Favorite/Loathed Cooking Jobs?

[johnsmith45678]

In my cooking career I had many jobs at many places. Looking back, my favorite jobs were:

Country club: worked with my best friend. Got away with murder. Everybody got along. Plenty of cool people. It was really pretty laid-back, but we busted our asses during the holidays. Partied hard.

Hotel: Pretty much the same as above.

Small mexican restaurant: Worked hard, played really hard. Yup, that about sums it up!

My least favorite:

Small fine-dining Italian restaurant: Worked really hard. Got treated like shit.

Fast Food joint: BOOORRRIIINNNGGG! It really makes you aware of just how many lame rule-following people there are out there -- bunch of button-pushing monkeys.

Chain restaurant: Slave labor.

I worked at various other places, and they fell somewhere in between.

So, what are/were your most and least favorite places to work? I'm curious about the experience people have had at high-end restaurants (which wasn't me!).

[FabulousFoodBabe]

The good jobs: Italian restaurant, all my friends worked there, we'd clock out at the proper time and work until 2 a.m. Lots of after-work partying, and general fun.

Externship job: terrific, loved it so much I stayed past my time. It was a new place, getting lots of press, very fun, and the chefs were amazing. Very hard work, too. VERY. And I learned something every day.

Job at an organic-inspired restaurant close by: The chef's sister told me on my first day that she hated "cooking school people." She'd see that something I made was selling, taste it, and spit it out on the floor. Also told the Latins that I didn't speak Spanish, but I understood a lot of it, which was fun until it wasn't. Worst of all: filthy, filthy, filthy. Lots of finger licking and cooking with hands that hadn't been washed for a week. Yick. My attempts to organize and clean were met with, "f*cking cooking school prima donna." Oh yeah, that was fun.

Job at a gourmet market: Good food, nice people, hours were workable, GM got bonuses based on her bottom line, which only meant she ordered NO product the last ten days of the month. Which wouldn't be bad, but we had nothing to work with and she'd be unavailable, and no one could fix it. However, when she went on maternity leave and I did all the ordering, well, I figured actually having food to sell would counteract having stock on hand. And plus, I didn't care! (Oh, she was furious ..)

Catering company: Lots of freedom, loved the food, terrific owner. Learned quickly to take the checks to the bank and get the cash.

There's more. Oh dear Lord, there's more. Just quit one after making the fatal decision to accept without a trail. Within two hours of seeing this place in action, I knew this was not going to happen. I finished the day and told the big boss that my professional style didn't mesh with their chef's, and mea culpa'ed the whole way outta there.

[Mikeb19]

Chain restaurant: Large restaurant, everyone from the 'hood worked there, and everyone was friends. Work itself sucked, but we partied very, very hard - I mean, even looking back at those days I still cannot believe some of the stuff that happened.

Golf course: Lots of banquets, long hours, but the work itself was easy. Food was a step up from the chain restaurant. Partied hard, drank way too much.

Fine dining Italian restaurant: Amazing food. Worked way too much, 70 hour weeks, was on salary so the money was terrible for the workload. Partied pretty hard.

Fine dining French restaurant (favourite place): Best food of all the restaurants I've worked at. Long hours, but made an hourly wage. Very small staff, everyone was tight. Not your standard brigade - there was the Chef, and everyone else. Pretty chillin place - not too much in the way of partying, but we had fun. We won alot of awards. Still friends with the chef and many others long after leaving.

Least favourite places? I never stayed longer than a month - I absolutely refuse to work somewhere I don't enjoy. About a dozen of these types of jobs...

Currently looking around for a restaurant to work at. Looking at France, England, and elsewhere.

Edited October 26, 2006 by Mikeb19 (log)

[johnsmith45678]

Currently looking around for a restaurant to work at.  Looking at France, England, and elsewhere.

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You're living in Calgary currently? How are you going about looking for work? And places to live?

I had a CIA grad friend who worked his way around Europe after graduating -- sounded way cool. I've thought about doing the same, but am not sure how I'd go about it.

Edited October 26, 2006 by johnsmith45678 (log)

[Lactic Solar Dust]

All of the places that I was fortunate enough to work at are my favorites. It is all about putting your head down, working hard, and learning as much as you can.

[BarbaraY]

I think the only job I've ever had that I hated was one where the business was sold and I stayed on. I had been head cook for 6 years and for some reason the new owner/chef treated my like I was a lazy, incompetant idiot. He and his brother dumbed down everything.

I couldm't even get an interview for a year even though I sent out resumes and applications all over the place.

I still get POd about it. Noone has treated me that way before or since.

My favorite jobs have been in small, historic hotels where I was given pretty much free rein to make good food. One of those sold to people who didn't have a clue but I managed to get out after several weeks. Needless to say they went bankrupt.