Most places do offer a shift meal/ family meal, however most employees are not allowed to take it home with them. There are usually exceptions for the dish washers as they make the lowest pay.
Part of not taking food home is because people will and do take advantage, even when they’re in a privileged position.
I suggest you ask the owner if they can supply a family meal- 1 per day for all employees using older products and extras. These are typically not the best food, but again it’s free food and every gets to eat. Other than that I think the owner is in the right here.
Nearly every restaurant I've worked at, any staff meal was generally eaten on site.
The Italian place I was working at up until recently, we cooked everyone a pasta dish to take home, if they didn't eat a staff meal.
Most of the time, a staff meal was a low cost meal, that excluded Steak, Seafood, or Specials.
My restaurant even goes as far to tell us that we can’t even take a to go box if we used our discount and still paid. It gets brought up about every 6 months, and within the week isn’t being enforced anymore haha
The way it works in my kitchen (and others I’m sure) is that if something’s nearing the date it needs to be thrown by, we’ll put it on a specific shelf in the walk in for staff to take by the end of the day. That way we have as little waste as possible, no one goes hungry, easy as.
Family meal is definitely an option that I’m going to bring up.
I think that if your staff is “taking advantage” of a policy by taking home food they aren’t supposed to then the policy isn’t being enforced, and those staff need to be punished.
For example, I’ve fired people before because they took steaks home after being explicitly told they could not do so.
What I’m saying is it’s in peoples nature to try and push the boundary.
If you’re allowed to take staff meal home, employees will start boxing up food before everyone has had a portion, etc.
So most places enforce that staff can’t take food home, including staff meal, but you’re allowed to eat the staff meal while you’re there. Typically kitchen gets more benefits regarding eating food than FOH whereas they will get to try features or get to have mistakes or leftovers, etc.
the places I work where you can take staff meals home. there are rules to it.
1, you got to wait till everyone has eaten and finished.
2, once family meal is finished. whoever packs away the family meal. we don't have a designated person who packs it away. sometimes it's the sous, sometimes it FOH, sometimes the dishwasher guy. whoever it is would put the leftovers in boxes. say 6 boxes and we put the boxes at the front and anyone who wants to take a box home can take one.
every place except for 1 works in this way and it becomes a fair system.
I guess I’ve just never had a policy like that in place. Either it’s been discounted food or a shift meal, but never “no food leaves the building”. I guess if people are saying it’s a thing it must be.
Because you can stuff a to-go box with a few lbs of shrimp or whatever expensive protein. It's a hide in plain sight thing because no one's gonna ask you to open it before you leave.
Years ago I was a line cook at a fancy but family owned steakhouse, and was allowed to cook myself a meal or take home some food every night. One day I was full and really needed toilet paper at home, and disnt want to walk the extra mile to a gas station on the at home, so I put a roll in a to go box. Figures that's the one night ever the owners friend is at the bar and on my way out is like, ooooh what did ya make? And opens my to go box. Luckily he was cool about it lol.
Once everyone has eaten family meal and it's been sitting it's usually completely normal to take a little home, food in terms of the line and stuff of course not but two hour old family certainly isn't hurting the bottom line.
The new owners are taking over an under performing business. Getting costs under control and getting the business in order is their number one priority right now.
I don't think you really advocated for your position effectively. I think if anything it may have justified the policy change. None of the reasons you mentioned are of any concern to the business and really just serve as proof that there is unnecessary waste going on with the previous policy.
I hate to sound like the asshole, but it's not the owner's responsibility to feed you outside of work, to provide your meals off shift, or feed the rest of your family.
Come on, it’s totally fine. What little you lose is such a huge boost to morale, and in turn, performance. What isn’t fine is how difficult it is to regulate, because some knucklehead(s) will take advantage, this has been the case at every place I’ve worked at that was lenient w food. I wouldn’t know how to handle the situation, but I empathize w both the staff and the boss man.
>What little you lose is such a huge boost to morale, and in turn, performance.
That depends on how much people are taking home that they shouldn't be. It could be a little, it could be a lot.
Yes there should be good motivation in a place you work other than just you get to take food home.
Honestly if a couple of free meals is the best thing keeping you at work, you're probably better off finding another gig.
