Kitchen slang/phrases

It's been said I should write something on this topic, since I've been considered an expert on this catagory.  If this were ever a topic on Jeopardy! I'd probably take home some mad cash.  Especially if there was one of those daily double things there.  That'd be sweet.

"Get the cigar"   - roughly translated, getting chewed out by the Chef or Sous.  Not used as commonly as it used to be.  In a sentence, "Ben just burned that lobster bisque, he's gonna get the cigar for sure."

"Magic dust, Japanese magic dust, glue, meat glue"  - terms for transglutaminase, an enzyme that sticks meat to... well, other meat or similar protein.  Often snuck into culinary competitions years ago before most molecular hackstronomists started using it willy-nilly on anything and everything.  Heard rumors that it was being used in some diet pills to bind with loose proteins in the body and allowing them to be... well, um, passed.  Currently considered safe to eat, I would think that in excess it's prolly not too good for you.  Lobster corndogs in Chitown often contain magic dust.  Not PCP.

"In the weeds", "Lost" or "Sinking"  - term for a cook who can't keep up with the orders coming in.  Horrible feeling, often precludes getting the cigar or being 86'd.  Most often heard on Fridays, Saturdays, New Year's, Mother's Day, Valentine's Day, etc...  The times most kitchens are packed beyond their means.

"86 or 86'd" - to run out of something or to take it off the menu... not usually a good thing.  Happens too much to you, and the chef will 86 you from the kitchen (meaning you've been fired). 

"Swimming" - not sinking.  A new cook who's swimming is keeping up for the most part.

"Rockstar" - a particularly good cook.  Rockstars are always swimming and never in the weeds.  Could also refer to a chef that used to be in a rock band.  Dirk Flanigan (The Gage, Henri) was sometimes in the industrial band, Pigface.  Thus, Flanigan is a rockstar twice.  Or something.

"Behind, Atras, Hot, Chaud, Watch your huevos, or anything similar..." - get out of my way.  Now, or face possible consequences.  My favorite is saying, "I'm not stopping," while playing chicken with someone that's in the way.

"Ordering! (followed by menu item or ticket number)"  - get this ready, now.

"Firing! (followed by menu item or ticket number)" - put the food that was ordered in the window now.  In good restaurants the cooks will call out in response to orders and fires with a time or acknowledgement.

"The Tank or Pit" - dish area.

"Meat Grinder" - a kitchen that turns through cooks like most people use tissues.  Usually when the Chef is intense or the pace of the kitchen is harsh (or the checks bounce).

"Sergeant's stripes" - burns one gets on their body, betraying their existence as a cook or chef.  A lady once stopped me at a bookstore and tried to get me to join a recovery group for heroin addicts after seeing my burns and thinking wrongly that they were track marks.  Needless to say, I was unenthused by her mistake and told her I was a broiler cook. 

"Put a bird on it..." - this one's just a reference to the tv show, Portlandia.  Check it out.  Funny show.  For a week I was telling cooks "put a bird on it.  Now it's ready." Priceless.

"Piano" - the stove you cook on.  Some chefs can't stand when you put plates on the piano, or don't clean it often enough.

"Whites" - your uniform.  Even when black or a different color, referred to as whites. 

"Pitbull" - a particularly mean chef or sous.  "That Bob jerk is a real pitbull, man.  I was sinking last night and he gave me the cigar."  Some chefs keep a pitbull in their kitchen to keep the other cooks in line so they don't have to yell themselves.   

"Salamis for hands..." - a person who's all thumbs.  Most often used in Italian kitchens.  I guess if you had galantines for hands you might be French.

"Sally" - term used to describe a salamander or broiler.  Often used to hurry orders, but sometimes to the order's detriment. 

"Meez (or Plass)" - short for the French term "mise en place", or "everything in its place."  The zen-like term of setting up one's station.  If your station's completely set, there's nothing that can stop you.  But the second you f*#k your Meez, you're in the weeds, Rockstar.

"Guy, sweetie, honey, etc..." - in kitchens that are meatgrinders, it's hard to remember everyone's name, guy.  "Hey guy!  Get over here!"

