Reader T is wondering why the Cheesecake Factory’s kitchen is being run by a drill sergeant. He says his meal was ruined by the “unrelenting, verbal assaults” that were wafting from the open kitchen into the dining room where he and the restaurant’s other customers were trying to eat.
T writes:
I wrote a letter to the Cheesecake Factory HQ and it basically tells the story of a miserable experience at the Cheesecake Factory in Columbus, Ohio and here is a copy of it:
My wife and I were using a gift card that was given to us at your Cheesecake Factory Fine Dining Restaurant. The food was superb.
There was one major annoyance that several customers including our party had to endure. It was the drill-sgt that you placed in the kitchen which isn’t separated from the rest of restaurant. This person attacked the cooks with such acrimony it made me sick. Continuous, unrelenting, verbal assaults. Other patrons were standing up wondering what was all the yelling about. I finally went over and told him to “Shut up, there are people trying to eat”. Only after that, could I actually hear my wife talking when she was only sitting arm’s length. A lady came to our table and apologized, but I come to find out that this belligerent brow-beating is normal protocol and it wasn’t a one time occurrence. I got word from several of your people as we were making our way out of your restaurant that they had been waiting for a customer to finally speak up as I did. They thanked me. How can you continue to offer a fine dining experience? You need to do something about your restaurant because if I were you, I would be embarrassed. My wife and I eat out when we can and our first impression of the Cheesecake Factory was terrible to say the least.
Sincerely,
TWhat I want to know is are all Cheesecake Factories like the one we have? Management must of known about this Drill Sgt., how could they not? It was a disaster dining experience. I don’t expect to hear anything back from the Cheesecake Factory people after getting an empty apology from management.
Well, we’ve only been to the Cheesecake Factory once, but we didn’t notice Sergeant Hulka running the kitchen. What gives?
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I worked at a cajun seafood restaurant in the 90′s, and the Kitchen Manager would shout abusive things like “Get this godd*mn food out NOW!” and throw trays on the floor because there were no waiters to run the food out to the tables. There were two in and out doors through which diners could hear the yelling and screaming from the other end of the restaurant. Plus to get a drink from the bar (as a waiter) you had to yell it out. Very loud and unprofessional, considering the average entree was $20, which back then and even now is pricey so people expect a little ambiance to offset the cost.
Cheesecake Factory? I’ll never eat there again. We went for a birthday party. Knowing that the birthday boy was turning 22, and having been a part of large groups enough times to know what happens when dealing with youth, the three more intelligent people (think slightly older) sat at a separate table across from the large table. We specifically told the waitress we’re a different party after she asked if we were all together, and asked her, “we will get a separate check for our items, right?” She said, “Of course.” Dinner, no drinks, check. The large table’s check came first, they paid, we still hadn’t gotten ours, and they left. When ours came, it had 6 alcoholic drinks on it, none of which were ours, and an extra entree. We immediately called the attention of the waitress, explained it to her, and all she said was something like, “Well you know them, so pay it now, and get it from them later. I must have messed up.” We immediately hit the, “Oh HELL NO!” phase, and asked for the manager. We explained it again to him, and he asked us what we’d like as a resolution. We explained that even since the waitress admitted flubbing the checks, to have only our items on our bill, and have it reprinted so we could pay. He said he couldn’t do that since we were ONE PARTY. We then explained that we were not one party, we had separate reservations, a separate table, and clarified that with the waitress before hand. She then interrupted claiming she didn’t understand what we meant by that (but not that we didn’t say it). The waitress said she would call the cops if we didn’t pay the whole thing, and we were fine with that since a bulk of the bill wasn’t even ours! The manager asked her to stop talking and let him handle it, she then started arguing with the manager, who eventually dropped the bill on our table and said, “Fuck it, do whatever you want,” and walked away. In the end, we paid what we owed, calculated the tax on our own, and left with the manager glaring at us as we walked out.
@KirkDouglas: I can’t believe it took this long for somebody to make a Gunnery Sargeant Hartman reference.
And the head chef’s behavior was totally inappropriate towards both the customers and the employees. Patrons shouldn’t be subjected to yelling and foul language, even second-hand, during their dining experience, and employee performance isn’t going to increase in an unnecessarily hostile workplace. Yeah, sometimes a manager has to take off the gloves and kick ass to get business done, but it sounds like the guy was just being profusely abusive, and nobody works well in those conditions. Not only are the employees suffering undue abuse, it’s going to end up harming the customer as well in the end through substandard results.
