Posts Tagged ‘kitchen’

10 Server Commandments

May 3, 2013

The service you get when you go out to eat dinner a lot of times can make or break your experience. No matter how good the food is if I repeatedly get bad service from the same place I will stop going. Bad service creates an uncomfortable ambiance and can be insulting. In the service industry your livelihood is the gratuity you receive for your service and you have to earn it every day.

Granted as someone who works in the industry you would expect me to be a very hard man to please and at times I can be. But if you ask anyone who currently works as a server they will all agree their fellow service industry employees are usually the best tippers. I believe in tip karma and in order to maintain balance in our strange world I always take care of my brethren. When I get bad service I tip twenty percent. When I get good service I am most likely going to help make your night and quite possibly your weekend.

In order to consistently make twenty percent as a server there are ten basic rules to follow to keep your customer fat, drunk and generous. When I say basic I am not saying being a server is easy because that couldn’t be further from the truth. Being a server is like having to run over hot coals for four to six hours straight while screaming customers jab your sides with javelins. When things go wrong servers usually get blamed by the customer, the kitchen and their manager so on a nightly basis there are multiple people to please.

That being said these basic rules I am about to lay out are easy enough that a blind monkey with one arm could execute them. That is why when a seemingly normal human cannot follow the ten basic commandments of being an efficient and successful server it is very frustrating. To be in the presence of blatant ignorance and stupidity angers me to no end especially when the person portraying these traits expects me to give them money for their services.

So to all you servers out there who can’t figure out why you average six percent in tips I give you the Ten Server Commandments:

Rule One:  Act like you like your job. Now I know a lot of servers hate their jobs for various different reasons and that’s okay. People in every field of employment hate their jobs. However, when the hatred you have for your job reaches a table of customers it is not okay. Part of being a good server is making your customer believe that there is no place in the world you would rather be and there is nothing you would rather be doing then serving them food. If you hate serving so much that you can’t fake it for intervals of less then a minute when dealing with my table it is time for you to choose a new career.

Rule Two:  Never, ever under any circumstance chew gum while serving me. The second I see you pop a bubble I will be asking for my check and leaving. I don’t know if there is something that makes me angrier than having someone taking my order as they noisily and rudely chew on gum like a cow chomping on grass.

Rule Three:  Do not camp at my table. It’s one thing to be friendly and engaging, it’s another to tell me your life story including how your baby daddy just left you again and that your second kid might have to go without for his birthday because the restaurant has been slow. I don’t care. Believe me. If I wanted to talk to someone as I ate I would have sat at the bar.

Rule Four: Be sober. I know this seems like common sense but you would be shocked at how many restaurant employees across the world show up shitfaced to work on a regular basis. If you reek like vodka red bull’s and shots of fireball and continually sway as you try to focus on how I want my burger cooked than I will most likely let your clueless manager who couldn’t manage their way out of a wet paper bag with scissors in their hands know that their employee is intoxicated and costing them business.

Rule Five: Write everything down. I don’t care if you have been waiting tables for your entire life and claim to be able to recite every order you have ever taken if you don’t have a pen and paper out I automatically assume that my order will be fucked up.

Rule Six: Always keep whatever beverage or beverages I have in front of me full. This might be the most important rule to me. Keeping me full of my beverage of choice keeps me happy and makes me more generous when the bill arrives.

Rule Seven: Never blame the kitchen. I hate it when after my food runs long or comes out wrong the first thing the sorry no account server says is, “Sorry, the kitchen’s been fucking up all day I don’t know what’s wrong with them.” This immediately says to me that you are terrible at your job because you just threw the person who works five times as hard as you and makes twenty times less money under the bus in hopes that your fuck up won’t affect your tip.

Rule Eight: Don’t disappear. Sometimes once food gets dropped a server will automatically assume that their guests who are eating are good to be left unattended to for a while. This is a mistake. Once I start eating that’s when I start needing help. As I eat I drink so please reference Rule Six. If my beer glass stays empty for over five minutes because you are out back smoking or talking to your girlfriend if and when you return to my table you will be entering into an extremely hostile situation.

Rule Nine: Don’t drop my check until I ask you to. Nothing says you want me to leave and fast more then giving me my check before I’ve asked for it. Just because I finished my eighth beer does not mean I am done for the evening. At the diner during breakfast fine no problem drop away, but during dinner service keep that check open and in your apron until I say differently.

Rule Ten: Don’t check the tip right in front of me. If I am still at my table and the only thing keeping you from getting off work is grabbing my check book so you can finish your checkout than by all means swipe it off my table. However, do not open the book in front of me so you can read the tip line on my credit card receipt or count the change I left you for the effort. This is offensive and bush league and the next time it happens to me I am taking my tip back.

