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Chef Of 25 years + needing help with new owners demands and treatments..what. To do . how to handle

2K views 10 replies 10 participants last post by  panini 
#1 ·
Hey everyone..my name is Chef Scott Pressley I have been anywhere from a young sous chef to Corporate traveling abroad to an Executive Chef and General Manager of restaitants doing upwards of 8-10 million a year. Now I face a new job ..i have been here for approximately 3-4 weeks.. I have written and developed over 50 new recipes in that very short time ..and now after putting in 7 days a week every week and a minum of 12 hour days.. The owner sent out for most if tbe menu from these restaurants to be brought back for me to try and recreate granted that it's now 720pm I have been here since 9 am and the food still isnt back.here are the restaurants
Carabass - Red Lobster - Olive Garden - Outback - Gunthries with getting 7 - 10 items from each restaurant.. And tasting everyone tonight enough to recreate them perfectly......while being threated with my job...is this even legal?
 
#4 ·
If I understand you correctly, they want you to recreate 7 to 10 menu items from SEVERAL restaurants, all in the next few hours. That sounds absurd... @halb is right, even if you were to somehow pull that off, or hell, even if you order take out from those places and say you did it, there's no telling what else they're going to ask you to do tomorrow, or the next week, etc. We're people, not machines, no matter how badly your restaurant owner might believe otherwise :|
 
#6 ·
Did you consider that this nutbar request might be calculated by the owners as “the straw that broke the camel’s back”? That they want you to quit now so they can hire a 19 yr old fresh out of culinary school for $2400 /mth?
 
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#8 ·
Why would they want to create food exactly as found at chain restaurants? Do they not want to be their "own" place? I agree, I would give notice no matter their intentions. Doesn't sound like a place I would want to work. And as much as I hate to say it, foodpump might be on to something with his observation. There are a lot of a-holes in this business.
 
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#10 ·
Agree with everyone else here.

Ask for a meeting, explain point by point why and how they're being both unreasonable and unprofessional. Make it clear how a proper kitchen functions, and only then tell them that's why you are leaving effective immediately.

If you start the conversation with "I'm out" that will be the end of the it, and for the sake of the rest of your crew it sounds like they really need to hear the unpleasant truth.
 
#11 ·
It sounds like an owner with no food experience. Very common place now a days. This administration has made everything IE: market, exports, imports to volatile to invest.
You may have an unforeseen opportunity to fund your dreams.
Just my personal 2 cents: with inexperience, you can't sit back and wait.
Take charge! get a driver, make reservations at these eateries with potential meetings with Chef staff. Order all the foods to be tasted with ingredient documentation so that you can compare your menu creations;Tell the owner when and where to meet you for this culinary tasting adventure.
You might be pleasantly surprised. Stupid money needs guidance.
If it goes bad, you have your answer.
As a creative person, never take a back seat to money. It is absolutely astounding how much stupid money exists in this country.
How many books on how a person came up from nothing to success have been on the best seller list in the past 10-15 yrs?
Best of luck to you.
remember, just my opinion as an old fart that has owned his businesses his whole adult life.
 
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