me, was that the fact that 2/3rds of the alleged schnitzel was eaten and it wasnt until I told the guy that it was scone dough that the penny dropped. What worries me, is that someone can eat sweet dough and not tell the difference between that and chicken breast.
> 
> But anyway.


But your location says Australia, not America./img/vbsmilies/smilies/wink.gif


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## chefray (Sep 29, 2009)

Theages said:


> Pouring vinegar into someone's drink left sitting around. A paste of cayenne pepper spread over cookies which have been pilfered. Chocolate dipped garlic or crisco left sitting on a plate for someone to steal.


A plastic to-go sauce cup full of garlic oil works really well. You fill it about half way and wrap it in cling film. Then you jam their straw through the plastic. It's really horrible tasting and the reason that I bring clear cups in from the grocery store for my beverages.


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## lordbacon (Feb 16, 2010)

Anybody ever bread rubber bands, fry them, and give them to servers as calamari.


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## dc sunshine (Feb 26, 2007)

Not a pro...but you mob are *evil* and gave me great big laughs :lol: Thank you all for that....luckily nobody pranked me when i was kitchen donkey in the long ago. If I ever get back into it I'll watch out for these things.


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## a_mak (Aug 27, 2009)

The best prank that we pulled was the time one of the cooks had the day off but left his fish spatula at work.  So we took a bucket & filled it with water.  Then we tied some twine to the handle and then tied it to the edge of the bucket so that the blade was submerged in water.  Then we stuck it in the freezer.  When the water got solid enough we cut off the twine.  When the guy came back from his days off he found his spatula stuck in a huge block of ice.  

Mostly though our idea of "kitchen humor" is to make remarks about the male servers sexual orientation.


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## chefboyarg (Oct 28, 2008)

Rimming someone's coffee cup with Frank's Red Hot can be funny. Until the person retaliates.


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## theethical chef (Jan 29, 2010)

We used to play the salt game at one place I worked, if you left your cup unattended boom salt.  Also once I was having serverbecsc eating truffles in my walk in so I made a batch filled with fish sauce, cayenne pepper & roast beef, needless to say they stopped eating the truffles. The server's knew it was against the rules to graze so it was hilarious watching the male server not be able to react because he knew what he was doing was wrong, he turned a pale green and we had a good laugh on the  line.


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## nick.shu (Jul 18, 2000)

Hmmm, the truffle thingy reminds me when the maitre'd used to eat the chocolate truffles i prepared. Until I left one on top of the pile filled with dark green food dye. You know, the stuff that makes your teeth go dark green, and then you have to greet guests at the front door.

Another place I worked in another city, I was introduced to "the circle game".  With hilarious results.  It spread from me and the apprentices playing it, to stewards, to other Hotel Depts, even to guests.  From a entire hotel playing "the circle game", it then spread to nearby bars from the Hotel in the area.  Even today, when I see "Malcolm in the middle" episodes, and they're playing the game, i still crack up.  It actually got to the stage where I was getting MMS messages playing the game. Out of control.


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## bengis (Feb 21, 2010)

Have tried/seen many of these over the years, but the one that backfired most spectacularly was leaving a commis to cook lobsters for a 200 cover banquet in a 5 star hotel. He was given very specific instructions, with a final warning that 'If they change colour, they're screwed, and so are you...'
On returning from the split shift, everyone set themselves up, and it took a while to realise the commis was nowhere to be seen. And neither were the lobsters.
At which point a kitchen porter arrived, asking if there were supposed to be so many lobsters in the garbage....

...The kid was found, in tears, in his room, packing his bag...!


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## leeniek (Aug 21, 2009)

I'll admit that I laughed at this... poor kid though!


