Foodservice experiences

[shaberon]

Posted by Mike (here)
I worked at a restaurant called 'The Friendly Fisherman' many years ago. I always had stubble growing back then, and the manager pulled me aside one day and insisted I shave every day and arrive at work with a rubbery face. The faint stubble drove him mad. But he made one exception: I could grow a mustache exclusively, but that's it. So in other words it was okay to look like a 70's porn star but not okay to look like a slightly rugged (but otherwise clean'ish) young man from the aughts.

That tale at least sounded human. That makes the first "familiar" thing I've heard, in, I don't know. At least since I have been dragged into the backwater, which was a temporary plan that already expired five or six years ago, yet here I am.

Not having been there, at least compared to what I have done, I am used to dealing with owners. Most of what I have done was in small businesses with owners that actually came in. When you say a manager, it sounds like a delegate.

The reason I say that is because I would agree it was an owner's choice to command you to shave daily.

Like I think it would be an owner's choice to allow smoking or not -- not to have something like that be governmental diktat.

Most of what are called managers are false. They're mostly supervisors. I know because I have done both; management is decisions on revenue and expenses, usually made by unknowns.


What I meant to post yesterday was "These are the first mashed potatoes that have cut me". It's not unusual that if they dry out, you will notice some pointy little nibs on them. I tried to wipe some out of a pan, and they had actually become knives. I lost my concentration due to stress from a managerial decision made by those unknown.

When I say dumpster, I don't mean a receptacle; we have to use the thing like at the trash dump with a mechanical masher. They said I could use it today, and the thing knocked all to hell, wheezing, whirring, clanking, and clunking, with a zero pressure readout, but apparently the masher moved. Then I found out this nasty rumor. This is why I need to be stepped on!

It's because we're opening a few more stores. To get them open "faster" (?), we have to steal from the employees.

No, it's not really stealing because it is legal, it's just evil.

I do this for overflowing garbage and dangerous potatoes.

By day three of the reduction, you can already see the buildup of grease and grime and we are starting to irritate customers. Or, actually, that was inevitable. It's because our display units actually freeze the produce that is in them.

I heard there was a Friendly Fisherman across town. Maybe that's where I will wind up next. I don't like to set foot in these places nearby; I don't really even like being in the parking lot.

As one example, while we are serving food, we don't make coffee. So I went to a stand-alone Starbucks. As soon as I set foot in the place, I thought "I'm going to go through with this, but, I'm pretty sure it's the only time". So I go to a gas station and get it from a dispensing machine. They also have better sandwiches than I do. The options of McDonald's and Subway are right there, but, as I said.

This thing today is pretty similar to the reason that kicked me out here. When I was in the world of cooking, it was a grassroots operation that the owner grew to a massive flagship store over 30-40 years and then sold it. Becoming owned by venture capitalists, they decided to open new stores. But these were big stores in areas where we did not have that grassroots history. They weren't successful and it took down the whole company.

On the other hand, I, personally, have take a new, underperforming store and turned it into a profitable operation with my own hands, and the thanks I got was being whisked out, which is what sent me back to food. I always used to like it. But the reason I started this thread, is, not so much the fact that I am now around a smaller population, more like a Bermuda Triangle of unknowable effects. This is not legal in the vast majority of states.

[shaberon]

This is a change of subject because it happened quick.

A few days ago I was stomping around in a tirade about "incompetence", and got to the part about the shortened hours and lack of signage. I watched someone spend all day sitting in the floor to make a month of signs. Obviously you can do it if you want to.

Mine are misleading. You better not read them or I will think you are a womprat from T34. It's a serious challenge. So I'm going around criticizing that which is present, lamenting that which is absent...and then I see it.

A new sign!

Does it tell you to go away, like it ought to, or warn you that what is about to come out of my mouth is a foreign word or possibly a psychic assault? No! It's an advertisement for:


Inflation.

Now I thought I knew what was going on after standing there for two years, but, I found out I better not talk to you about the price of something because it changes at will. I started noticing these 10% to 20% hikes in various areas and started double checking and so on, and, I don't know what it was or what it is, but what I do know, is wrong. It only concerns the things I handle all the time. I don't know how much they are. There's no planning. It just does it, and, you will be the one to find out, not me.

