Wednesday, July 19, 2023

Back of the House (餐厅厨房, 레스토랑 주방, レストランのキッチン)

 "The back of the house" is a specialized term in English that doesn't exist in Asian languages, or any other languages that I know of, which means specifically the back part of the restaurant that customers don't see, aka the kitchen area. I've just used "restaurant kitchen" for the translations above. I usually don't care at all about the back of the house when I go to a restaurant, I don't want to see all the gross stuff that goes on behind close doors (there's a reason those doors are closed) like cutting meat, washing gross dishes, etc. Heck, for most of my life I barely entered my own kitchen, except to maybe heat up some water or microwave something pre-made, and I'd never worked at a restaurant as a line cook or anything to experience how a kitchen works. 

Which is probably why "The Bear" on Hulu is such a fun show for me. For 2 straight summers (last season was Season 1, and it got picked up for season 2) I feel like I've spent part of my life (at least 10 hours of my life watching the episodes) in a Chicago family-owned restaurant serving Italian Beef sandwiches trying to convert itself into a gourmet restaurant and implementing real 5-star resturant disciplines to its chefs. There are so many things that can go wrong like fire hazards (no smoking in the kitchen), walls falling apart, employees quitting, dealing with busy lunch hours that require everyone to work feverishly until their fingers fall off, and a lot of swearing. Like Wolf of Wall Street level of swearing (a notable trivia question of like 100+ utterances of the F-word in that movie), The Bear doesn't focus in one swear word but likes to spread it around with a diversity of expletives, even getting into a little controversy over its use of a forgotten Jewish slur (the forum I followed for that story devolved into arguing over if certain areas of Chicago were considered Chicago or Chicago suburbs, something that is intensely personal to Chicagoans. I'm technically from the Chicago suburbs, but I just say Chicago to save people time and for the recognition factor). 

Contrast the Bear's back of the house to the back of the house of Eleven Madison Park restaurant in NYC, "THE best restaurants in the world" at one time, where MJ and I visited for the 2nd time this past weekend for her birthday. For anyone going to fine dining establishments, I highly recommend always leaving a comment that you (or anyone in your party) is celebrating a birthday, the restaurant won't check, and they'll likely offer some extra thing to the arrangement, whether it be a small birthday cupcake with a candle, or a song, or...in the case of Eleven Madison Park, "THE best restaurants in the world" at one time (they certainly do charge best restaurant in the world prices, they allowed MJ and I to visit the back of the house and get a small treat. The small treat was not memorable and tasted like any other dessert fancy restaurants have (ever notice that some of the dishes at fancy restaurants start tasting the same?) but the visit was more valuable in my opinion, where I witnessed just how many chefs-in-training (probably recently graduated or waiting to graduate from the nearby CIA, the Culinary Institute of America, and Eleven Madison is great to have on your resume) were preparing different things back there. There honestly seemed like more chefs with toque hats (trivia question) back there than patrons dining in the front of the house. No wonder we're paying so much for a meal: it's like a 1:1 chef:patron ratio of what's being prepared. They of course all ignored me like I didn't exist, which I was fine with because it would have been quite awkward, but they all seemed to be experimenting with some new dish they were working on, of course all dishes with just a tiny scoop of ingredients and seared/diced/decorated to perfection. It was such a stark contrast with the grimey, sweaty, unsanitary, Health Code-negligent conditions depicted on the Bear; everything at Eleven Madison was tiptop, counters were scrubbed, sections of the kitchen were neatly defined, people seemed polite (no expletives were hurled across the room), and they were very serious about saying "corner" before turning a corner; I got so into the vibe I almost felt obligated to say "Corner" when I was leaving. So that's what working in a top-flight restaurant looks like. Good to know, and in general I do like seeing what the top level of any profession can be; I've seen it with law firms, most sports, trivia experts.....I guess not that many fields. Now I've seen firsthand the top of a fancy restaurant. I was impressed. I still didn't tip up to 20% though, even knowing there were so many mouths to feed back there in the back of the house. Really daunting when the tip you're paying is more than the entire bill you pay even at decent restaurants. 

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