Harvest America CUES BLOG

Is our profession becoming a victim of circumstances? There is a deeper price to pay when looming issues like the labor shortage, rising costs of operation, an eroding passion for careers in the kitchen, and diminishing profits haunt our everyday operations. Of course, all these issues make it more difficult for restaurants to survive, but even deeper than that it pushes the restaurant experience into the category of commodity. In the commodities world, the driving force is efficiency and cost savings (not that these initiatives are bad) oftentimes at the expense of what it means to cook, serve, and create memorable experiences.

Unfortunately, your customers are oblivious to the difficulty in operating a restaurant, especially at a time when challenges are abundant. So, their expectations remain high, and their patience is low. One thing that is core to their belief is the expected relationship that restaurants have with the ingredients they use and the processes of cooking that they engage in.

As was the case for generations, customers expect that ingredients come from the farmer, fisherman, rancher, and producer to you. They believe that you inspect these fresh ingredients, care for them, respect them, and apply your fine-tuned skills in their preparation and finishing. They would never expect that you might purchase pre-cut vegetables, pre-portioned meats, frozen fish, pre-cracked and whipped eggs, frozen shredded potatoes, frozen soups and sauces, and certainly not pre-baked breads and frozen desserts. They agree to pay for the restaurant experience assuming that talented people are handling those fresh ingredients from scratch, as they had been for generations.

I know, I know, you can’t find the help and those who do sign on are not professionally trained cooks, and you must pay them more than you can afford. I know that ingredient costs never go down, they always rise; that your rent keeps going up, utilities are out of sight, and you pay a fortune just for the privilege of accepting credit cards. Being in the restaurant business is nuts and expecting to earn a profit seems impossible. But ask yourself this: how do you feel about the product you serve and the service that you provide? Are you respecting the ingredients you work with and the farmers, fishermen, ranchers, and other producers who brought their ingredients to market? Does it still matter?

As the psychologist, Abraham Maslow determined – SURVIVAL is the first foundational motivator for people and restaurants are in survival mode right now. Until you can push aside the fear that you won’t make it through another day – noting else matters. In the long-run, survival mentality will make you question what you are doing and why you are doing it.

Cooking is a process, to be a cook is something totally different. Cooking, as we are now witnessing while shaking our heads, can be accomplished by a well programmed robot (yes, this is very real). But being a cook involves understanding of technique, embracing cultural heritage, building skills, developing an appreciation for ingredients, having pride in your work, expressing passion for the craft, and commitment to doing things right. These are not part of the commodity environment.

During this time of significant challenge to what we do, how we do it, and how we want to be perceived, we are faced with losing everything that is important, noble, honest, and inspiring about the craft.

I want to peel my garlic (the flavor profile is so much better than pre-peeled versions), wash the still clinging dirt off the roots of my carrots, trim and portion my steaks from sub-primal, fillet fish and use the bones from some for a fumet, brown veal bones to make a rich stock that simmers for hours in the kitchen and engulfs the operation in its enticing smell, watch a pastry chef pull genoise cakes out of the oven for tonight’s dessert, smell the robust, nutty aroma of sour dough breads being peeled from an oven’s hearth, and wipe the tears from my eyes as I dice another 25 pounds of yellow onions. This is what cooking is about, this is what professional cooks long to do. Are we losing much of this? Is the commodity culture creeping into our kitchens?

I don’t have the answers to many of the challenges facing restaurants today, but I would ask that we take a breath before jumping into this commodity culture and think about what might be lost. Anthony Bourdain once proclaimed that cooking for another person is one of the most expressive, personal things that we can do. It reveals so much about the person we are, our history, and how much we care for the experience of the receiver. I doubt very much that he felt that this could be so by opening a bag of pre-processed vegetables or sliding a frozen dessert onto a plate.

Food for thought.

PLAN BETTER – TRAIN HARDER

Harvest America Ventures, LLC

Restaurant Consulting

www.harvestamericacues.com  BLOG

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