My wife and I ate at that very restaurant (Easton Cheesecake Factory) last night and had a good experience. The food was great and actually came out a little sooner than I expected. We were pretty far from the kitchen, but I didn’t hear any yelling. I’ve never had a bad experience there.
A family member of mine just started work as a server at the Cheesecake Factory. She has worked for many restaurants but I can’t remember her ever being as enthusiastic about any of them. The staff there are treated well and have to go through an extensive training with a lot of food tasting. I always dismissed them as yet another ‘chain restaurant’ but I thought it was neat that they are very interested in creating quality food (they use NO microwaves there).
@TakingItSeriously: While Ramsey might be the extreme, I’ve spent about 10 years working in restaurants, and it’s a high stress environment. Head Chefs with veins popping out of their foreheads shouting obscenities is more the rule than the exception. Granted, I have not worked in an ‘open kitchen’ restaurant – I do agree that’s it’s a dumbass maneuver to have a Ramsey-type chef in that sort of environment.
In defense of the ramsey-type chef’s that I have worked under, all but one were great guys (and girls) AFTER the shift, and all were generally well liked, respected, and at least slightly crazy. You kind of have to be to survive in a highly competitive restaurant.
Cheesecake factory = big, confusing menu, overpriced sub par food. The food is good, but you pay WAAAAAY too much for it. The service at the Cheesecake factory near us is decent, but it’s not worth the disorganized menu and prices.
Also: if you order a cheesecake over the phone, they wait till you get there to make it. We wanted to be in and out, ended up waiting almost half an hour.
@P_Smith: +1
Chef is a brilliant show.
“I am…in a world…of cream cheese”
I always tell the waitress that I hear they make good pies, I’ll have a slice of dutch apple.
@SkokieGuy:
>>OMG – Cheesecake factory on Consumerist. The (few) times I’ve eaten there I continue to be amazed by their enormous menu containing large glossy advertisements for other merchants.
Actually, years ago I interview a couple of guys (when I was a reporter) who started a business selling advertising in menus. That would have been around 1992 or 1993.
I’ve eaten in the Easton (Columbus) CF, and never had a problem with noisy kitchen staff, but that was years ago. However, the huge crowds waiting for lunch and dinner kind of turned me off.
@RAREBREED:
That last comment would have earned him a broken nose from me.
@SMSDHubbard Learn to take a joke my friend.
@spinachdip: Glad you got it was a joke.
It just reminded me of a friend of mine, who is a manager, and all of his cooks are spanish speaking and he has a hard time directing them.
Let me guess… this person must not like Gordon Ramsey.
He ROCKS btw!
The way I look at it, if you’re going to have an open kitchen restaurant consider that when you’re hiring your staff. If my meal had been interrupted like that I would have done what the OP did and then some. Needless to say I would have gotten the manager involved and started a row before leaving without having the food (because as others have mentioned, don’t mess with the people who handle your food unless you like bodily fluids mixed with your meal) or leaving any money. But then again, I’m a hotheaded guy who likes the occasional confrontation…
Cheesecake factory & fine dining have never occured to me.
The menu is like the Sears catalog. They do have fairly large portions of heat & eat food (think Sysco not haute cuisine).
It is OK, sometimes a group from my office will go to lunch there, but I wouldn’t take the family there (unless I had a gift card).
I did get a gift card to a place that had really PO’ed me once. I gave it to homeless people. They have to eat too – they were nice homeless people – not drug addict looking crackheads.
The words “Cheesecake Factory” and “fine dining” should never appear in the same pararaph.
I mean, the food’s not awful, but it’s damned expensive for what it is. I’d gladly exchange the giant portion sizes for some higher quality.
And for this people wait an hour or two? I honestly don’t get it.
@johnarlington: “For a restaurant that is often located at malls, you would expect them to have children’s portions.”
Considering they are at malls, I’ve noticed this to be a perhaps intentional marketing move. Big portions = take home boxes, theirs come with their trademark brightly coloured plastic bags which will get toted around the mall afterwards as walking billboards for other hungry mallgoers to see.
