Practical jokes in the kitchen

[jzchef23]

We all were the "new kid" at one time or another... How bout sharing your most embarassing moments or those cruel jokes you may have (or still) played on the new hires to welcome them to the team...

Like the one we used to pull on the new fry cook back when solid shortening was used in the fryer. We would roll up the shortening into "bay scallops" and bread them. During the rush, the chef would hand the new guy the plate of "scallops" and say "I need these on the fly". The newbie would drop the scallops into the fryer and we would quickly distrct him for a few seconds while the fakes would melt away. The chef would come down the line in a huff asking for the scallops, and the fry cook would look befuddled thinking someone may have sent them. We would keep it up for a few 'orders' always distracting him while the morsels vanished in the hot oil. Finally, the chef would be bearing down on the poor victim with the last 'order' telling him that if he didn't stand over the fryer until they were done, he would be fired! Chef would then stand over him and watch as the last batch disappeared and we all broke into fits of laughter as the new kid finally caught on!

What's yours???

[philadining]

I'm not sure this is quite the same thing as taunting the newbies, but I love this story. "Gar" Reed, the original owner/chef at the Birchrunville Store Cafe, told us about a time that an old friend came to eat at the restaurant. Ahead of time, Gar asked him to not tell anyone he was a friend, and when it came time for dessert, to take a bite and then make up some complaint and send it back. Apparently he did, at which point Gar came storming out of the kitchen, screaming that he had a lot of nerve to criticize his food, and physically picked him up and threw him out of the place.

He says he got a lot less static, from customers and staff alike, for a long time.

This sounds like one of those stories people make-up, but Gar was a grumpy old guy, so I can picture him doing it....

[Really Nice!]

In culinary school one student was irritating the chef so much that the chef asked him to mince a pound of flour. So the guy stood at the cutting board mincing away with his chefs knife. Chef would stop by about every five minutes and sample the texture between his finger tips and say something like, "Nope, it's still too rough. I want it silky." So the guy, who had the attitude that he could do anything better than anybody, would chop faster. I think this lasted for about 45 minutes when the chef sent the woman who was the lowest in the classroom pecking order over to him to tell him he could stop. The guy proudly brought the cutting board over to the chef who examined the flour between his finger tips and then took the cutting board to the garbage can and dumped the flour. He handed the cutting board back and said, "Now stop wasting your time and finish your assignment." I've never seen a face turn so red so fast from embarassment. The guy was quiet for about two weeks and then slowly returned to his arogant self.

Then there's the "Ask the chef for a left-handed strainer," during the middle of a rush. Or, "I need a bucket of steam, NOW!"

[Ore]

I remember the new guy letting us know he had to use the restroom (#2)...too much info. He found himself drenched with a 5 gal. bucket of water - all over his shoes and pants - THAT was a good one!

Then there is always the Tabasco float on top of the coca-cola - or the vinegar inside the straw of a 7up. The salt in a bottle of water, etc. etc.

When I was in Italy the worst that happend was on a Sunday night we were cleaning the vents of the hood and one of the female line cooks pantsd me - so i finished putting up all the clean filters before i picked my pants back up...I had to play it off like it wasn't a big deal - it was hilarious!

Edited May 23, 2005 by Ore (log)

[chef koo]

mine actually happened yesterday. and it wasn't so much a deception but it was definately funny. this one guy was telling one of the cooks in the kitchen (who happened to be taiwanese) that he couldn't understand his accent. he was was being a dick about it. so the taiwanese guy while the other guy is making some orders takes some paper out of the printer and slides it up his chef whites. he then takes his lighter and lights it up. about 15 seconds later the guy looks up from his work wide eyed, quickly looks behind him and runs for the sink. the whole kitchen is laughing their asses off. myself included

[Pan]

I don't know if this counts, but one Sunday morning, all the members of Cabin 5 in French Woods camp including the counselors woke up early, walked through a silent camp to the cafeteria, went into the kitchen, and put the sugar into all the salt shakers and the salt into all the tall sugar shakers. It must have been no later than 6:30. We walked back to our cabin through a still-silent camp, went back to bed and slept for another couple of hours or so. We then had the juvenile pleasure of laughing at everyone's faces when they drank salty coffee and had sugar on their eggs and bacon. I tell you, for teenagers, it was the funniest practical joke.