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## coulis-o (Jan 23, 2010)

there is a Coke can vending machine at work in the staff room, the 'coin-return' lever jams when it is pressed down fully so that everytime a coin gets slotted in it just comes right back out again. i sit there watching people trying and eventually giving up after numerous attempts to get a can.


one of the chefs i work with is due to leave, he's on a weeks leave right now before returning for a final week, i worked the final shift with him before his leave and at the end of the shift we totally rearranged all the kitchen equipment - all the benches, fridges and microwaves, and locked all the draws on the fridges too


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## rabicamail (Feb 19, 2010)

I feel prety about the new trainees but its really funny


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## lordbacon (Feb 16, 2010)

Another time, we had a culinary weenie, and our exec screamed at him,"Hey, reduce me a gallon of water by half, STAT!!!'  When the weenie was done, the chef walked over, tasted it real quick, and with an incredulous look on his face, screamed "You idiot, you didn't season it."  That one brought the kitchen to a standstill for 15 minutes.


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## chefjade (Sep 20, 2013)

My favorite trick for the new guy when we were across from the Canadian tire store, was sending him over to the auto shop to get a "wheel alignment" on the kitchen cart, haha or frantically asking him to find the ice mix because we are running out, have him come back and he cant find ther bag so i gave him some cash to go buy ice mix from the store across the street only to have the employees there laugh him out of the store, poor guy went to two different stores asking everybody for ice mix because he didnt want to come back empty handed,


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## mikeswoods (Jun 14, 2013)

We had a helium tank that needed to be returned to the rental shop---It was half full and it did seem a shame to send it back full----

The answer was to fill a dozen garbage bags with the gas and pack them into the dumpster---and send Pablo to take out the trash--

The look on his face when he flipped open the lid was priceless-----


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## linecook854 (Feb 13, 2013)

I hate to admit that I laughed at many of the instances people wrote here (the lobsters, the shrimp and the reduced water were hilarious) cause I once worked with a FNG who was incredibly shy and nice to everyone but really motivated to learn. He didn't show up for work one day and everyone was like WTF he's never late, come to find out he purposely mixed a bunch of sleeping pills and alcohol the previous night because he really thought he sickened a customer because he served a broken aioli. The GM and the sous were just playing around but kept the story up of how we might get sued because this phantom customer got a terrible infection from the aioli and this poor kid thought he almost killed someone because "he was so stupid to serve a broken aioli". He never came back to work and nobody knows what happened to him, I still think of him 3 years later every time I get frustrated with a FNG.

Hate to burst the fun bubble but never do anything where someone can get hurt, honest pranks are OK but know what type of people you're dealing with and  where that line exists.


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## shichangchu (Dec 4, 2010)

One of my favorite stories was completely unintentional. At my work place, we were doing a Filipino marketing event. There were some ingredients I couldn't get from my current purveyors so I had to go shopping at some Filipino and Asian markets. I was doing this on Monday, my day off, and I was by myself. I'd done this before. I would stop in and get the company credit card, go do the shopping, and return with the ingredients and card. 

As I'm walking through one of the markets getting all my stuff, I see a great sale on live blue crabs at only $1.99/lb. It was a one day only thing and they were some great looking crabs so I picked four of the scrappiest looking ones. I figured I'd buy them with my own money and give them to the executive chef and the other sous chef as a nice gesture. They're both big crab fans. I get out the market and make my way back to work. They're in a brown paper bag I started going around the building to a few of the managers and employees and I'd say "Hey, check out what else I found." They would be startled for a second and then usually laugh about it when the bag opened and these four angry crabs are shaking their claws at them. The best part is this isn't even the good part of the story.

The chef and other sous chef were happy for these crabs was they were both leaving in about an hour and they decided they'd like to hold off till the next day before eating them. I decided to set up a little make shift enclosure for them in the office that the three of us shared. I filled a pan with 6" hotel pan with ice and put a 4" pan on top with a little water, a few bits of food, etc. Our big worry when we got in the next day that the crabs would be dead and our snack would be gone. Not from leaving them alone all night but these particular little buggers were especially ornery. Whenever they saw someone, they'd started gurgling and waving their claws violently. We were worried that our snacks would start a fight club and we'd be sharing one crab between the three of us the next day. We turned out the lights and hoped for the best.