Ive eaten at the Portland/Beaverton one twice now and both times had a good experience. It’s very much like (west coast franchise) Claim Jumper in that it’s HUGE, faux-fancy decorated and has menus the size of Alaska. I’ve always felt like it’s good food for a reasonableish price considering the portions. The last time I was there I do remember saying “doesnt it look like it belongs in a Vegas casino?” But in a good way…since going there you shouldnt expect intimate fine dining – just look at the place! Not coincidentally it always seems to be a popular place during prom season.
@ironchef:
Oh, come on… I put myself through college working as a line chef, and worked with a few of these ‘Kitchen Nazis’. When everyone is cool headed and having a good time the food just flows out of the kitchen. These Drill Sergeant types just complicate the process and piss everyone off.
@seandavid010: It really depends on the crew – some crews respond to a polite, “Rush on the steak, please,” while others respond to “Where’s the fucking steak I needed five minutes ago?” I’ve worked with the latter style, and no one took it personally – we understood that it was his style, and everything was forgotten once the shift was over. The key is mutual understanding between the chefs and the cooks.
Of course, the latter style is a horrible, horrible fit for Cheesecake Factory.
@seandavid010: I’ll agree with you. You hire serious people, who want to work hard, you shouldn’t need nazi’s running the place.
@spinachdip: However I would advise don’t do the latter way if the customers can see/hear you.
@spinachdip:
I’ll give you that. There were *some* nights that I wish we had someone yelling at guys on our line. And you’re right, when we did have to work with a ‘Kitchen Nazi’ everything was forgiven if not forgotten by the end of the shift. I have to say, though, nobody was inviting him out for a beer at the end of the night.
@Bladefist: Methinks SMSDHubbard‘s just never read Kitchen Confidential.
Besides, people, isn’t the biggest news that they got seated at a Cheesecake Factory? Called ahead to the West Hartford location to reserve a table (birthday dinner and all) and was told that not only could they not hold one (fair enough), it’d be a three-hour wait. And here I thought the novelty had worn off after a few months. I’m afraid to find out how long you’d have to wait when they open P.F. Chang’s at Westfarms.
@Bladefist: Oh, I agree with you completely. There’s a reason restaurants keep an impenetrable wall between the floor and the kitchen. Not to channel Bourdain too much, but restaurant kitchens are often manned by sweaty, dysfunctional people. No need to show customers how the proverbial sausage is made.
But yeah, no matter how fast the food needs to go out, the ultimate goal has to be customer satisfaction. You’d think a CCF manager would take that into consideration when they hire the chef.
@seandavid010: I don’t think I worked under anyone who could be considered a “kitchen nazi”, but the conversations definitely were not fit for customer consumption.
The one and only time I have been to Cheesecake Factory we watched our waitress sit with a table of friends for 45 minutes while we waited for our check. The manager then took her side and said it was a Saturday night and they were busy so the wait is normal. I will never step foot in there again.
Cheesecake factory and fine dining don’t go together in the same sentence. A good filet mignon doesnt cost $30 with 3 sides.
I never worked in a Cheesecake Factory, but I’ve put in some time in a few kitchens, and I’ve worked with the occasional person like the chef described above. I suppose some people might respond to that approach, even if it weren’t audible outside the kitchen, but to me, generally two things were true when a guy treated us like that:
1. He wasn’t telling us anything we didn’t already know.
2. He sure wasn’t helping to resolve it.
I’ve eaten at CF in Indianapolis a few times. I thought the food was pretty good, but reasonably priced only if you made two or three meals out of it. The wait, both in terms of time and room, was exactly as described above, and with the huge number of restaurants in the area, we don’t go back often. If we do, we’ll go mid-afternoon and finish up before rush hour.
If you ever walked back there and told Chef Ramsay to shut up he’d break your jaw for ya.
@TakingItSeriously:
That’s funny. His employees love him, and he lauds those that stand out, lavishing them with money to open their own restaurants (as a partnership, of course), promoting them very regularly, and even supporting them when they choose to leave his restaurant for others or strike out on their own.
He treats them like family, and expects them to do their jobs, cook his recipes according to his standards, and reads them the riot act when they screw something up.