I did get a type of negative plan which is to not give you no strawberries no more.

Nothing said this was "seasonal" -- which would be closer to a "plan", i. e. they will come back down in April or something. It was categorical. I shall have to see if this applies to all strawberries, or only to the ones I don't have.

The problem may be that half of everything in the world is strawberry flavored these days, and, if only 2% of that consists of real strawberries, then yes we must have year-round greenhouses in Iceland and Antarctica. It's a big thing and we must be covering somebody's major mishap. I'm not sure. It's sanitized.


Be that as it may, the new sign takes the blue ribbon for bold and adventurous of the past ten years. It informs you of inflation of no less than:


fifty per cent.


The small is almost as much as the large used to be, and, the large was too cheap because one guy was taking eight at a time. This is stuff that only serves addicts. No one else cares. If this is what you eat all the time, then, it only costs a whole hell of a lot more.


I know how you can fight it. Pay cash. As we are launching Operation Destroy-a-Penny, for now the scales tip in your favor. Cash transactions will be rounded down to the nearest nickel. That means you can keep up to four cents off your bill! Even if you are only clever enough to knock off two, by the time you do a hundred and fifty of these transactions, you will have earned the smallest inflationary spread I just mentioned.

Does this affect anything? The attendant has to enter a separate code per penny neglected. It doesn't come out of anyone's price. It's an instant rebate. If so, why not plug it in so I just pay two cents for everything?

Or, a nickel.

I think it is hell and high water having your food system suspended on the tightropes of Big Ag and Big Finance.

I don't know where to turn or how to escape any more. This was not supposed to happen. Everything I have spent over three decades boycotting is piled up in huge mounds all around me. I can't find value or anything that is actually good.

And, yes, the not having stuff is going negatively according to someone each day. But guess what? Today someone called from another store that is almost an hour away as if they were complaining that place didn't have any stuff and maybe I did. Answers like "yes, about enough for one small serving" did not work out to be attractive enough for the journey to be made.

I am absolved of responsibility since there was no response from my departmental overseer other than "we're closing early".

I mean, they can see that.

Don't look at me for all the gunned down business.

I'll find something I can wreck in my own way, on purpose. It won't be incidental or accidental and I will be glad to give a full explanation to anyone, any time. I just don't know what that is yet.

With any luck, I will be making them stare into space by saying foie de canard. That's easy. Sort of the opposite of this recent conversation:


Them: "How familiar are you with cheese?"

Me: "Extremely".

Them: (shoves phone in my face)

Me: "I have no idea what that is. It's not a cheese question. You're asking about an item location. I've never heard of it and have no idea".


Computers will let you experience that. If things were not up in the stratosphere, nothing like that would ever happen.

Or:

Them: "What about that department?"

Me: "Yes, it's open".

Them: "There's no one there."

Me: "Yes."


It may be possible to drag the zombie farm down to a lower level, but, it can't be brought up.

[AutumnW]

Rude, snide behavior is usually a gimmick. But, the Morningside Cafe is rude for real! Read the one star reviews, and understand the 4 and 5 stars are suspected of being their Vegan buddies who were likely asked to flood the zone.

I'll try to find the review where she called the cops on someone who asked for milk for their coffee, or something equally minor.



Did not get a chance to experience the food!! We walked in inquiring for pizza as the sign at ferry and at cafe indicated there was there to be had!!
The person serving at counter replied quite rudely ..no we used to!! So I asked why the sign says pizza? She appeared irritated! Asked ..do you what to eat? I hesitated a moment, but my friend said yes.
Then the woman turned and said..I am not going to serve you and walked away!
We had just spent 2 days staying spending,and enjoying Salt Spring! Every other encounter has been wonderful!!
What a sad way to spend the end time of our getaway
The woman has some serious social issues!

And this one...

If I could give zero stars I would. My husband and I got off the ferry on our bikes on the first day of our two-week cycling tour - island hopping in the gulf islands. We stopped here for lunch. Food was good, atmosphere was really cool, until I went to pay and asked if the server could fill my water bottle, as we had a long ride ahead of us. She REFUSED and was incredibly rude - she informed me they "don't have water" (WHAT?! Not sure if this is true or even legal for a food establishment...) and if they did, she wouldn't fill my water bottle for me because I was, in her words, "f---ing up your hormones and killing the planet". I stood there, stunned, as my payment (and 20% tip) went through, and said, "excuse me?" She then rolled her eyes and completely ignored me as she continued her conversation with another staff member. I was in shock.

