Deserting desserts
- Posted by Brendan Francis Newnam
- on January 23, 2009 1:06 PM
Blair Kolb has been laid off three times in the past year, and six times in the past three years. Nope, he’s not a temp, he’s a pastry chef:
Restaurants are notorious for having small margins even in the best of times. As soon as things start tightening, people may not stop going out, but their habits can change quickly. As a pastry chef, I’m acutely aware of those changes; desserts are usually the first to go. Two restaurants have closed out from under me, three others have explicitly eliminated my position, and the last just sort of petered out over a number of weeks until I was no longer on the schedule.
Have you been eating out less? If you still go out to eat, have you changed your eating habits?
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Discussion: 2 Comments
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- Posted by Carolyn Adolph on February 10, 2009 11:55 AM
I’m always trying to get dessert at restaurants but most restaurant desserts require a person to be able to eat dairy and/or wheat. Each is problematic for significant - some say growing - chunks of the population. I order if there were something for me, which is about 5 per cent of the time. Trouble is, one person not getting dessert crushes the dessert-getting efforts of everyone else at the table. Guilt sets in and is replaced by a requirement for self-discipline. Darn.
- Respond to Carolyn Adolph
I’ve definitely been eating out less. I know it’s bad for people in the food service business, but now that I’m getting in the habit of cooking and eating at home more, I like it better!