Veeky Forums, do you work in the business? Are you Back of the House or the Front of the House...

Veeky Forums, do you work in the business? Are you Back of the House or the Front of the House? Any horror stories you'd like to share from the trenches?

i work back bar at a strip club :/

I only do Food-Prep at a Family owned Cafe, bit I shit you not, one of the Newbie dishwasher/janitor teens we hired once just began vomiting uncontrollably.

We sent him home, turns out he was eating a lot of raw slices of salmon we were cooking, because he figured it was like sushi.

FOH myself, one time had some poor old soul's cholostomy bag spring a leak in the dining room. The rest of her family rushed her out the back door and left us with a dining room that reeked of shit and; there was a trail of shit through the dining room to the back door. It was a nightmare.

HOLY FUCK that takes the crown

>19
>work at theme park
>ticket taker
>user, food is short because five blacks called in sick. Go work in the snack booth
>normal snack food, meat tubes, knotted breads, crispy circles with cheese, frozen flavour drinks etc
>get there
>smells rancid
>everything is coated in grease and oil
>literally everywhere
>counter, ceiling, walls, floor, till, inside display cases on tips of fizzy drink machine
>ask why
>The cleaning schedule's "light"
>Okay, whatever. Don't understand that. Maybe they're being obtuse
>learn to unfreeze and heat up 1500% markup food
>the entire day is spent just eating food that's been sitting out too long because no one wants to come to to a theme park when it's 45*C out
>find out that their clean up is putting on paper towel on the hot dog roller's grease catcher overnight and leaving
>never eat food there again

>Ladies' Night, drinks are 1/2 off
>older women come in early to get crazy, party of 6
>one hour into dinner, walking through dining room, find my boss kneeling on the floor next to a woman
>lady has crawled under the table and is on her knees throwing up onto the floor
>mfw when I keep walking and leave my boss to handle the shitshow

I'm a dinner chef. 10 years in. I fucking hate my job. I've had enough and am starting a photography business instead. From now on my wife and kids will be the only people I cook for.

I have a load of them
>That time the dishwasher was washing dishes with floor cleaner
>That time the baker lost his glove in the dough and decided to just pick it out and use the dough.
>That time the porter fell asleep on the delivery.
>That time the head cook set fire to the kitchen by spilling butter or w.e on the grill
>That time the two front of house girls got into a
full blow fist fight.
>That time my cheap fucking boss of one day instructed me to not use gloves because I used to many already.(literally walked out of this dump)
I can go forever,

But it sounds like your wife is doing the photography. Perhaps you should find a different job to supplement it.

I once found a diaper on a table while bussing tables. Made the waitress clean it up. Felt not shitty..lol get it.

>white spot
>dropped a piece of fried chicken
>usually takes 8 minutes of deep frying to fully cook it from frozen (raw)
>Head chef just says to pick it back up and put it back in for 2 more minutes
>"previous owner showed me this will kill bacteria"

>oil from white spot is only thrown out until it is noticeably rancid
>the vats we had were shitty ones where you would screw a pipe faucet in
>the shits in the back would tell the owner they changed it but they were just too lazy to fucking change it
>fish was near black next to chips

>working late night
>Sanhanjeebdoob staring down
>"what are you doing"
>he looks up and frantically looks back down and gets back to prep
>Puddle on the ground next to grate
>he fucking pissed on the ground
>quit three weeks later due to tendentious

>mcdooodles
>pies are reheated over and over and never thrown away
>manager just picks off the old best before date and reapplies new one
>same for angus third pounder meat
>That shit stays until someone buys it
>Qtr and reg meat are fine as almost anyone coming in is buying a qtr or a reg cheese burger

Just regular shit

I work at a michelin starred fine dining restaurant, as a cook, been there for about 8 months. Our kitchen is pretty busted, but I don't think I have any major horror stories.

I guess there was the time we had like 3 or 4 days of holidays and we weren't gonna open. Our frozen chamber had been hinting it wanted to malfunction anytime soon. The only day shift cook we have was telling the chef about it, chef decided to ignore and just go with the flow.

I wasn't there to see, although I did come earlier to help clean up, but all the shit inside it went rotten, often exploding in their vacuum sacks,we were glad no flies made it inside or anything. We lost a couple thousands for that.

No I meant I was going to change careers. She has here's own office job. Just saying my days of being a professional chef are over.

I still love cooking. I just can't deal with the low pay, odd hours, shit head owners / managers or even the sight or smell of a kitchen anymore. I'm so over it I turned down an offer to be a Co-owner of a new restaurant with my mentor. Maybe it's the city I'm in because it's a culinary wasteland. All the "best restaurants" are carbon copies of each other and trust me, I've worked for all of them. Good luck to you guys sticking with it but I'm out.

