Restaurant Week: Great for you; not so great for cooks
Beads of sweat drip down my back and chest. My head throbs from my concentration and meticulous precision. My legs ache from the hours of standing while burns cover my wrist and thumb.
It’s restaurant week in the district and cooks everywhere are questioning why their owners ever put them threw this.
Restaurant week in Washington, D.C. is an affair that attracts everyone from business people to college kids to the hottest, trendiest, and most expensive restaurants it has to offer. Over 200 restaurants participate in this food fest for the sole purpose of good public relations. As a cook who has participated in two of these “food weeks”, I can attest that high revenue is not a result of participating in restaurant week. Rather, to attract customers, gain their respect and hopefully have some returning diners.
As for the cooks, the cooks are put through a 7-day headache. Sure only a selection of dishes are offered, but if you have to do it for 6 more days, the preparation of food you have to complete, while still maintaining that you serve the best ingredients, is often burdening. And that’s not to say your restaurant doesn’t also have a set menu for dinner. If so, different and abundant preparation has to be done for that menu as well.
Hell, I’m lucky enough to actually get to another restaurant that isn’t the one I work at for restaurant week. And while I’m there, dining on my first course, I’ll savor my freedom.
Make reservation and take advantage of this week if you live in D.C.
Your stomach will thank you!
It’s restaurant week in the district and cooks everywhere are questioning why their owners ever put them threw this.
Restaurant week in Washington, D.C. is an affair that attracts everyone from business people to college kids to the hottest, trendiest, and most expensive restaurants it has to offer. Over 200 restaurants participate in this food fest for the sole purpose of good public relations. As a cook who has participated in two of these “food weeks”, I can attest that high revenue is not a result of participating in restaurant week. Rather, to attract customers, gain their respect and hopefully have some returning diners.
As for the cooks, the cooks are put through a 7-day headache. Sure only a selection of dishes are offered, but if you have to do it for 6 more days, the preparation of food you have to complete, while still maintaining that you serve the best ingredients, is often burdening. And that’s not to say your restaurant doesn’t also have a set menu for dinner. If so, different and abundant preparation has to be done for that menu as well.
Hell, I’m lucky enough to actually get to another restaurant that isn’t the one I work at for restaurant week. And while I’m there, dining on my first course, I’ll savor my freedom.
Make reservation and take advantage of this week if you live in D.C.
Your stomach will thank you!
Labels: rest. week
posted by Allison at
5:29 PM
2 Comments:
Hey Alli, I have a question (as you are by far the most knowledgeable chef I know).
My roommate and I were making a garlic-butter chicken and pasta dish the other evening, and I gladly took the task of mincing the cloves - or so I thought I'd be mincing.
She insisted that I keep the garlic in pretty large chunks, even when we were simmering them in with the butter and chicken breast. My question is a two-parter: first, is this more common, or was I correct in assuming that smaller bits of garlic would be far less overpowering to the chicken? And second, what is your opinion on this scenario; would you have kept the pieces smaller so as not to overpower the chicken, or kept them large for the "little chunks of flavor explosion" my roommate was going for?
Julia,
Great question! I would suggest your intended mincing was a good idea. Mincing it in with small pieces of chicken adds for more flavor to be spread throughout the dish. Larger pieces of garlic like chopped or whole are usuallu meant for larger meats and serving portion, like say a pork roast or steak.
It's just important to be careful of those "explosions" because garlic could easily overpower the chicken if left whole or in large pieces.
Good luck !
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