Another typical review

The woman behind the counter saw us, scoffed loudly and went about her business without greeting us.
I thought maybe we had accidentally missed a sign that they were closed, so I checked. Seeing that they were in fact still open, we just assumed she was having a rough day and waited patiently for her to ask for our order.
After a few minutes of silence, she came to the till and said loudly "Two people in the shop!", right before calling a man in from outside by name. At this point I thought I had some clarity - I figured he was meant to be taking orders and was instead hanging outside, and that was why she was frustrated. But no. She kindly charged him for his bill, before glaring at us and yelling "Ugh! I'm just going to shut the door!" Before physically pushing us outside and slamming the door.


https://www.google.com/search?sca_es...h=734&dpr=2.22

[shaberon]

Here is the immediate aftermath of inflation.

I show up and hear something to the effect that's how much you're supposed to make every time.

It was a gigantic pile.

Usually, there is some "extra", to replenish the hot table where we sell it. Usually, I am able to flip some to most of the pieces by the end of the day. Not last time. The process seemed to sell about half the table.

Along the way, I had to get something, and one of the pieces went splat on the floor, because what I was getting was simply stacked on top because it had nowhere else to go. So I lost one, which I don't consider it my responsibility, because you are supposed to stack everything in a stable manner. That's one of the definitions of "work". So I chalk it up to something that will never happen.

Moving all these pieces from hot to cold is a time-consuming nuisance, but we have to do it, meaning we stored away about thirty excess units, which are good for a few days, some of which might sell at normal prices. But that's a lot. Never seen anything like it before. Twelve, maybe. Never anything knee deep that rolls out on the floor.

I don't know why you would raise the price of something and then overdo it.

It seems to match paying the workers less.

It's just a weird experiment. To me, it looks like Aristotle when you sit there generating numbers in a notebook based on peoples' reactions, whereas my view is more Platonic since I can do something that works with little recourse to packets of information. These are different things.

So far, more inflation means lower sales and less work for everybody.

[shaberon]

Round two of inflation and the really big pile.

First of all as a member of the work force, I'd like to say I really hate holidays because they foment a "busy season" punctuated by a day off, which is almost long enough for the headache to go away, and then it is right back at it the next day.

That is basically true, I would say, for most of over thirty years. Not this time. The level of business is substantially less than average. This is currently combined with hacking labor to pieces, meaning, it more or less costs us out-of-pocket to have this holiday.

I tried to get an answer about last week's "pile", but the people who work with it are completely unable to say anything about it, as to whether the product could even remotely be sold. So, we just don't know what we are doing.

This time it became my turn, and this is what it is like to be confronted with a large pile of goods created by harming living creatures.

Unlike most of the past week, I show up and actually get customers in "my area", and I begin to do what I thought I was doing.

At 4:45, I get a phone call clarifying something about an order that had been placed. I go to check and the confirmation "Yes, we have you for six o'clock" is accompanied by the discovery of an order stacked on top of it, for 5:00.

This isn't going to happen. It means at 4:50 I begin to gather the materials for it, and, it is a lot, very large, and the person had to wait and fortunately was patient and did not get angry. However, as the mere maker of things that are supposed to be bundled with information about has the payment been made, I'm empty-handed. And, the thing is, the order for 6:00 is larger, so, I'm just making stuff and have to intervene through another employee to ask for a receipt.

All I know is the thing I did was given out for a receipt that accounted for about half as much.

When I finish making this stuff, I have to make stuff. I'm not going in to make anything. Me doing any of it is a favor for the lack of staffing. And by now, this has cut in to the exorbitant amount of cleaning time required, which is already snafu'd by being told to stop earlier.

At that point, the near-impossibility becomes barricaded by a larger pile than the first go-round, because the inflated items have not sold that much off the table.

The dang stuff is intended to have a four or five day shelf life. Something like that. There isn't exactly a dispute about whether "some leftovers" are desirable.

