Billy gathering cooking

[snousle]

Yeah, that was a lot of work. After all the pastry development the week before I was already kind of bushed by the time I arrived. Up at 5 AM on Saturday then 6 AM on Sunday, and working until about 9 PM, is kind of a lot. But for what a real client would be paying it would be quite worthwhile.

It's fantastic having Bill in the kitchen cleaning things. I turn around for a few seconds and before I know it my cutting board is all sparkly clean again. The whole is definitely more than the sum of the parts; the flow works so much better when I don't have to shift gears between prepping and cleaning up.

I had aspired to, among other things, do a test run of the buffet kit and take photos. Well, I didn't haul out the whole kit and caboodle; the chafing dishes and nice silverware just seemed like too much of a burden at the time. But a few nice photos gave me a sense of where things need to go in the presentation department. I'd handed a box of linens and vases to some guests and told them to dress the table - gee, think a group of gay men might find some volunteers for that? - and they made it look quite nice.



The only website-worthy shots were of a nice looking bowl of oatmeal cookies I baked from frozen dough balls.



I'm wondering what the professional cooks reading this think about this volume of work - 30 people x 6 meals. What kind of manpower would it take you? I'm still doing a lot of things that I'm going to cut out - like peeling pounds of garlic at a time, what a pain. There is definitely room for greater efficiency, but I'm not sure what a realistic target would be.

Comments

[barbarian-rat.livejournal.com]

There's something about the top photo, it seems so .... comfortable. The colors are not glaring, but draw me to the food. Not really a good 'food presentation' photo, but from another angle, perhaps.

[snousle.livejournal.com]

Heh. Maybe that's because I was trying to recreate the look of 1970s cookbook photography. ;-)

[barbarian-rat.livejournal.com]

Hummm... it doesn't seem 70s to me ... but then the 70s were a fog of pot, pills and alcohol ...

[growler-south.livejournal.com]

Just the '70s, Rat?

[barbarian-rat.livejournal.com]

Well, OK, part of the 80s too ... But really no much since then, mostly tobacco now ...
:)

[growler-south.livejournal.com]

Peeling pounds of garlic- cut off the root to separate the cloves, put them in a stainless bowl, hold another stainles bowl on top to make a big hollow chamber, and shake the crap out of the garlic like it was a giant maraca. It'll make a huge noise, but you'll be left with peeled (and only slightly bruised) garlic.

Much better than the icky oxidised tasting minced garlic you get in jars. You can smell that stuff a mile away.

30x6 is a LOT of work! Generally a 3-course evening meal for 10 takes me 4 hours from prep to dishing up. But if you're up around 30 people the sheer volume of prep work starts to become a hassle. Potatoes don't peel themselves! For 30x6 I'd probably spend a day in the kitchen alone getting the menu right, a day buying all ingredients, and then a day with 2 kitchenhands prepping. On the 2 days of service I'd want 1 kitchenhand.

(I'm estimating this based on my experience with Robbie and Fish's wedding dinner, a kitchen I worked at where for a couple of weeks a year we'd do 300-400 meals a day (no, not McDonalds ;-)) and the organisational refinements I've learned from doing meals for 10 at home (limited space, time, and help). I think this is close to what you're trying to do- using organisational skills and a long lead-in to compensate for a lack of staff and a dedicated kitchen/dining area.)

[snousle.livejournal.com]

I'd say that's about the amount of labor I put into it, considering that I did almost all the meat and veggie prep on the fly but worked very long hours each day. It might be that I'm close to the limit here; specific techniques aside, it's not like I flail around anymore.

Yep, I find it's possible to put on very sophisticated events when everything is prepped to the last possible stage ahead of time. But it takes discipline - if things get behind you're pretty much hosed!

[furr-a-bruin.livejournal.com]

I think we need to lock you two in a kitchen together for a day or two... ;)

[theotherqpc.livejournal.com]

every kitchen i've worked in buys prepeeled garlic. it's more or less a necessity considering the amount we go through and the cost of labor. most places cut the bit of root end off and toss it all in the food processor to mince, though at Incanto, every clove was sliced (about 1 mm thin) one at a time on the mandoline - Chris prefers the flavor and visibility of the large slices.
shallots are also often bought in prepeeled with the ends cut off.

i don't have much experience with banquet/buffet style service, but for some perspective...
we do a variety of private parties at work with varying menus. the most complicated would be a passed hors d'oeuvres service/cocktail hour (usually 5-6 different HDs), choice of two different offerings for 1st course, three different entrees, three different desserts, all food individually plated and cooked a la minute. for this, we'll have 4-5 prep guys, 6-7 cooks, and two dishwashers (one for prep time, one for service). a dinner for 100-200 guests moves briskly, but easily with this much staff.

[h0gwash.livejournal.com]

To the uneducated eye, that all looks fantastic!