Hi all,
I was always wondering how some restaurants make food. Recently for example I was to family small restaurant that had many different soups, meals, pasta etc and all came within 10 min or max 15.
How do they make so many different recipes quick?
– would it be possible to use some of their techniques so cooking at home is efficient and fast? (for example, for me it takes like 1 hour to make such soup)
Thank you!
In: 9052
*EDIT:* WOW. This really blew up.. Thank you to everyone for the awards and updoots.. I hope this was helpful.
I was a professional chef in haute cuisine for 10 years, so I actually have the answers. We have a credo: “mise en place.” This means everything in its place. The first part of the day is spent on prep, preparing your mise en place, all the ingredients you need. This means knife work (cutting ingredients), long fire items (something that cooks for a long time), sauces, dressings, garnishes, portioning meat and fish, etc. The prepped ingredients that will be used for service are brought to the station and organized in special chilled pans.
When an order is placed, a ticket with the order prints to the kitchen and is hung on the “expo” (expediting) station. Expo calls out what is on the ticket. “Order in” means something has been ordered, but don’t make it yet. “Fire” means start cooking. So expo will say “fire entree on table 42” and the chef knows to start making the dish.
Let’s say I’m making seared halibut filet with roasted sunchoke mash, miso vinaigrette, and fresh herbs. From 10am to 3pm, I am roasting the sunchokes, mashing them, adjusting seasoning, picking herbs, making the vinaigrette, slicing portions of halibut. From 3p to 5p, I set up my station.
Now, it’s dinner time and someone orders the halibut. I take a precut piece of fish from my station’s lowboy (fridge under counter), oil it and salt the flesh, throw it in a pan, throw the sunchoke mash in a pan to heat it up, plate and garnish everything, and pass the complete dish to the expo window, where I say “I need hands to table 42!” From the time expo said “Fire 42” to the time I said “Hands!” only 5 minutes have passed.
TLDR: Mise en place. Everything is prepared and organized so you are simply (using my halibut example) searing the fish, reheating/reseasoning the set, plate, and garnish.
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