Here was the fun part. The next day the head cook came in at 5:30 in the morning to work our Tuesday morning omelette station. All the burners and pans were kept in the office so he had a key. Here's the fun part, he didn't work on Monday so he had no knowledge of the crabs from the day before. He opens the office and decides to sit down for a couple minutes while finishing his coffee. For whatever reason, he didn't turn the lights one. After a minute, he starts hearing a gurgling noise. He started to get worried thinking it sounded like gas. He starts looking around the office and sees the hotel pans sitting on a table by the wall. He walks over and looks in where he see four crabs spitting and angrily waving their claws at him. He jumps back wondering if he was dreaming or not. He initially thought he was dreaming because he's allergic to shellfish and figured it was some sort of weird nightmare. When he realized he wasn't dreaming, his second question was "Why are there crabs in the office"?


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## mise (Aug 19, 2013)

lordbacon said:


> Anybody ever bread rubber bands, fry them, and give them to servers as calamari.


Will be doing this soon. Thank you.


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## theperegrine (Jul 17, 2012)

We had an FOH manager who liked to sample the desserts, so one day we made a few special mayo-filled cream puffs for her. Priceless.


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## jaredstone (Dec 18, 2011)

The sous chef hid in the linen dumpster, then we called the know it all waiter and told him we needed help prying it open...priceless...he literally pissed himself.


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## irishcook (Sep 27, 2013)

Our head chef poured a bag of flour onto a newbies chopping board and said "chop this flour much finer than it already is".

Newbie grabs a santuko from the wall and begins to chop away at it. Think we all needed to sit down for ten minutes after that.


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## shrimpboat chef (Sep 27, 2013)

Back in the day I was working in a restaurant  where our sous chef was also our pastry chef.One day the head chef sends a newly hired prep cook across the way to another restaurant  so that he can borrow the souffle pump for our pastry chef.I got a good chuckle when they sent him back with a fire extinguiser.


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## the boss (Sep 27, 2013)

Hi guys i am looking for 2 chefs to join my team, chefs need to be experienced in cooking Mexican food or a very fast learner, 1 will be lead chef the other an assistant which will depend on your experience etc., all applicants must have food hygiene certificates etc., the area of the job is Runcorn and pay to be negotiated

please contact simon on 07977719633 immediate start

or email me at [email protected]


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## chefbuba (Feb 17, 2010)

I have a work visa, When can I start? I can make burritos, chimi changas, gorditas, tacos locos, nachos, enchiritos.

Does everything need to be home made or do we open tins and heat it up?

I suspect that Mexican food found in the UK might be a bit different than what's available in the states.


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## mikeswoods (Jun 14, 2013)

chefbuba said:


> I have a work visa, When can I start? I can make burritos, chimi changas, gorditas, tacos locos, nachos, enchiritos.
> 
> Does everything need to be home made or do we open tins and heat it up?
> 
> ...


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## ras1187 (Oct 3, 2006)

So many of these I can't post here as they are really bad...

Worked with a hotel chef that was particular about dishes being more "colorful". Even if a dish was assembled and garnished appropriately (to the rest of us), he still insisted on throwing micro greens, parsley sprigs, pomegrante seeds, etc. just for the sake of making the dishes more colorful while disregarding the flavor profiles of the dish and additional ingredients. The banquet sous chef had about enough of this one day and grabbed a bag of M&M's and started throwing them on the plates to finish. When the plates finally reached the end of the assembly line to chef, his face was blood red and his endless barrage of profanity and threats could be heard throughout the entire hotel (servers from banquet rooms far away claimed to have heard it).

Had a mate that lacerated his finger pretty badly with a mishandled knife. He had several stitches and was out of work for 2 weeks. On his first day back, he was greeted by a plastic lettuce knife sitting on his station

I worked with a few people that routinely drank energy drinks or soda from cans. Take a (cheap) paring knife and poke a little hole on the side of the can that is directly underneath the spout and sit back and watch.

One the cooks I work with has a website for small private catering events that he does on the side. As soon as we caught wind of this, everyone started filling his inbox with bogus inquiries including requests for 1 on 1 naked cooking sessions with the chef.

