Chefs Bite Back

[Chef Fowke]

Interesting note:

I just finished service tonight and I am still laughing! We had a customer, very polite and genuine, who just arrived in Vancouver after a long flight and was being entertained by friends. All he wanted was to have a 'burger' and retire to his hotel room.

How much did the special order cost (we have a burger at lunch, not at dinner)?

· Cost of lunch steak we ground (we had no lunch burgers available) $3.45

· Labour of finding garnish and preparing (10 minutes @ $12.50 and hour) $2.08

· Cost of garnish $0.48

· Hand cut fries $0.25

· Condiments $0.45

Total Cost $6.71

Selling price: $11.25

Cost: 60%

How many special requests can a restaurant afford to do? The cost does not include utilities, bread/butter ($0.62/per customer), linen ($3.15 per table of four), entertainment (piano player), washing the dishes, rent, utilities, guest supplies and labour.

I believe I just lost money having this guest in for dinner. I really enjoyed the guest; he was friendly, polite and tipped the server 18%.

Just some food for thought…

Edited June 15, 2003 by Chef Fowke (log)

[Jinmyo]

That's an excellent example of breaking down the costs, Chef Fowke.

[Fat Guy]

It would be fun to present a bill like this:

Total cost of bringing you this meal: $17.32 (see itemization below)

Your contribution: $13

You're welcome!

(Suggested gratuity: don't worry about it! Just say you're a European tourist and didn't know you had to tip.)

[KNorthrup]

linen ($3.15 per table of four)

Sorry, ignorant question -- Is that for laundry? How is it so high?

[Chef Fowke]

Sorry, you are right...

We estimate $3.15 a table of four for linen, plate/small ware cost (annualizes cost over the year), washing of cutlery, polishing of cutlery and servers/bussers time setting the table.

[Blond007]

Help! The post I was *trying* to respond to disappeared. Forgive the interruption, I'l show myself out...

Edited June 17, 2003 by Blond007 (log)

[Blond007]

Rockin' good name. Gender? (Spencer)

Sorry guys, this'll have to do until I figure out those nifty little boxes everyone else has mastered. Thanks for the welcome, Jimmyo and Spencer! I've been reading for a few weeks, but haven't gotten into the whole posting bit 'til now. Female, not blond at all! I'm more on the baking side of things than cooking, but humble and willing to learn. Well, willing to learn, anyway. OK, enough distraction! On with the debate! To throw another twist into it, what about a baker who creates beautiful, intricate baked goods, and displays them in the bakery case, when they're not for sale? Sure, it's good for his ego, and impresses the customers, but they're also disappointed when they learn it's not available because it's so labor-intensive it would be impossible to produce on demand, even if they were willing to pay the outrageously high price he would have to charge (we're talking $200.00 loaves of bread here). He claims it's an expression of his art, but he doesn't have to turn down customers every day. Is showing people something they can't have inspirational, or stupid?

[Pan]

I vote for "stupid." Everything in the display case should be available.

[Steve Klc]

Please, everything IS available. If the price is right.

I fear you're jumbling a bunch of issues Blond007, perception, art, commerce, ego that don't directly translate to this Chef's Bite Back piece. Ultimately, everything is for sale, including one's time, and it's just a matter of putting a price on it and finding a market--or someone--willing to pay it. This includes very special, skilled, artistic and/or labor intensive work. The fact that such work couldn't be produced quickly or on demand as you say, is, frankly, irrelevant. That's why there would be a premium put on that work and why not just anyone could afford to pay that premium--or prioritize paying that premium.

I'm speculating here, but I'm guessing the baker in this example is very gifted in salt dough displays or artistic bread work--practically a lost art and something wholly separate from cranking out great loaves of rustic bread that walk-in customers can take home or restaurants can buy wholesale. He has the training, skills and artistry to do that work--and do it well. Why begrudge someone the opportunity to reveal the depth and variety of his skills and by displaying work like this raise some awareness?

I don't work in bread but from time to time I am commissioned to create special things for special clients--showpieces, sculptures--that are very labor intensive and require a high degree of artistic and technical skill--apart from whatever skills I'm able to reveal in my restaurant work or wedding cake work. Can everyone afford these special pieces? No. Do I have the time to do many of these or do them on demand? No. But these pieces--just like that seemingly unobtainable bread piece in that baker's shop in your example--raises awareness, expands the boundaries a little bit of how our work might be appreciated. It's also the first step toward restoring more of an artistic appreciation for what bread bakers and ice carvers and chocolatiers and pastry chefs are capable of doing.

I can't know for sure how this bread baker handles discussion of these seemingly unobtainable artistic bread pieces--but if handled well, if discussed as the end result of passionate labor and dedication to craft--how could it not be seen as inspirational?

[Nikki]

Although I am not a chef, I'm an avid consumer and I grew up in the restaurant business. When I want to eat food my way, I cook and eat at home. When I go out to a restaurant, the pleasure and intention is to enjoy something made by someone else, not according to my personal specifications (obviously, I'm not alluding here to folks with health/allergic concerns)

[Bux]

Personally, I have been known to order the dish cooked the way the chef likes to serve it, especially lamb and fish.  Sort of a compliment to the kitchen,  also insures that I get the dish as the chef intended.  That way I can experience where they were going  with the dish.  I doubt that someone from outside the world of food would understand this concept.

I think diners are inside the world of food. At least I'd like to think this one is. I mean I assume there's really no point in cooking unless there's some hope the guy who's eating your food appreciates it. Well no point unless you're making really big money. Chef Fowke already covered the reality that there are entirely different kinds of places and although they may all be called restaurants, different behaviors are appropriate.

When I am in the kind of place I determine is a chef driven restaurant and asked how I'd like my steak, or lamb or pigeon cooked, I will tell the waiter that I imagine the chef knows how he thinks the dish should best be prepared, but I'll also note that I usually like my meat very rare. More so in France than in the US, I am apt not to comment at all unless asked.