Was dead set against mise en place until I hit my 80th cover Friday...

I always thought mise en place was for newbies or control freaks, but after 80 covers on a 4-top flat top I finally caved and prepped everything down to the shallots. Having my butter blocks diced and my herbs picked before service shaved off a full 2 hours of scrambling. How do you seasoned cooks balance prep time with the actual cooking without burning out?

2 comments

2 Comments

jesse8411d agoMost Upvoted

Damn right! I remember this one time I was so anti-mise en place that I'd just grab stuff as I went. Then I tried doing a big brunch service with like 40 orders of eggs benedict and had to stop every two minutes to chop chives or portion hollandaise. Total nightmare. Now I'm the guy who has everything in little deli cups and my station looks like a nerds science project but man does it save your ass when the tickets start stacking up. The trick for me was figuring out what actually needs prepped vs what's okay to grab fresh.

finley93911d ago

Did you ever work with a guy named Marco? I had a friend who cooked with him back in the late 2000s, and Marco was the polar opposite of organized mise en place. He'd show up, pull a few things out of the walk-in, and just start cooking from memory. One night during a sold out tasting menu, he ran out of his prepped beurre blanc mid service. He had to stop everything, whisk up a new batch from scratch right there on the pass while the chef was screaming. He switched to the little deli cup method after that night.