Thumbs Up From “the Swedish Guy”

Everybody likes validation, right? I mean, is there anything better than the day when your boss tells you, “hey, you’re doing a good job”? It’s not going to kill me if my boss doesn’t say anything, although eventually you get the feeling you’re just going through the motions without feedback, or even worse, you start to think your boss hates you almost as much as Anderson Cooper hates Heidi Montag and just doesn’t care enough to even yell at you. But if there’s gonna be feedback, I like the non-yelly, non-screamy variety.

When I was working in the West Village for “the Swedish Guy” I had a pretty interesting chef de cuisine. Obviously, when you’re trying to run a restaurant empire, even a small one, you need have people minding the store for you so you can do things like hit investors up for money or make television appearances. Interestingly enough, he went outside to get his chef, but that’s not important. What is important is that the chef he hired was a little, um, emotional. To say she wore her emotions on her sleeve would be an understatement; she wore her emotions on her crisp white chef’s coat in fucking Technicolor! One day she flipped out on the entire kitchen staff, the GM and a poor reservationist who had the misfortune of wandering by; and told everyone that if they didn’t want to work there, we could all get the hell out…no one left. We were, or should I say I was, a little more confused a couple hours later when she walked into the prep kitchen, put her arm around me and asked how I was doing and if everything was okay with me (um, yeah, feeling great with maybe a touch of bipolar).

I know it takes all kinds in the kitchen, but most people (especially head chefs) end up on one side of the spectrum: either they scream and yell and act like lunatics or they’re pretty even keeled and realize you “catch more flies with honey.” Chef Lithium ran the gamut from both sides, so you never knew what to expect from day-to-day, hour-to-hour. I guess you could say she was more dangerous than typing “Jessica Biel” into my Firefox nav-bar.

So one night, the Swedish Guy showed up while I was prepping and asked for a little help for a television appearance he was getting ready for. Considering I had a light day (meaning I’d gotten done everything I needed to get done) I was more than happy to help him out. He and I got down to business and when he stepped out to take a phone call, Chef Screamy swooped in like an angry gaggle of crows to ask what the hell was wrong with me listening to music while the Swedish Guy tried to get work done? I didn’t see it as a big deal because before she came in and started her yelling; I’d stood across the steel table from him while he nodded his head along with the music as he perfectly…and I mean perfectly diced pumpkin.

Later that evening, I was plating appetizers during an especially busy service. I was picking up Yellowtail, a Lobster Salad, a Mixed Green Salad, Tabbouleh, Oysters and about five other dishes during a Friday night and word had apparently spread that the Swedish Guy would be there, as we only got busier as the night wore on. I was also running between my station and the grill helping plate the shrimp app and the duck salad because my sous chef was super cool and was smart to occasionally put me in the weeds to help me learn to maximize efficiency. The Swede was downstairs finishing getting ready for his television appearance and I was trying to ease into service. Around 8:30 a big ticket (like Alaska big) came out and I, and the rest of the kitchen, furiously got to work.

Things were going well until Chef Screamy turned around from the pass to see me plating somewhere around dish number seven of the ten (I think it was a Lobster Salad), or so, I was responsible for and had a grand mal flip-out. Seriously, it was a tantrum of epic proportions, complete with choice phrases like: “that looks like shit,” and “I’d be embarrassed send that out,” and “you’re so goddamn slow I’d have you re-plate it, but there’s no time.” At some point during the yell-fest, unbeknownst to me or Chef Screamy, The Swedish Guy had made his way back into the kitchen. He’d quietly been surveying things from the corner and before the dish went out, he walked over and took a look at it. I held my breath, the waiter cowered against the wall, Screamy fumed, arms folded across her chest (and in retrospect this entire exchange probably took place in about four seconds), the rest of the cooks paused. The Swede looked at my dish, looked me square in the eye and nodded his head. He didn’t say anything, but he didn’t have to. His silent implication was clear: nice job, keep doing what you're doing.

I gloated internally for the rest of the night and every day after that.

Next Time: Making the best of a bad corn situation.

Picture: Courtesy Sesame Street