High-Class Restaurant/Lounge

Taylor Harbin

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The book I'm planning features a high-class lounge in the better part of town where one of the characters lives (haven't figured out the building dimensions yet, but maybe it's a refurbished hotel; haven't figured out number of seats either). I know nothing about the food/hospitality business, so anyone who has anything is welcome to comment on the following:

- Cooking. How does a chef determine a menu? I'm sure there's a method behind it...but to me it just looks like whatever might sell. One of the characters wants to be a chef and is training with the head cook. So long as they aren't serving dangerous exotic stuff like fugu, do the apprentice have to get a culinary arts degree?

- Mission statement. Do restaurants have something like this that guides who they hire, what kind of food they serve, image, etc?

- Staff. Besides a clean record, are there any special traits that management would look for in the front-line waitstaff? Charm? Charisma? Sociability?

- Entertainment. How are outside entertainers selected to perform and if it's a high-class place, what's a reasonable fee for the performer to charge?

- Budget. I assume this is solely up to management. Are there some things that are prioritized more than others?

- Waterworks. If anyone knows anything about building a pool...PM me. This lounge has a very special room where diners can eat on floating tables, so I need to come up with a realistic idea of how it would work and be maintained.

That's all for now. Thanks!
 

Siri Kirpal

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You see a lot of mission statements for vegan restaurants. It's wouldn't be out of the way for high end. These would appear on the website.

Okay: What you have is a lot of prep cooks. These are the folks who cut the veggies, etc. A lot of line cooks. These are the folks who do the actual cooking. If the restaurant makes pastries, then there will be pastry prep staff. My niece works as a line cook and prep cook in a high end wine bar restaurant. She has no degree.

Menu is determined by the nature of the restaurant. High end Italian and high end vegan will share some items, like pasta with truffles, but lots of menu items will differ. High end typically features very fresh produce, often farm to table, and expensive ingredients, like those truffles. It may or may not be innovative. A high end steak house will usually have a more sedate menu than Asian fusion. A good cook (and you don't actually need a degree for this either) can tell which ingredients will work with which other ingredients.

If this restaurant is large, it may have platers: people who plate the meals and make them look fancy.

How the wait staff is picked will depend on who hires them and what they want. Good looks helps. Some restaurants want sociability, but high end sometimes actually pick snooty one or dignified ones. In all cases, you want someone with a steady hand, so they don't spill the beans...literally. If you've got a restaurant with floating tables, you might want wait staff who can swim. You'll need to think carefully about how the waiters will get the tables with the food. And by the way, wait staff are often people who really would rather be artists/actors/writers. There is a literary agent who made ends meet by hostessing in a restaurant.

Blessings,

Siri Kirpal
 

cornflake

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The book I'm planning features a high-class lounge in the better part of town where one of the characters lives (haven't figured out the building dimensions yet, but maybe it's a refurbished hotel; haven't figured out number of seats either). I know nothing about the food/hospitality business, so anyone who has anything is welcome to comment on the following:

- Cooking. How does a chef determine a menu? I'm sure there's a method behind it...but to me it just looks like whatever might sell. One of the characters wants to be a chef and is training with the head cook. So long as they aren't serving dangerous exotic stuff like fugu, do the apprentice have to get a culinary arts degree?

Hoo boy. Ok, so yes, if someone is a prep cook, line, sous chef, whatever you're looking for here, at a high-end place, they're a culinary school grad, or at least IN culinary school. Prep you can probably get away with in school, maaybe a garde manager. If it's a good restaurant, it's not a culinary arts degree like from a community college (I actually didn't know this was a thing until one of the Teen Moms got one -- trashy tv teaches so much), but from a real school like the CIA or something vaguely of the same type, if not calibre.


