Latest / Chef's PSA Podcast / Unwritten Rules of the Kitchen: What Culinary School Doesn't Teach You | Chef's PSA Podcast Ep. 123

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Unwritten Rules of the Kitchen: What Culinary School Doesn't Teach You | Chef's PSA Podcast Ep. 123 · Chef's PSA Podcast

0:00
Hello chefs, This is Chef's PSA podcast.
0:02
I'm your host Andre Natera. On today's episode, we're going
0:04
to talk about the unwritten rules of the kitchen that they
0:07
don't tell you at school. Stay tuned.
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interviews with great chefs, plus you support your favorite
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podcast. Anyway, we digress, where will
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we? Today's episode, The unwritten
3:12
rules of the industry. What they don't tell you in
3:16
culinary school, what all the chefs know that are already in
3:19
the kitchen. But if you haven't necessarily
3:21
worked in the kitchen, you might be in for a little bit of a
3:24
surprise. The reason I wanted to do this
3:25
episode is because there's so much that people don't know when
3:29
they walk into a professional kitchen for the first time.
3:31
I was a chef for a very long time and I would see so many new
3:34
cooks come into the professional kitchen for the first time and
3:36
they were shocked. They were shell shocked by the
3:38
pace and intensity, the things that they didn't know, the
3:40
working speed, the language, the long hours.
3:44
There's some shocking things that go with it.
3:45
They don't always tell you this in culinary school and even if
3:48
they do, because a lot of times they do, sometimes you just
3:51
don't listen. Take it from me, I'm not going
3:54
to steer you wrong. I'm always going to give you the
3:56
real. I can share this with you.
3:57
When I was in culinary school and I started working in my
4:00
first real kitchen job, I thought I was fast but I got
4:04
demoted really quick. They demoted me from Baker to
4:08
dishwasher and I was bummed out because I thought I was hot
4:11
shit. But the only thing they cared
4:14
about was speed and intensity and I wanted to make everything
4:16
perfect and make sure my bread rolls were nice and my brownies
4:20
or my cakes whatever I was working on were just perfect.
4:22
But I wasn't fast enough to their standard right?
4:25
I was on culinary school speed, and I remember I was bussing
4:28
tables, really upset at the fact that they took me out of the
4:32
kitchen to put me on bussing and and dishwashing.
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And I just remember vowing like, one day I'll show them.
4:38
Well, maybe they were right, though in retrospect, I wasn't
4:41
fast enough. But sometimes it could be a
4:43
difficult pill to swallow because you've gotten all these
4:46
good grades, you passed every class, you've memorized the five
4:50
mother sauces and how to make a bechamel, and you're a walking
4:55
culinary dictionary, but you don't have practical work
4:59
experience. On the last episode I had Chef
5:02
Rogelio Garcia from Oro and Napa Valley.
5:05
We started talking about fights in MMA, and I use this example
5:10
that culinary school is like training in an MMA gym.
5:16
Because in the gym, when you first start out, you learn how
5:18
to punch, you're hitting pads, you learn how to kick.
5:21
You have all these really pretty techniques and you look really
5:24
good on the pads. And then they say, OK, now go
5:27
spar. And it's a completely different
5:29
world. You're getting punched in the
5:30
face. All the techniques that you
5:31
know. You realize what you don't know.
5:33
You realize that you learned how to punch, but you never learned
5:36
how to block. You learned that what you know
5:39
is much different when punches are coming at your face.
5:42
You learned that you can't knock everyone out with one punch.
5:45
Everything goes out the window. Your training goes out the
5:47
window. Now the fundamentals remain.
5:49
You still have to punch. You still have to kick, but in
5:52
reality, it's much different than in practice.
5:54
The same thing that happens in the kitchen.
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When you're in culinary school, you have all these fundamentals.
5:59
You know how to use your knife, you know how to use a pot and
6:01
pan, you know how to use a cutting board.
6:02
But when you get into the kitchen, what you realize once
6:06
service starts, the pace and intensity of a real kitchen is
6:09
much different than the pace in culinary school.
6:12
You're not working with a team. No one's coming to save you.
6:15
No one's cutting you any slack. They need results.
