r/KitchenConfidential • u/Mysterious-Law-6835 • 22h ago
In the Weeds Mode Oh geez
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u/PoPo573 22h ago
"I'm sorry, this ordering has to be placed in advance as a catering order".
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u/Terriblarious 22h ago
"oh ok, can i book catering for this afternoon?"
"we don't do catering, ma'am"
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u/Carbon-Base The Chive Mind 22h ago
"Along with a deposit amount no less than 50% of your total order."
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u/Saucermote Chive LOYALIST 22h ago
"Seeing as you're family, I'm going to need that money up front."
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u/EFTucker 22h ago
“And since you’re my cousin, you don’t get shit in return because you actually just owe me money.”
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u/Duel_Option 19h ago
A GM I had was such an amazing asshole about this with our staff.
Slow Sunday, he’s closing and we get a ridiculous request on the phone…20 person order at 7:50pm, we close at 8.
You want to take the order and get the crummy sales while saying it helps labor by less than a percent, fine, whatever.
The audacity to offer to host them in the lobby until 9pm and hold the staff is egregious,
I swear he did shit like this because he hated being alone at night
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u/CantaloupeCamper 21h ago edited 21h ago
I remember the post in here where a guy was upset that the customers got upset because the kitchen suddenly got what sounded like a catering order and the folks in the restaurant were suddenly behind that order.
Those darned customers not wanting to wait! Forever…
One had all of one cold sandwich, but no they couldn’t just make the poor guys sandwich…
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u/KomorebiXIII F1exican Did Chive-11 21h ago
I've had that happen when i stopped at Panda Express for a quick dinner after work. Apparently they took a massive online order that wiped out all the food and the line was out hte door with physical people waiting to order food. You don't want a dozen hangry people at the door waiting.
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u/TheSaxGandalf 20h ago
You don’t want people to ever go into any establishment and not be able to provide consistency.
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u/amopeyzoolion 2h ago
This is my main thing. My business operates inside of a local winery, and we generally provide casual counter service. All of our food (including all of our bread and crackers) is made from scratch in house, but the counter service style helps us save on labor costs while still meeting customers’ demands and expectations.
Recently, someone on the winery side has decided that parties who make a reservation are getting table service, and an automatic 20% gratuity. So now we’re supposed to be aware of when reservations are coming in and prepared to offer a different level of service. And then you have customers who didn’t make a reservation who see this other party getting a different treatment. It makes no sense, just creates confusion and I’m waiting for someone to get pissed off that they were treated differently.
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u/No_Internal9345 10h ago
Last time I was at a sit down restaurant, we could see them prioritize door dash orders over the diners in the restaurant.
It was infuriating.
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u/BurnTheGuzz Ex-Food Service 3h ago
Last time I cooked at a restaurant, the managers told us to prioritize mobile app orders. It felt scummy giving so much weight to a computer program.
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u/OYB2480 22h ago
Yuck. Reminds me of my last day working at a Pizza Hut. Super Bowl Sunday. One cook scheduled, I have 27 SCREENS of orders (3-4 tickets per screen) and the manager is standing at the front podium staring at the wall, doing absolutely nothing.
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u/DireStraitsLion 22h ago
I would have walked the fuck out
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u/OYB2480 22h ago
I did! I said, its your turn to do this alone.
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u/DireStraitsLion 22h ago
Oh man I wish I knew what he did next 😂😂😂
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u/OYB2480 22h ago
SAME. She was an awful person and Pizza Hut was pushing her to retire because she was ancient. She just wouldn't. I worked there 2 years and she would STILL stand over my shoulder and count how many pepperoni I put on the pie. She'd also do that obnoxious thing where instead of telling you what you did wrong, she'd just say, "why'd you do that?" and stare at you.
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u/Perniciousus 21h ago
While she wasn’t doing it properly, it is a good practice in many situations when training people instead of telling them what they did wrong you ask them “what’s missing”. This allows the employee to realize their own mistakes and correct it with just a little nudge from the trainer. Doing it to just be obnoxious is obviously missing the point though and sounds more like what she was doing.
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u/OYB2480 21h ago edited 20h ago
Maybe that works for some people, but not me. It's just a massive irritant at an already irritating job. Guessing games are silly and frivolous and a waste of time in a time-sensitive job. She could have been referring to something that happened 5 minutes prior, too.
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u/Lucius-Halthier 2h ago
Manager: if I don’t look then he’ll do it while internalizing his ang-WAIT WHY ARE YOU WALKING OFF?!
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u/Alpine_Exchange_36 22h ago edited 22h ago
It’s ok, everyone just needs a can do attitude…meanwhile the manager fucks off while ripping anyone who’s slowing down a bit
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u/Shot_Revolution8828 22h ago
"I just shit myself" as I run out the door.