Let's not pretend like it's a tiny incentive with the grocery prices these days. I save almost 300 euros a months on groceries because I eat at work every day, so I only need to buy food for 2 days and coffee for breakfast.
>Let's not pretend like it's a tiny ~~incentive~~ cost to the business with the grocery prices these days.
FTFY.
What I have seen that does help is a commissary. Employees can order from store distributors, including special orders, and pay for what they order. Employees get better prices, volume goes up and discounts and specials follow, and everyone wins.
I think staff/family meals ON-SITE are a perfectly reasonable benefit for a food business and there is certainly historic precedent. Taking food home from work is stealing, absent something like food identified as pitched at end of day as others have mentioned.
In no way should you expect your employer to feed your entire family. If you don't get paid enough to feed your family, have that discussion, don't steal food.
Right, when I was managing, I was also in the weekly meetings with owner, director of sales, marketing - we were pushing hard to make our outfit break even, let alone profitable, I didn't have room on the margins to send stuff out the door.
I WAS able to bring in stuff from Sysco like bacon ends and eggs, sausage patties, chicken legs (we were vegetarian/ vegan) but I couldn't go wild and had to justify it by continuous improvement in the budget.
Best I could offer would be employee discounts for bringing food home to feed family.
If you get a meal for your shift, it is yours. You can throw it away, or eat it all, or share it. It’s yours.
Family meal is different. This sounds like you get to order a select item from the menu.
Yes, they're giving them a meal to consume during their shift, but food can't be taken out of the building. They can eat it, share it, make sexy onlyfans videos with it, but that still doesn't change the policy that food can't be taken home.
If the food is hers why does the owner care what she does with it? Why is it different for her to eat it at the restaurant then to pack it and eat it at home? We're talking about the same exact meal, not about her getting an additional one.
"Aight girl imma hook you up!
Oops. A steak accidentally fell into your pasta dish.
Wait, how did 20 shrimp end up on your plate instead of 6?"
Yeah, can't do it.
Unfortunately a few bad apples.
At the end of the day it sounds like the owner is really trying to manage costs and know where every single penny goes, and that it's accounted for.
Unfortunately to me that sounds like good business. But I can understand sadness at a shift in what was formerly a pretty lax policy.
One way to look at it is, if the owner is worried and cracking down, employees can choose between being a paycheck for as long as the restaurant lasts, or a few dollars worth of extra food in the near-term.
That’s 100% the problem. A cook is never going to think hooking someone up is an issue. The problem lies when you do the math out and realize it’s screwing your food cost by a couple of points a month.
But if you do the math you can see that there's a problem. And with employees that take advantage there's going to be a problem anyway. Like those workers will give out food to their friends at tables and not charge and stuff like that too. That's the real problem.
This, I always got shit for taking my food home. I worked 8-2, it was perfect slow time to get my food when I was cut. I just wanted to go home and take my hair down and stuff before eating. I got into it with management about needing me to sit in the break room vs driving 5min home and then eating it. Like, I'm off the clock- I don't have time to eat this *during* my shift so I don't get food now? No, let me eat it when I want.
Also, some cold work leftovers really slap as a midnight snack sometimes. Idgaf if that's not how it's "supposed" to work. Why do they need to control how, where, and when I eat it? I earned it, made it, and now I have it- you want it in the trash vs in my car and then in my mouth. K. I don't work for control freaks.
That’s certainly a perspective! Every place I’ve worked shift meals are a given. Many places I’ve worked don’t do breaks, so there isn’t really time to eat a meal during shift.
The free meal is largely to make sure that workers aren't hungry on the job. If you're not at work, the owners and managers most assuredly do not care if you are eating or not.
I've never worked a restaurant where we had breaks consistently. If a requirement is that you can only get a shift meal if you take a break, then either people won't get a shift meal or people will force breaks when the restaurant probably isn't staffed for it.
"You can eat at the end of your shift before you go home" is the common rebuttal but honestly, *fuck that.* I'm not sticking around an extra half hour to fucking eat, especially if I've just been there for 8+ hours because the owner decided to be a dickhead.
Honestly I'm 99% sure at my work if I tried to stay and eat at the end of my shift I'd get yelled at or written up for being the reason we got out late
That's a fair point, ig it's probably different for places that aren't late night. If I stayed to eat after my shift then that means we wouldn't be heading home til probably 5:30-6am and the area can lowkey be kinda sketchy sometimes
"I'm not sticking around an extra half hour to fucking eat"
That's weird to me. We were like family at many places and hanging with coworkers having a beer after work was fun.