6:19
Now when you're in culinary school and you're paying your
6:21
instructors, they're a little bit more patient.
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You're there to learn and now you're in the real world.
6:27
You're getting paid to do. They're paying you now.
6:29
The same expectation you had of your teachers to drop everything
6:33
and pay attention to you is the same expectation the chefs have
6:35
of you now to drop everything and pay attention to them.
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It's a completely different world, and sometimes it could be
6:41
a bit shocking. So why unwritten rules in the
6:44
kitchen? Well, first and foremost,
6:46
someone needs to tell you this, and I recognize that I don't
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think we do a good job at preparing people for what the
6:53
industry really is. You watch TV, you see some Iron
6:56
Chef or you're Something, you watch some Top Chef.
6:59
What's the new one that I've been watching on Netflix?
7:02
I don't know, it's a Korean show, but it's a good, it's a
7:04
good game show. I can't remember the name of it,
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but you go in there and you think that's what it's like,
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only to realize that it's nothing like that at all.
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One of the first things that you get to experience is working in
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a hierarchy. Now, in culinary school, there
7:17
is a bit of a hierarchy. You have the chef instructor,
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but then everyone else is kind of the same.
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Sometimes you're in teams and you have a sous chef and then
7:23
everyone else. But in culinary school, you
7:25
could talk back to the sous chef.
7:27
You don't, you know, you get into arguments, you disagree.
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Everyone's fighting to become the leader in the restaurant.
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It doesn't work that way. You have the chef and you have
7:34
the sous chefs and everyone falls in line.
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Whether you respect them or not. The decisions are made from the
7:39
top down. Not all kitchens are
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collaborative, and that's shocking.
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When you're in culinary school, maybe you're able to bounce
7:46
ideas off each other. Your opinion matters.
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And sometimes when you get into the real world kitchens, it's
7:50
not that way. That's not all kitchen.
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Some kitchens are very collaborative, but a lot of them
7:53
are not. And you can't go in expecting
7:56
that your opinions are valid right out of culinary school
7:59
because most of the people that are there have been doing it for
8:01
10 times longer than you, and they also went to culinary
8:04
school. So those credentials don't
8:06
matter as much when you're in the real world.
8:08
They expect you to listen more and talk less, especially when
8:11
you're Gray. Don't go in there talking about
8:14
you want to quickly get your dish on the menu and it's only
8:17
your third day in and you're going crazy because you want to
8:20
work with algenettes, but they have you on prep.
8:23
Learn the system first. It becomes repetitive and I
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think it's very important to talk about the repetition that
8:28
you face in the kitchen. You might be doing a task 1 task
8:33
all day long. Your task might be cutting
8:36
vegetables. And guess what?
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The second you walk in, you're cutting vegetables.
8:40
The second that you're leaving before you clean up, you're
8:42
cutting vegetables. And all kitchens are different.
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If you're working in a very large hotel catering house,
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there's some positions that their only job is to cut melons
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all day long. That's it.
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That's what they do. They go in and they cut
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watermelon, cantaloupe, honeydew and maybe pineapple all day
9:02
long. That's it.
9:03
And they're a part of the team and the only thing that they do
9:06
is they cut fruit. That's it.
9:08
There's no working with anything else other than your knife and
9:11
your cutting board and some flute right in front of you.
9:13
There's other places where you may be staging and you may just
9:16
be on the herbs, or you may be making one thing or two things
9:20
all day long. And that's your 8 hours.
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You're going to get really efficient at those things.
9:24
But you're also going to get frustrated because you're going
9:26
to say, I want to learn more. I've already mastered this.
9:29
I already know how to cut a melon.
9:30
I already know how to make a twill.
9:32
Well, guess what? It doesn't work that way because
9:35
everyone else in those kitchens also had to go through that.
9:38
And I'm not saying that you shouldn't make it known that you
9:41
have aspirations to move up because you should.
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But what I am saying is that don't be disappointed when after
9:48
a week and you want to get off the station and move up and they
9:51
say you're not ready. Don't be surprised because
9:53
that's the reality of it. Most places are not going to
9:56
move you off the station for about 3 months to six months,
9:58
depending on where you work. And then also depending on how
10:01
you're performing. Because if you're working in a
10:03
team and two or three other people are also doing the same
10:06
job as you and you want to get off and so do they, Well, the
10:09
person that's getting off station, get out.
