Chapter 643 - Newlywed Chefs (7)
Chapter 643: Newlywed Chefs (7)
Of course, Min-joon and Kaya understood their questions. However, they did not respond directly because they knew their words alone could not persuade these applicants. The chef couple needed to prove it by cooking by themselves.
Min-joon said, "You'll find out more about it soon. Then let me tell you about how this cooking mission works."
The interview method that Min-joon explained was simple. Min-joon and Kaya would assign the new cooks and demi-chefs to the course they prepared in advance.
Then Min-joon and Kaya would have them work as their sous chefs to show off their cooking skills. It looked easy, but it wasn't because they were just hired, and today was the first time they had a chance to work in tandem with Min-joon and Kaya. It would have been difficult for them to work as sous chefs at the restaurants they were affiliated with, so it was natural that they found it hard and challenging to play the role of sous chef for the chef couple. This was obviously a 'cooking mission' for them.
But soon, they stopped complaining. Of course, the going was not easy. They struggled to make food according to Min-joon and Kaya's orders. However, after working as sous chefs for Min-joon and Kaya one after another, they made blank expressions as if they were possessed by something. And they got more and more embarrassed as time went on.
Even Jill thought with a puzzled expression, 'They've never made any mistake.'
It wasn't just one hour when she worked as a sous chef for them. Even when Min-joon and Kaya had others as their sous chefs, they didn't make any mistakes, either. Watching them, she had no choice but to reexamine her cooking stereotypes. In her mind, it was inevitable that the head chef made mistakes when they worked in the kitchen with those who had never worked for them before, but Min-joon and Kaya were confident enough to lead them comfortably without making any mistakes.
Only then did Jill realize that she made a big misjudgment of the chef couple before her eyes. Min-joon and Kaya were not the type of chefs that she could make light of. They were simply too great for her judgment.
'The atmosphere among them has changed.'
After looking around the applicants here, Jill thought so. In fact, it was inevitable that the atmosphere changed. The applicants for the sous chef position at Lotus Island here were excellent at cooking. Of course, their cooking skills might not be impressive enough, but their cooking careers were literally outstanding enough to make them appreciate Min-joon and Kaya's cooking. They literally admired the chef couple's extraordinary cooking capabilities.
The cooks and demi-chefs who were cooking under their direction were at a loss, not knowing how to express their admiration. Actually, they didn't even know the recipes for Lotus Bridge. They didn't have a proper understanding of their own section at Lotus Bridge.
Nevertheless, when the chef couple led them in the kitchen, their dishes were made perfect. Of course, they didn't understand Min-joon and Kaya's cooking and recipes and what they wanted in an instant. Nonetheless, the chef couple used them as if they were their own hands by directing them to do things like turning the meat over, chopping the onions, and boiling more sauce.
If there had been only one head chef here, things would not have been so smooth. Apart from excluding the time to check and judge the chefs' dishes one by one, the head chef would probably have to spend most of his or her time giving them specific instructions.
Besides, Kaya and Min-joon were not ordinary head chefs. Thanks to her cooking talent, Kaya showed great leadership in the kitchen, which was as good as that of any great head chef.
In terms of the difficulty of kitchen leadership, Min-joon was actually one of the ablest chefs who could lead the kitchen staff in the world, for the system window before his eyes helped him figure out what was going on in his kitchen at a glance.
In other words, the two chefs with such extraordinary capabilities joined hands together. It didn't matter to them at all how to lead a motley of cooks and chefs like the applicants here because they had already experienced dealing with such people at the Grand Chef competition.
That was why Jill had lots of mixed feelings right now.
'If I worked as a sous chef, what can I do here?'
As she already witnessed, Min-joon and Kaya were perfect head chefs without any doubt. The two chefs promised excellent compensation packages to them when the restaurants they were affiliated with were not yet widely known to the public, compared with their competent cooking skills for many years. So the value of the sous chef with such a career was great. In fact, the biggest treasure Jill could find from Lotus Bridge would be building her career there.
Of course, there was no question that she would build such a career at Lotus Bridge if she was selected as a sous chef. But she was bothered by one thing. As Min-joon already pointed out, sous chefs like her didn't need to give advice to head chefs Min-joon and Kaya. Their kitchen would be perfect enough to give the sous chefs little room for them to express their feedback or advice. Actually, the chef couple had little expectations of the sous chefs, which meant that the value of sous chefs at Lotus Bridge would not be as high as they expected.
Perhaps Min-joon and Kaya wouldn't be able to show the same kitchen leadership as they did today. Some might think it was not a big deal for the chef couple to instruct them to do this or that in the kitchen, but it meant that they paid attention to each and every detail as far as cooking was concerned. There was a big difference between what they could do now and what they could always do. That was why they needed a sous chef. It was the duty of the sous chef, not the head chef, to check whether the head chef made any mistake in the kitchen.
Even though she agonized over the matter, she made up her mind right away. This was not the time for her to worry about it. It was not too late for her to think about it again after she got hired.
At that moment, she heard the good news. She earned the right to agonize over it.
"Congratulations, Jill! Let's do a great job together!"
She took it for granted that she would be hired. She even thought if she could not land a job at a restaurant in this world, she would not be able to compete with other chefs later. But when Min-joon gave her the good news, she thought the situation she was in was pretty unrealistic. At the same time, she realized that she was not so sure of being hired at first.
With her rich cooking career under her belt, she mistook it for her confidence. She was scared, not confident, from the beginning. She kept reassuring herself that she would not fail because she was really prepared for this job hard, so she should not be nervous or tense. She kept whispering such a message to herself.
So she said in a slightly tense voice, "Oh, I see…"
Obviously, she was tense at that moment.
Recruiting new hires didn't necessarily mean hiring only kitchen staff. Just like Rachel had Isaac, Min-joon and Kaya needed a manager, and at the same time, they also needed to hire servers, sommeliers, and patissiers.
Hiring was a lot more work than they expected. Min-joon and Kaya had to interview the applicants almost every day, and at the same time, they had to build a close relationship with those they already hired. There was a big difference between the kitchen with those who were closely knit together and one without such staff.
At first, Min-joon was a little worried about the way he treated Korean hires. He even googled about things like 'How to deal with your subordinates older than you.' But he soon came to realize that he didn't have to worry about it. Minwoo and another Korean hire, Sujong Yu, did not bother to speak Korean in front of him.
The moment they spoke in English, they didn't have to worry too much about Korean culture or manners. Actually, that was the best way for them to shake off their awkward feelings toward each other. When Koreans met for the first time, they checked their age first and use honorifics to their seniors. If they began to use honorifics, they tended to feel somewhat burdensome or stressed to carry on their conversation sometimes.
"Gosh, our reservations are already full," Kaya said in a stunned voice.
For a month after opening the restaurant, they were surprised that all the tables were booked everyday. Of course, some of those who made the reservations would not appear. Because of that, Min-joon and Kaya attached an additional clause on reservations. They notified the customers that if they didn't appear for 30 minutes without any notice after their appointment time expired, their reservations would be canceled automatically.. Considering how important 30 minutes was at a restaurant, no one would argue that their cancellation policy was unreasonable.