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blog, chef, cooking, hotel, kitchen, Nottingham, restaurant
First of all, let me point out that this happened before all of the other posts, just to avoid confusion. 
I had been quite fortunate to get this trial shift, seeing as I had no experience in a ‘fresh-food kitchen’, and having only completed one year of cookery school. My previous experience in kitchens having been in Harvesters and Brewers Fayre, which, for anyone who hasn’t had the pleasure, are horrible chain restaurants that get everything delivered a) cooked b) frozen or c) all of the above. Luckily for me, my friend who was working at The Walton Hotel (for all of 2 weeks), had received an offer of a job in one of Nottinghams best restaurants, but they wanted him to start the next week and he wanted to find a replacement, so he could go without working a notice.
Having been told that I wasn’t going to be allowed to continue on to the second year of my course because of my poor attendance (I was working 50 hours a week and attending college full time, sometimes college got skipped so I could work in order to pay rent), I really needed this job! It was only for a commis position, but I was very nervous and eager to do a good job. The hotel was situated about 6 streets away from my house, so at 9:30am, I head to work. I am met in the reception area by the Headchef, Alex Chilten. He is full of energy and explains this is because he’s had 4 coffees and done the breakfast shift. I go and get changed and head to the kitchen. It is a real kitchen! There is a solid top, the Walk-in fridge is much bigger than the freezer and I can see there are a couple of stocks reducing away on the stove. This is going to be a good place for me! Miles away from the Harvester of sorrow I was working at! 
The chef sets me up near him, peeling down asparagus for one of the starters. I go to grab a few containers, one for the prepped asparagus, one to put the unprepped asparagus in, one for the peelings, so that I am working clean. The sous chef tells me, “We don’t have enough gastros for you to do that, just peel onto your board and put the asparagus next to you.” Ok, so things are different outside of college! Next I am tasked with washing the salad, and doing tomato concasse. Again, I run into a subtle difference from what I had been taught in college, having been to get a pan of water boiling to blanch my tomatoes, I start scoring them. Standard stuff. Sous chef comes across again, “oh, you don’t need to do that, we keep the skin on”. Makes my life easier, I guess. Soon enough it’s time for lunch and one of the CDPs has joined us. So I put over on the starters/dessert section with him. They have me toasting the brioche for the pate, and doing the blue cheese and walnut salad. Nothing too mental, but I am pleased to be left in charge of a couple of things. Service goes by fairly quickly and without any problems, we clean down and then we have a break for 2.5 hours! This is nice! I go home and have a nap. This was a mistake, I wake up at 5:15pm, but I am so sleepy and groggy, I wish I had stayed awake! I make my way back to the hotel and get back in the kitchen, trying to hide the fact that I want to go back to bed. The chef asks me if I have ever segmented an orange before, at this point I hadn’t, so he showed me one. It seemed simple enough, and I prepped 4 or 5. I’m sure I was quite slow, but he told me that they were nice, and it is better to do them slowly and properly, rather than rush them and they are shit. Seems like good advice for most things. Then he asks me if I have ever seen Animal Farm…I am unsure where this is going and the other chefs seem a bit surprised that he is asking me. I have heard of Animal farm, and knowing what it is, have never seen it. I tell him, I am aware of the George Orwell book but didn’t realise it was a film. He calls me into his little office, which is attached to the kitchen and on the computer he has Animal Farm playing. “Bit more X rated than the book I have read”. I’m not sure why you would share this with anyone, let alone someone on trial. The CDP I am working with assures me that the chef is just having a laugh and he likes weird stuff like that. Dinner service seems a lot slower than lunch, and the menu is bigger. There are some dishes from the lunch menu on the a la carte menu, and so I am again in charge of doing some salads and the pate and plating up a few desserts. It gets to 10pm and the chef calls me into his office (his favourite film isn’t on this time, which is nice) and tells me I have done a good job, and that he will be in touch. We shake hands and I leave, content with my days work and confident that he will give me the job. 
Are you a chef? Have you had any similar experiences you’d like to share? If so please leave a reply below!
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