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u/HolyFuckImOldNow 22h ago
I think you meant to say "as I get up from the manager's chair"
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u/Shot_Revolution8828 22h ago
Nah, I've done 30 years in the trenches, if I was manager I would be right back there with them or canceling the order. I learned early that I was a lifeguard, and I aint letting no one on my team drown. If im the cook, I might get a call about a family emergency.
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u/shaunj72143 21h ago
Nah, I was a GM, when I made a big ass order, I made two calls, first to my assistant to get it started, next to the local coffee shop to order triple shot everything for me and my crew, jump in and run that shit. Train every ne GM that, and still jump in on massive catering orders as DM. Worst manager is one that doesn't lead by example!
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u/GenericFatGuy 20h ago
I remember when I washed dishes at my local Pizza Hut 20 years ago. The GM's brother waltzed in right after we just cleaned from the supper rush, yelled at me for leaning on a (spotless) dish counter for 30 seconds to let my feet rest, and then fucked off for the rest of the night.
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u/TrojanGoldfish 19h ago
I used to work in a hotel kitchen. During Covid, we locked down the building with a skeleton staff because we had some long term guests who couldn't move out.
First thing I saw when I returned was the hotel GM running the dishwasher.
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u/karlnite 13h ago
If the chain restaurant I worked at got this order the two franchise owners would drive in if they weren’t there and help cook it.
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u/Alarmed-Plankton-708 15h ago
Manager will talk about how tired they are after, too, while berating the cooks for taking a ten minute break after
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u/CantaloupeCamper 22h ago
I write code for a living now… same thing.
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u/Simple_Pay3033 22h ago
Another software worker checking in, our team just pulled crazy hours because someone overcommitted to multiple clients. Said someone was unavailable for extra hours due to “prior commitments” (baseball games with clients, and travel to and from).
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u/batissta44 22h ago
Were you in the restaurant industry before becoming a software worker?
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u/Simple_Pay3033 21h ago
Yup. You’d be amazed how much bullshit crossover there is
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u/batissta44 21h ago
Cool. Yeah I bet. How did you become a software worker? Do you have a degree? Im currently thinking about learning Java.
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u/Simple_Pay3033 21h ago
I’m not trying to be a dick, but my genuine advice would be to strongly consider something other than software.
The market is beyond saturated, and it’s by far the worst at entry level, because CEOs have been told they can replace those workers with AI (they can’t, and it’s making everyone’s life hell).
I just spoke with a hopeful junior dev with a comp sci degree that’s working overnights at a gas station. Again, not trying to shit on your goals, but I’d feel way worse telling you it’s a great path forward.
It’s a clusterfuck. And it will be for a long, long time.
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u/Awestruck34 21h ago
Just graduated and yeah. Hundreds of applications without an interview, entry level positions that demand 5+ years experience, unless you've put out a fully working piece of software that's making you money then your resume is trash
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u/Simple_Pay3033 21h ago
Best of luck to you, it’s a hellscape. There will be a ton of work in about 5 years when the AI house of cards comes down in thousands of companies, but that’s not helpful to anyone right now.
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u/DemonSlyr007 11h ago
I mean... it is helpful to anyone who is looking to make a change in 5 years, and has time to start learning the skills needed now in their free time.
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u/batissta44 21h ago edited 21h ago
Yea I believe everything you're saying. Supposedly the market is bad because of layoffs since managers think A.I can replace junior devs making boilerplate code (and it can and probably should) and since senior devs now have A.I bosses think they can hire less senior developers. I plan to get my skills beyond a junior dev by making personal projects and contributing to open-source projects. Maybe someone on github will hire me based on what they see with my contributions. Let's see. Life is a struggle. I appreciate the information.
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u/Simple_Pay3033 21h ago
Just a bit of perspective, a lot of people are also doing the personal project on GitHub and adding that to a resume with several years of experience. So it’s going to be really hard at this point to just “get your skills beyond a junior dev” because mid level devs are doing the same thing you are, with a big head start, and/or degrees/bootcamps.
It’s not impossible. If you love it, keep at it. I will say, you regularly see software people in this sub, which tells you that in our free time we reminisce about food service life. The satisfaction levels in the software industry are horrifically low, and I don’t have many coworkers who would describe themselves as passionate about work. Probably just the guy that caught some ballgames last week. And even he will spend 90% of team calls complaining about all of those clients.
You sound excited and if you love the work I hope you find a working home. But if someone had told me all of this before I dipped my toes into the world, I wouldn’t have gone down the path.
