Kitchen Confidential- Secrets of The back

Disclaimer: The opinions of this post don't necessarily reflect mine, those of The Wooden Spoon Chefs, or its affiliates. The experiences and information presented are from my experiences and observations in restaurant kitchens, not bakeries, and do not necessarily represent every restaurant or service industry professional.

Restaurants are wonderful and exciting places to work. The whole food service industry is exhilarating and rarely comes with a dull moment. But with all its exciting moments come its secrets. Just as the back of house has its secrets, so does the front of house, which you can read about here.

There are two distinctions in the restaurant industry: the front of the house (FOH) and the back of the house (BOH). The front of the house consists of the bar, servers, bussers, and food runners, while the back of the house consists of the various chefs and dishwashers.

Each kitchen has its secrets. So, it's time to break the stereotypes and let you peek inside the kitchen doors. We will focus on the anchor of a restaurant, the blood, sweat, and tears of the chefs who work 60+ hours a week with little to no break, constantly on their feet to ensure the dish in front of you is mouthwatering heaven.

So just what goes on behind the scenes in restaurants? Read on to find our version of Kitchen Confidential.

The Great Wagyu Scam

If there is one thing the food industry does well, it’s clever marketing, or in more sinister terms, misleading. Whether it be vanilla, butter, or *insert nearly any food, if the food industry can market it differently or alter its ingredients to sell more, it can and will. If you are interested in learning more about the concerning practices of large food corporations, I recommend the book called Ultra-Processed People by Chris Van Tulleken. The food industry exists to make a profit, just as any other business.

There is no greater illusion of luxury than Wagyu Beef. If you see it on a menu, I would highly recommend you order something else. In the United States, regulations are rather loose on food labels. Despite the common misconception that Wagyu beef is imported from Japan, this is not necessarily the case. In the United States, for something to be listed as Wagyu, it needs only to have Japanese genetics. It can be American cattle, raised as American Cattle, fat content of American cattle, but as long as it has Japanese genetics, it can and will be labeled as Wagyu. This has simply become a title to mark up the price of your food. So, when you see it on a restaurant’s menu, be aware that there is a 99% chance you aren’t buying the Wagyu you think you’re getting. It is extremely rare to find it in the United States; your best chance of tasting it is to purchase a plane ticket to Japan.

Salt, Salt, Salt

You've probably noticed that restaurant food tends to be saltier. Besides the fact that salt seasons food, brings out the flavor, and is a preservative, there is a slightly more sinister reason behind the effective use of salt in food. It's well established that the saltier a food is, the more likely its customers are to order drinks. Since liquor has a significant profit margin, more salt = more liquor sales = more profit. Salt is a big profit maker in restaurants.

Do Restaurants Cook From Scratch?

This is one topic that infuriates me more than anything in the food industry. I’ve worked in, and left restaurants due to their lack of “from scratch” cooking. Listed at the top of their menu, and in my interview, they mentioned how they prided themselves on from-scratch cooking. It only took a shift or two to find that this claim was beyond misleading.

Have you ever seen a Sysco truck out and about? Or perhaps a U.S. Foods (marginally better than Sysco) truck rolling around town? They are the main restaurant food distributors and the issue of the food industry. While there are countless restaurants that do everything they can to cook from scratch, countless others cut corners. Whether it be salad dressing, French fries, chicken tenders, or the most common culprit, desserts, a notable portion of restaurant food comes from these providers. I would go so far as to say that 80-90% of desserts are not made in-house, but instead, ordered from Sysco or a similar company. Pastry chefs, or chefs skilled in desserts, are hard to come by and expensive to keep on payroll. The issue is that a majority of restaurants are bringing in frozen food from these food distributors, as well as pre-made food that the restaurant next door uses.

So, when you start to see patterns in menus, and the food next door tastes the same or near identical, you have Sysco to blame for the lack of true from-scratch cooking. Food is expensive, especially that of a restaurant; we deserve food that’s cooked, not food that’s thrown in a pan or in the oven to be reheated.

