Harvest America CUES BLOG

The very thing that makes a complex kitchen environment work is the same thing that drives non-culinary folks away from professional chefs. Everything has a place, and everything is in its place, is a mantra that becomes an obsession with cooks and chefs. It is the very act that allows cooks to push through the chaos of a restaurant kitchen day with military precision and awareness of looming uncertainty.

To outsiders, mise en place is an obsessive behavior that cooks buy into – hook, line, and sinker. “Cooks seem to willingly drink the Kool-Aid”. Stack and fold your side towels a certain way; first-in, first out with perishables; label and date everything, pan handles pointing in a certain direction, every ingredient on the line has a place and follows a “station map” so that everyone knows and respects the pattern; work within a pivot step, loads of checklists, labels of dry goods on the shelf pointing in the same direction, all pans inverted on the shelf, jar spices in alphabetical order, every item put back in its designated area – always, stack same size dirty plates in the dish pit even before they are washed and line them up in order on the rack before pushing through the machine, sharpen your knives every day and line them up in a certain order, pre-rinse dishes and pots before scrubbing and sanitizing, and the list goes on and on. This is what allows cooks to stay one step ahead of chaos, if anything is out of order than the system starts to crumble.

Of course, those of you who may have military experience will be familiar with this regimen. You were taught how to fold your socks, the right way to make a bed, how to polish your boots so they shine like a mirror, the proper way to wear your uniform, the exactness of a salute, marching in step, breaking down your weapon, cleaning it, and reassembling in the right order – everything has a place, and everything is in its place. This is what helps to keep an army working together and at least aware of the potential chaos around every turn.

It all makes sense – so why is this a problem? It’s not a problem at work, but once it becomes a habit, your way of doing things, you can’t turn it on and off. That same intense, never vary from the model approach towards life in the professional kitchen will inevitably drift into your home life. Chefs are not able to push aside the “need to live the mise en place life” outside of work as well. It becomes uncomfortable to find a plate, cup, side towel, pan, or pantry shelf out of order. We “must” pre-rinse and stack plates a certain way in the dishwasher, turn the can labels in the same direction, store our pots, and pans as if they were part of a kitchen line set-up, and rotate our perishables every time the refrigerator is opened.

Watch a chef at home or visiting a friend’s kitchen, plate a dinner for four or six. One cup each of whipped potatoes shaped as a quenelle, points facing four o’clock and eight o’clock. Chicken breast clean cut, cross grain into five same thickness slices, mounted and fanned on the potato starting at four o’clock. Baby buttered and parslied carrots tucked behind the fanned chicken on the right of the plate. Sauce pooled in a crescent beginning at the base of the chicken at six o’clock extending to eleven o’clock. Citrus relish tucked at the end of the last chicken slice on the left. Top with fresh sprig of Italian parsley. All this occurs as your guests look on with concern for your state of mind as you wipe the rims of the plate and shout – “Hands! Pick up on four-top!”

It’s little wonder that you rarely get invited to dinner at a friend’s house or that your partner is reluctant to go anywhere with you. No one else gets it, resulting in occasional friction, lots of eye rolls, head scratching, and sighs of exasperation. It has moved on from a quirk to an obsession – an obsession that many consider annoying and hard to deal with. It has become a disease that needs treatment. Kitchens can’t live without this attention to detail and your home life can’t seem to live with it. You are at an impasse, and something needs to give. Guess which side wins?

You can see it in a chef’s body language. The attempt to overlook everyone else’s seemingly callous disregard for order is akin to a doctor poking you with bent needles. You twist your neck, blink your eyes hard and deliberate, clench your teeth, ball your hands into fists, look around the room for a pair of tongs that you could click as a distraction, bounce from foot to foot, wipe the sweat from your forehead, and finally decide to step outside for a brisk walk and a few curse words before you lose your cool in front of family and friends. “How can they live like this?”, you shout to no one in particular. “Doesn’t this drive them nuts and keep them up at night?” You ask another question without an answer. Order is one thing that the chef must hold on to. It is a definition of who they are and a sacred way that helps to maintain sanity while at work. Chefs know that chaos is right around the corner so “If I can just keep everyone’s mise in order then we might just make it through another service”, is a mantra that is ever-present in their head.

On those occasional shifts when things fell apart in the kitchen, you spent many sleepless nights afterward trying to find out what went wrong. Inevitably you always think back to kitchen organization, to mise en place as the culprit. “If only those side towels had been folded properly. If only the back up supplies had been labeled properly. If only, if only, if only.  Yes, it was definitely poor mise en place – can’t let that happen again.” Chefs need answers so they can organize solutions and preventative maintenance to avoid another meltdown.

So, as important as this is at work – to a chef it only makes sense that the same must apply at home. “How can I keep the family, my home from slipping into chaos? Ah…mise en place – let’s keep order in the ship. Everything has a place, and everything is in its place.”

Hmmm…is obsession a disease? Well, re-read this article and let me know what you think. This is a portrayal of typical chefs and how their mind works.

From NPR’s – The Salt – on mise en place:

“Some cooks call it their religion. It helps them coordinate vast amounts of labor and material and transforms the lives of its practitioners through focus and self-discipline.” 

From Anthony Bourdain:

“The universe is in order when your station is set up the way you like it: you know where to find everything with your eyes closed, everything you need during the course of the shift is at the ready at arm’s reach, your defenses are deployed.”

PLAN BETTER – TRAIN HARDER

Harvest America Ventures, LLC

Restaurant Consulting

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