10:12
Getting off station, by the way, not getting, not just getting
10:14
off, but getting off the station.
10:16
The person who's getting off the station, the seem to be the
10:18
person who's performing the best, right?
10:21
So you might want to get off the station, but they are performing
10:24
a little bit better than you. So you have to have a little bit
10:28
of competitiveness to be the best cook in the kitchen.
10:30
It's very mundane. If you're working the line, you
10:33
might only be working on three to four dishes every day at a
10:37
different pace. So you might be making four
10:39
dishes. Sometimes you're making a lot of
10:40
them, sometimes you're making a few of them.
10:42
And you might think to yourself, I went to culinary school.
10:45
I know how to braise, I know how to cook meats.
10:46
I know how to butcher. I want to learn more about this.
10:50
Guess what, You're just making salads.
10:53
And then prepare for that conversation when you go up to
10:56
your chef and you say, I want to learn more and they say you're
10:59
not ready. And that will seem very
11:01
frustrating to you because you're going to think that you
11:03
are ready. But there's a lot of little
11:05
things that you're learning by doing something repetitively.
11:08
You learn little efficiencies. And it's one of these things
11:11
that it's difficult to understand when you're in the
11:14
moment. But when you look back in
11:15
retrospect, you'll see how much you've learned and how far
11:19
you've come. Another thing that's universally
11:21
appreciated in kitchens is speed and efficiency.
11:24
You're not on culinary school speed anymore, You're in kitchen
11:27
speed. It's an expression that I have
11:29
is you can never work too clean or you can never work too fast.
11:32
You can always work faster. You can always work clear.
11:34
Now, of course, I mean with safety in mind and paying
11:37
attention to detail, but no one is ever going to tell you, hey,
11:40
you're way too efficient in the kitchen.
11:41
You're getting your work done way too fast.
11:43
Slow it down so we could have you melt the clock a little bit.
11:46
That doesn't happen. You're expected to get more done
11:48
with less. Sometimes the prep list is going
11:51
to be unachievable. I used to write prep list that
11:53
were usually just out of people's reach because it would
11:56
push them to learn how to work faster, and you're going to
11:59
encounter that in a lot of kitchens.
12:01
The prep list is going to be very long and it's going to seem
12:04
like you can't get it done. What you have to do in one day
12:07
now is like what you would do in five days in culinary school.
12:10
The only difference is no one's helping you.
12:13
You're not in a teen and no one is accepting your excuses.
12:16
So learn how to work fast. Learn how to be efficient.
12:19
Learn how to use economy of motion.
12:21
Put things in an order in which they flow efficiently.
12:24
If you're working from left to right, for example, if you're in
12:27
a tight space and you're working vertically, all of this is
12:30
really important. When you're in culinary school,
12:32
sometimes you're allowed to spread out a little bit, but
12:34
when you're in a tight kitchen, it's all valuable real estate.
12:38
So you need to learn how to work efficiently in tight spots.
12:40
What do I do when I'm working in a tight spot is I have my
12:43
cutting board always organized the same way.
12:46
So cutting board right in front of me.
12:48
At the top of my cutting board, I have a folded towel where I
12:51
put my knife. Usually I'm going to have two or
12:53
three knives that I only use. So for most jobs in the kitchen,
12:57
you're going to use a chef's knife or a petty knife or a
12:59
paring knife. That's pretty much all you're
13:00
ever going to use. You have a utensil bang.
13:03
If you have utensils that you need, if you're working on the
13:05
line, you might have spoons and tweezers and offset spatulas and
13:08
things like that. You may have a little salt
13:11
container or pepper mill. All this is within arm's reach.
13:13
I have a few folded towels next to me.
13:15
Depending on where you are, you might have a damp folded
13:17
sanitizer towel or you might have a sanitizer bucket
13:20
underneath you. Right?
13:21
But I really don't want to have my workstation, you know, not
13:24
too far outside of the reach of my arms.