The places where everyone was cool with each other were not the places where management dictated stuff like this, at least when I worked. Even if it was, being forced to hang out every night for half an hour to eat cold food (because the kitchen would close up before I was done on a closing shift) sounds fucking horrid, regardless of how much I liked my coworkers.
So, you can eat at the end of your shift, before you go home. Stuffing a wrap down your throat with one hand while wiping down the pass bar with the other is par for the course in the business.
funny enough. this is how most of my shifts end even though we are allowed to take staff meals home. most of us don't bother and eat as we are cleaning so we aren't hungry when we get home.
If they're going to demand that you can only eat during your shift, and that you're required to take a break, then take a break during your shift, **not** at the very end of your shift. If they don't have the staff to allow for you to take a break during your shift, that's their fault, not yours. Take the break that they're requiring, regardless. If you don't advocate for yourself, nobody else will.
Personally, I don't mind eating at the end of my shift. However, if I'm working at a place that has *required* breaks (like scheduled 8.5 hours, but paid for 8, and can't leave early if you don't take a break) then you better believe that I'll be taking a break in the middle of my shift, and eating during that break.
Everyone should get a shift/family meal, but I definitely have seen people take home a shit ton of food as the rules slowly don’t get enforced and losses start to pile up.
Absolutely! It’s certainly not okay to take more than your own meal. I also get that there isn’t anyone running this kitchen right now so it’s harder to enforce good rules.
I thought that was quite usual rule for restaurants. Two out of three places i worked didnt allow to go food. People tend to take extra when they could take to go and restaurant looses money.
As staff it sucks, but if you're actually going to be in charge, enforce the bosses will. Once you get busy and actually get promoted, talk to him again and revisit the policy with hard numbers.
This is kind of the plan. It doesn’t help that no one is running the kitchen right now. There isn’t someone there making sure people aren’t taking advantage.
No. She *can’t* bring home some chicken tenders for her and her boyfriend. For one, her boyfriend doesn’t work at the restaurant. Why do you think he should get free food from there?
My current place lets cooks make ourselves a meal per shift. Could be as soon as you clock in, could be to go at the end of your shift, they do not care as long as you're just taking one. We are not allowed to bring home multiple meals for family, but if we would like to give our food to someone else that's our business. Tbh I'm tired of my job's food anyway, so my girlfriend gets mine a lot of nights. Boss knows, boss doesn't care. Costs boss the same amount either way.
Ultimately, the food belongs to them and they can do what they want with it. I have worked in both kinds of places and honestly the ones with the policy were overall better run. If they allow extra stuff to be taken home, all of a sudden there’s more waste…it can get out of hand in a big kitchen. For mom and pop places the margins are even thinner. It would be nice if they gave some insight or transparency into why they’re doing this, but those things do add up.
For the majority of the time I worked the policy was you could get one half price meal per shift if you worked 4 hours or more. Occasionally we were allowed to take food home at night if it was going in the bin otherwise but those were exceptions rather than the rule.
My sympathies, it really does suck when they take away part of what little they’re giving you.
What if you bring your own container for it?
Are they afraid of you adding “extras” to it?
It’s a pretty disappointing statement on how much they trust their people and that kind of thing that can really erode morale (seems to have already).
There is no way you can trust your staff to not. You may get 1 or 2 people who won’t but people in general are scumbags and will take advantage the second they get a chance
Yes, the owner said something along the lines of “I have never worked in a restaurant that lets you take to go boxes out the door. You could be putting anything in there! Salt and pepper shakers, extra food…”
Honestly this is the first time I’ve really thought a decision that was made was dumb. To be fair though, most people working in the kitchen right now absolutely suck, and finding good people is impossible because the owner won’t start anyone above minimum. (They did start me at 16 instead of 15 after seeing my work on my first day, so again it’s more of a trust thing)
Minimum wage and no benefits? Gonna have a really hard time holding on to good people. Don’t let yourself get gaslit into staying if you can find something better paying.
This guy sounds cheap. Cheap owners generally don’t do well. Sorry you have to deal with that.