"Shoemaker (or mercenary)" - a person who's only expected to do the minimum amount of work, but generally doesn't cost too much to employ.  Strength in numbers?  aka- a hack.

"Shoe leather" - well done steaks or such.  Suburbanites are known for eating shoe leather on occasion.

"Meat coming out of their ears..." - in reference to a meathead.  So meatheaded it's coming outta their ears, guy.

"Beginner's night, Amateur hour, (or something similar)" - a night that anyone who really enjoys eating well avoids... as in any really busy night were a kitchen might be compromised or stressed keeping them from getting food out to you in the way the chef meant, ie. hot and tasty and on time.  Valentine's Day is a beginner's night, as any self respecting gastronaut should not looking for culinary epiphany then.  Also used in reference to St. Patrick's Day when talking about drinking, or 4/20 to those other folk. 

Another memorable quote from a Sous named Joe on his way walking out from a restaurant in Winnetka was, while carrying a sack of his stuff, "I wish this was a bag of d*!ks for *insert name here* to suck!"
Any other slang I'm missing?  Feel free to comment, there might be a sequel to this topic but for now, signing out, guy.

Arizona Stories, Sammy the Grill Cook

Sammy was awesome.  I first learned a busy grill station from him as an intern in Phoenix and he was quite the character.  He originally moved to Arizona from Texas after getting into some gang problems in Dallas.  He was shot a few times in the knee and ended up getting his right leg amputated.  You wouldn't know it except for his limp, and it wasn't the first thing he'd run up and tell you.  This led to some interesting stories... mainly because Sammy had a warped sense of humor.

He used to play box with the saute cook, Kenneth.  Kenny used to draw pictures of Sammy in permanent marker on the line, and repeatedly hit it with things while muttering, "Can you feel that?!  Can you feel that Sammy?"  I had to work the middle and set up plates for them during service when I first started, which honed my trash talk a lot better than my cooking skills for a brief period of time.

One day Sammy decided to play box with a newer cook, and the two of them were having a great time.  It was the beginning of our shift, and the newer cook hadn't buttoned his jacket up all the way yet.  Sammy grabbed a small Braun stick blender from a bain marie and started to "fence" with it.  It was still plugged in, and tore into the skin on the new cook's chest.  While it wasn't a deep cut, the new cook looked down with disbelief before he was rushed off to emergency care.  Neither were fired, but Chef J had an hour long reprimand waiting for them both about goofing off at work.

Now, in Phoenix, the bars close super early in comparison to Chicago, so it leads to more and more house parties & socialization after work.  At one party, Sammy had been drinking quite heavily, and was getting more and more angry at a rich girl that wouldn't stop talking about all of the skiing equipment she'd just bought and how great of a time she was going to have in Colorado when the snow fell.  She was sitting next to him on the couch, when he hopped up, threw off his leg, and stated drunkenly...

"I'll never hit the damned slopes again!"

He then proceeded to hop to the kitchen to pour another rum & coke.  His "friend" screamed and ran out of the party, proceeding to ditch her boyfriend taking the only car.  He was about to start a fight with Sammy until our friends broke them up, and some samaritan gave the unhappy man a ride home. 

I couldn't stop laughing.

Arizona Stories, A Request

An old Chef of mine (I'll call him Monroe) from Phoenix wanted to hear a story about our old Executive Chef J.  Now Monroe really wasn't too keen on J's rules and general Boy Scoutedness.  There's a few key things for you to know about Chef J to make this post make sense.  So let me give you some background.

Chef J (and our head steward) used to search the employee housing weekly (where I lived) to ensure the interns and/or current residents were living to code.  Heck, we weren't allowed to have food in our rooms, all meals were supposed to be eaten at the resort or somewhere on the town.  Which sucked.  One day he stole the vanilla wafer cookies I had hidden in my sock drawer.  Swear to God.  Never got written up for it, but the empty package was in the trash...  With no cookies! 

With that I decided a prank was in order.

