The Bear brought me back to working in restaurants.
I’ve worked in diners to fine dining, and the pressure and conflict is real, constant, and actually much worse in real life.
Most places in NYC only want people with NYC experience. The shifts here are long and busy, and when it gets hectic, it can stay that way seemingly forever.
So while I like The Bear and understand that it’s just a TV show, and even a decent one, there are some problems.
Firstly, where the hell are the servers?
They are alluded to when other staff members visit other restaurants, and while artistically, it might have been too much to add a typically angry, frustrated, front of house, it still doesn’t make any sense.
Restaurants need waiters and bartenders, and while the table numbers were briefly mentioned, no restaurant I’ve worked in has table numbers that straightforward.
There are different numbers for booths vs. tables, depending on where you work each table also has a seating number, and there’s always at least one table with a number that makes no sense. Maybe it became the owner’s table, or it’s so old it kept its number despite being moved to a place where it no longer makes numerical sense.
Still, my main problem is with the lack of servers. Aside from filling water glasses, you have to move, you have to be fast, you have to know the menu, and you have to be a diplomat.
Also, at least in NY, the majority if not all of the back of house (the chefs) are Hispanic, and they’re too stressed out or out of touch to deal with the customers.
Customers can be demeaning pricks. I hated the customers who insisted on knowing my name. They wanted their own personal servant, despite the fact I had anywhere from six to twelve other tables, or was working at a place where we all split our tips and were at least partially responsible for every table.
There was also a lot more violence and drug use in every restaurant I’ve worked in, and the people in the back are there for a reason. They don’t understand that some customers are demented assholes. They forget what they ordered, and a study was done in NY that showed more food was returned after smartphones became common because people took so much time taking pictures of their food it ended up getting cold and had to go back into the kitchen.
The chefs hated this and took their rage out on the waiters, who in turn told the chefs to just shut the fuck up and do it.
Most restaurants also have a basement where we keep the kegs, booze, and other ingredients, and it’s always a waiter who’s sent down to lug that crap up. Cases of wine, enormous buckets filled with sauce, and emergency cutlery and plates, were always brought up by a waiter.
These jobs were below the chefs and if you were unfortunate enough to work with runners you had to tip out, they always argued that they were too busy, even though most waiters ran their food and bussed the tables to turn them over more quickly. If you don’t turn tables fast enough, you make less money, and you have to tip the runners and busboys out.
As a server, you also have to learn a new batch of specials nearly every shift and know the ingredients in everything. For every 100 people who claim to have a gluten allergy, one actually does, so you have to know, and these special orders piss off the chefs even more.
Servers are constantly working. We have to know how to use drink trays and trays in general, unless you work in a place so crowded there’s no room. In that case, you have to learn how to carry plates, and they’re hot. It’s a matter of balance and learning how to use the plates to grip each other so you can carry at least four main courses plus their sides in one trip.
For coffee and dessert, it gets tricky. I could carry 10 cups of coffee at the same time without a tray, but it looked like shit. They had to be piled, and I can’t blame customers for not wanting a coffee that has another stacked right on top of it.
They were typically impressed and had no problem with stacked desserts. The way you balance the plates, which is by balancing them by the ledges of the plates and stacking them, looks more hygienic and becomes easier the more you can carry. Desserts are typically light, and easier to balance and more stable if you have more weight.
You’re carrying this shit through a frantic restaurant with customers and their children crowding the bar, backing up unexpectedly, and generally causing chaos. You tell the customers “right behind you” just like you do with the staff, but they don’t listen.
In some ways, the trays are even worse, especially for martinis. When younger waiters have asked me and other more experienced waiters how to use a drink tray without dumping it, we always gave the same advice.
The trick is to not think about it. You take the drinks and go, and if you think about how impossible this is, you will dump the tray.
In some of the more upscale restaurants, you bring the ingredients separately in cups and shakers and make the drink on the tray at the table before serving it.
Among several other reasons, this is why I don’t give a waiter shit if they mess up my order or complain to errant delivery people. I’m grateful, especially to the delivery people, for bringing me food when it’s 100 degrees outside. I’m not going to make them go back if they forgot some hot sauce or brought me a regular pizza instead of a margarita.
I was a waiter and I’m accurate when I order, but there are language differences, phones aren’t always clear, and I’m not going to make some poor bastard go back and have to redeliver. I’d be putting their job in jeopardy, I’m not a fussy eater, I have hot sauce at home, and every time, whatever they’ve brought me is tasty and close enough.
The only exception is when I see they have multiple orders and fucking up mine would prompt complaints from others. I don’t order for delivery frequently, and this almost never happens. They almost never make mistakes, and if mine is the last, I’ll just take it.
I also know I’m not perfect and the customer is usually wrong. Again, they forget what they ordered, or forgot to make a request, and I’m the fucker writing everything down.
Regardless, I like The Bear. I can relate to a never ending machine cranking out orders.
My main problem is that they don’t show the poor bastards entering those orders.
I'm two episodes in, and like the show so far. Regarding the lack of wait staff, I was under the impression it was a counter service restaurant. Maybe in later episodes you see more of the restaurant.
Good stuff 👍