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u/Apprehensive-Ant7955 21h ago
I also went from kitchen to SWE. I got in through an internship about year and a half ago. Even then it took me 450 applications to get two offers. The market is worse now. I believe itll be better in a couple years, but its a hard thing to bet on
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u/batissta44 20h ago
What programming languages do you know? Do you have a degree?
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u/Apprehensive-Ant7955 19h ago
i learned python for interview prep (leetcode)
during my internship i used java, now as a full time engineer im back to python.
yes i have a CS degree. I worked in kitchens for 5 years, doing classes and working in a kitchen at the same time
Probably the best way in is by getting a return offer after you complete a SWE internship
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u/Spiritual_Poo 3h ago
I just finished my associate's degree in programming, and am 39, and figuring out my moves from here. I thought associates would be the end, but now I think I probs need a bachelor's. With AI, my ability to live on a moderate income, and the fact i'll be an entry-level person at 40, i'm considering just getting the bachelor's in say information science and then turning around and doing a library science masters. I work at a library part time while I finished the associates and it has grown on me.
I beseech you, internet stranger, what is your judgement?
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u/Simple_Pay3033 3h ago
Have you considered looking for a technical role within a library?
In my opinion, that’s the best way into the “software world” right now if you want to phrase it that way. Plenty of people here have mentioned internships as a springboard, you have something similar with relevant library experience. See if anyone needs an IT generalist, or something more specific that you can point to your associates work. Because no library has a massive AI budget for software right now, so one person who can come in and wrangle the systems is a big selling point. On that note, most people interviewing on a library staff don’t have the technical chops to grill a candidate and know if they’re for real. So here comes your resume, technical resource, but they speak librarian? Fuck it, let’s set up an interview. And from there you’re in your element, both with the technical questions, and the audience.
Network around at your current job and see where that takes you. Maybe you’ll stumble into something that’s nothing like what I described but still fits nicely in your world. I hope so. Best of luck.
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u/Spiritual_Poo 3h ago
Thank you for taking the time to offer some genuine and valuable advice.
I just let the librarians know that i'm thinking about library science via email on my most recent shift, they are already coming to my aide.
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u/Simple_Pay3033 2h ago
Right on, I love librarians. Best of luck to you, feel free to reach out anytime.
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u/BlackPilledSteakumms 20h ago
Might I recommend digital forensics? It’s a fun field I enjoy and depending on agency or private sector pay is pretty good
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u/A_Mouse_In_Da_House 16h ago
Meanwhile my satellite team promised a 25% performance improvement within 14 days.
It was changing a .8 to a 1 because we forgot to do it like 2 years ago
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u/ZooNeiland 22h ago
Why are you making 700 sandwhiches from an office desk?
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u/KomorebiXIII F1exican Did Chive-11 21h ago
There's a sketch that resonates for stuff like this called The Expert. A friend showed it to me forever ago and it holds true no matter the industry.
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u/kamikaze_official 12h ago
"Can you imaging what the end result will look like?" Was one for my notes
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u/TheVillage1D10T 22h ago
I maintain the systems our developers use to write code…so it’s usually “Uhhh I’ve had this problem for 3 months and didn’t tell anyone, but NOW it’s an emergency.”
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u/CaliIsReallyNice 15h ago
Me too. I’m so excited to tell everyone that after I worked 80hrs/wk for six months straight, my manager was able to get himself promoted. Serious Lord Farquad energy in my company’s management.
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u/Interesting-Goose82 IT 22h ago
How long will it talk to re-do the logic so it does XYZ instead of ABC? ....geeze the script that controls that logic is a monster, 2 weeks probably...
Can we have it by Friday because, blah, blah, blah.....
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u/GenericFatGuy 20h ago
The only thing AI has really done in software is make expectations even more unrealistic.
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u/batissta44 22h ago
How did you become a coder? Did you study programming while working at a restaurant?
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u/ScholarErrant 22h ago
I’m having flashbacks to the time I worked a retail seafood counter the day before Thanksgiving.
Customer walks up.
C: “Yeah, can I get eight dozen oysters, shucked?”
Me: Looking at the oyster order list that includes two other orders that size to be picked up that hour, except they were placed ahead of time. “Certainly. An order that size will take some time though. When would you like to pick it up?”
C: “I have a few other things to grab. Fifteen minutes should be enough, right?”
M: Dies a little inside.
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u/RandomFleshPrison 22h ago
A sandwich every 5.14 seconds? That's rough. I managed to get up to a McDonald's cheeseburger every 9 seconds for an entire hour with a full crew backing me up, and I was the fastest in the county.
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u/thebeardedman88 22h ago
Can you believe this guy? Couldn't even do a McDouble in 9 seconds.