This same guy has pictures of his work on his website. For some odd reason he has a picture of a salad in a mixing bowl with a whisk in it. When questioned about it, he just gets aggravated and frustrated. It is now proper protocol at our place that if someone is carrying a whisk, they must be asked "What salad are you going to make with that?" ESPECIALLY if he is around.

Banquet chef tells the new and very green storeroom assistant to call up the produce vendor and ask for "dingle berries". He nods his head and runs as fast as he can. He comes back up and says "The produce vendor wants to know if we want them fresh or dried?"

Argue with someone and convince them that it is impossible to break an egg in one hand. Even put on a dramatic show to prove "your side" of the argument. Then sit back and watch.


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## theperegrine (Jul 17, 2012)

Another great one is if you have a FNG prepped who is having trouble with onions - crying, burning etc. Let them know that a thick smear of mayo under the eyes and nose will stop the tears. It's amazing watching them cover their face in mayo and crying the whole time.


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## carole craine (Sep 29, 2013)

What is the difference between a tuna fish and a guitar?
--You can’t tune a fish.


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## staceface (Sep 26, 2013)

Mayo under the eyes and nose!! Hahaha that's really good!
Ice sculpture melting!
This is too good..
I work alone now, but when I worked at a local restaurant, we had a kitchen upstairs and a bakery/prep station downstairs, with all the food, refrigerators and freezer. So a lot of supplies were called down on the intercom, without a chance to question.
A cup of fennel seeds, split, on the rail. I'd watch preppers bumping into each other, grabbing paring knifes.
Clam/oyster glue.. Sent to store because we were always out. Make sure to get the "tasteless" not the "lobster fresh" glue.
A lot of the pranks were called down.. People afraid to go upstairs and say they couldn't find it. They would always come to me, shaking, holding their inventory list for upstairs. Filled with the weirdest stuff. Id snatch the list from them, saying I'd take care of it, while they whipped my cream by hand.
We had one guy running up and down the stairs for one thing at a time. One carrot, a quart of 1/2 and 1/2 ect. He got into a huge hurry that he was taking 2 to 3 stairs at a time. He slipped half way up and came tumbling back down. He jumped up, grabbed whatever he dropped an ran back up the stairs screaming "I'm good, it's cool". Determination.


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## rat (Mar 2, 2006)

I had a kid once running around asking for the bagel stretcher because the brunch customers did not like bagels with the holes closed up. The chef caught wind of that and yelled to the commis that the stretcher was in the storeroom next to the cans of steam.


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## chefbuba (Feb 17, 2010)

I sent a dishwasher to the hardware store for a can of elbow grease, told him to ask for help if he could not find it. He came back empty handed, I asked if he asked for help, his reply was that the clerk went over to the isle where all the lubricants were and could not find it.

Left handed bacon stretcher was always a good one to have a new disher or busser look for.


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## vic cardenas (Nov 11, 2012)

I posted this on another similar thread but its worth repeating here.

I worked at a ski resort cafeteria style restaurant many years ago. One of my cooks found a new spray bottle and filled it with blue Gatorade. He started cleaning the counters with it in front of customers. Then he would spray it into his mouth And say "Hmmmm... It tastes like cleaner." The looks some of the customers would give him was priceless. We all had a good laugh at some of the people that really freaked out. Everybody took it quite well. 

Then, a few days later the GM found the bottle and thought it was windex. He started cleaning a window with it and when it would smear he would look at the bottle with a confused look and then start spraying and wiping again. Then he would give the bottle another confused look. He repeated this about 8 times before he gave up. The entire kitchen was just in stitches the whole time. 

Another place I worked, we had this "berry sauce" that looked like blood. I filled a latex glove with it, slipped my hand in and started running around the kitchen screaming. Everybody's face turned white. 

A month or so after that, we all had a day where we were all playing simple pranks on each other. It all culminated with the sous chef sticking a pretty graphic note on my back. Which I didn't notice for quite some time. When I did notice, I told him I was going to get him back someday. Well, I sure did... 