If you are a server and you follow the Ten Server Commandments then myself and people like me who over tip on a regular basis out of fear of an invisible karmic force that rules our universe will not only tip you fat but we will also continue to come back.

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Tony D., East Vista, CA. GULPU

April 28, 2012

A husband and wife walk into the bar. He is a fifty year old wearing a Hawaiian shirt half buttoned and she is homely and half his age. She is pushing a stroller with their child inside it. Most bars aren’t kid friendly, but since our establishment is both a restaurant and a pub we encourage families to be comfortable there. In fact a lot of our regulars bring in their sweet, well-mannered and well-behaved children all the time and not only do we as employees embrace them but other customers do as well.

This is why when this man strolled up with his kid and his darts no one really thought much of it. He approaches the bar. After waiting less than a minute he grows impatient and begins waving his cash in the air. I walk over to him.

“Jack and Coke. And whatever she wants,” he says.

He points over his shoulder at the woman he walked in with who is frantically trying to find a safer place than a crowded dart room in a busy pub for her to store her child. As she does she dodges darts until she finally finds a safe corner for her kid and her to sit. She begins to order, but does so in what sounded like German. She spoke as if she expected me to understand her. I stopped her finally and began to respond in English. She held up her finger and waved it in my face before turning and calling for the man in the Hawaiian shirt. He was playing darts so it took a minute to get his attention. She waved him over. He leaned on the bar, annoyed.

“I said a Jack and Coke.”

“Right, what is she having?” I asked pointing at his wife.

He nodded.

“Vodka Tonic. Make it the cheap stuff.”

I made their drinks and by the time I returned he was back to playing darts. I placed the drinks in front of the foreigner and told her it was nine dollars. She stared blankly at me. I motioned money with my fingers and she finally got it pulling out a twenty. I gave her some change which she pocketed.

Then the crying began. It started out quietly and brief, but slowly transformed into the sound of a constant scream. It was the kid. I scanned the bar and received annoyed looks from my happy hour regulars. The screaming stopped but continued to ring in my ears for several seconds longer. The guy returns with an empty glass.

“I don’t think there was any whiskey in that drink so make this one a double,” he says as he waves his money in my face.

I pull out a glass and a shot glass. I measure the drink to exactly two ounces and top it off with coke. He pays without tipping.

“Do you guys have any snacks? She’s hungry,” he says as he nods to his mail order bride.

I slide him a menu. He slides it back.

“No, no, I meant like peanuts or crackers or something.”

“No we do not, sir.”

“What kind of restaurant is this?”

He goes back to playing darts. I serve some other people when out of the corner of my eye I see him standing halfway in the doorway to the kitchen. I rush over and find him harassing the kitchen staff for soup crackers which unfortunately they give to him. I inform the man he is not to be bothering the kitchen and he walks away without acknowledging me.

I return to the bar and see that his wife is dousing the soup crackers in Tabasco sauce and shoving them down her throat. The screaming begins again shortly after that. The mother tries to console the child but to no avail. The father keeps playing darts not even looking over at her or the child. He returns to the bar and orders another double. I inform him that it would be appreciated if he could get the kid to stop screaming. He shrugs me off and returns to the dart board again without leaving a tip.

The screaming stops and everyone sitting at the bar and those sitting in the section of tables to the left of the dartboard release a collective sigh of relief to be free from the piercing sound of an angry child. He orders another double without tipping. Five minutes later the screaming starts right back up. The mother has since given up and stares blankly off into space while the father never acknowledges either one of them.

This happened every Friday for a month straight. It was to the point that customers were complaining about the noise. Both parents had been warned every week, but finally it became too much to bare. I was forced to walk out from behind the bar, pull the man to the side and inform him that his five year old child was 86ed from the establishment. He looked shocked. He glanced over at his screaming child briefly before turning back to me.

“If they wait out front can I stay?”

After fighting off the urge to call Child Protective Services I sent the whole fucked up family packing and thankfully have not seen them since.

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Jesse W., Vista CA. GULPU.COM

January 21, 2012

I was in the last hour of a double getting ready to close out my last tab when a mother in her mid-twenties came in with her two sons. They looked to be around nine or ten, and were extremely loud. The mother was too engrossed in her cell phone conversation to care. When I went to greet them I noticed the kids had dumped sugar all over the table and were now doing the same with the salt and pepper. I offered them drinks and when she finally put her phone down she demanded a Long Island Iced Tea.

She was on the phone again when I returned with the drinks and the kids were now pouring sugar directly into their mouths. In the span of a minute they had each swallowed three packets worth of sugar. This whole time the mother was on her phone. She held her finger up to signal for me to wait. I did so for another several minutes before giving up and walking away. As soon as I did I heard her yell “Hey” as loud as she could. I begrudgingly returned to the table. As I did I caught the end of her phone conversation which included the words “stupid fucking waiter…”

She hung up the phone.