Chefs determine menus depending on many factors -- that's the executive chef's job. First, what kind of restaurant is it, does it focus on seafood, French cuisine, Steak, some kind of fusion, some variety of Asian, Indian, New American, New French, Mexican, Contemporary American Mexican, I mean you could go on for days with this. Second, what is the theory, for wont of a better term, of the chef/restaurant? Is it a place aiming for a Michelin star? Is it a place dedicated to Farm to Table cooking? If it's the former, the menu is decided in advance by careful planning and thought. If it's the latter, the menu might change day to day, depending on where the place is and its sourcing. These are not mutually exclusive, btw, before Thomas Keller or Alice Waters comes along and hits me; I'm just speaking in broad generalities!


- Mission statement. Do restaurants have something like this that guides who they hire, what kind of food they serve, image, etc?

See above.

- Staff. Besides a clean record, are there any special traits that management would look for in the front-line waitstaff? Charm? Charisma? Sociability?

Oh, hell yes. In a high-end place, or even mid-range, waitstaff are hugely important. They should go along with the type of place it is, for starters. A like, old-school steakhouse that's been operating for 150 years is likely to have old-school waiters, older men, very experienced with the meat, like, one sommelier, etc. A Michelin-starred new American place is likely to have waitstaff more mixed gender, younger, very competent, clear, cool, collected, knowledgeable, etc. A craft-beer pub is staffing with hipsters...


Restaurants with high check averages and full houses are competitive for waitstaff, and they get really good, experienced people who can raise averages. They have to be able to know the menu, inside and out, even if it changes daily, be able to explain every dish and ingredients, take orders without writing stuff down, manage tables and time... experienced, smart people.


- Entertainment. How are outside entertainers selected to perform and if it's a high-class place, what's a reasonable fee for the performer to charge?

Depends, again, what kind of place. Are you thinking like, lounge singers? They want big names -- I have no idea what they charge, if it's a fee, a part of the door, a combo. Huh, interesting. I just looked up a singer I know used to perform at the Rainbow Room, who is a decently-known name. Her booking agent online suggests it costs $30,000 to have her come sing at your event. I don't have any idea how that'd relate to a gig -- it's for a private booking, so it may not relate at all, but it's all I could find.


- Budget. I assume this is solely up to management. Are there some things that are prioritized more than others?

For what? The chef? The running of the whole place? Remember the little things.

- Waterworks. If anyone knows anything about building a pool...PM me. This lounge has a very special room where diners can eat on floating tables, so I need to come up with a realistic idea of how it would work and be maintained.

Hole + water? :D

That's all for now. Thanks!

The food stuff I'm pretty ok, pool building, I got nuttin.

Also, reading SK's reply made me ponder and edit for clarity -- this is probably also dependent on location. In a city with more restaurants and more of a scene, the competition is much higher. There are certainly tens of thousands of prep cooks and line workers without degrees working in restaurants of all types here, but most of the ones without schooling are immigrants who are not angling to move up off the line to sous or exec chef. I'm not denigrating anyone -- the restaurant industry would collapse in a hot second without first-generation immigrants. They're not, though, even working on the same line, usually looking to move the same way a culinary grad is. They're cooks, not chefs. Your character, as I read it, wants to be a chef. You want to be a chef, you have to go to school.
 
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Siri Kirpal

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Yes. Line staff cooks are often immigrants or people (like my niece) who've opted out of college and like to cook. Chefs, the guys who set the menus, nearly always have degrees. The exception would be things like high end Indian, and even those might have degrees in big cities.

Blessings,

Siri Kirpal
 

Ketzel

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I recommend you read Phoebe Damrosch's memoir Service Included, about her time waiting tables at Per Se, Thomas Keller's New York City restaurant. Can't get much higher-end than that, and the book itself is a pleasure to read.
 

frimble3

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As to the 'dining pool', if you're planning on setting this in a specific city, call their Health Department for an opinion. I'm thinking that a big pool of warm water, what with the inevitable spills and dropping of food on the way to the mouth, not to mentions slobs brushing crumbs off the table and into the water, it's a health risk waiting to happen. And, you can hardly screen your diners for contagious skin diseases. Or merely unsightly ones.

Not to mention, if all the tables are floating, what happens when the really big guy attempts to leave the pool, and the resulting waves slosh the tables back and forth?

