A trial shift to remember
As I walked through the doors of a restaurant empty of customer. Chaos whirled around me, it was the calm before the storm. Waiters, chefs, and bar men dancing across the restaurant floor like the crew to a ship rushing from port to starboard. Menus crossed hands, napkins placed down delicately were realigned with the corners of the tables, and aprons were being tied one after the other. I stood, feeling intrigued and incredibly nervous. I wasn’t an annoying customer arriving far too early for their meal, I was the girl I hoped they were expecting. It was my trial shift, and I was standing like a useless lemon at the doorway.
The manager of the restaurant soon approached. Fashioning a red neckerchief with hair growing sporadically out from different angles of his face, he looked more like a sheriff than a manager of one of the most popular restaurants in London. He walked down through the centre of the restaurant to greet me with a strut that made it feel like this was an exclusive members club and he was the man I needed he impress to offered entry. But there was nothing intimidating about this man, he welcomed me with a warm embrace that said, ‘good to see you’ instead of ‘don’t fuck up, we’re watching’.
I was introduced to the waiters who began to explain the laws of order here. Table numbers are my weakness, something my dyslexic brain finds incredibly difficult to memorise. Fortunately, the inside tables were all positioned neatly in numerical order (you’ll be surprised by how many restaurants don’t do this). This could not be said for the outside tables. Starting from the right-hand side you had table 61, 62, 63, 64, a gap for the entrance, and then one final table. As logic would have it this final table would be named 65, but as the manager would have it, it was named 69.
A calm start turned into an excited rush of Londoners just dying to try the newest and most seasonal dishes that their menu had to offer. I got to try the artichoke tagliolini before we opened. I regretted this just about halfway through my shift which accounted for probably about 15 tagliolini’s later. It’s a lot easier when you don’t know how delicious the food is when all your allowed to do for four hours is transport it back and forth from the kitchen to the customer.
So, what was it like deep within the kitchen; a room so exclusive you don’t pay to enter, you have to earn your way in (unless you’re a half decent waitress/broke freelance journalist like me). The answer is mesmerising. While the manager thankfully wasn’t frightening the head chef certainly was, if you were to imagine a stereotypical scary chef that you thought only existed in movies, this was him. Being made the runner (the waiter in charge of running the food – no talking to customers) meant I was stuck with this man for the night.
I always imagined that the head chef would be in charge of the most complex of dishes. But that logic neglects the fact that each chef present in that kitchen was trained to the highest standard. Everything down to the sprinkle of salt encompassed a level of perfection that could only be captured by years of dedicating one’s life to the kitchen. The duty of the head chef therefore becomes something that can only be compared to the conductor of an orchestra. As the tickets came flying through the machine, representing the culinary desires of the customers, he would guide his team through a theatrical performance, only, instead of violins and drums they had knives and spatulas. Each chef was in tune to the others’ rhythm. They operated as a single unit, communicating in a way that was lost on me but nevertheless was undeniably captivating (although, I can’t deny the word ‘fuck’ was substituted for almost every word in the English language besides the word’s actual meaning). I wondered when the anger, frustration, and potential drug use would come into play. The closest I came to this was when he was prepping a sea bass ceviche and screamed to the team ‘Does anyone have a line!’. I was shocked, not realising how open they would all be about this. I soon realised he was asking for a lime, not a line. Less thrilling but for a brief moment I got the adrenalin rush I was hoping for.
The shift was exhausting, hospitality always is. But there was something different about this shift. I came out feeling like I had been clubbing instead of working (this may be due to the joint music taste of the head chef and manager), and I recounted stories of the night to my sister like I would have, had I’d been on some wild night out. The party-like experience that characterised my trial shift came down to one thing: the team. I had never experienced being a waiter in a place where everyone actually didn’t mind being there. Yes, I’m sure they all looked forward to the end of the night, but once that time came, they wouldn’t be travelling off to different corners of London. Instead, they would all head to the same pub where they would discuss the joys and disasters that unfolded that night. I didn’t get the job, and I wasn’t disappointed when I discover this, I’m much more comfortable serving croissants with a side chat than meals that cost more than my days wages. What I am disappointed by is the missed opportunity to work within a team so dedicated and in love with what they do. Not having tried the food besides a bite of tagliolini means I’m sadly unqualified to comment on the quality of food itself. However, I stand by the fact that this team could make eating a Tesco’s ready meal taste and feel like a first-class fine dining experience, with a side of misdemeanour. One final though, considering the price of the food, I would have appreciated being paid for the five hour-shift I ended up doing for free, or at least be given supper.
P.S my sister read this out to me in a Stanley Tucci accent, I highly recommend!