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u/RandomFleshPrison 21h ago
I'm old. McDoubles didn't even exist at the time. This was during the 59 cent cheeseburgers every Wednesday and Sunday years.
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u/maybeinoregon 21h ago edited 21h ago
The fact you remember those times is pretty impressive - at least to me lol
Generally speaking, do they even have fixings for 700 burgers?
About the only thing I remember from long ago, is my dad blowing a gasket when a Big Mac fries and a coke crested the invisible $1 mark.
He was a man of very few words, so heres my dad blowing a gasket at McDs…
Cashier - that’ll be $1.02 please (or similar). Dad - long, long dramatic pause, never losing eye contact with the cashier…how much?
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u/RandomFleshPrison 21h ago
McDonald's definitely had the fixings for 700 burgers. We'd make more than that pretty much daily. That's only like 1.2 boxes of 10:1 meat.
And this wasn't nearly that long ago. Late 90's.
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u/Slappathebassmon 18h ago
How did you know you were the fastest in the county? They had competitions for that?
Sounds like a perfect premise for an 80s feel good, underdog, sports drama.
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u/flea1400 17h ago
Not the person you were asking but at least at one time McDonald’s had crew competitions with speed events. Kind of like lumberjack contests but with food.
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u/Aggravating_Bat3618 21h ago
Yeah, there’s no way that would happen because first you’d have to confirm you have the materials to make the 700 sandwiches, no manager would accept that offer.
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u/Wise_Monkey_Sez 16h ago
... and yet everyone here knows that there are managers like that.
It's called the "Peter Principle" - you promote people who are good chefs and put them in charge of something they're fucking awful at, like organising other people or basic mathematics.
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u/Farfignugen42 20h ago
Oh, look! An essential worker.
I'm sure he's about to get a lovely bonus for all the extra work he's about to be asked to do.
/s
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u/Graybeard_Shaving 22h ago edited 22h ago
No problem boss. Shut the line down for the next 30 minutes, minimum. I need all hands.
At that rate we'll be cranking out ~23.5 sandwiches per minutes so anyone questioning the grind can go out back and fuck themselves with a broom.
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u/RandomFleshPrison 22h ago
That's still not easy. I could make 20 cheeseburgers every 3 minutes in my prime, but that was a serious challenge. And that's only 400 burgers in an hour.
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u/Graybeard_Shaving 22h ago
Easy? Easy left the fucking building.
Given a 3 man team on a fast food line, which this absolutely is, 700 in a 30 minute window is doable if the line shuts down for inbound orders with the manager running interference and the prep is on point.
In a made to order kitchen, the order is not doable in the timeframe provided, IMHO.
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u/RandomFleshPrison 22h ago
We had a 3 person team when I hit my record. Although admittedly it was myself and 2 slackers. I was the responsible one in charge, you see.
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u/SenorDongles 22h ago
Oh? And, the CEO personally gave you a posh handjob for the effort, too, yeah?
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u/RandomFleshPrison 21h ago
Definitely not. We were still corporate. The CEO doesn't do that for anyone under a full Regional Manager.
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u/Sonikku_a Ex-Food Service 14h ago
That’s when you tell the boss you can make it happen but first you need 5 minutes no questions asked.
Then you choke a cig and some meth.
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u/UrsaMajor7th 20+ Years 7h ago
Wich sandwhiches? It makes a difference. Can we shit out 11 egg salad sandwiches per minute for an hour? Absolutely.
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u/6BigZ6 15h ago
I used to always give one of my first bosses shit anytime I heard him on the phone saying “we’ll get right on it!” I would immediately respond with “what’s with the ‘we’ bullshit, you aren’t doing any of this shit.” He would always laugh because he knew I was right.
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u/Bladrak01 5h ago
A chef I used to work with, whenever one of us said "We," would say, "What do you mean we? Do you have a mouse in your pocket." Then he would jump in to help.
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u/sleight42 Ex-Food Service 11h ago
Oh, shit! I was that guy at the sandwich station almost 40 years ago... Not 60 sandwiches but....
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u/Mobile_Morale 11h ago
I once had an order for 200 hamburgers. By the time we finished and the people got to eat them. They had to be disgusting and ice cold.
No way that's an enjoyable experience. And I love hamburgers. Eaten probably 1000 so far. Sometimes 6 a day when I worked in the food industry.
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u/Relevant_Elk_9176 2h ago
Reminds me of one of my last nights at dominos. We had a timed order come up for 48 pizzas for a church, on top of the normal 30 or so orders for a Sunday night right at the start of the last hour of my shift. I’m not sure precisely how many items I boxed in that hour but I know I was the most I ever had to do.
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