Long hours, hot kitchens, and tight deadlines. The life of a chef is anything but easy. The good news is that there are some things that can help lighten the load of the overworked and underpaid chef. Keep reading to find out what they are.
Knives
Are you even a real chef if you don’t have a proper set of knives? Probably not, because sharp, high-quality knives will make all the difference to your work, and make sure you stay as safe as possible too. After all, blunt knives require more pressure and so the risk of more severe injury is higher.
With that in mind, be sure to shop around and find the best knives for the tasks you do regularly. You won’t regret it.
Colour coordinated cutting boards.
While it may seem like a stylish option to have a different coloured board for each type of food you are working with, the benefits go far beyond this.
Colour coordinated cutting boards are all about safety and reducing the risk of cross-contamination. What this means is that you should have a red board for raw meat, a blue board for raw fish, a brown board for cooked meat, a green board for fruit and vegetable, a white board for dairy and bread, and a yellow board for poultry.
Of course, with a different colour board for each type of food, bacteria, and other contaminants present in things like raw meat will not be carried over to other food. Something that means your dishes will be safe for your customers to eat, and you will continue to be able to practice your art.
Proper measuring tools
Cooking is said to be a mixture of art and science. However, the science side of things is most pronounced when it comes to using exact amounts of ingredients. That means estimating is out, and therefore, a good digital scale, measuring spoon, and measuring cup set are all essential kits.
A reliable watch
A chef who is late for their shift or has a poor grasp of time is very unlikely to thrive in this competitive environment. After all, a chef with poor or lax timekeeping skills will get behind on prep, burn things, and fail to produce timely turnarounds on orders, resulting in unhappy customers and restaurant managers!
With that in mind, investing in a robust and reliable timepiece is essential, as is keeping it well maintained. Fortunately, finding local shops that fix watches isn’t tricky at all. Something that means even if your timepiece does fail, you can have it back up and running for your next shift.
Plenty of cookbooks
I’m not talking about recipe books to use at work here. Instead, to excel as a chef, you need to stay up to date with the latest trends and absorb culinary inspiration all the time.
With that in mind, a good selection of cookbooks, magazines, and blogs saved into your computer’s favourite are essential if you want to stay ahead at the top of your culinary game; that is?