Long & Difficult Hours

Being a chef rarely equates to working an eight-hour day. An eight-hour day is a cake walk; a 12-14-hour day is more common. Depending on the type of chef, a chef's working day would consist of waking up early, going to work their first shift, followed by a second shift in the same restaurant or another. On numerous occasions, I would begin my shift at 8:00 am, work until three, then head off and work a 6:00 pm to midnight shift. That three-hour break and eight hours of sleep were a privilege; many chefs don't even get that. Working in a kitchen is not for the faint of heart. Work hard, and it's rewarding, but you must love the craft.

How to Make Chefs Mad

Imagine this: you are five to ten minutes away from going home, everything is cleaned, food put away, and you’re hoping and praying you get to leave on time. Then a customer walks in, with just minutes till close. You can be sure that the entire kitchen will be less than thrilled. You bet that numerous people in that kitchen will be moaning and not thrilled with this customer. Yes, technically, the restaurant and its kitchen are open until close, or the kitchen closes, but that doesn’t negate the fact that the cooks are exhausted and mentally ready to go home. It is now time for them to cook the order, re-clean, and go home late. A good rule of thumb is that if it’s within 20 minutes of closing time, and the restaurant is quiet, the kitchen is all ready to go home. 

Kitchen Banter

If you have ever watched a movie with a cooking scene, chances are they were wearing chef whites with tall hats and had a larger-than-life chef at the helm. Everyone probably seemed to idealize him and would always shout back, “Yes, Chef! This is perhaps the case in finer restaurants, but for 80% of other kitchens, this couldn't be further from the truth. In most kitchens, chefs more than likely have food on their clothes, and there is no larger-than-life chef to idealize. And instead of saying yes, chef, you'll find a profound amount of banter between chefs. A kitchen can be an HR's nightmare; there are no boundaries in the kitchen, everything is on the table, and frequently, the banter isn't family-friendly. I have yet to work in a kitchen without banter between chefs and servers.

With all that being said, you can bet that each chef is closer to one another after service than before. None of the banter is personal; the banter makes a kitchen exciting; it helps the time fly by as you stand for the 12th hour of the day.

How Much Food Is Made To Order?

With hundreds of orders for dishes every night, and multiple items on a menu, it would be near impossible to cook every dish from scratch the second it’s ordered. Restaurants make large batches of food each day. Once a server puts in an order, the cooks need only cook certain elements or put the finishing touches on a dish. For example, soups are made ahead of time and kept warm throughout the night. Other elements, like sauces, are made ahead of time. However, items such as burgers or steaks should be cooked to order. Hundreds of peppers, onions and other ingredients are prepped each day depending on the restaurant. Due to the large amount of prep work done early in the morning, it likely takes only 6-8 minutes of active work on your dish before it’s served to you. If everything were made 100% to order, you’d be waiting a significant amount of time.

Health inspections

Health inspections ensure the food customers eat is safe, right? True, however, there is a little more to that than you may think. Each restaurant tends to see the health inspector on an undisclosed, unannounced day once every 12-18 months. This may sound like a short time, but a lot can change in that period: new equipment, new people, new menu. So, when a kitchen is inspected just once a year, chances are it's not in the same tip-top shape a few months following an inspection. Because inspectors come so rarely, restaurants can anticipate the time of the year they will arrive, so you bet some extra cleaning is done around that time.

As for the rest of the year, the kitchen probably isn't as clean. That's not to say the kitchen is unclean or unsafe to eat food from; it just doesn't look like a fabricated kitchen in the movies. However, I've seen some very disgusting kitchens in my time, and I will refuse to eat in such a restaurant again. A good rule of thumb is that if the front of the house isn't taken care of, you can probably assume the kitchen is a little messy.

I could go on and on about kitchen secrets, but I hope this list gives you a glimpse into restaurants behind the scenes. Even with a kitchen’s banter, sinister methods to get you to order drinks, and long working hours, it is truly an exhilarating place to work. The chefs are fun to work with, and the food they turn out is truly an art. What’s the best part of it all? Each plate we make creates joy for those we serve. Though not for the faint of heart, a kitchen, whether it be a fast-paced commercial kitchen, bakery, or the kitchen in my house, will always be home to me.

Cheers,

Chef Olson

“The Flying Chef”