Stories of crazy chefs ....

[foodpump]

Nah, no stories to compare with these. I remember one Chef I worked for in a Hotel in Zermatt, Switzerland. It was the summer, and the hotel was geared for skiing, so it was kind of slow, and the Chef took his advantage at the bar... One Sunday I remember looking at the new week's duty schedule. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Fri. Sat,... Wait a minute, where was Wednesday? When I asked the Chef, he got infuriated, threw a hissy fit, and started screaming that no one needed two days off a week, all his life he worked 6 days. (this was true, it was only two years prior that Switzerland finally passed a bill for hospitality workers giving them a 5 day week...)

Every time I plan a staff schedule, I always remember that incident

[ogreplate]

Foodpump,

Sir, I expected a good one from you. You've been around the block. A five day workweek in Switzerland- sounds nice. My current job is pretty easy, but prior to it I have been a chef on several different types of ships. One trip I helped deckhand as well as run the galley. My longest schedule was a three week trip- I worked 72 hours on and 2 hours off for the whole three weeks because of several emergencies that arose while we were out. Much like yourself, I have learned to appreciate a regular five day week. It sounds like you've been able to take your experiences and turn it into a better work atmosphere for those in your charge than you had when you were coming up. Good for you, many chefs either forget these things or figure they had to so their employees will have to aswell. Have a good day!

[starlord]

When I got out of high school, I worked in restaurants for several years, starting at a White Castle in Indianapolis. In several of the restaurants I worked in, I saw some cfrazy chefs, and have even had my own spells of insanity. It was enjoyable reading these stories, but I now see that much of the criticism leveled at Gordon Ramsay is only because he is so highly visible. I figure if you have three Michelin stars, you can do pretty much as you please, cause you have truly paid your dues.

Two of the stories I found truly distressing. The first one was the worst, and I would report the offender to the management, if not the police. Spitting in food is the lowest, most despicable act I can imagine. The other was the slipping of a dessert to a diabetic. I am surprised that the target of this prank (?) did not realize that he had been given something sugar-laden. This can be fatal, and is certainly not funny. If you were a diabetic, as I am, you would understand. In Arizona, where I live, either of these actions constitutes a felony, which can land you in the state prison for a few years. In addition, the perpetrator of the diabetic gag could be charged with aggravated assault or attempted murder. There is a world of difference between a playful prank or emotional blow-up, and truly endangering the life of another.

Steps down off his soap box, slides it out of the way, tips his hat and leaves quietly

[boosehound]

when i was in high school i got a job at a golf club, both the exec and the sous were lunatics, they would freeese my whites then scream at me for 20 minutes about why i dont have whites and they dont care that i cant find them(almost funny now) they would write the worst profanities all over my tool box (which was plastic at the time) in black magic marker, they destroyed my radio one night, god forbid i made a mistake the chef would throw the food in my face weather it was hot cold he didnt care , but the big topper for me was the night the sous chef got so pissed at me for laughing at him when a squeegy broke in his hand he picked me by my throat slammed me into a sink and turnd the hot water on till it got to its hottest point and just held me there with my head directly under the running water(another note the maintnence crue turned the water heaters above normal, so the tap ran about 175-190F) once he let me go i informed the chef what happend punched out and left, my head was red for a few days.

[Free Rider]

My goodness. The kitchen I worked in was much friendlier than what has been described here. In fact, it might have been a little too friendly at times. 'Spose it's better than a fork stuck through one's hand.

I worked for a mad and crazy German chef back when I was 25. He got upset with a 16 year old busboy who made the fatal mistake of repeatedly sticking his finger in the soup to taste it . He was promptly stabbed in the hand with a roast fork . That was bad enough but the 16 year old's mother also worked there too. She was about 5 ft nothin and weighed about 90 lbs nothin and when she got wind of what had happened that was the first time I ever saw the chef who normally was usually pushing people around and yelling and screaming at everybody with a look of fear in his eyes looking for a place to hide . He had also been witnessed pouring scalding water on people also.. The Powers that be at the time had made the fatal mistake of management of being pigeonholed into thinking he could not be replaced. When that person knows this they end up getting away with murder...

Another time on a lighter note I was working at a country club . We had a really tight crew with great chemistry so we were always pulling stunts with each other. A lot of the guys were wearing the football jerseys of their favorite teams to work on Sundays . On one Sunday one individual was not having a great day(too much to drink the night before)so we decided to go grab his jersey out of the change room and completely submerge it in water and then hang it up on a hanger in the freezer.. Needless to say when it was time to go home he would find his jersey back in the change room neatly hanging on a hanger solid frozen....lol

After a couple of years of this we had to up the anty a little so we proceeded to wrap a coworker's car up completey in saran wrap only to find out at the last minute that we had inadvertently wrapped up ..
"THE WRONG CAR" ???????? OH NO ! HOLY SH*T..It took us about 5 minutes to remove 2000 feet of plastic wrap...not too much fun
Then we searched the building getting ready to kill the guy who told us to wrap the wrong car... Strangely enough he disappeared that day....lol


Boy those were the my golden years ...we all had so much fun ,got along great and put out great food...This whole experience taught me the value of chemistry on a staff and how it could ultimately impact the final product !

