by Tony Hackley

Time-saving tips for when you’re short on staff

Time-saving tips for when you’re short on staff

Running a restaurant is a military operation. One day it runs smoothly, the next you’ve got one chef off sick, one of the ovens doesn’t work, a food delivery hasn’t turned up and you’ve got 100 covers this evening and somehow you need to feed them.

We’ve come up with some time-saver ideas to help prepare you for those tricky moments:

  1. Don’t over complicate things! Keep dishes simple and let your ingredients shine for themselves.
  2. Repurpose ingredients where you can. Doing mash for one dish? Use it to make salmon fish cakes, and/or use the off cuts from a salmon fillet you are using in another dish to make your fish cakes – this will save money too!
  3. Keep your menu short and simple. No one needs 900 choices at a restaurant. Identify which dishes are your best sellers and stick to those!
  4. Cross train your staff. While this might take a little more effort at first, having your staff trained on all stations means that anyone can jump in where needed.
  5. Utilise the food solutions we have on offer to you. By intertwining some ready to serve options into your menu it could help take off the slack when things do go wrong and also allow your chef more time to finesse other meals within your menu. Alternatively, have them as back up.

So, those are just 5 ideas for optimising your menu during busy periods. We also have a Quality Cuisine hand crafted range which could be your perfect solution. The range has individually prepared, frozen meal options which are all handcrafted with locally sourced ingredients; anything from pâtés and parfaits to tarts and savoury traybakes, ideal for functions and healthy meal solutions.

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