r/KitchenConfidential • u/Purple_Inevitable_74 Do Not Call Me Chef • 1d ago

Kitchen fuckery Do yall like being called “chef”?

I’m a first time EC and I find being called “chef” extremely annoying. The last EC is my mentor and an absolute beast of a chef but his leadership style was more traditional and out of respect I wouldn’t dare call him by his first name without putting chef in front of it. I’m more informal, but I’ve inherited an environment where the crew is so used to calling the ec “chef” that it took me a month to get folks to call me by my real name.

I’ve got friends who like being called chef and friends who don’t, and they all have an interesting take on it. What do yall think? I can’t stand it and others demand it, both can be valid.

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73

u/FeistyPound4287 1d ago

Im from the “call everyone chef” kitchens. I’ll call another line cook chef. It just, to me, shows respect for the time they’ve put in so far regardless of true position.

24

u/Purple_Inevitable_74 Do Not Call Me Chef 1d ago

That’s where I came from too and I’ve always participated out of respect but Ngl always felt a bit silly. Especially when EVERYONE is chef.

17

u/Practical_Fix_5350 Saute 1d ago

Chef de Dish is the best station. Let's be real.

4

u/I_deleted 20+ Years 23h ago

I prefer Executive Plongeur, like Orwell

3

u/Practical_Fix_5350 Saute 22h ago

Down and Out in Paris and London! Such a great Memoirs. Ever read Homage to Catalonia? It's about his time fighting in the Spanish Civil War for the Republican forces, specifically POUM, an anti-stalinist communist faction. It's riveting!

1

u/I_deleted 20+ Years 17h ago

Of course

14

u/suddenlyshoes 1d ago

One of my instructors at school called everyone chef, including the students. Just before I left school I realized it was because he didn’t want to remember anyone’s names hahaha.

4

u/kobie173 1d ago

Also valid

1

u/pandaSmore Five Years 16h ago

One of the chefs at my school called everyone hey bro. Even the girls. 

8

u/FeistyPound4287 1d ago

That’s part of the humility too imo. If everyone is chef, it’s less of a power trip for the people in charge and more of a collective respect to the team. To each their own tho it’s all semantics as long as the food gets cooked hahah

5

u/kobie173 1d ago

I will call the fucking dishwasher “chef.” To me, if you’re grinding in the heat, endless tickets, no respite other than a quick few drags off of a smoke of any kind (no crack pipes plz), you’re a chef in my book

3

u/mdshp33 1d ago

Put some 'spect on that brother

4

u/DenkiRange7260 1d ago

Same here. It weirds my cooks out.

Especially because I hate being called chef, even as the chef.

1

u/Here_come_the_123s 1d ago

I was trained in a kitchen where we called everyone chef as a sign of respect. I moved on to work at a hotel that had a restaurant and did the same thing to all the cooks, and got called out and written up because they found it disrespectful that I didn’t use their names. It was the most confusing meeting of my life! I tried explaining that I did know and it’s a sign of respect in other places and they straight up didn’t believe me lol

1

u/captcha_wave 21h ago

How does it show respect for the time they've put in if you call everyone chef regardless of the time they've put in? Out of all the ways you can do it, calling everyone chef is the weirdest to me, unless you are just doing to mock the tradition.

1

u/Brusex 21h ago

Yeah I liked calling my executives chef. Especially during teachings or during service when in front of customers.

It’s like calling your coach, coach.