Had a chat with a line cook about mise en place and it wrecked my whole system

I've been a chef for 12 years and always thought my prep setup was fine. Then last Tuesday this young line cook from Peru named Diego asked why I don't group my ingredients by cook time instead of by station. He showed me his station layout with 3 small containers per dish and it cut his ticket times by almost 40%. Now I'm rethinking how I teach new cooks to set up their stations. Has anyone else tried rearranging their mise en place and seen big differences in speed?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_charlie18d ago

Start by admitting that Diego just humbled a 12 year veteran in under five minutes. I've been doing this long enough to know when someone's got a better system and your old way with the big bins of onions is DEAD to me now. Sounds like that kid's gonna be running his own kitchen before you retire.

dianas5017d ago

12 years of experience and a 5 minute onion demo means nothing. You ever watch a guy work a 50 pound sack of onions with a mandoline? That kid's method falls apart when you're prepping for a Saturday night service at 4:30 and the whole station is backed up. I've seen these young guns come in with their fancy knife work and their small batch techniques. They can't handle the volume. Diego might have a pretty little system for a demo but put him on a line with a 200 pound order of French onion soup and see how fast that "better system" turns into a mess of burned hands and wasted product. The old bins work because they move product fast when the tickets are flying.