March 2013

More and more operators are making the observation that it is getting harder and harder to make a buck in the restaurant business. Between fewer customers, many of who are demanding more satisfaction but expect to pay less for it, and rising costs, not to mention plenty of competition doing their best to rise to the challenge, they have a point. Much of the wiggle room many restaurateurs have had in the past in terms of profitability is gone.

February 2013

In almost any restaurant no position is more important than that of the chef. Of course other positions, such as the dining room manager and GM or owner/operator, are just as critical. But if the menu is not appealing, the food not consistently well prepared, the food costs not kept in line and staff turnover not kept to a minimum, the chances of any operation’s success recede to zero. Most operators understand this, which explains the level of apprehension, if not the genuine anxiety, that many feel when faced with the task of hiring a new chef. Let’s examine just what we should be looking for in a chef, and how to best go about finding it.

One of the worst, but undeserved, stereotypes that the hospitality industry endures is the concept that it offers nothing but low paying, boring, dead end jobs to people who have no better options in life. But ask anyone who has been a proud member of our fraternity for any length of time and the overall impression you’ll get is just the opposite. It is an industry that has been consistently growing for years, has a genuine need for workers at every level of expertise and ability, and is hungry for people who are willing to work their way up the ladder as far as they are able to go, with little or no arbitrary limits placed on anyone willing to rise to the occasion.

As any good chef will tell you, there is nothing more important than the part of each day dedicated to prep work. Without well-planned and executed prep, labor and food costs, as well as quality, are impossible to control. And although service time is where the rubber meets the road, prep time is where we install the tires. When our restaurant’s doors open, we all want our kitchens to perform like a perfectly designed, well-oiled machine from the very first order through to the very last dessert.

October 2012 Feature Article

For many operators the promise of a strong fourth quarter can, at worst, partially make up for an otherwise lackluster year. On the other hand, if things are already going well, a strong finish will turn a good year into a great one. During the Holidays most peoples’ spending patterns loosen up, there are more reasons and occasions for individuals and families to splurge and celebrate and corporate revelry kicks into high gear (albeit not as high as a few years ago.) This is good news for restaurateurs.

When it comes to keeping our dining rooms filled, certain times of the year just seem to take care of themselves – others, not so much. If your restaurant is located near a beach, summer is probably fine, and winter might be good too; but the fall, when the kids go back to school, might be a little on the slow side. If you’re located in a ski town, when the conditions on the slopes are great, so is your guest count. But before the first snowfall arrives, or after the last is just a memory, depending on how much of a draw your area has for non-skiers, things might start to feel a more peaceful than you’d like.

July 2012 Feature Article

Everyone in the restaurant business understands and appreciates the fact that nothing is more important than providing great service. It is often said – and I, for one, agree – that great service can make up for mediocre food, but great food will never make up for miserable service. No matter how well thought out your wine list is, if it’s served by waiters who succeed in making your guests feel inadequate for their selection, everybody loses.

May 2012 Feature Article

Every operator knows just how much thought and effort go into getting their dining rooms full of happy customers. Or even, when our wildest dreams aren’t quite coming true, half full of happy customers. Every seat that is filled is a testament to our ability to get people to believe in what we do enough so that they choose to come into our restaurant, instead of one down the street.

Improving Kitchen Efficiency & Quality

May 2012 Chef Training and Kitchen Management Article

The Pros and Cons

April 2012 Chef Training

One of the most basic decisions a restaurateur makes when developing their concept is where his or her kitchen will exist on the continuum that starts with buying everything pre-prepared, and ends with doing everything from scratch. Very few restaurants occupy the terrain at either extreme, with most fitting somewhere in between.

10 Critical Points of Kitchen Sanitation

I don’t think I am going out on a limb to say that most of us don’t get into the restaurant business because of a visceral attraction to the field of sanitation. More likely, we chose this path because of a love of food and wine, a proclivity to hospitality, or the possibility of turning a passion (or, at least a talent) into a livelihood.

How to Prepare for and Profit from St. Valentine's and Mother’s Day Traffic

For many restaurants, St. Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day are the two biggest days of the year. With a little planning and forethought these Holidays have the potential to turn an otherwise ho-hum February and May into real bright spots in your yearly sales picture, while also earning you some new, regular clients. On the other hand, if executed poorly, they’ll just be two more days of the week at best, or actually leave a bad taste in the mouths of both new and old clients.

Accommodate Guests and Create an "All-Day" Day Part with Smaller-Portion Menu Items

October 2011  Chef Training Article

One of our major challenges as restaurateurs is to always be aware of the changes taking place in the preferences of our customers. When we become complacent in our efforts to keep our finger on the most current pulse of what’s hot and what’s not, we risk becoming lukewarm ourselves. No good would come from changing course every time we detected the slightest hint of the latest fad. But rejecting out of hand anything unfamiliar or new will not serve us well, either.

August 2011  Feature Article

To make the most of their operations, restaurateurs need to leverage every asset they have available to them. Whether it is making sure that every bit of their chef’s experience and talent is evident on the plates in their dining room, that the most appropriate and pleasant wines their vendors can supply are being sampled and considered for inclusion in their wine program, or negotiating the best terms for a line of credit with their banker, the more effective they are at not wasting opportunities, the better off everyone is. When it comes to assets, one of the biggest you can have as a restaurateur is your current client base.

July 2011  Feature Article

There is not a person in the restaurant business that has any doubts that the service their guests receive is at least as important as any other aspect of their operations. No matter how compelling the concept, how perfect the location, how amazing the food and how well thought out the beverage selection, a disinterested, unorganized, incompetent or unwelcoming front of the house staff will spell certain doom for any restaurant.

July 2011 Chef Training

May 2011

Your dining room is full of happy customers looking forward to a great meal. You are proud of the job you’ve done putting together some crowd-pleasing specials that the waiters are having no problem selling alongside your classic dishes. The orders start coming in and, at first, things in the kitchen are humming right along. But before you can begin to relax a little and start to enjoy the well-oiled culinary machine you thought you had assembled, you notice a few things aren’t quite right.

April 2011

Along with food costs, kitchen payroll is one of the two most important, easily quantifiable things for a chef to control in his or her kitchen. Like controlling food costs, payroll is a balancing act between what is obviously sufficient, but not practical (i.e., affordable), and what will make the bean counter in your organization happy (at least in the short-term), but cause your erstwhile clients to choose to go elsewhere to spend their dining dollars.

Feb 2011

Jan 2011 Feature Article

September 2010

While maintaining food safety is not the most glamorous part of running a restaurant, without it, everything else we do is for naught. No matter how inviting the dining room, how beautiful and tasty the food, how innovative the wine list and cocktails are and how impeccable the service, if someone gets sick from food they’ve eaten in your establishment, it could cost you everything you’ve worked for in one miserable, avoidable moment.

August 2010

One way to set your restaurant apart from the competition is to serve your guests freshly baked goods that are made from scratch. This is something that any customer will notice and love, and will keep them coming back for more. From muffins at breakfast, cornbread for lunch and dinner, biscuits any time of day and cream puff-based items for dessert, there are always opportunities to add these items to your kitchen’s repertoire. Although some baked items require quite a bit of special skills and experience that might be beyond the scope of your staff, there are others that any cook can handle with just a little training and practice.