I fry donuts and make bagels and rolls for a fancy grocery store.

It's not too bad of a place actually. Donuts are fucking disgusting though.

The other night we had a shortening shipment not come in, so I ended up having to pull 12 huge ass cans of Crisco from the shelves in one night to keep the fryer from going empty.

I work solo all night, so I've been considering frying up various other random shit from around the store (twinkies, ice cream, produce, whatever) but I honestly don't think I could bring myself to eat it knowing how much oil is involved.

>go in for a normal night
>"hey guys morgan freeman will be eating here tonight"
>fug
>I'm on grill
>the moment arrives
>all the servers are squirreling over to get a glimpse
>we all stare at each other in horror as we prepare meals for insignificant plebs
>the ticket printer starts squawking
>grilled salmon
>I have to cook for Morgan fucking Freeman
>herewego.jpg
>autistically tend to my salmon like it's my newborn child
>artfully season it and hand it over to expo
>it goes out, high fives all around
>five minutes later, manager comes in white as a ghost
>"he sent it back. it's undercooked."
>it's fucking red in the middle

I haven't worked in a kitchen since

Filthy dishwater pirate reporting in.

Not too many horror stories as my work is pretty fucking clean and my coworkers are hard working.

Probably the worst was when some fucktards decided to bring in confetti for someone's birthday and it was IMPOSSIBLE to get off the dishes. I had to literally scrape it off with a fucking knife.

Kek. I worked at a super market for a few years and some guy broke his colostomy bag on aisle 1 and dragged it down like 3 aisles before the managers told him to leave.

The smell was so bad we had to close the store.

Yeah I've been cooking for 7 years, mostly fine dining stuff. But I've just started uni part time and hopefully will move over to full time next year. Doing food science which is still a little related, but after talking to my friends and realising they all only work 38hrs a week, get far better pay and working conditions, and in the end have a more balanced and happy life I realised the hospitality industry really does take the fucking piss with this work culture propagated for chefs. Yes I love food and cooking in a restaurant, but that doesn't mean I have to do it 85 hours a week for fuck all pay, its a goddam scam.

You probably already left but I would like to hear your stories.

Sounds like someone who will have to learn things the hard way their whole life desu

Good luck man. I hate cooking for any groups larger than 4.

FOH checking in: as far as I'm concerned the BOH guys like dish are doing God's work.

Yes, a lot of restaurant work, especially BOH is pretty thankless. I used to work for a wannabe celebrity chef and he was just douchcanoe. I hated my time with him.

>burns night
>all bookings in advance
>set menu
>vegetarian shows up and complains about the food after failing to declare that she wanted the vegetarian option when booking

Currently office/ floor supervisor, but can fill in for salad prep, general prep, dishwasher, barista, host, bus, server.

>oh no user, we're out of (important ingerdient)
>go to stockroom
>on the shelf
>every fucking time

Kitchen horror:
>saute cook goes to bathroom
>no one will take his
position
>tickets back up for 10 minutes
>badass saute cook returns to line: puts out food faster than humanly possible to catch up
>plates everywhere
>all hands on deck, still can't run food fast enough
>2-3 tables complain their food took forever & came out cold
>fucking a

>user, can you make (employee X) do his job
>Employee X do your job
>Employee Z isn't doing *his* job, why should I?
Jesus Christ

We had one girl who fucked off home early just as we were washing the kitchen down for the night every time, the boss never said a word because he was sweet on her.

Ugh.
I basically run the place, but with no power to hire or fire.
>The owner will never get rid of ANYONE, even the creepy old sexual harasser or the bitchy servers that blow off sidework
>user, why is there so much trouble among the staff? You've got to make them respect you, make them get along

>doing inventory, ordering, filing invoices & paying statements
>answering endless customer emails for large events
>co-ordinating payroll
>dealing with customer complaints
>accounting and banking
>resolving employee disputes, esp FOH/ BOH conflicts

>user, you never help us run food

Fucking prima donna servers, I swear to god

>I basically run the place, but with no power to hire or fire.
I've been in that position (although doing truck loading). Worked a month before I quit b/c manager was retarded and they wouldn't fire the asshat that didn't want to work. Never again...

>>The owner will never get rid of ANYONE

this is why I left my last job, covering for someone is one thing, doing their job is another, it made everyone bitter and bitchy.

It puts me in the position of teacher or babysitter: I have to assume that everyone is basically there for life and approach problems like a fucking psychotherapist.
And most people have some kind of fucking history with just about everyone else.

Did you lay down on the floor when your friends asked you to too.you boring fuck.
Please don't post more of thi boring mundade bullshit