Unless you don't mean that the diners are in the pool, but rather sitting, dry, around the edge outside the pool, while the tables are floating. In that case it sounds like a bigger version of one of those fancy sushi places with a moat of moving water and a chef behind that - food goes into boat, boat drifts past diner, diner picks what they want. If you don't want the water to float the tables away, maybe have a small bubbler in the middle to give a little motion to the water, without pulling on the table-anchors. In any case, the Health Department is going to want to know all about your plans to keep that water clean. Expect frequent inspections.
 
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MDSchafer

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I worked in high end restaurants and one club in Atlanta before becoming a nurse....

- Cooking. How does a chef determine a menu? I'm sure there's a method behind it...but to me it just looks like whatever might sell. One of the characters wants to be a chef and is training with the head cook. So long as they aren't serving dangerous exotic stuff like fugu, do the apprentice have to get a culinary arts degree?

Cost and quality are the main driver of the what makes it on the menu. You want your food costs to be between 22-30 percent of the menu price, and then from there it varies based on the restaurant's concept and the chef's comfort zone. I worked at a french restaurant for years, there were about eight entrees and they only changed one or two items a year with a special entree and appetizer every day. Typically there were eight or so standard specials that rotated around, but could change when the chef wanted to be creative. Menus change less than you'd think, in partbecause it's rare to find someone who comes to the same restaurant more than four times a year, and in part because it helps cut down on food costs.

Does your main character need a CA degree? Depends on where they're working. When you get to established fine dining it's hard to succeed if you're not a classically trained chef. In the more aggressive, yet still upscale restaurants, they care less about training and more about technique and ability. If your character has the skills, but not the paper, they'll probably not groomed to be a head chef of high end restaurant. That said, there are a lot of less traditional restaurants that don't care, and if your character has the skills and puts in the time it's possible.

- Mission statement. Do restaurants have something like this that guides who they hire, what kind of food they serve, image, etc?

Good restaurants absolutely have a mission statement. You can't be all things to all people. In my experience they've varied from Classical French, to Fun, Flirt, Food.


- Staff. Besides a clean record, are there any special traits that management would look for in the front-line waitstaff? Charm? Charisma? Sociability?

You don't have to have a clean criminal record to work in a restaurant. Typically stealing is frowned on more than things like murder, but if someone has the knowledge, attitude and is dedicated to the job, and they're far enough removed from the crime it's not that big of a deal. One of the best managers I ever worked with was a convicted murder.... long story, it was a crime of passion, but yeah, he killed a guy with his bare hands and served over a decade in super max.

Bad restaurants will hire based on physical attractiveness, and will be openly honest about in their ads. Good restaurants hire on attitude and knowledge. Once you get high end there is a ton of etiquette you need to know along with food and wine, spirits, and beer knowledge. You can teach those things, but high end restaurants want you ready to go. I once had an interview where it was 30 minutes of talking wine and beer pairings. One manager had me set up a table to see how fast and correct I was.

Honestly though, it's easier to get hired if you're an attractive woman in your 20s or early 30s, just is.

- Entertainment. How are outside entertainers selected to perform and if it's a high-class place, what's a reasonable fee for the performer to charge?

Depends on the act, but typically there is a group of people the staff knows and those people get tipped for gigs. The pricing really varies on the act. For a string quartet the entire group might split $1,000, a pianist might get $100 and whatever tips they leave. Sometimes the servings staff has to tip out to the music act, but that's kind of a dick thing to do.

- Budget. I assume this is solely up to management. Are there some things that are prioritized more than others?

Varies widely.
 

waylander

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In UK high end restaurants it seems all about who you trained with for chefs rather than paper qualifications. If you have a good reference from Raymond Blanc or Michel Roux then you'll get just about any position you apply for.
 

Tsu Dho Nimh

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Staff. Besides a clean record, are there any special traits that management would look for in the front-line waitstaff? Charm? Charisma? Sociability?

Efficiency, not sociability. Calm, fast but appear unhurried, unobtrusive, good at reading the cues that means it's time to clear for the next course, never waste a trip across the room, good at remembering regular clients and their preferences even after an absence of months or more.