You’ve obviously never seen the Channel 4 ‘Kitchen Nightmares,” where he genuinely cares about the success of the restaurants he visits. He’s not simply yelling for the sake of it, he’s screaming a them because he’s genuinely angered by poor food, poor service, and poor sanitation.
@RvLeshrac:
While I’m on the subject, Ramsay has taken the entire staff of his London restaurant to France, Italy, and Spain, at the least.
When’s the last time your boss took you on a trip to another country, let alone drinking and clubbing?
@seandavid010:
Then obviously all was NOT forgiven.
There’s a reason you’re supposed to take your work home with you.
I really only like cheesecake factory’s cheesecake. Why not get it to go?
@drjayphd: GREAT book
The only type of restaurant where I appreciate seeing into an open kitchen are steakhouses that are cooking meat over open flames. It’s kind of neat to watch. Other than that, I have no desire to be anywhere near a kitchen, let alone hear what goes on back there.
By the by, Cheesecake Factory’s key lime cheesecake and the seasonal pumpkin cheesecake are awesome. Unfortunately, their other food isn’t as good as it used to be. I’ve stopped ordering two of my favorite dishes because they don’t make them like they used to, which makes me sad.
I’ve recently eaten there, and while it may be toned down in the sense of insults or something, its certainly not any quieter… you can definitely hear the line manager or whoever yelling as if they’re in the army.
@donkeyjote: They like being employed. Yeah, sounds like being constantly publically berated is a great way to earn a living.
You gotta respect Sgt. Hulka….. He’s the big toe….
And he took a hand grenade for you….
Show him some love…
My wife and I probably would’ve been laughing at hearing all the remarks…but that’s just us.
If that’s how it is working in a kitchen, then the addition of some walls or sound proofing are in order.
“our first impression of the Cheesecake Factory was terrible to say the least.”
That would be the case regardless of the drill sergeant or not.
Dont go back there!
Eat local!
In regards to Gordon Ramsay, he is not the chef he is perceived to be on the American version of his show. Watch any of his BBC versions and you will see he is not souped up jerk who does nothing but belittle people. You people also need to realize that these head chefs are in an industry that thrives on consistency. If you’re one line cook is falling behind you have to get on him and make him get caught back up. One guy falls behind and the whole kitchen falls behind. I’d also like to point out that everyone instantly thought of Ramsay when they’re plenty of other chefs who act in the same manner; belittling comments, constant ragging, etc. Read books by any renowned chef (Boulud, Ruhlman, Bourdain, Colicchio, etc) and you’ll see they are similar or have gone through similar experiences.
As far as cheesecake factory goes, they are par at best. Yes they have a HUGE menu but that is scary when you begin to think about it. I’d rather see a restaurant have 10-20 items TOTAL because it tells me they have gotten those items down pat and can kill it every time they serve them. When you begin to have these overly complex menus the cooks don’t know how to fully execute each item on the menu; it also means ingredients that become less fresh because they’re not being turned over as quickly. CF is just a big gimmick change restaurant, nothing more. I find it funny people think of it as a fine dining experience. I’d say the only place worse then CF that trys to do the whole “fine dining” theme is PF Changs; what a waste of $50 that place was.
The last time I ate at CF I promised myself I would get 2 slices of cheesecake and skip the entree. But then I took too long staring at the menu and it was time to order and quickly ordered a burger at random. The burger I ordered was the Mondo Burger.
When the burger came it was HUGE. Ridiculously huge. Like, practical joke huge. It was sorta like a Big Mac made with 1/3rd pound patties. It had the tri-bun, shredded lettuce, onion straws, random plops of goo, cheese and god knows what else. It stood about 5 inches tall. I do not have the ability to unhinge my jaw so the burger became a huge sloppy mess after 1 or 2 half-ass attempts at taking a bite. I was then left with a Mondo Burger Hotdish left on my plate. The burger bummed me out so much that I skipped the cheesecake.
If I ever go back, I am just getting 2 slices of cheesecake, they can keep their silly jumbo burgers. What a joke.
@InfiniTrent:
“…and thank YOU for our daily dose of “open minded” name calling!”
Please re-read. Point out which words actually were name-calling.
@jtkooch:
“The problem is not with the yelling chef, but the fact that the kitchen can be heard from the dining room. I would suggest you stop being a baby, or don’t sit so close to the kitchen next time.”