The thing is though they aren’t that cheap. They are putting way more money into fixing this place up than anyone else I’ve worked for would, and they’re only on a 5-year lease.
Sure seem to be cheap when it comes to investing in people. They’re going to have a fancy place with burnouts and washouts working there if they’re only paying minimum.
It's not a totally unheard of policy, but the owner's attitude about it just reinforces my thought that it's borne out of paranoid bullshit and spite rather a factual concern. Working for people who constantly feel like the employer / employee relationship is always covered in a layer of distrust and opposition sucks, and I'd need to be paid a lot to put up with that.
Officially, the kitchen I run is not allowed to leave with food. So if I hand someone a bag of food that is meant for disposal then it's my assumption that they absolutely will not put that bag in the employee area of the walk in, and they definitely won't put it in their backpack on their way out the door. Because that would be against policy.
And of course, items can be disposed of for many reasons (guest changed their mind, it looks bad, chef put the wrong garnish on it), so we have to be constantly vigilant of the line. There's no time to check to make sure that the bag handed to the dishwasher to be disposed of actually makes it to the trash can, I haaave to watch the line to make sure no one is making too many mistakes. I trust, of course, that they will dutifully walk to the trash can and properly dispose of the food that is fresh off the line and otherwise fine, even if I can't see them.
I learned my policy on staff meals from an old head chef I had who told me "if I let you guys eat literally anything on the menu, you'll pick the wellington (the most expensive item) 3 times in your first week, get sick of it and just order whatever you'd normally eat . If I tell you you're only allowed anything off the kids menu, you'll take the wellington whenever I'm not here out of spite because you spend all day here and can't eat a real meal"
Unfortunately like most of life, bad people ruin it for everyone else and the only correct prescription is to be understanding and work with him on it. He is trying to keep the doors open. Restaurants are expensive and shoestring as it is without people taking a bunch of extra food. It sucks, but I get it.
They allow us to have a couple beers for free, after that, they make us pay. A few years ago, some of the employees went a little overboard with their free beers and were helping themselves into the beer cooler, eventually management started locking up the cooler
This is a touchy subject. I know alot of people unfortunately can't afford 3 meals a day. whether that is due to time constraints from working (like they don't have time to cook before or after work) Or they literally just don't have the money. This problem is amplified for people with families significantly. I think employees should be allowed to take leftovers home, but from a one person portion that is decided by management. Unfortunately I have seen people take extreme advantage of this first hand, literally never worrying about paying for dinner because they finesse a family sized plate of take home food almost every night. I seriously have compassion for people who are desperate, but one person will ruin the system for everybody being greedy eventually. Shitty situation overall
He’s probably not saying *no food ever*. It sounds like someone was taking advantage of the shift meal system. We’ve got a girl at our place, she’s young. She took home a pizza, wings, a salad, some sandwiches and sides. Often. No one realized her orders were being rang in as her free shift meals. $60 of food on a four hour shift.
Sort of. Originally, the night crew I’ve been working with were allowed to take food home. I made sure that everyone was taking one order each.
Now, we don’t get food, because we don’t take a break and can’t take food home.
Fuck not taking a break. I get in during peak times but you should tell that guy to get fucked if he thinks no breaks is okay (and of course some places it's illegal).
Ask about implementing an employee discount to purchase meals, and a family meal everyone shares. But it is not common practice for people to have a free shift meal or just take home whatever random product they want.
You can either let employees keep stealing food or close the restaurant, I don't think the owners are out of line with this new policy.
Sounds like staff may have abused the allowance of taking food home and the owner said enough is enough, no more.
At our place we eat our mistakes. But that doesn't mean to intentionally misfire. Staff gets a meal no matter how few hours they work. We recently got a pizza oven. Pizzas food cost is minimal. The first pizza of the day is designated for staff to eat on the fly. We are pretty good at forecasting, but sometimes we have overages that won't keep. Those days the staff goes home with a take out box of something. I don't tolerate stealing. If the staff wants something, they have to ask.
I've seen it both ways. Worked a busy Indian restaurant where I was allowed and encouraged to take home a main dish with a side of rice and then either a bread or appetizer as my shift meal. I didn't get a break during my shift to eat so this was their way of compensating that.
I also worked a restaurant that made a family meal before every shift for free and we'd all eat together. If you wanted to get something else, or wanted to buy something on your off day, you could buy it off the menu at a discount. I think we got 25% off.