The most awesome restaurant I was ever in (the 6-star kind with no prices on the menus!) had those. I'd swear they had telepathy.

And another - a business class hotel cafe - where I had had the same breakfast and waiter for two weeks ... I showed up over a year later and before the menu showed up he put coffee the way I like it in front of me and told me that strawberries were alas out of season and perhaps mangos would be acceptable. That's a WAITER!
 

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The most awesome restaurant I was ever in (the 6-star kind with no prices on the menus!) had those. I'd swear they had telepathy.

And another - a business class hotel cafe - where I had had the same breakfast and waiter for two weeks ... I showed up over a year later and before the menu showed up he put coffee the way I like it in front of me and told me that strawberries were alas out of season and perhaps mangos would be acceptable. That's a WAITER!
Now that's dining!


Yeah, OP, you might want to clarify on the water thing. Because my initial reaction is that it's got to be a major code violation in so many ways (health and egress).
 

Taylor Harbin

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Thanks for the fabulous responses, guys! That's book sounds like the thing I need.
 

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For the host/hostess, definintely charm/charisma/sociability.

I have relatives that owned a restaurant/serviced the restaurant industry as well, and also have friends that work in high-end restaurants. One thing to remember: when the restaurant is new, the management often over-hires staff and has to cut back, even in a high-class restaurant. Think about how they do payroll. Sometimes they will do it in house, but sometimes they will contract out--especially if they're just opening.

The book I'm planning features a high-class lounge in the better part of town where one of the characters lives (haven't figured out the building dimensions yet, but maybe it's a refurbished hotel; haven't figured out number of seats either). I know nothing about the food/hospitality business, so anyone who has anything is welcome to comment on the following:

- Cooking. How does a chef determine a menu? I'm sure there's a method behind it...but to me it just looks like whatever might sell. One of the characters wants to be a chef and is training with the head cook. So long as they aren't serving dangerous exotic stuff like fugu, do the apprentice have to get a culinary arts degree?

- Mission statement. Do restaurants have something like this that guides who they hire, what kind of food they serve, image, etc?

- Staff. Besides a clean record, are there any special traits that management would look for in the front-line waitstaff? Charm? Charisma? Sociability?

- Entertainment. How are outside entertainers selected to perform and if it's a high-class place, what's a reasonable fee for the performer to charge?

- Budget. I assume this is solely up to management. Are there some things that are prioritized more than others?

- Waterworks. If anyone knows anything about building a pool...PM me. This lounge has a very special room where diners can eat on floating tables, so I need to come up with a realistic idea of how it would work and be maintained.

That's all for now. Thanks!
 

WeaselFire

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How does a chef determine a menu?

There are as many options here as there are chefs. Some use family recipes, others choose whatever is fresh right now and build menus around those items. If the business is successful, they base menu price with 20-30% being food costs, if that is too high for the clientele, they change menu items.

do(sic) the apprentice have to get a culinary arts degree?

No. Never have to for any cooking job. Just gets you in the door at a higher level. Like any degree.

Do restaurants have something like this that guides who they hire, what kind of food they serve, image, etc?

Some do, some don't.

Besides a clean record, are there any special traits that management would look for in the front-line waitstaff? Charm? Charisma? Sociability?

Clean record? If every staff member needs a clean record, your restaurant is out of business, you won't find enough staff. :)

Other features are whatever management wants to project as the look and feel of the establishment.

How are outside entertainers selected to perform and if it's a high-class place, what's a reasonable fee for the performer to charge?

Often through booking services or the entertainment manager will do this. Reasonable fees are determined by the establishment, here's what we pay, take it or leave it. Union scale will be adhered to as a minimum, and for most restaurant entertainment that's the pay.

I assume this is solely up to management. Are there some things that are prioritized more than others?

Budgets vary as much as managers and restaurants.

If anyone knows anything about building a pool...PM me.

Why? Google will tell you all you need.

If this restaurant and the operations will figure prominently in your novel, you need to do a lot more research. These are the same questions that get asked by thousands on new owners whose restaurants will disappear by Christmas.