13:26
Everything has to be close and compact.
13:28
I'm going to have a little container in front of me for
13:31
trim so that I'm not working over a garbage bin.
13:34
So if I'm peeling something, it's going to go in the trim kit
13:37
and that's going to get dumped or that's going to get used for
13:39
stock or whatever. That has a purpose, right?
13:41
I'm going to have a bench scraper, pass card, whatever you
13:44
call it. So I could keep my station nice
13:46
and neat. And for me, I'm going to set
13:48
timers for everything that I'm doing.
13:50
So I like to work in 15 minute chunks where every 15 minutes I
13:54
know I have to accomplish certain amount of tasks.
13:57
Because you want to get faster, so you need to time yourself.
14:01
If it gets measured, it gets done.
14:02
There's also the language of the communication signals that are
14:05
used in the kitchen. It's universally appreciated
14:08
during service. If you're not talking right,
14:10
someone's calling the past. They don't want to be calling
14:13
over you. When the expediter or the chef
14:15
is calling, that should be the only voice that everyone's
14:18
listening to. There should be some sort of
14:19
call back in your kitchen. Maybe it's yeah, chef, maybe
14:22
it's chef. Maybe it's we, maybe it's heard,
14:26
or maybe you're calling back the order.
14:28
Maybe they're saying picking up two fish, you might be calling
14:31
back 2 fish. Whatever it is, figure it out in
14:34
the kitchen that you're in. Use that universal language.
14:37
There's other universally appreciated language hot behind
14:40
corner, right? Don't 86 something after the
14:42
fact hack moo. No one likes this person that 86
14:46
things after the fact because they forgot to count.
14:49
And nothing's worse than when the order comes in.
14:52
Hey, I know you sold five of these, but I don't have any
14:55
more. Do you have enough to cover the
14:56
board? No, no, I don't.
14:57
I don't even have enough to cover the file.
14:59
Nothing worse than that. So make sure you're doing your
15:01
prep list. Don't guess.
15:03
If you don't know count, have a backup.
15:06
Know when you're running low. A good trick I used to do every
15:09
pen that I had was enough for 10.
15:12
Then I knew OK I have two down here.
15:13
When I'm in the last one I have 10 more back up in the fridge
15:15
and that's it. So I would let them know 10
15:17
left. Be loud with your language.
15:19
Don't be obnoxious but be loud. I'd rather you say hot behind
15:23
then burn me because I couldn't hear you right.
15:27
And I've noticed this a lot to a lot of new people in kitchens.
15:30
They sometimes are reluctant to use their chef voice because
15:34
they think they're being polite. Don't worry about being polite.
15:37
I'd rather you say nice than stab me.
15:39
And trust me, I accidentally stabbed someone with the thin
15:43
Bony knife right in their leg and it went right in and they're
15:45
like, wow, they didn't even freak out there.
15:47
They'd like bandaged it up and went back to work different.
15:52
He's a tough guy. But point being is I'd rather
15:55
you say nice than stab me, right?
15:57
You've seen it all in the kitchen, all sorts of accidents
15:59
because people don't say the right thing.
16:01
Wear the right shoes, don't slip, right?
16:04
Shout out to me. He's footwear, by the way.
16:06
They have great shoes. You also have to be prepared to
16:08
handle the pressure. It's going to be busy, you're
16:10
going to fall behind, you're going to know that sometimes you
16:14
just need to ask for help because people might not want to
16:18
bail you out because they might be in a situation where they're
16:20
going down too. But as the chef, I'd rather you
16:23
say you need help then I have to comp 5 tables because you didn't
16:26
say anything. Be honest with your
16:28
communication. If you forgot to fire it, say
16:30
you forgot to fire it because the chef may be coordinating
16:33
other dishes that are going out to other tables.
16:36
They could sell another table first.
16:38
Being the expediter, you're having to make on the fly
16:40
decisions that affect multiple tables.
16:43
So when the cooks are not honest with you and they try and cover
16:46
up their mistakes, yes, it's annoying, but it really effects
16:50
service in a much greater way. So be honest and upfront.
16:53
When you forgot to fire it or you forgot to drop it.
