Prep Cook Arrives at 8am
This is when we begin preparing the many things we need for our guests to have a fresh and delicious meal. First thing’s first, we throw together some pizza dough and press it. Then, we move on to preparing the pizza toppings, including tomato sauce, fresh herbs, veggies, cured meats and bacon. Pulling our own fresh mozzarella around 10:30 every day is key, as we like to ensure that the cheese is never more than 24 hours old. We braise shortribs, make polenta, portion out meats and cheeses and marinate beets. Dessert preparation may be our favorite part! We make chocolate pudding from a crème anglaise recipe with 2 lbs. of chocolate added. In one of our recent desserts, we highlighted amazing honeycomb from Slide Ridge Farms, served with fresh fruit – blueberries and apricots! We are now featuring peaches and cream and are looking forward to other desserts with seasonal summer fruits. We try to create simple recipes with extra care in order to let each ingredient shine.
Lunch Service
Before lunch begins at 11:30, we set up our line so that we are clean, organized and stocked with everything we’ll need for each menu item. As lunch guests pour in, we carefully prepare salads, sandwiches and pizza so that they not only taste delicious, but are aesthetically pleasing. We love being in an open kitchen so that we can see all of the faces as they enjoy what we have created.
Changing of the Guard
As lunch service starts to wind down, we close down our line and once again, go back to preparing the food for dinner service. Our dinnertime counterparts arrive and we all help to finalize and prepare everything we’ll need for that evening.
Family Meal!
This is when we take whatever leftovers we have and experiment to see what fun dishes we can test out on the staff. We like getting to be creative with limited ingredients, whether it’s making omelettes with leftover egg whites from the chocolate pudding or shortrib tacos with homemade salsa. Family meal is the time when we get to sit down with our fellow employees, share a few laughs, some delicious food and go over the events of the upcoming evening.
Dinner Service
The guests come rolling back in at 5 o’clock, but we have been prepping all day and are ready to go! We have the oven fired up and a couple of cooks switching off between topping and throwing, and turning and pulling the pizzas. One sets up appetizers, one gets salads and desserts. We throw on some finishing touches and send them out for our guests to enjoy. The energy in the restaurant around this time is infectious and we love feeling the good vibes while we work. Guests will come talk to us and we get to interact with them and (humbly, of course) accept their praise. Just another perk of working in an open kitchen!
Closing Time
As the restaurant slowly empties, we reflect on our evening while cleaning up. What went well? Did anything go wrong? What can we adjust for tomorrow? As we finish up, we get the food put away and the restaurant sparkling again; another successful service on the books.
