Disappointment

We worked hard all week. Our dishes are more complex and challenging, but we were coming together as a class. Our chefs noticed this and applauded our efforts. It only took one student doing one thing on Friday to put a large dent in 3 weeks of very hard work. Our chefs are approachable, encouraging and demanding. They know what the world we are entering is all about. There are only two things that really set them off. In this modern world, you can probably guess one of them. Cell phones. We have had students dismissed for the day for using cell phones during class time. Amen I say. The other is leaving work for others to complete. "Clean as you go, don't drop off dishes to be cleaned by someone else", is the mantra we hear every single day. Friday it happened big time. A burnt pot of Carnitas left for someone else to clean. I mean it was scorched. Chef asked who it belonged to, nobody spoke up. I could see the disappointment and the anger rising. This was not going to be pretty. After what seemed an eternity, still nobody spoke up. After chastising the entire class, Chef threw down the pot into the sink and as misfortune would have it, sprayed out burnt pork and grease on three students. Not what chef had intended, but it happened none the less. Anger turned to disbelief on chefs face. From scolding us to apologizing in a nano second. I felt so bad for chef, but there was nothing to be done. He left, told the dean of the school what he had done and left for the day.

We all received an email yesterday apologizing to each of us again for his actions. My email response was that it was us who need to apologize to both chefs. Actions sometimes intended to inspire or create learnings go awry. This was the case Friday. If I find the ass who didn't speak up, I will rat him out to every student and he or she will wish he or she had fessed up.

I also told him, next time, make sure the pot is empty before throwing it into the sink.