It just means that someone earlier spent about twenty minutes packing everything, which in the later circumstances I have to spend another twenty minutes unpacking, the net result being a garbage can full of disposed packages.

Because it is actually food, I have to prioritize it over the cleaning, which I left with another employee who was in over the elbows, to say the least. But you are in the same position as me which means you know you are supposed to stop working, and the fact that something may be incomplete is understood.

The main reason for that is personal, anyway, since the overload was all in the neglected retail, there wasn't any special amount of dirty stuff, that was normal. That's simply called slowness so I just leave them to do it, presuming they will blame "circumstances" to cover their tracks.


The state of bewilderment I go around in, derives from having spent a large number of years as a person in charge, which is not a job title, but a legal status with respect to a property when its actual owner is not present.

The only reason I did it was to fix whatever looked dumb and did not work good, which is one of the few things I consider a success. With what I am doing now, with food presented in any kind of live action service, there is supposed to be a certified person who is the person-in-charge, which means that they would know everything I have to say and be in the position to enforce it. There's no exceptions. They have to be there. They don't have to do anything, but they at least have to be available to answer any kind of questions and make decisions.

I wouldn't mind doing that, but it would have a lot to do with who for, which reverts it to the lack of realistic alternatives.


I don't think I posted the part, which, seasonably-adjusted well enough, is where someone doubted me in speaking about the actual presence of Satan.


It was basically the same as killing any of my personal outreach.

In my first year, I do what I can to farm out techniques and retail methods, and generally there is no response. The young lady I mentioned who has the Virgin Mary for a Goat was the only different one, who responded and actually remembered a few things I had said. Lo and behold, one day she's working in another are and is now just coming over once a week or so to cover someone's day off. The asset is forfeited and deterioration re-commences, in which time period I observe a pattern of someone being sent in from the outside to tell us to do, or not do, something, whatever, and it's going very poorly. That led to that last time where she did it to me and I just stared at her and she went away without saying anything else. Then after I looked around for two weeks, she was gone.

Then when I passed the tale of ignorant lack of incompetence to the younger one, she just left.

I didn't notice anything.

I was just going to dump it until I was interrogated on the matter. I was asked for my side of it. I said, I don't have a side of it, the situation as described is basically true. So what is your problem?

There was no answer for that.

Instead, I explained to them that I was working by myself in a big garbage can. This seemed to elude understanding.

As to whether my point is supported by the newly-inflated meats, I am not sure, but I am sure they are a bad mix for under-staffing.

[shaberon]

What boundary is this?


As I said in most of these posts, I seem to have stepped over a line called "civilization". I found myself in some place where the most basic things are buried in ignorance. This was different, for about six months, due to one co-worker because he was not from around here.

He wasn't from terribly far away; neighboring state. What he said was "I don't understand the mentality", as in everyone was very small-minded, and appeared as children moping around going "sorry, sorry".

Since then, I have managed to de-graduate, or whatever you do to go backwards to an even lower class, such as kindergarten, where the main topic of the day is bathroom permission. I've never seen that anywhere. Ever since I was a young adult, you could just take care of it.


My current sub-standard existence is primarily due to Covid. I had an alternative living arrangement lined up, and then the world was turned off. We got a certain amount of inflation from that, which of course did not go away, and in the aftermath, I have reported on it again.

This is a drastic increase in the cost-of-living. Normally, I would have thought you could go nearly anywhere, and a basic job and some cheap place to stay would at least be feasible. Not any more. This is untenable. Mobility is impeded.


So I checked what I might be missing in the world of seafood around here, and by the time of traveling about thirty minutes, there are some places that have the normal fried and broiled items and not a whole lot else.

Statistics are misleading, because the number of people has nothing to do with this. In this area there is double or more the population from where I used to live. But as soon as you look at "food" it is a completely different picture. I can find something Greek, Vietnamese, Irish, Indian, that is more or less all new from the time I was there. Foreign words that you learn and pictures of things that are almost indescribable. All within a few miles of each other.

These prospects would probably take at least forty-five minutes if I were to commute there. It's not trivial.


Not knowing what kind of "line" this is, I checked. I am now in one of the most heavily-gerrymandered districts known. In the 2020s apparently the GOP re-districted us shifting things in their favor. That's where I am, in a GOP starter kit. It's so solid that it was sued as racial discrimination by blacks and Latinos and the case was dismissed. They say their communities are "cracked" by being split apart from one another, and "packed" into some majority-white area to outvoice them.


