Two Paths

If I were to have stayed in culinary school, I would have graduated this week. It wasn't an easy decision leaving the culinary field to pursue a career in graphic design. For years being a chef has been my only driving force, the thing I wanted to be when I grew up. But when I started to learn how harsh and demanding kitchens in the industry were, I had to do some serious evaluation of what my life would be like if I decided to devote my life to cooking. This is what I came up with:

What follows is a long, kinda depressing series of events. So here's a jump break to keep it from pushing all the pretty pictures off the page. Click to continue.

• After graduation, I would get a job working at a buffet. Not a particularly fancy buffet, because I learned from my internships that fine dining means constant stress.

• Start as a server to get a feel for the restaurant. I would spend a few months getting to know the dishes and how they were meant to be prepared before the head chef would allow me to work on the cold line, mixing salads and cutting fruit.

• I would stay on the cold line for about six months. The turn-over at a buffet is a bit lower than at a regular restaurant - less stress, less incentive for cooks to quit unexpectedly. It might take even longer before a spot opened up for me on the hot line, where the real cooking happens. And even then, there'd be no guarantee that one of the other cold line cooks would be moved up and I would have to wait another six months for my opportunity.

• When I did make it to the hot line, my hours would get longer, in addition to a slight bump in pay. The preparation for setting up a hot line is much more involved than a cold line, especially on a buffet. The work is hectic and mistakes happen often. I would probably stay on the hot line for a few years, perfecting the methods written on cards taped to my station years ago to ensure consistency of product.

•  Prep cooks on buffets never quit. They work eleven hour days cutting and stewing and marinating product. Giant batches, enough to last a week or more. This would be my next step up. It would take years, but eventually one of them would die or get fed up or retire. There would be almost no cooking involved with this station, but it's the in-between step from a hot line cook to a sous chef, one of the most involved managers in the active kitchen. If I want to move up, I'll become a prep cook.

• Being a prep cook is  tedious work. Occasionally you'll be asked by the sous chef to assist the new kids on cold station, but aside from that it's chopping sixty pounds of potatoes or dicing red peppers by the gallon. I'd be at this for at least five years, though it wouldn't surprise me if I stayed longer. The next step up is a hard one to make.

• There is only one sous chef. They are in charge of all the production of the kitchen. Hot line, cold line, prep, all have to meet the expectations of the sous chef. This is a life-long career for most chefs, but at a buffet there's always the dim gleam of hope that they'll wise up and take their talents to a more reputable establishment. If I get so lucky as to find a vacant sous chef spot and there isn't a prep cook with seniority over me, I might be approached fro the sous chef position. This is the position I would hopefully keep for as short as I am able, which for my means is at least two years.

•  There are positions above the sous chef, but they are deeply ingrained in the establishment. The head chef falls to the more corporate side, determining sales trends and menu changes. But as soon as I had two years of a sous chef position on my résumé, I would be gone.
   
• Management experience can get you any position you want in almost any kind of kitchen. This would be my stab at fine dining, where I didn't have to deal with as much of the preparation or the wait service. I would run my gambit at a number of restaurants, learning their methods over the course of a decade. 
 
• Finally, after about thirty years of learning everything I could about restaurants, I would open my own. If I was extremely lucky, it would still be up and running by the time I died. But restaurants are not stable. Half of all restaurants fail within three years. Nothing I can possibly imagine would be as tragic as pouring a life's worth of training and experience into something and then having the world tell you that it's simply won't work. Nothing.

I decided six months ago that I didn't want to live that life. In the time between then and now, I've enrolled in a graphic design course and I'm having a lot of fun learning to make a profession out of what I've always considered a hobby. I don't know where the future will lead me, but I like to think that where ever it leads, I'll be happy doing what I love.