[Tonyy13]

I'm not sure how ethical this is, me being a teacher and all. Nothign is better than watchign a student make hollandaise (soemthing they are terrified of for absolutely no reason, ti has a bad rap as being tricky), and their arm gets tired of whisking the egg yolks, so they switch hands. I walk up to them, tell them that by switching hands, they are going to de-flate the egg yolks by wisking it left-handed, and they stop. They get that look like they think I am joking, but when I walk away without a smile or anything else, they get all confused. It is kind of like watching that guy on teh Gatorade commerical just crumble from de-hydration. Absolutely hillarious.

In the industry, we had two that were pretty bad. The first involved fake menu ingredients. In Maine, where red dyed hot dogs are normal, we used to send line cooks of our fried seafood restaurant into the walk-in in the middle of the rush to find a case of hot dogs (non-existent). When they came out empty handed, we would send them back to see if there were any red hot dogs. Well, of course, there were none, so the kitchen manager would go around and get in every one else's face, seriously, screaming at them asking them if they stole a case of brown hot dogs AND a case of red hot dogs. Of course, everyone was in on it, and you should have seen the newbie sweat!!

The other involved the hydrogenated fryer oil as well. We used to fill the fryers to the top, but sometimes got heavy handed, and some needed to be removed once the oil was hot. We used to put the excess oil in a bain marie under a prep table, and let it sit there till the end of th enight. Well, the color of the new grease with the old grease was absolutly perfect color of cooked apples, and with the hydroginated oil, when it cooled it would somewhat solidify back, just the perfect consistency to look like homemade applesauce. You know what is coming!! We used to get a big bowl of real applesauce, and be eating it, and tell some jerk-off waiter who we hated that so-and-so's mom made homemade applesauce and sent it in. We would even sprinkle cinnamon on the top of the grease sauce. The look on their faces when they got a spoonfull of the fryer grease was absolutly priceless. Then they would look at us like we were gross for eating the bowls of the same. They really got pissed when they saw that we had real applesauce!!!!

[TJHarris]

I've got two good but harmless ones.

Years ago while operating a catering house, it would often be neccessary to send a newbie to the market for small quantities of specialty items. One item on the list would usually end up being "white food coloring", something that just doesn't exist in the retail world. Invarialbly there would be a phone call from the poor sucker saying that he had been two three stores and none had heard of it. They always came back kind of red faced.

Another, unplanned good one: there is often a roll of plastic film that just doesn't behave properly. It tears or strips or gets tangled. One newbie was having a particularly bad time with a roll. I suggested that it might be past its expiration date. The fellow spent several minutes searching the box for that date to see if it was to old to be used.

[WolfChef]

First resturant I had the pleasure of working for one cook put tabasco in the soda straw of another's drink...it almost came to blows.

Then the time a prep/salad girl stretched saran over the drink glass of the head chef and cut in just below the rim all the way around. The chef tried to drink from it a couple of times before he figured out something was wrong.

We used to have the bartenders put club soda in place of the beer in our "free" beer (bottles) for other chefs during the rush.

The scallops post is hirlarious, makes me wish I would have known about it back then.

[phungi]

in grad school, first day on the job as a pizza delivery guy (Powelton Pizza), I could not manage carrying the various items and the pizza delivery stay-hot bag, so I turned the pizza vertical to get out the door...

I believe that nearly 20 years later, this story is still told to new delivery guys, although I do not believe it is a necessary part of the "how to deliver a pizza" orientation.

[andiesenji]

The only practical joke I ever remember pulling on someone was while I was taking a class many years ago. One of my fellow students was always carrying around a large mug of coffee and wasted a lot of time fixing it and slurping loudly while the chef was talking and often would set it down in my prep area and just leave it there in my way.

One day I was so fed up I cut some pieces off a sheet of gelatine and dropped them in on top of the coffee letting a couple of the other students and the chef, see what I was doing.

A little later he picked up the mug and tried to drink it but apparently the surface was stuck to the side of the cup. He tipped it up further and it broke loose, pouring down his chin and his front. He had what looked like a gelatin beard hanging from his lower lip.

It broke the chef up, he laughed so hard and got so red in the face I thought he was going to have a seizure. The rest of the class also got a good laugh.

He never figured out who had done it. But he was careful to keep his mug close by at all times and out of the way of others.