If I travel for about an hour, I might be able to talk to someone who's not under-developed.

Meeting a lot of kids right out of high school, I wouldn't say they're unintelligent. It's just a circle of the generic. American food is basically salt and grease. That's that, and, of course it was this severe limitation that made entrepreneurs look towards something other than mass production for better quality. This area seems nearly immune to it, despite being modernized and somewhat larger than where I was.



On the note of this "line", I am prompted to attribute something I have posted vaguely about where some of our political red herrings are coming from:

The most recent addition to this maelstrom of false alarms offers

the theory that the U.S. Constitution has been suspended since

1933 through a declaration of national emergency by President

Franklin Roosevelt. This alarming assertion is being promoted

chiefly by Dr. Eugene Schroder, a Colorado veterinarian, through

his book Constitution: Fact or Fiction.



Dr. Schroder has apparently influenced others. Larry Pratt,

executive director of Gun Owners of America (GOA), endorsed and

recommended Dr. Schroder's work, declaring that "America needs to

read this book!" GOA has released a video, Enemy Public Number

One, which mirrors the arguments of Dr. Schroder. Likewise, the

Republican Party of Texas, the nation's largest state Republican

party, issued a resolution claiming that the Constitution has

been suspended and calling for its restoration. John Tello, a

member of the executive committee of the Texas Republican Party

and the primary backer of the resolution, told The New American,

"Dr. Eugene Schroder worked with us." Seemingly, these groups

have taken Dr. Schroder's theory as fact without checking the

accuracy of the information on which it is based.

This particular book was in 1996.

It has a true type of premise -- the "Emergency Powers" were given a "bye" in their first Congressional review -- but then they were shut down in the next session.

Ignorance on this matter is sometimes posted on the forum. I knew it was a mistake, I just didn't know this veterinarian had written an influential book about it. It perhaps has colored the thinking inside the line here. That is the source it comes from.

[shaberon]

I found out where they keep the foodservice guy around here.

He's in the hospital.

It's a frail little 70-year-old guy from Brazil. He handmakes stuff and sets up a nice display.

That's because the hospital wants to bolster its image, so it's not just a last resort for the sick, but, a vibrant, normal part of your lunch.

That's where I would have to go to find anyone who understands me. Of course, I didn't find out about it from anyone who works in the industry, I heard it from a customer by way of describing things that are digestible compared to what we have.

Put in perspective, one of the first things someone told me as to why our case has a draw:


We don't have anything like this around here.

Let's see. That means, at the earliest, it was around 2015 that the munchkins first saw a few bowls of food.

What?!?

I mean, literally. That's how backwards it is. And you only have it because most of it is shipped out from Pennsylvania.

Today, I heard some of the potato stuff was frozen or raw. We were told people couldn't chew it, although the complaint was coming from a nursing home, The guy who had to deal with it took it less seriously at that point. That sounds a little mean. They're definitely not cooked down to fluff, they are sort of firm, but of course we have nothing to do with that. So it's like talking to a brick wall. If you want to talk to someone who knows their potatoes, go to the hospital.


Now, of course, I can't go there, because, for one, even though they would like this accessible image, it's actually not a part of anything. It's a campus that by definition has to be a little bit separate from other affairs. And -- this is how you know you're in podunk -- I was working for the guy who used to run the kitchen at "the hospital". But that's in another town. Where I'm from, you have to name them, there isn't a "the hospital". But in either of these towns out here, that's what it's called. Saying its actual name is so difficult that I'm not sure they did, and I don't remember them. They tell you where it is. I know where it is, I just don't know the name of it, but I do know the foodservice company is structured to pay you as little as possible. He explained doing it. So, by working on the private side, not only was I better off, I was actually paid more than some of the trained hospital techs. In other words, neither aspect is particularly attractive from the view of labor.

The hour we severed is gone for the foreseeable future. Should have known "three weeks" was true but not the complete truth. This season is literally the first I can think of where commerce appeared to be a serious negative even when compared to below average.

[shaberon]

That's finally it.


I extracted a full confession from the last possible victim.