Our fearless cookie thieving leader also had stickers of his face made to put on the tops of the spice rub jars the resort sold and/or gave away as amenities.  With a small distraction from an unnamed intern I was able to lift a roll of the stickers.  Good thing the statute of limitations is over in this epic crime of mine.  Later, I went back to the employee housing and proceeded to hang out with a coworker in their room.  After some drinking, the coworker decided to run some laundry.  I was still in the room, and made it to the restroom.  I quickly turned off the water valve and flushed the toilet to drain the tank.  I then dried off the bowl with a wad of Kleenex and stuck a bunch of stickers (of Chef J's head) to the bottom.  I then turned the water valves back on and walked out of the washroom. 

The epic part of the plan was this was one of the last nights the neighbor was in town.  They ran a shorter internship. 

And after they were gone, the chef had to inspect their room with the head steward. 

Word is the head steward caught the prank only after he'd used the facilities.  And he was the one that had to scrape the stickers off of the basin.

And that's what you get for stealing my cookies, jerks.

Arizona Stories, The Ballad of Lonely Bob

I used to work for a five starred, five Mobile Diamond resort on the west side of Phoenix.  It seems to be the source of most of the stories I retell over and over (much to my wife, family & friend's dismay).  I'd like to share a few of these choice gems that I've been polishing, as most of you won't get the chance to hear them in person.  And if you have heard them in person, well, quit whining.  I'll write about you next.

The property was huge, including three professionally designed golf courses, an incredible spa, a killer pool, over 365 rooms, three high end restaurants led by an ex-White House chef, and had a considerably large area to house workers and interns.  I was one of the latter during my internship from Kendall College.  I worked through every kitchen and station I could over two seasons, eventually working in their four star, four diamond ode to Southwestern cuisine.  We did everything from scratch.  We made our own bread, desserts, butchered only prime meats, and carried the biggest chip on our shoulders for doing this on a day-to-day high volume basis.

I saw an extremely large number of cooks flow though the line over a short period of time though those two seasons.  One of those I shall call "Lonely Bob".  We named him this because there were too many Bob's.  I should know, I was one of them.  My nickname was (still is) Shaky or Shakes.  I drink a lot of caffiene.  Lonely Bob got dumped by his girlfriend for a fellow cook.  Thus the lonely moniker.  Well, to put it kindly, Lonely Bob sucked.  Royally.  The culinary school he'd applied to said that he needed atleast a year's professional experience before they'd let him into their program, and they set him up with us.

Good 'ol Lonely quickly found himself on night shift duty.  It was the consumate bitch shift, 7 pm to 7 am.  The job entailed a few key tasks; to strain and cool the stocks, perform general prep, grind butcher scraps, set up breakfast for the main dining room, and to cook employee meal for the the night cleaners, bakery, & security staff.  Two days in, the night cleaners logged a formal complaint.  He'd marinated chicken in raw white vinegar and then cooked it with peppers, calling it chicken fajitas.  I swear every time a hispanic person walked by him they muttered a death threat under their breath.

The evening before Thanksgiving, Lonely was given the task of cooking turkeys for the next morning.  He was told by the Executive Sous to cook 8 turkeys to 135 degrees, and to set them up in a closed door speed rack with 6 sternos on a sheet pan on the bottom to keep them warm for the next morning, when they'd be brought up to temp before lunch service. 

For those of you who don't know how sternos work, they're the little cans of gelled, napalm heat that are placed under pans on buffet lines.  When lit, they burn blue flame.  They're effing hot.  Well, good old Bobby has never used them before, and interpreting the directions literally, takes the gel out of the cans with a spatula and smears the goo onto the oversized cookie sheet.  He puts it on the bottom, lights the pan, shuts the door, AND WALKS AWAY.  Now usually only a small surface area burns with these things.  He's multiplied this over tenfold. 

Long story short. my friend, a night baker comes out of the pastry shop and sees flames licking the outside of the cart.  Wide eyed, she runs to the dish area, grabs a mop & bucket, uses the butt end of the mop to open the cart's latch, and throws the dirty mop water over the fire frantically. 

All of the turkey's were ruined.  Blackened by Metallica comes to mind.  I remember the smell vividly as I walked into the kitchen for my morning shift.

Lonely had burnt a hole through the sheet pan.  No shit.

We had run to Safeway for more turkeys.  Lonely didn't last much longer after that.