I agree with the first half of this statement but strongly disagree with the second half. If what’s going on in the kitchen is interfering with the ambience and atmosphere of the front of the house then something is very wrong. However, the worst thing to do in this situation is to blame your customers for not being thick skinned enough when this occurs and they complain. Part of what people pay for when they go to a restaurant is the relaxing atmosphere where they can enjoy their meal and be sociable with others. It’s something that I at least consider part of the service restaurateurs provide, and in this case, was severely lacking.
@MyPetFly:
Yeah, my best friend is SFPD, and we thought it’d be better to just leave quietly…
@ironchef: It’s the supervisors with an attitude like that which cause the inconsistent quality. The good leads are the ones who lead by example. The ones that jump in during a rush and help, the ones that pull and order from the window and quietly point out what was “wrong” with the order. Some times it’s portion control, some times it’s over/under cooked, other times it’s simply presentation. Treat your employees like children and they act like children. Treat them with respect and they act responsibly.
And no, if you change your attitude today you won’t see results tomorrow. These relationships are something you have to build.
@wedgekun: Exactly. Many of us can cook at home just as well, and with known good ingredients. All of use like dining out for a few simple reasons.
Here are mine.
1. No cleanup!
2. No phone calls asking if we want to buy new siding. (Or any other interruption.)
3. A nice atmosphere.
A few things will steer us away pretty quickly.
1. A poor environment (see the original post for a good example).
2. Inconsistent quality. This is something that a good manager will “drill” in. (Not like this guy, but re-enforced at trainings and other appropriate times.) Average quality that is ALWAYS average is better than great quality, poor quality, great, ok, good, average, etc. That randomness is something that people don’t like. (Have you ever heard someone say “Man you should try this restaurant, sometimes the food is REALLY good.”)
I had one owner who worked the line with us. If something was dropped on the floor he’d simply run down the cost for you. “That bun is $0.15, the meat is $2 and the toppings were another $0.50. I only make $3 off that sandwich, so instead of making $3 we now made $0.50.”
He didn’t yell, he didn’t really make you feel like less of a person, (you did feel bad, but not attacked).
The good managers also ate the mistakes. (If you put the wrong sauce on something it didn’t get thrown away, or eaten by another staff member [because that leads to trading "mistakes"] but they would either take it home or eat it on their lunch.) I saw one manager eat meatloaf 3 times, even though he didn’t care for it and could get a free lunch as a manager.
In high school I worked at a pizza shop where we had a regular that ordered the exact same food every week at the same time. We wound up laminating his order and putting it behind the counter. He’d just call, say “hey, it’s Jeff” and we’d make is food.
One week I dropped the whole order on the way out the door. We quickly re-made the order and took it out but I didn’t think to call him. In all fairness, neither did the owner. When we got the order out there Jeff was hot. Angry, never ordering from us again angry. I lied and said the owner had sent his apologies and said the order was on him. As I finished the sentence he was still angry, so I quickly added that he also said next weeks was half off. The guy laughed and said (owner) knew how to keep a customer.
When I got back empty handed the owner asked what happened. I explained and the owner had us all stop working. (That never happened prior or again after, it was always rush rush rush.) He told them what had happened and told us that if we ever expected to get a manager position we should take risks like that. He ran down the profit he made from the one guy in a year and compared that to the stuff we’d given away in that meal and the one next week. He pointed out that the free food (probably less than $30) had MADE him money.
I’ve worked under some people who never would have understand what this guy knew intuitively. Treating your customers and employees like you care is usually the difference between success and failure. When we messed up we knew it impacted the bottom line. We didn’t need scolded, after a while he didn’t even need to say anything when we messed up. We did our best to fix mistakes quickly and with as little impact to our customers as possible. In the first paragraph I mention supervisors who quietly point out mistakes. After a while at that pizza gig what made me feel far worse was just the owner fixing a mistake of mine. He didn’t need to say anything, he knew I knew what had gone wrong. Scolding would have accomplished only one thing, he would have alienated me.
In the jobs where my mangers treated me poorly I never took a risk like the above, if my manger treated me like crap I’d never think of offering food free. My manger would likely have ripped my case and why should I go through that so he can get a bigger bonus in the end?