It was one of those times where I show up, and, everything was surprisingly neat, and, I was going to attempt to find a human being and award a mark of approval, but, it was not to be.


This is just how ignorance costs money.

You remember that Really Big Pile of 50% Inflation I was talking about? That. It was brought to my attention that $200 of the stuff was just disposed of.


Well, again, big companies pride themselves on hiring a third-party auditor to ensure that standards are being met. And so about a week ago, I was told that one of these auditors had come in, and basically shrugged and went away.

Today was clean because two health inspectors came in and stayed for two hours.

That's why the inflated meat was rejected out of its normal process.

And so the "confession" I was told was it means "we have to hide everything and stop".

No kidding. As just a sort of unlicensed self-policing level one, every time I show up, I would tell you everything needs to go in the trash, and if I get a chance, I actually dispose of some of it.

In other words, according to normal standards, none of that operation should be taking place.

What you get is a shell game of violations. In other words, since they put away the material and there was no mess, the repeat violation of making a mess went away. The chain broke, and so when it comes up again, it will be "first" like brand new. If the inspection had been later and it came up again, it would have become critical, which is the point where legal action can be taken against you.

Through my whirlwind tour of, you're not telling me anything I don't know, I got to say in front of my shift supervisor "There's no health code in this place", and she said nothing and went away. Then I grabbed some of the "cleaning work" and showed it to the Person in Charge, saying "Does this look clean?" and the answer was no, from several feet away.

How many authority figures did I just name, and, all of that put together makes something that's not supposed to be happening, and it won't be tomorrow.

Seems like there's money for everything but labor, doesn't it.

I find it disorienting and we simply can't communicate. It's simply amazing how all these resources put together makes nothing.

[shaberon]

Oh, to compensate.


From our production, that Really Big Pile got cut down to about a quarter of what they were doing.

Because that didn't work, we inflated prices on another line of stuff, to the tune of about 15-20%.

And, it was taken up by what I call easily panicked southerners.

I show up for my disorientation, which consists of salt being spread along the front edge of the parking lot.

It's not that cold here. It can be, when the jetstream slips, it can bring Ohio Valley, and then we have whatever they have. It may snow, but it will melt and be gone in a few days, instead of sitting there until further notice. However, there was a suggestion it may snow on Sunday.

I have nothing left to sell.

Not completely true but the bread wall only has a few loaves of rye.

The message produced the most business I think I have seen. When it does snow, they take the bread and a few predictable staples, but today, it was everything, no matter the cost. I found a soup tureen empty, and I turned it off going past, and I never went back to retrieve it. So we had a zoo when we are tuned to deal with no one.

That means we charged them an extra half hour to meet the very minimum cleanup and had to leave stuff they are not prepared to deal with.

Labor units are commutable. They're not imaginary.

In actuality, when temperatures hover around the freezing point, you don't get an honest snow which is powdery and dry. It probably already rained, or, there is freezing rain, or sleet, and so with the additional moisture, it tends to make slush that begins re-freezing, and that is far more dangerous. This is the national weather alert:

...Major winter storm to begin impacting the Central and Southern Plains
today, before moving into the Mid-South, Mid-Atlantic, and Northeast this
weekend...

...Catastrophic ice accumulations are expected from the Southern Plains to
the Southeast/Mid-Atlantic...

...Dangerously cold temperatures set to expand across much of the eastern
two-thirds of the U.S. through early next week...

It specifically says it might snow here, and then it will sleet and freezing rain for the rest of it.

It doesn't look like I was given the actual story. Typical. Now it is just going to prove what I said. Except it's not a front. I'm expecting it to be six degrees. Areas of potential devastation reach across New Mexico.

Chances are we will be on the very edge of it. The main part looks atrocious. That could easily impact transportation, and, most food transport has a lot of miles in it. If we look a bit further south, it will probably be unaffected, but that is millions of acres that is not diversified, it is all big conglomerates that only do a few things. It's not in any way relevant to an attempt to provide a complete diet for the local population.

I am the type of person who has a can of beans and a fireplace, somewhat indifferent to a brief bout of inclemency. This area doesn't faze me because in a lot of those other places, it might be really serious.

Again, by people I'm not given the right story, and this is a more satisfying explanation for what I encountered.