I come in to work today wearing my fucking chef’s coat and ask the sous chef very nicely if she could please look up the specific and relevant dress code for me, because the corporate dress code policy is literally “it’s different for every account,” so that tells me it’s either the dining director, his boss, or the school deciding it
Well she just fucking snaps at me and tells me I’m “not fucking special” and I’ll “have to fucking deal with it” (while throwing in the good ol classic of “it was even hotter this summer” because obviously if one person deals with miserable situations one time everyone has to forever)
I want her to die!
Turns out that yes it was the dining director and his boss deciding this so she snapped at me for no reason
I’m gonna try to get a doctor’s note to see if I can get an ADA exemption because if not i’m going to have to quit this fucking job, i can’t live like this, I’ve spent the last 3 hours feeling like i’m going to throw up
Collecting all my service worker comrades and bringing you to my corporate hellscape so I don’t have to work with fash techbros who do nothing of value
if you can get me a job and it won’t drug test for weed i’ll dm you and doxx myself to get it
my pros: i’m a very smart boy who learned real good. I grew up on computer and know how to internet and download.
my cons: i’m abrasive and full of hatred and do a lot of drugs but it’s okay some of them are legal now
Kitchen work is unfortunately full of people who will be relentlessly abusive unless you match their aggression and get them to back off. It’s horrible if you can’t use that kind of communication without it killing you inside, too.
Shit sucks ,I’ve been there and I’m so sorry
what really sucks is that I liked this fucking job, like, I enjoy the work, I like feeding people, I generally have a lot of freedom in what and how I cook and can frequently try new things just to experiment or fuck around, but like my bosses clearly 1) do not like me and 2) do not appreciate what I do enough, apparently, to be more concerned about keeping me than if I wear a fucking coat
I just constantly look around and see the other cooks make substandard food (i.e. monday’s blackened chicken literally seasoned on one side, what the fuck lol like why. why. tossing chicken thighs in a lexan with the seasoning is one of the easiest things you can do. all I can surmise is he did it intentionally for some reason but like okay you’ve got a nice looking crust but then like the entire other side of that chicken is going to be unseasoned and bland)
also crowded onto sheetpans because I am literally the only person in the entire building who, despite educating everyone about it, understands maillard reactions and how they work. I guess they think they’re saving the dishwashers work but they’re also literally always cooking the chicken so that it all fucking steams itself in its own juices. fucking christ when they do the teriyaki chicken it’s essentially braised in so much teriyaki sauce it will never know what browning even is. maybe I’m a philistine shithead but like idk I think it would taste way better dry rubbed, roasted then tossed in teriyaki sauce, or at the very least not cooked in so much of it that it’s literally swimming in it
that’s when they’re not doing fun stuff like cutting potatoes directly into the CHICKEN ONLY sink, like, hahahahhaha why was I literally the only one noticing or giving a shit about that, sous chef, executive chef, dining director walking past it. I brought that up today and got a “how do you know people weren’t counseled about stuff” and it’s like, my point is I don’t need counseling on that shit because I don’t fuck up like that. christ I could pass the fucking servsafe exam in my sleep based on 9th grade biology classes
the worst part of all of this though is honestly I considered the sous chef a friend, somewhat ideologically aligned, but she’s slowly revealed herself as basically a living version of those trans people with ukraine flags on twitter who I honestly thought were fake, but here she is and I work for her, and my god is it shitty going from feeling like I had at least one comrade to, oh, no, she enjoys the taste of boot apparently.
Im almost certain you have me blocked, but look into hotels and stuff if there are any. Most are unionized and it’s a lot better of an environment, same with catering if there are any jobs in that regard. I would also consider getting your red seal and working towards a head chef situation. You are not gonna have a good time until you’re da boss and its super easy to be a good boss in a kitchen, ive got really good co workers, but they have openly said they appreciate my leadership. Become the delegator at a place that you make dependent on you. I do that by not writing down all of my recipes. There are certsin things that im the only one who knows how to make em that customers love. Restaurants have way looser ships that sre easy as hell to sneak over to the steering wheel
I’ve learned to hit da bricks if I gotta deal with crap like that. But I live in a city with lots of options and am a very appealing candidate
I’ve only experienced it once or twice but it sucks when you don’t have any other options or savings to keep you afloat
So like what’s the recourse when a big bead of sweat plops down on a plated dish? Fucking assholes never have an answer to that question when they turn a kitchen into a sauna
my stupid fucking bosses made me sit through a meeting with them and an HR lady even though i kept saying “i don’t get what the point of this is when you’ve made your positions clear and do not care about me or what i have to say” and during it yes i literally asked “how much sweat can drip into the food before it’s a problem” and iirc all he said was “everyone sweats” and some bullshit about the hats are supposed to help stop that
like dude i’m sweating drops down my fucking forearms. I was doing light tasks standing in place and every 2 minutes would wipe my face with a paper towel and it’d be soaked
Part of what’s pissing me off about this enough to want to try to get an ADA exemption is these stupid fucking assholes having the implicit stance that everybody’s bodies are just the same, nobody can be particularly sensitive to heat (or if they are theyre just a pussy!) and I definitely get hot and start sweating way fucking easier than most people. Even just wearing a shirt on Monday and last Friday I STILL went home drenched in sweat!
my only hope to not just have to find a new job immediately is if my doctor will be willing to write a note to the effect of “yeah, dude has ADHD, and both the condition itself as well as medication contribute to heat intolerance” and hope I can legally compel them to fuck off with it.
The dining director has indicated he wouldn’t push back as long as it’s legal and justified so i guess i hope my doctor is cool doing that
ask her if she can put her head in the oven and check for gas leaks.
Professional kitchens seem like the most toxic work environment ever. Every line cook I’ve ever met was addicted to like 20 substances and clocked like 10 hours of sleep a night. Sitdown restaurants should be abolished after the revolution, anything more formal than a Panera Bread should be illegal.
Can panera be illegal too
Make Panera illegal except for the heart attack lemonade. That can be legal.
NGL, when I’m sick as fuck I do love ordering a ton of soup and bread from them.
Sounds like a typical kitchen environment
This comment sounds like my boss!
I know those feels comrade
I appreciate the sympathy and will always be grateful that I can air even my most petty grievances on here and find at least some sympathy or show of solidarity. there’s like two people I work with who seem to have any sympathy for me