16:56
Make sure you're honest. Give realistic time.
16:59
How long? Work it hard, that doesn't help
17:01
me. How long almost.
17:02
What does that mean if I'm coordinating five other dishes
17:05
and try to sell some tickets? I want to know if it's two
17:08
minutes, 3 minutes, 5 minutes. A quantifiable unit of time, how
17:12
long it takes for light to cross the width of an electron is an
17:16
accurate answer. Don't actually say that, but be
17:19
that specific. You're on stressful moments of
17:21
the kitchen. It's going to seem like the
17:23
wheels fall off the bus. People who may get angry with
17:26
you, tempers may flare. I saw Marco Pure White say this
17:29
in an interview. He said, remember, service is
17:32
service and it's true. There.
17:34
There is something to be said about that.
17:36
During service, people get a little bit louder.
17:40
They get just a little bit more curt, a little bit more direct.
17:43
They need to be efficient. Some of the please and thank
17:45
yous are out the window. I just need it now.
17:48
It might seem like they're yelling at you, but sometimes
17:50
they're just saying it loudly. And if you're not used to that,
17:53
you might be saying, ah, why are you yelling at me?
17:55
Like, no, they're not yelling at you.
17:56
They just need the steak. They need the fish.
17:58
It's a pressure cooker because you're getting it from all
18:01
angles. Orders are coming in.
18:03
Servers are trying to talk to you, the chef is asking for the
18:06
food, you're trying to remember what you have cooking, plus
18:09
you're also cooking and you're communicating with other line
18:12
cooks because you might have multiple things on the same
18:15
dish. Stay calm, breathe.
18:18
Wiper cutting board reset. A lot of people ask, how do you
18:22
handle multiple orders in your mind?
18:24
One of the things that I do is I'll just remember the amount of
18:28
fish that I'm cooking. So I know, OK, it's always plus
18:31
1 + 1 fish. Now they called another 2.
18:34
So now we're up to 3 + 3 fish. They're calling another fish
18:37
plus 4 fish. We sold 1 -, 1 fish.
18:40
We're down to three. So you're constantly doing math
18:42
in your head. You're batching a few tickets at
18:45
a time because sometimes the tickets are going to come in and
18:48
picket rails going to be falling over and you're going to know
18:51
where you're at. Just remember, you could only do
18:53
what's right in front of you, so that might mean you're only
18:55
working on the next 5 tickets and then you'll get to the next
18:58
ones. If you have something that takes
18:59
a long time, it might be a good idea to drop the steak.
19:03
You say porterhouse, Come in and don't wait.
19:05
Drop the porterhouse now. Maybe just get it marked and
19:07
tempered. Stay calm, start cooking.
19:10
The worst thing you can do is panic, because panic will make
19:13
things worse. You'll start to go to a downward
19:15
spiral and you make everyone else nervous.
19:17
And if you're the chef and you're listening to this, when
19:20
you panic, everyone panics. There's also a sense of
19:22
professionalism. If you've never worked in a
19:24
professional kitchen, you have to know that there are certain
19:27
things that are expected. Walk in, introduce yourself,
19:30
shake people's hands. Don't talk too much about how
19:33
you did at the last job or how you did it at school.
19:36
That really doesn't matter. People want to get to know you
19:38
first. Be very respectful.
19:40
Learn where you're at. Notice how everyone dresses.
19:43
A lot of kitchens nowadays. Maybe it's T-shirts and aprons
19:46
and bandanas. Maybe it's chef coats.
19:49
Whatever it is, look like you're a part of the team.
19:53
Pick up the clues of what you're looking at.
19:55
Another thing, when it comes to calling off, request in advance.
19:59
If you need time off, the person writing the schedule sometimes
20:02
is doing it two weeks out. If you know they're doing a two
20:04
weeks outlet them know two weeks in advance.
20:05
One week in advance, whatever it may be at your place, right?
20:09
If you know something's very important, you got a wedding
20:11
coming up, let them know as soon as you can.
20:13
No one likes the surprise if you're interviewing at a job.