Edited May 23, 2005 by andiesenji (log)

[choux]

Duck fat cheesecake. Looks surprisingly realistic. Your mouth ends up water proof for quite a while. Send newbie to neighboring restaurant to pick up "ice mix".

[culinary bear]

I had a commis whipping a half-gallon of cream for chantilly with a whisk which measured about 5" in length (half was handle!) and whose four (count them, four) spokes made a bulb about an inch and a half across at its widest part. I told him that the smaller the whisk, the smaller and finer the bubbles in the finished product, and that we had to make an exceptionally fine chantilly.

Fifty minutes and much changing of arms later, we relented. :)

[francois]

A few months ago, I made some choux à la creme. The next day, my teenage son, wanting some more, used the leftover choux and what he thought was creme patissiere in the fridg. It was a bowl of duck fat! You should have seen his face when he took the first bite!!!

[LaurieB]

I worked in a restaurant where the manager had the bad habit of leaving her set of manager's keys laying around. So one day the chef found them, put them in a 6 pan, filled it with water and put it in the freezer. By the time she started looking for them, they were frozen into a solid block of ice.

I wish I could say she was much more careful after that, but alas. The next time, her keys ended up in a 6 pan in the oven.

[ohmyganache]

I worked in a restaurant where the manager had the bad habit of leaving her set of manager's keys laying around. So one day the chef found them, put them in a 6 pan, filled it with water and put it in the freezer. By the time she started looking for them, they were frozen into a solid block of ice.

Our banquet chef did that to an extern a few months ago with his knives and stuff. I would have found it funny, but the whole kitchen was standing around laughing about it... and they were in my way. I don't mind when people are having a good time in the kitchen, but get the hell out of my way.

Way back in my high school cookin' days (shout out to Steve's Cafe Americain in Gainesville), I remember putting mayo in a brulee ramekin, torching the top, and giving it the the front of the house. Man, those were the days...

[jackal10]

Send to stores/equipment supplier for a "long weight" (wait). They usually get what they ask for...

[MeDeMi]

The first job I ever had was answering phones at a pizza place when I was 14. Needless to say I was VERY young and VERY gullible. The guys that worked there took great joy in tormenting and corrupting the young and naive "phone girls"-(yes, that was my politically correct job title!) One night we were getting slammed and the guy who was making the pizzas tore one of the crusts. He yelled to me to go in the walk-in and get the dough patch kit. I spent a good long while in the cooler searching every shelf and couldn't find it. I finally came out and told him I couldn't find it and he sent me to ask another cook where it was. That cook told me where to look and when I still couldn't find it he sent me to ask the GM... and on and on. It was pretty embarrassing-but I do have a sense of humor so I found it pretty funny when I finally figured it out!

[Grandgousier]

It takes an exceptionally gullible new guy, but I've always liked sending the new guy to the grocery/dry storage for a can/bag of dehydrated water. It might seem cruel, but considering the frequency with which my cooks tell me they can't find an item even after I tell them exactly where it is, and force me to get it for them, I consider it neccesary to my survival.

[klauskuche]

We always ask the new cooks to make red salt for us. It involves chopping salt at a very high rate of speed in order to create the red salt. You get them going and then come by and tell them that they need to chop faster and harder. You gather the rest of the kitchen around them and then send the sous chef over to ask what the h*** they are doing. Sous chef rolls eys when told and tells newbie to turn around. Here is the rest of the kitchen having a good chuckle and the only thing red is newbies face.

[Luckylies]

one of the chefs at school told us that if a cherry was washed without it's stem it would take on 8x it's water weight ? So in the middle of service I walk into the pastry kitchen and there is a cherry (with it's stem) in a cambo next to a plum (stemless). I was told the stem cherry was the control group. Apparently lots of people fell for it.

[Mayhaw Man]

Well, I have an oldie but a goodie.

I live in Louisiana and roaches happen. Big ones. Giant man killing flying roaches. Not much you can do about it.

We also have Mardi Gras which means that we have bead shops where maskers can buy their trinkets to throw to the crowds.

They sell all kinds of stuff, but my favorites are rubber roaches.

These are good for all kinds of things but the best is hiding them below the surface of the sugar bowl. Nothing like a good late morning sleep that is ended by the scream of a loved one who has fallen for the "old roach in the sugat bowl" trick one more time.

In fact, I might go hide one again tonight. It never gets old.