[boosehound]

well that story just opened my mind to a closed off area of bad memories i shal now share with the world, on top of what i typed above i found my sous under my car at night in the dead of january(its cold in new england at that time) with a 14inch french knife when i asked what the **** he was doin all he said was, god dam fords can never find the breaks lines, i still dont know if he was messing with me of if he was realy going to cut them, he stuffed as many golf balls as he could into my exhaust pipe(ya that was realy funny) if i was taking a shower say after a 17 hour shift he would dump 5 gallon buckets of freazing cold water on me over the curtain, yes floks i went threw **** at this place thank god he got fired, and o ya a this one is funny only cuz thank god it didnt involve me but a dishwasher quit in the middle of his shift called his uncle(the golf pro at the course) then his MOM to get a ride home, the exec the sous and lead line cook proceded to hold him in a chair and plastic wrap him to it then they tipped him over and left him there for 40 minutes, the exec at one point went outside were he was and screamed at him to shut the **** up because he was disturbing golfers and customers in the restaurant and since no one could see him no one new were the noise was coming from, when the finaly let him o he finished his shift and his mom picked him up, that was an insane four years of my life.

[kapuk]

I were a waiter when I were in university. I work in a Chinese restaurant for 3 days a week. The chef were quite stricky and always angry with everyone. I still feel scary when I remember it everytime!

[Mikeb]

What IS crazy? Alot of people think I'm out of my mind, some days I feel the same way. Or do you mean chefs who are out of control, act badly, etc...?

This one time, we had some meat trimmings sitting in the resting area to be eaten as snacks. One server came by, and ate the trimmings without asking. The chef lost it, grabbed a sharpening steel, and hurled it at the server. It missed the server, but put a hole in the wall. So the chef then grabbed a bucket of sani-water and kitchen utensils and threw that at the server, soaking him.

I'm a decently sized guy (6'1", 190, very strong), pretty young, and one of my old chefs used to be a boxer. So he had a habit of coming up to me and punching me as hard as he could on the arm. He'd also yell alot (of course, he's a frenchman...), but honestly I got along great with him, it was all jokes. He was crazy, but I'm also pretty nuts, so it was all good.

Other than that, I don't have many stories. A few times while working in chain restaurants, a fistfight would break out on line, or cooks would build bombs and explode them out back, servers would sniff coke during their shift, but other than that I haven't seen too much crazy stuff...

[Mikeb]

Originally Posted by boosehound

well that story just opened my mind to a closed off area of bad memories i shal now share with the world, on top of what i typed above i found my sous under my car at night in the dead of january(its cold in new england at that time) with a 14inch french knife when i asked what the **** he was doin all he said was, god dam fords can never find the breaks lines, i still dont know if he was messing with me of if he was realy going to cut them, he stuffed as many golf balls as he could into my exhaust pipe(ya that was realy funny)

I remember when someone would quit this one restaurant (chain restaurant, my first real cooking job), it was a tradition to haze them to send 'em off. So this one manager quit, and as his send-off they stole the spark plugs out of his car's engine. There was also the more normal stuff, soaking uniforms in water and hanging them up in the freezer, hiding on the roof and throwing water, eggs and flour at people, freezing an entire knife kit in a block of ice, etc...

[foodpump]

The goodbye hazing is quite popular in other places too. Remember this one place I worked at, huge hotel kitchen, commis entremetier was leaving. Not a very popular guy, he'd grab a handful of blueberries and smash them on your back as you walked by, (this was Switz. and you were responsible for your own uniforms) or he'd empty out your locker and hide your clothes when you were in the shower. Managed to p. off the Sous by putting mouse crap in his shoes too... The Sous was an Italian/Swiss, very prone to mood changes, and on the guy's last day he barked out orders to the rest of us in the Entremetier station:

"You, Kanadier, is that bucket of bubbly tomato soup still in the walk-in like I asked you to keep? No, don't throw it out, did I say to throw it out? Pour it into the large (120 liter) steam kettle. And don't turn on the kettle either..."
He got skanky halibut trimmings from the Garde, orange grease from the skimmings from the saucier's jus pot, and half a bucket of seedless raspberry jam from the pattisiere. It all got dumped into the kettle. Then he ordered us to all go down to the locker room and wait. Our little friend was up in the payroll office settling up, and when he was done, he went straight down to the locker room. Took five guys to get him down, Sous was doing most of the "persuading", rag was shoved in his mouth, and was told to keep very still, because if he didn't he'd crack his head on the kettle lip. In he went. The Chef, who was usually in the kitchen doing his ordering, was suspiciously absent. That was one crazy kitchen....