Chefs say the pot washer can make or break a restaurant. So I signed up for a shift - lucy and ethel doing dishes in restaurant

My dish hose has its own ideas.
Every time I spray water on a dirty plate with it, it splashes everything it touches --
Then shoot most of the debris back into my face.
At the end of my shift, I had almost every dish in this restaurant: rice, seafood, salsa, black beans, which you can say.
Every time I put the twisted rubber snake between tasks, it relocates, forcing me to apologize to my colleagues because they not only soaked myself, but also myself.
Until recently, the most dishes I washed were at home, after a 10-year dinner.
So why do I register at 250-Seating restaurant?
Because I want to get a hands-on experience of what CNN star Anthony burden calls "every important lesson in my life," New York chef Daniel Brud calls it "the best way to get into the industry ".
A lot of bandwidth is wasted on cooking, pouring wine and pampering our men and women in restaurants.
Some of the lowest people have received little attention.
The chefs say the highest paid workers are the key to the dining room kitchen.
"Without a great dishwasher, you wouldn't have been able to enjoy a successful service in the restaurant," said Emory lagasser of New Orleans --
Chef and writer with 14 restaurants across the country.
"The bad will pull the boat down.
"After carrying out tasks that others don't want to do for many years --
Clean up dirty garbage, clean up garbage, Polish Japanese wine glasses for $66
The nameless hero in the kitchen may eventually get the reward it deserves.
This spring, the world chef Rene redzby-
Copenhagen's famous Noma made headlines in his dishwasher, Ali Sonko.
The Gambia native helped Redzepi open the landmark restaurant in 2003.
On July, the highly respected French laundry staff in Yountville, California voted to award the dishwasher their most prestigious corporate honor, the core Award: Jaimie Portillo, he said he had never missed a day's work in seven years.
The average annual salary of about 500,000 washing machines in the United States is about $20,000 (£15,000)
Only $4,000 more than a decade ago.
However, some restaurants, including the French laundry room, gave the washing machine chef the status of the sous chef and expanded the title covering a wide range of responsibility.
"Instead of calling them washing machines, we call them porters," Keller said . " He began washing dishes in his mother's restaurant, "Back Bay Surf.
"We give them the same respect as everyone else in the restaurant.
"In fact, the only difference between his chef and the embroidered uniform worn by the Porter is the short sleeves of the latter.
When I started my shift at Caracol, an upscale Mexican seafood restaurant in Houston, Keller's words echoed in my mind: "Everyone in the restaurant depends on you," he told me.
"Drinks will not be served without glasses.
If there is no silverware, the table cannot be placed.
Food is not cooked without a pan bowl pans basin. ”Yes, chef.
Hugo Ortega told me before I was seven that the main problem with getting into the "washing machine is not getting hurt by hot pot, broken glass or sharp knife"hour shift.
Caracol is the largest of his five restaurants, including the back street cafe, and the most recent James Beard Prize winner opened in 1987.
As a migrant worker and a Mexican immigrant who can't speak English.
Ortega's image shows a war zone, especially for a volunteer recruitment with some obvious obstacles, including a flowerpot with no plant size and a layout of 3,300. square-foot kitchen.
For me, there are only 77 bookings for this evening's book.
There will be three people, including me, not the usual four.
Caracol welcomed me with a black shirt, Hood, industrial
Plastic apron and plastic container marked with my name.
I'm thomas tonight. ”My minders —
Pot ban Soc, 30, and Joselino Aguilar, 19, from Guatemala-
They are wearing black garbage bags with holes in their black shirts.
For their efforts here, the washing machine earns $10 per hour, inviting them to join the staff family dinner, health insurance and a week's paid holiday after one year of service.
There are translators present (
Help me interview)
It reminds me of how lonely their work is sometimes.
It is only a few steps away from the Oyster Bar in the restaurant, there is a trash can in front of the dishwashing station, the waiter will empty the uneaten food and equipped with L-
Stainless steel counter.