Go talk to restaurant owners, read magazines and books and give yourself a basis to go by.


Jeff
 

GeorgeK

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Mostly what I've noticed in high end places is that the food doesn't necessarily taste better than a $30 per entree place, but there's more attention to the appearance, like having platers as was mentioned above, a more extensive wine list but not necessarily a more extensive menu. The menu mostly seems to be driven by availability and season. The waitstaff have tried everything on the menu and know the ingredients so there's none of this, "I'll go check." Also the tables are further apart so you don't have to listen to the next table's conversation.
 

ap123

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No, not all kitchen staff in high end restaurants are culinary grads or attendees. However, whether they are or not, they will be short lived if they do not work like animals for many, many hours a day and accept lots of abuse.

Menus are often determined seasonally, and depends on the cuisine of the restaurant. They are not using food supply places like Chefs Warehouse, etc, they are getting ingredients from small farms from the region, and preparing everything from scratch, often including their own flours, yeasts, etc.

Dishes are considered an art, in how they are presented as much as the cooking process. Dishes often reflect the skills of many different brigade members.

Generally they're looking for refined people for front of house staff, age of staff depends on the customer base they're shooting for, attractive, well spoken, calm, experienced and eager. They have to be able to sell the food.

If it's a catering venue, they might have entertainment, often avant-garde. High end restaurants do not generally have entertainment, the food is the art/experience, and the service is often energetic and engaging enough to stimulate customers. This is why high end restaurants offer unique tasting menus that are often tailored to each table.

As much $ as possible goes into the FOOD. Most line cooks in high end restaurants still only make about minimum wage, when your milk comes from a cow you can visit (in a locally sourced field), that's where your $ is going.

Yes, high end restaurants have a specific vision long before doors are opened. This vision goes into the business plan and is often modeled from the executive chef (who does very little if any cooking) and is used to interest/attract financial backers.

For high end restaurants the Brigade (hierarchy) is structured thusly;

Executive Chef
Chef (can create some dishes that are approved by the executive chef and sets the standards for the brigade)
Executive Sous-Chef(s) (maintain strict order over Sous-Chefs, they often handle ordering and inventory management, they often expedite a service if there is no expediter)
Sous Chef(s) (organize the line cooks and run service)
Tournade(s) (line cooks who are capable of cooking for the entire line)
Chef-de-Partie (these are the line cooks who are organized by another scheme of protein cooks, sauce makers, pasta cooks, vegetable cooks, starch cooks, soup cooks, bakers, salad makers, the grade-mangers as well as "externs" often unpaid culinary school students who are looking for a taste of the line, &c.)
Porters (clean the kitchen and restaurant)
Dishwashers

Missing from this list is the extremely important expeditor whose job is a balance between back and front of house. This person runs the service (if a chef is not). To run the service is to call out tickets and manage how fast customers are receiving their food. While a member of front of house, an expeditor is often "rough" enough to handle to demands of being near high heat, angry managers, furious chefs and cramped spaced. They are often as important as an executive sous chef during service, but otherwise, take on the role of runner, silver polisher when it is slow.

"High end" restaurant no longer automatically means formal, customers may be young and casually dressed, so the "front" of many of the michelin starred restaurants have changed, but the kitchen brigade hasn't changed much over the years.

Go to a fine dining restaurant, it's an experience you'll want to have before writing one. If you have Netflix, Chef's Table is an excellent show to give you an idea about some of the top executive chefs worldwide today. For another perspective, Gordon Ramsey's old show Boiling Point also has a lot of interesting info for you to see/use as a resource.
 

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I can't comment on the real-world questions, but I have an idea about your floating tables. What about open rafts just big enough to fit a table and chairs, fitted with impellers and RFID? A computer could regulate the activity of the impellers ensure that each raft stays "free floating"--that they don't bump into each other or the walls--while people are eating. When it is time to serve a table or if a diner wants to leave the table, the push of a button could be used to move the table to a specific service or embarkation spot at the edge of the water.