20:18
Nothing is worse and a lot of people do this and it drives me
20:21
crazy. You ask them do you have any
20:24
schedule requests? They're like Nope, open
20:26
availability. And then as soon as they start
20:28
they say, by the way, I have a pre planned vacation and I'm
20:32
going to be out of town for five weeks.
20:34
Nothing worse than that. Be upfront with your time off
20:37
before you take the job. It's not professional.
20:39
People are counting on you. And then you might say, well I
20:42
might not get the job. Well guess what?
20:45
You're probably not going to have the job when you come back
20:47
so might as well be upfront about it.
20:49
Be transparent with what your needs are and if they can't meet
20:52
them, that's fine, you would go somewhere else.
20:54
But be professional. Give proper notice that you're
20:56
not going to make it into work if you're running late.
20:59
Traffic is bad, call. Don't be the person that's
21:02
habitually late. Don't be the person that calls
21:05
off on Friday night service and Saturday because you didn't get
21:08
the day off. So you call off and you say I
21:13
got a cold and then everyone follows you on Instagram like
21:17
cold. They were down on 6th St. living
21:20
it up. They were at the club.
21:21
Don't be that person. Everyone's checking, right?
21:23
It's only your reputation on the line.
21:25
Don't forget early on in the kitchen, especially when you're
21:28
new, a lot of people are going to want to mentor you.
21:31
It's important to be selective with your mentors because
21:34
sometimes the person who wants to be your mentor just might be
21:38
the line cook that's been doing it six months longer than you,
21:41
but they're they're better than you should.
21:42
Like, let me show you the ropes. Pay attention, think about the
21:45
position you want to be in and get that person to mentor you.
21:48
Choose wisely. Look at who works efficiently,
21:51
look at who creates great food. That's the person that you need
21:55
as a mentor. Ideally it's the head chef
21:58
wherever you're at. And I know this sounds weird
22:00
because a lot of you are shy, but just ask for mentorship when
22:03
you take the job. Say I'm also looking for a
22:05
mentor. Is there any way that you could
22:06
also mentor and coach me during my time working here?
22:10
Because that's the time when you get to ask questions and get
22:13
feedback on how you're performing.
22:14
It's more than just someone that's cooking on the line.
22:17
It's a it's a more intimate relationship where you give each
22:20
other feedback, you coach them and you want them to succeed.
22:23
So a lot of chefs are very happy to mentor people.
22:25
So just ask. Worst they could say is no, and
22:28
you're in exactly the same spot that you were before, maybe with
22:31
a slightly bruised ego, but you have everything to gain and only
22:35
a slightly bruised ego to lose. A couple of other things I
22:39
should say that get honorable mention, right?
22:41
Don't disappear from the line. If you're going to leave the
22:43
line and say offline, don't touch another chef's knives
22:46
without asking. Bring your own knives if you
22:48
don't have any knives. A lot of kitchens have utility
22:51
knives that people can use or community knives that people
22:53
could use. Don't tell everyone how you did
22:56
at your last job. Eyes open.
22:58
Figure out what the cadence is in the kitchen where you're at.
23:00
Ask questions, bring a notepad, Write things down.
23:05
Anyway, I want to give a special shout out to my friend Alex
23:09
Castro used to work for me. He just recently took the job at
23:12
Fonda San Miguel in Austin, TX. Alex is a great chef.
23:16
Congratulations chef, really proud of you.
23:18
Shout out to Fonda San Miguel in Austin.
23:21
They're celebrating 50 years in 2025.
23:24
They were considered definitely one of the first restaurants in
23:27
Austin to do interior and coastal Mexican cuisine, and
23:30
they remain true to that to this day.
23:32
They're in the process of opening up another breakfast and
23:34
lunch spot very close to Fonda San Miguel in the spring of
23:38
2025. Go check them out again.
23:40
Congratulations, Alex, you're in a good spot.
23:43
Shout out to Fonda San Miguel, one of the best restaurants in
23:46
Austin. If you love Mexican food, go
23:48
check it out. If you want to support the show,
23:50
make sure you leave five stars, not the less than five stars.
23:53
Go to chefspsa.com, get yourself a book, get yourself a hat,
23:57
become a premium subscriber on Sub Stack or Spotify and we'll
24:01
see you next week. Hit the porno music.