“Is there any alcohol in this because it tastes awfully weak?”

As she spoke I could smell the alcohol steaming off her breath. I tried to explain that there was no such thing as a weak Long Island, but she wasn’t having it. Even though she had drank half of it I brought her a new one.

I took the food orders as well as another Long Island order and walked away. All three of them got burgers, although the two kids were sharing one. By the time the food came out she was ready for her third Long Island in twenty minutes. When I returned with her drink she was sitting at the table by herself. The kids were dumping sugar on all the other tables in the dining room and screeching at the top of their lungs. I waited for her to say something, but when it became evident that she was okay ignoring the little bastards I intervened.

“Hey guys. Foods ready. How about you go join your Mom.”

The response from both of them was to shove their middle fingers in my face. My patience dwindled but I fought the urge to strangle them.

“Excuse me,” the mother yelled.

I returned to the table. She told me not to speak to her children because I wasn’t their father. I cringed at the thought that someone actually had sex with this awful woman, not just once, but twice. She waved me away and ordered another Long Island.  When I returned the kids were sitting on the floor punching each other.

She had inhaled her burger, but informed me that her kids hadn’t liked theirs. I looked at their burger. It hadn’t been touched. I wondered if the bastards were too full on sugar and stupidity to be able to eat anything more. I asked her how they knew they didn’t like it if they hadn’t even tasted it. She was grossly offended and demanded her check. I took the kids burger off the check in hopes of avoiding any confrontation. She informed me that it was unethical for me to charge her for all four of her Long Island Iced Tea’s when the first one had been so weak. I swallowed my pride and apologized and took one off the bill paying for it with money out of my own pocket. They left a half hour after we were supposed to be closed. In addition to not tipping the dining room was trashed by her demon seeds. As I wiped sugar off of everything I actually found myself grateful for our encounter as it gave me a newfound respect for birth control. I beg you mam please forget how you got here.

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GULPU!!!

January 6, 2012

The government has informed me via a sealed letter that due to legal restrictions the website GULP is not available for public use. Apparently, although I can neither confirm nor deny whether what I am about to say is true, the term GULP is the name of some sort of secret government program which the government wishes to keep the general public from learning about. We here at GuerillaDeSwine Productions are used to Government interference in our business and are pleased to announce that what was once GULP.COM is now GULPU.COM! The website is still under construction but the response to our initial announcement of GULPU has been overwhelming. Here is just one of the many GULPU reviews we have already received.

Emily B. San Marcos, CA

Two ex or current streetwalkers walked in the other night. One had on a puffy jacket with a fake fur-line collar while the other had shorts short enough to require two hairdos. When asked if they were eating dinner they exchanged annoyed glances and then replied “yes” with an over exaggerated gasp. After looking at a menu skank one asked if the mac and cheese was really six dollars. I fought the urge to ask her if most restaurants she went to listed fake prices or if maybe she was used to bartering for food. When I answered yes she waved me off in disgust.

They were ready to order when I returned with their drinks. One ordered the Mushroom and Bleu burger, well done, which is a wonderful way to ruin a good piece of meat. The other ordered the mac and cheese she had wished to negotiate down in price earlier. In addition she wanted a grilled cheese. I guess walking the streets called for a constant intake of cheese, amongst other things, into her body. I placed the order and fifteen minutes later it was up. When I placed the food on the table the mac skank let me know that she thought the food had taken way too long. I began to explain that ruining a good burger by ordering it well done took extra time but she waved me off before I could finish.

The burger skank flagged me down after taking two bites from her burger. She said there was something funky tasting on it. I pointed out that the mushroom and bleu burger had bleu cheese on it and perhaps that was what gave off a slightly funky taste. She said that wasn’t it. She loved bleu cheese. I took her plate away and had the kitchen make a plain well done burger.

The mac skank flagged me down. She pointed at her mac. She asked if the mac and cheese was really six dollars. I nodded yes. She waved me off. I returned with the well done burger. They both let me know this time that they thought the food had taken way too long. They proceeded to scarf the food down as if it was their first meal in days and that their figure-obsessed pimp may be lurking around a corner somewhere ready to smack them down for eating.

I cleared their plates and listened as the mac skank trash talked the food and restaurant to her friend as if I didn’t exist. Without even looking at me or stopping her conversation she signaled for the check. They left in a hurry so I immediately checked the check book. There was money in it but it was eleven cents short. I decided against going after them when I realized they clearly needed that eleven cents way more than I did. I would have rather paid for their food and once the kitchen was finished making it just throw it away rather than having those two in at all.

Please don’t come back, whoever you are.

Thanks Emily for being a part of GULPU! While we are updating our software for the GULPU.COM launch feel free to leave your reviews in the comment area of this blog.

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