SC - Re: SC Kitchen Crew management

[Anne-Marie Rousseau]

hiya all from Anne-Marie
last night was our annual Baronial Banquet. For the first time I got to be
on the Hall Steward side (taking lessons from our 20+ veteran hall steward).
wow! what a rush!!!

what we have found works in the Madrone Culinary Guild:

1. preplan what dishes and pots and pans and stuff you'll need throughout
the cooking and serving. If you KNOW that you'll be needing that pot for
the paste en pot AND for the colliflowers in Egg sauce, make sure to tell
the people using them that they'll need to be used again. Mark it on the
recipe sheet.

2. Each recipe has its own sheet that is taped to the wall. A person comes
in and if they decide to do a recipe, they take it to their area where
they'll be. On that sheet is the expanded recipe with amounts,
instructions, what to use to cook in, what to cook on (stove? which one?),
and who the "expert" is for the final taste ok, questions, etc. 

3. We also have a kitchen schedule on the wall. I do mine in an BIG excel
spreadsheet. Map out what dishes go into the oven or onto burners when.
Mark out time to clean the kitchen (I give us an hour before we even start
cooking to disinfect counters, rinse pots that have been in storage, etc).
Each dish is its own line item. Be sure you've included time to peel all
those carrots, slice lemons, etc. Be sure you've included PLENTY Of time to
bring water to boil (figure at least an hour for a big pot, more if you're
only got little wimpy coleman stoves. And dont forget that when you put
that 20 lbs of colliflower in, you'll need MORE time to bring BACK to a
boil...) Put on the schedule the job of washing that large skillet that
you'll need again, and the job of washing the serving trays as they come
back if you need to reuse them (its a VERY happy thing if you dont need to
do this last...the push of getting those last minute dishes out will take
all the hands you can use!)

as people come in the kitchen, tell them to wash their hands and look at
the kitchen schedule. If they're enthusiastic but not pariticularily
skilled, they can see that there's parsley to chop, or greens to wash, etc,
and take those on easily. If they know how to make a good emulsion sauce,
you can put them on those tricky egg sauces. Have them Cross the task off
the list (with the pencil you have taped to the wall with the schedule)
when its done, and put their initials by the dish they've taken on, so
folks know who to ask about it.

4. Make sure you have enough bodies for dishing up. The culinary guild here
prides itself on excellent period food, served HOT. Time things carefully,
and at the push to get the dishes out, make sure you have enough bodies.
Lay out the 18 plates on one table, and dish up. Have your garnish already
prepped so you can just toss on the calendula petals, or parsley, or lemon
zest or whatever onto each plate. when the plates are ALL done, have your
servers take them away!

5. This is important, and the import was stressed last night becuase we
didnt get to do this (and it made us lose our minds!) Know EXACTLY how many
tables yuou got, and how many people per table BEFORE the banuqet starts.
That is going to tell you how many serving dishes you'll need, and how much
food goes on each serving dish. Figure out what is going to be served on
what, and what spoons are going with which bowls BEFORE you need to dish
up.We did it at noon, for example, for a 7pm serve time. Make stacks,
counting out carefully. Make a list and tape it to the wall at the dishup
station so the hall steward can tell at a glance which dish goes into what
serving containers, and which spoons/etc goes with which (ie which is goopy
and needs bowls and ladles, what can go in basket6s, what can go on plates.
Think about colors too....dont put that brown stew in a brown bowl if you
can avoid it).

6. MOst importantly, the head cook CANNOT be the hall steward. She'll be
too busy fixing disasters, putting the final touch on the food, and tasting
everything for final quality control that she wont be able to handle server
questions and the dishing up, much less garnish. Ideally, you have one
person as hall steward, and a crew of about three or four (with at least
two people who know what's going on) for dishing up etc, and if you can
have a couple for Team Garnish, that's wonderful. 

7. Try to line up dishwashers ahead of tiem. Get some for during the day
(we find that a crew of two or so suffices) as well as after the banquet
(that's when you need lots more!). Make sure they know that they'll be
doing dishes, and that you appreicate them very very very much! its a
grubby job, but some people really get into it. We had a Countess
Pelican/Laurel, a double peer from about 1500 miles away, the sargentry and
handful of enthusastic recruits pitch in at the last and it made a world of
difference to a bunch of very tired cooks. Enlist your queen or baroness to
recruit for you...they often enjoy an excuse to get their people to show
off how helpful they can be :).

hope this helps!
- --ANne-Marie, who's been head cook many many times, but is hoping to learn
how to be a hall steward now :)