Drama In the Food Industry

 So I've spent the better part of the past six years working in some aspect of the food industry.Weather it be slingin hot dogs at 7-Eleven, making cookies by the thousands, making mass amounts of pie filling or flipping fancy burgers I've seen quite a few things in different areas of the industry.

 Recently I started working for one of those high end fast food joints with the $10 hamburgers. I thought it was going to be a good job with some room for me to grow and learn. I was wrong.  The first couple days went by pretty decent, I was learning some new things and taking the advice of my new boss trying to get things right but I soon started to notice some things were just not adding up. For example we were using steam trays to keep certain items hot during service yet the owner insiste.d that they were to be filled all the way with water. Last time I checked I was pretty sure steam was hotter than water.  That may not be such a big deal but what kills me is the way the meat was cooked. Ground beef should be cooked to a temperature of 71C to be sure that it is safe to eat and the bacteria is no longer living. That will put the average burger to a doneness of well done. We were instructed to cook our burgers to medium well which I was not comfortable with so I left them on and cooked them to well and never got a complaint from a customer. About two weeks after I started an order came in for a medium rare burger. When I saw this chit come up I laughed it off and said no way was I cooking ground beef to medium rare for a customer. I don't want to make anyone sick and I don't want my name attatched to that in the least. After a squabble with the owner she took the burger off at medium rare and served it. Disgusting if you ask me.

We also have had customers bring back their medium well burgers and ask why they were undercooked and the owners answer is that is how we cook them. One customer asked why we don't have a sign up saying so and the owner said that the hea;th inspector wont let us put up the sign. One would think that would make them realize we are not cooking things properly but no, apparently the health inspectors are wrong and they are right. Did I mention that neither of the owners have any formal culinary training?

 It really amazes me how people can be so far up themselves and think that everything they do is right just because they own a restaurant. There is nothing that I could do to convince these people that they were making mistakes, I was just trying to help them run a better business but they wanted none of it. Because of that I decided to end my employment there and seek out something better suited to my needs. It was an experience but one I'm glad has come to an end. So next time you decide to put $10 of your hard earned money towards a hamburger make sure to ask for it well done.