#004///Fellas, could you turn it down?

Line Cook for Life #004

The doors open at five and it's twenty-to. You're actually looking solid. Prep is mostly done, just have to wait for the braise to come out in fifteen minutes, then pack it up and process the sauce - ten minute gig at most. Mise en place? Fresh to def, son. You look down at garde mangier and he's not flipping out, chopping romaine at the perfect quick-but-not-hurrying pace. A glance at the pit tells you that's not buried and his absence means he's probably sorting the bottles in the basement - a sign in itself that he must have been bored for a half-second. You're kitchen is set up for bear and feelin' it.
Kabuyah! You're in to win.
Right at that moment the radio plays THAT song...

This exists everywhere, I understand, we're no different. The same thing happens though: Everyone gets a bounce to their step - that is if they are also prepared, otherwise they become more irritated. A chef or manager can use this almost as a barometer as to who is and who is not ready. When a good crew is together they don't need to ask for help, its understood. They don't have to talk. Body language is sufficient. A kitchen works in an almost animalistic way, depending a lot on interpersonal relationships - almost as much as knowledge and skill. As with all tribal cultures, kitchens need a level of trust and interdependance.
Once you add a song, it becomes rhythmic.
It becomes a dance.
Its odd how one moves through a kitchen. Tight quarters involve a lot of hip swinging to avoid one another or corners of countertops, avoiding the cracked tile with a stutter step. Opening a cooler, grabbing product from the bottom shelf and closing the cooler door in one elevator-like spin is a slick move and is practiced by any linecook trying to impress a waitress.
It is a dance... within it's own rights.
Ive found that there is a direct relationship to the size of the kitchen and the prevelance of music. Big kitchens equal less music. Something to add to the divisiveness of the crew and can be easily avoided. The largest kitchen I ever worked in we had thirty-some cooks in the kitchen - eight on garmo alone. This kitchen had an oddball intercom system so the music was piped in during prep at an extremely low volume, just enough to hear it, not enough to distract. Mostly instrumental stuff to the liking of the chef, jazz and samba. That shit was was turned off at twenty to five. There were at least ten different nationalities on line every night. We were not trained to converse. Our services were in a near silence, yet we all still had the same rhythms installed by our chef in our heads. We moved to the same beat all night - gracefully due to the design of the kitchen. For six hours a night we would be perfect soldiers. The second the last table went out the radio came back on. The selection of music went to the closing sous who would crank it the second Chef hung up his coat and went home. For the first time since punching in personalities appear. People called each other their names instead of "chef" or - even worse - your station name (grill, sauce, expo, etc.) The music brought back the humanity to a room full of what had just been tools for the chef: human spatulas and tongs. Breakdown involved laughter, arguments. Life.
Small kitchens allowed more music to be played since there were fewer coworkers to piss off. Here a radio is played all day, everyday. In these kitchens music is essential. It becomes a rallying cry. Anthemic. The thing that unifies the crew instead of divides. I've seen some small kitchens. Once a bar with a "galley kitchen" where the wall was so close to the stoves the oven doors almost could open all the way. I worked in a Hawaiian fushion joint with a massive Samoan chef in a kitchen that was about ten by twelve. Postage stamp. Tight quarters. In another kitchen, when interviewing with the chef he would inquire as to your waist-size, not for uniform pants as he claimed but rather to determine whether you could fit around his butcher block. The basement kitchen where you were or were not hired based on height. In these places a radio becomes the thing that fills the silences, preventing the awkward need for conversation when there are only two to four people in a room together for six hours plus - when the same people are bumping into each other all day a song can relieve tension.

...and when THAT song comes on, chatter in the kitchen goes down, everyone is tying up the loose ends that need tightening, double-checking. You're doing the exact same thing. Bottles of oil are being topped off, boiling pots of salty-like-the-sea water are being lowered to simmers, grill-tops are being brushed-and-oiled-and-wiped, the dishpit is getting dry-mopped. Then the hook of the song comes in and the bartender cutting lemons picks up a little head nod. Someone turns it up a little. Servers carrying glassware out to the front do almost-pirouettes around each other in their efforts, in near perfect time with the song, balancing handfuls of stemware delicately as they turn. Oven doors close on the down beat. The pounding of the chicken cutlets is following the snare. Everyone has a little crooked smile. Someone starts to sing along, now a small chorus. Grill and saute are alternating lines. The dishwasher comes upstairs into this scene and starts laughing and clinking recyclables in time. The new barback, who used to be a drummer - but now does meth - picks up his cue, grabs some soup spoons and starts doing paradiddles on countertops and stacks of plates. The feeling of confidence and camaraderie is experienced by everyone and we all are prepared for anything...
That's when it all comes back to reality.
Someone in the front of the house - regardless of restaurant, place or time - pokes their head through the door.
"Fellas, could you turn it down? We have customers..."
Dammit.
Let's get back to work...

 ---

At Line Cook for Life we strive to understand all angles of linecookery. Everyone has different paths. Send us pictures of your beat-up, flour covered radios. Send us recommendations of good kitchen music and prep playlists at linecookforlife@gmail.com .
A buddy of mine who was a part of a catering group that travelled a bunch claims to have a ten year or so running survey of the most widely accepted album in kitchens. I checked in with him recently and after cooking with cooks in seven countries and thirty-eight states evidence shows that Cyprus Hills' "Black Sunday" is currently at the top, closely followed by Led Zepplin "II." Though he was not taking official notes for these statistics, I inquired what the most hated and most divisive musicians were. Nickleback and Dave Matthews, respectively. He said The Arcade Fire were the most upwardly moving group. add your voice to the vote. Whose the group your crew digs the most? Whose banned from your kitchen? Banned from mine: Radiohead.
Surprise!
Personally I'm the guy who listens to the Deftones when I'm crazy busy, LTJ Bukem when prepping, and Kanye during breakdown. If you haven't heard about Nujabes then google that shit like now. 

As usual, I ask you check us out on facebook. Podcast coming June first if the planets align.

Until then keep bangin'.

James Pawl Kane

Head Chef and Huge Gorillaz Fan