While the waiter put the dishes together, the chef put the dirty equipment together on the other side.
At the beginning of the shift, the counter closest to the kitchen was already filled with utensils to prepare the chef and late lunches and early happy dishes --hour customers.
At Caracol, the pan washers are rinsed, sorted and moved by turns through the conveyor belt
Typewriter, remove them, classify them on steel tables, and send them to the stations of other staff drying silverware and stemware.
I looked at the Soc and Aguilar for a while before asking to remove the first one and then the other.
The most troublesome thing so far is the front end of the business.
A cutting board with orange stains and when I spray it down it makes everyone around me cry all the time.
Self-attention: hot water on habanello oil can produce tear gas.
Also, unlike at home, five
Rule 2 does not apply.
So, when I put a mixing bowl and grabbed it and showed it to one of my mentors, he nodded in the direction of the dishwasher instead of the sorting table.
I pushed a full shelf into the dishwasher, where it was 160-
The degree of water and the solution of detergent and drying agent that appears after 30 seconds.
Well, most of the time.
When I put a large cutting board into the washing machine without a rack, it stops the machine and forces my teammates to open a metal door in the center to remove the obstacle.
A little blind, repeat can be crazy.
Remember the episode I Love Lucy? In this episode, Lucy and Ethel failed to keep up with the chocolate conveyor belt that needs to be packaged.
That's me. it's only plates and plates, not candy.
Get a hint from Soc, He whistle to pass the time, I stop flushing individual plates and put them on the shelf before flushing with water, saving precious time
There are also fewer menus for my own collection of kalakol.
My teammates agreed with a smile. “You’re hired! Aguilar joked.
Tomorrow's chefsShow showed me a chef who sang compliments from the washing machine and most likely took time for him or her to "dive and buy pearls ".
This is how restaurant consultant Paul Sorgule describes the search for dishes under soap bubbles.
"If you want to be a chef, you need to wash the dishes first," said Sorgule, a former deputy chef.
Dean of the New England Culinary Institute.
"If you don't know how far things will go and how the kitchen works --
Who does what?
You have no business.
"As an executive chef at Lake Mirror Resort and Spa at Lake Placid, sourgrad asked interns to wash their dishes for a week before cooking.
He also made sure to wash the dishes himself in 15 to 30 minutes a day to "show everyone's work ".
Similarly, to remind the waiter to respect the porter, Boulud occasionally shows how to arrange dirty items to reduce the work of the cleaner: place in the pit of the dish!
Like Keller and Bolden, some of the hard-working graduates are the most respected brands in the industry.
Including: Michael Schlow in Boston
In his portfolio, there are six chefs in the Washington restaurant;
San Francisco chef Gonzalo Guzman's popular Nopalito inspired the new recipe "Nopalito: Mexican Kitchen ";
He recalled washing dishes at an 11-year-old Portuguese bakery in his hometown of Farr River.
Their entry points show different paths to the chefdom. A 14-year-
Lao Schlow lied about his age of washing dishes in New Jersey.
"It's a hard, hot, sweaty back job, but I love it.
Guzman left a car shop and factory in Mexico to work with his father in San Francisco, where he initially worked for food, but left a deep impression on the boss, he changed from three days a week to five days, and then began to prepare for work.
You can get to the cooking station in a few months.
Washing machine-what pot:turned-
The chefs share a desire to reach out to the people of their past who are ready to put in and willing to learn new things.
Because many workers come from immigrant backgrounds and speak very little English, Schlow plans to provide free language guidance to any of his employees in Washington, which is his first idea to execute in Boston. At the Italian-
Schlow, with the theme of Alta Strada in Washington, promoted two potwashers to China
Level cooking position.
One of them is Edwin vilullah, who is very skilled and he is called Mr. pizza.
Guzman trained three senior chefs in the pit.
"Hire people with dreams," he said . "
Ortega estimates that his 100 former washing machines in Houston have entered a higher position. based company.
