Tactics aka Menu

I heard from some military general that tactics are wonderful but it's logistics that wins wars. I have the same philosophy when it comes to menus. If you can't serve the menu properly you've lost the war. I see many menus while dining out or surfing the net. Some sound incredibly good. It's also not uncommon to see those same restaurants out of business within a year. I've noticed the shi-shi menu craze really geared up in recent years with the celebrity chef craze. It seems more chefs are interested in showing off how great they are rather than concentrating on what this business is really about. Being successful, making money, keeping the employees employed and making a livable wage. If you can do all that AND show off you are ahead of the game.

I have spent a good portion of my career dealing with logistics. If you can't realistically serve that fancy menu what good does it do you? If you can't get that exotic ingredient it won't impress anyone. If the chef is the only one skilled enough to implement the menu then you're going to crash and burn sooner or later.

As a result my "style" is keep it simple, serve a quality product, accent it in a positive manner and don't screw it up. The "don't screw it up" part is all about restraint and logistics. I think you'll find that most places with similar philosophies do pretty well. You may not find corn fungus on the menu but the odds are the customers will appreciate it.

Food

I mentioned in the post I deleted that one of the things that keeps me sane this time of year is food. Preparation of great food. The downside to that is this time of year many of the additional customers that we are serving are "special occasion" customers. Also the crowd around here in general is a less discriminating customer. I don't mean that to sound critical it's just a fact of life. When I want to let my hair down I have to be careful I don't loose money doing it. If the crowd wants the Rolling Stones I shouldn't give them Mozart. I love the Rolling Stones but playing Mozart is my passion, if ya know what I mean.

So this week I went from one end of the spectrum to the other. I flew in some gorgeous seafood from Hawaii and smoked some equally gorgeous (well, not really) beef brisket. Our seafood is always fresh and excellent but the stuff I get from Hawaii is especially beautiful. It's brought to the piers a couple hours before I order it and shipped shortly after that. It's overnighted to me and I get it about 24hours out of the ocean. This week it was Big Eye tuna, Blue Snapper and Kampachi. I did some sushi, sashimi and tar tar with the Big Eye, ceviche with the Kampachi and the snapper wrapped in cedar and grilled. It all was "world class. This was a big hors d'oeuvres week so I was also smoking beef brisket "low and slow" with cherry wood and a dry rub for mini brisket sandwiches. I also cut alot of tenders this time of year and grind up the trimmings for micro burgers. Both the brisket and burgers are served on little buns that I baked fresh just hours before. The fish sold ok but the little sandwiches were pounced upon. As I said, it's a Rolling Stones crowd and I didn't mind doing some "covers".

I'm taking some video around the restaurants this weekend and hope to put together a little video I can post here.

Hopefully I can direct all my attention to #1 today. Two big parties at #2 yesterday so I was there all day. When I got to #1 last night the boys were in the weeds. I walked in the kitchen and the servers were hovering in front of the line like a bunch of vultures waiting not-so-patiently for their food. I'll be there tonight to expedite, back up any one who needs help and to keep the vultures at bay. Their impatience pisses me off. They are spoiled rotten. It's not often the boys get in the weeds. The servers aren't aware of just how good those guys are. The cooks are also very nice guys and let them slide on the snide remarks. Me, I'm not so nice. they'll be getting snapped on tonight and the cooks are going to love every minute of it. It's been a long week, I'm going to make sure we have fun tonight.

Delete

I decided to delete the "Days" post and replace it with a less scrooge like tone.

A hard day. A good day. All things considered it went well. Our days have been busy with Holiday parties, some easier than others. We did an event for a local business. All appetizers, cash bar. We started the day a tad behind. My day cook was dragging and was ten minutes late getting in the kitchen. The weather has slowed things down lately and Fridays are usually slow and steady. We ended up getting our asses kicked. A couple weeks of complacency showed. Day cook's primary responsibility is to set up the line and be prepared to get through the lunch with the prep on hand. Sloppy set-up and short on a number of things. We pushed through a good rush doing a little prep on the way. (I absolutely hate that) I'm proud of the job Day cook did after a slow start. We jumped right into prepping the app party. It was something like 48 dozen pieces of hors d'oeuvres. Very time consuming. We had to have them out by five pm. Mad dash between 4 and 5. Everything came out great. From the smoked brisket on freshly baked mini buns to the tuna tataki.

Best of all get to go home tonight.

New Knife!

The other thing that keeps me sane this time of year is acquiring little rewards for the hard work. I just received a new yanagi, (long Japanese knife for slicing raw fish or cooked meat. Mostly used for sushi)It's a Masamoto 360mm KS series. It's a monster. It came gift wrapped but I couldn't help take a peak and wrap it back up again. I'm going to try and leave it alone until Christmas. I have another yanagi on the way as well. A very special one that is currently being made in Japan. If I ever find my camera I'll post some pics in the slide show.

That Time of Year

I may not be posting very much through the Holidays. I will when I can but we get kinda busy this time of year.

I hope everyone has a great holiday season.

Hey Bud!

Anyone who has visited any of my restaurants may have noticed I don't sell Budweiser. I haven't for many years. I also don't sell any beer brands that the local Bud distributor sells. In my opinion that's the biggest downfall for not dealing with that supplier. They sell Guinness and Sprecher among other worthy beers. Those I'd like to have on my lists.

The original reason for not selling Bud was simply that I didn't like it. I also grew up in the shadow of Miller Brewery and feel an allegiance to that beer. As a young man if I was short on cash my friends and I knew we could always take brewery tours to satisfy our taste for the hops. We also could go over to the brewery and buy "shorts", bottles that were incorrectly filled and sold dirt cheap. Many of my friends dads worked there as well. You simply didn't drink beer that wasn't brewed in Milwaukee. (To this day I rarely do)

When we opened #1 I was convinced by the locals that I HAD to sell Bud. It was a big Bud town. So against my better judgement we opened selling the evil brew. The decision to stop selling it was made easy by the arrogance and ineptitude of the local distributor. Their service and attitude were terrible. It gave me a good excuse to dump it. So for years I didn't sell it, much to the chagrin of the local bumpkins who drank it. Unfortunately, one of my favorite beers, Sprecher, (A Milwaukee micro brew)recently switched to the Bud distributor. I stopped selling Sprecher. To their credit the Sprecher guys got wind of it and starting shipping direct. It must have been a pain in the ass for them because the next thing you know a Bud salesman shows up at my door. (They've always known better not to waste their time) I explained the lousy service and attitude and how I'd really like to sell Sprecher. He promised better service and mentioned I wouldn't have to sell Bud to sell Sprecher. I'm sure he looked at it as a foot in the door. I agreed and began selling Sprecher once again.

I think it was the second time we placed an order that the distributor screwed up. They also didn't fix it and gave me the impression they couldn't care less. Bye bye Sprecher. They will not be given a third chance.

I guess when you are the biggest brewery in the world you don't have to try so hard. Customer service is simply two words in the manual. In my book, it's the first two.

You would think that Bud would want a presance in the best restaurants in a community of a quarter million people? Also the restaurants that host executives from the biggest employers in the area and from all over the world. We may not sell a ton of beer but you'd think it would be embarassing for the Bud people not to be sold in the highest profile restaurants in the area. They couldn't care less.

So Budweiser? Kiss my ass.