Me and the sous chef in the past had talked about ulcers. I used to have pretty bad ulcers that I treated and cured. He was having them pretty bad. I baited him by telling him "God, I think my ulcers are coming back. My stomach has been hurting really bad lately." About an hour later I went and filled my mouth with the aforementioned "berry sauce". I walked out of the walk in, found him and gave him my best acting of my life. I gave him a sickly look. I clutched my stomach and grabbed the wall like I was reeling in pain. I let loose my mouth full of "blood" all over the floor in front of him. His face drained of blood and jaw hit the floor. Now I know what someone's face looks like when they really think that I am seconds from death. Its a look of fear, terror and concern... times 10. He grabbed me and yelled "Vic! Vic! Sit down!" Then he grabbed the phone and I started busting out laughing. I said "I told you I would get you back, mf'er!" Then he gave me a good punch in my chest. 

I know... that was really cold.


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## etherial (Sep 22, 2013)

Man, I hope I never work for one of you guys because if anyone tried that shiznet on me, they'd be dialing 911 for salt!  Real quick!


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## craiger (Oct 19, 2013)

Lets see.

We used to have a tradition of sending guys to the gas station on the corner to get a bucket of propane, because our grill was getting low.

We would hand the guy a bucket, and $10 and send him on his way. When he returned empty handed the $10 was his to keep, more as a welcome present.

I've sent guy's looking for the basement, in a building that didn't have a basement. Guy's watering the plastic cactus.

I think I did the best counter prank I've ever heard of.

I had been away for school, and returned to the restaurant I had worked at for years before. Before the supper staff came in, it was getting close to my time to leave, and the 3 guys in the kitchen had no idea I had worked at the place years before, and thought it would be funny to send me for the bucket of propane.

So I took the $10 and the bucket and walked my way to the gas station. But instead of stupidly asking them to fill it, I went to the water hose and filled the bucket about 1/4 full of water. Then went back to the kitchen.

"OK they managed to get some propane in the bucket for me, boy was it hard, I'll just throw it on the grill for you"

At which point I tipped the bucket, and poured some of the water onto the grill.

You've never seen 3 cooks hit the deck so fast.


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## potos (Sep 13, 2015)

If the dishwasher is some dumb kid or slack jaw, I'll mess with them just to see how far they can take stress. But on my worst days, hungover out of my mind and hating life. I would love to be them. Listening to my ear buds, just concerned with making sure silverware is washed and sorted and that the line is stocked. So I like to fuck with them from time to time if I know they're being assholes. I wouldn't wish your pepper prank on anyone. But new guys I will train/fuck with. "Hey asshole! Saute pickup!.. Stop listening to the servers! They are scum bags, you work for us! And for god sake, tell them if they don't scrape and stack their plates in the pit that you will kill them! I promise you that they are more scared of you than you are of them!" hahhaha


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## chezpopp (Aug 8, 2015)

TheEthical Chef said:


> Also another prank I like to pull is to take sour cream and smear it on the back of a handle to a reach in or a deli unit, I then watch my cook or sous open the reach in or deli unit ending up with the sour cream all over their hand I then ask them "playing with your meat again?" or something wise to that effect.
> 
> I once had a server who was always trying to upsell to get a bigger tip I took a quarter and threw it on the grill for about 10 minutes, then took a pair of tongs and threw it on the ground, the server walked into the kitchen a moment later at which time I pointed out the coin on the floor, it was really funny and very cruel watching them burn their finger picking up the coin.
> 
> I once got a server to eat a cod fish eye after making fumet telling them that I had gotten in beluga caviar for a special and I really wanted them to try it so they could sell it to the guests, it was funny but having to mop up his vomit and getting it from my boss later was not so fun.


 posted from the ethical chef. Thats awesome. Really not talking smack. Thats awesome. I am a big fan of smell the vinegar reduction and tell me if it is ready. I have seen some other really mean stuff happen but not my circus not my monkeys.


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## akat (Jun 9, 2015)

shave an onion. 20 straws. high altitude ice. 4kg mez. confuse a cabbage. bucket of stream. 150 degree water. sodium reduced salt. free range cellery. left handed knife... too many dude...


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## ferfigueroa (Sep 21, 2015)

Send people to the next door restaurant asking for caramel for my caramelized onions make me laugh every single time


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