Keller made it clear when talking about porters about the current immigration problem in the United States: "Today, they feel it is important that they are needed and respected.
His peers agreed.
Lagasse designed his nearest kitchen, Meril of New Orleans, with washing machines inside, to put them big-than-
A common station close to the kitchen and dining room with a storage area included in the layout.
Meanwhile, at the Boulud Cafe in New York, a posole staff meal made by a porter with pig heads was delicious --
Upon receipt, Mexican cuisine continues to shine during the restaurant's voyage (non-French)menu.
Guzman said he knew he was a better cook because he cleaned the pan bowl pans basin and worked in the kitchen.
"The cooking school will not prepare you for the broken dishwasher," he said . ".
Also, when his staff complained "I know what people are talking about.
Boulud, a young apprentice in Lyon, France, only washes dishes occasionally, but he can always say which chef started like this: "When you learn to wash dishes, the French chef says: "You learned to dirty the pan bowl pans less. "
"Although the dishes are busy and dirty, some food figures show comfort in water, soap and elbow grease.
"I'm a happy dishwasher," Bourdain said . ".
This job "is the first time I am proud to go home after a day of work, and the first time I want to be respected and work for the respect of others.
In a gray zone and a world of ambiguity, the pan washing is absolute: the dishes are dirty.
They are clean.
You either keep up or you don't.
The advantages are obvious.
"The course of the Life a model begins.
I look forward to seeing the white plates, regardless of their size (
Easy to rinse and rack! )
Sigh as soon as you see the snail-
Shape bowl for avocado (
Hard to clean considering the internal Ridge).
I don't mind deep pots or even mixing bowls.
My arm is long.
But for a person who is still fumbling at home with a food processor, it is a pain to thoroughly clean up its interlocking parts in a restaurant that doesn't seem to sleep.
The worst thing to wash?
Pewter Platter for oysters, lined with rock salt, spend time at 600-degree wood-fired oven (
Main front washing machine Staff).
Coarse salt sticks to the hot pot like white on rice;
The explosion from the power hose is rarely enough, so it is only thoroughly scrubbed with salt (
Bleach sometimes)will do.
In stark contrast to the restaurant, the potwashing area is damp and loud as if the generator was sharing our workstation.
The heavy mesh bed rubber pads minimize slipping, but in the early days my tennis shoes were as wet as the briolo mat.
We don't even wear gloves. Too cumbersome.
My hands have never been dry except when I was stacking plates or shipping them.
My colleague's work ethic is heroic.
Pause a bit in action and they are looking for something to do, whether it's returning 40-quart, half-their-
Adjust the mixing bowl to a suitable location or remove the garbage, which includes manipulating the plastic case filled with solids and liquids within the kitchen, through the cooler and storage room and the back of Caracol.
For one person, the bin is too heavy to lift on a large metal bin, and when some content in a slippery garbage bag comes into contact with my uniform, it's hard for me to learn the task.
I was joking when I asked my babysitter if they would run me out of the dishwasher as well, but the truth is, I can't wait to get back to my hotel for a shower.
Close to the end of the shift, I asked my colleague what hurt the most after the shift.
"I'm just tired," Soc and Aguilar responded . ".
Sing, brothers.
I have pain in my feet and back, but my pride is the most hurt.
I didn't notice a hook until I was about to hand over the apron and I could put the animated plate hose on it.
I asked Aguilar: how is this compared to the construction work you do at home?
"It's easy," he said . "
There are a lot of takeout tonight, including Bourdain's advice, who says his time in the sink "fits me well with all the twists and turns of my life and any industry ".
He wrote in an email, "respect the people who work hard with you. . .
Shut up and learn. . .
And be ready to accept that you are probably the stupidest person in the room.
"There is no doubt that the dirtiest job in a restaurant is one of the most important, and Ortega believes that the washing machine needs a title that better reflects many of their contributions.
He likes Terminator.