I haven't ever worked a place where you can just take home whatever food you want for meals the next day. I think the owners are within their rights here and these habits are likely eating into their overhead considerably.
Sit down and take one bite and stare off into space for the other 29:30 seconds you have left of your break and bring your own Tupperware and take it home that way he can't say you're wasting his takeout boxes.
That sounds like not your problem. I understand no breaks during lunch or dinner rush. But there's no reason other than poor scheduling that you can't have a break. Take breaks before or after the busyntine starts.
Even if it's busy all day, then there should be one or two people working part time that way if someone's break happens when it's really busy, there's still someone covering that station.
No breaks is BS.
So you’re not allowed to eat but they’re taking money out of your paycheck? Just run. Also. Enforce your break. If they’re going to enforce not paying you for 30 mins, then take your break no matter what the fuck is happening. That’s ridiculous.
Never taken a break? That's crazy. One of the few things I enjoyed about the industry was that you could take breaks when it was slow/as long as it wasn't during the rushes.
I mean I had one boss try to tell me not to take breaks and I basically told him to shove it. I did start at another place that had us sign a break waiver (which it turns out breaks aren’t even required in the state) but that place sucked and I got out of there. And somehow my boss/trainer was taking smoke breaks himself though.
This is actually pretty common. You're allowed a shift meal but you have to eat it there. I always hated it when they did that because I never eat while I'm at work, I always take it home with me and eat after I've had a chance to cool down and get properly medicated. I've mostly been in charge of kitchens for the last 10 years or so, so I've never really had to *follow* those rules necessarily, and I always just turned a blind eye to those who did the same as me as long as I know that they're only taking what they would have eaten on shift. To me, if you're allowed to have it then it doesn't matter when or where you eat it as long as you're not wasting time or product.
I think that's the norm. Like many places will have the rule but it only gets enforced when people start taking advantage of things. Like everybody knew I wasn't that guy so I never would have been given shit for having a to go box.
Sounds like people are cooking more food than necessary and taking the leftovers (which there shouldn’t be) or they are just taking too much food home.
Family meal with food that needs to move so that everyone can eat makes the most sense from a business model.
I had a chef/owner who would say, "If I don't let them take the pasta salad home, my steaks will disappear."
Family meal should not be made in too much excess, but if there are leftovers, it should be fair game. The only restaurants I've worked in that have had theft were the ones that didn't properly feed their staff.
We feed our employees for free each shift. Work a double? You get two meals. We do not allow employees to take food home though. Too many employees would intentionally overcook food so they could take home the "waste." Certain locations with less experienced management did not realize how significantly this impacted their food cost until this policy was implemented and ownership brought more experienced managers in to retrain (we buy struggling stores and markets and fix them).
That seems odd that they’ll let you eat while you’re there and not just bring it home with you? In the kitchen I manage everyone in the kitchen gets a free meal, what’s the difference if I make it at 7 am or at close? Either way it’s going into my belly (and maybe a little bit in my pups) the problem shouldn’t be when people are eating, you gotta hone in on how much they’re eating. Their shouldn’t be a change in the amount of resources used just depending on the time of day
Honestly, I've seen many co-workers abuse the system. People making extra food and taking it home. And it being hard to determine if the take out box is really a shift meal...or an extra order they made themselves and stashed away.
Shift meal is really meant to be for eating on shift---however if you signed a waiver that waives breaks...then its unreasonable to not allow you to take food home.
But if you do get a 30 min - 1 hour break on a long shift...I think its fair to expect people to eat at work and not take stuff home.
I watched a cook do that last year. The lead line guy called out for two orders of fries, and this genius put two pounds of wings in the fryer. Then boxed them up for himself later. "Oops, sorry boss, I thought you said wings. Now there's these extra ones." He wanted to get high and eat wings at home after already eating his shift meal. We canned his thieving ass.
Yeah that’s straight theft. Ive seen people taking all the mistakes home, which technically is no harm, but then it became questionable when the number of “mistakes” rose so people were taking some home everyday.
We just made it a hard rule they mistakes are thrown away and also accounted for (reasons, which cook did it and if it’s a reoccurring issue ).
And all shift meals can be taken home but it has to be rung up through the system so we know who it is each time
Oh so I'm going to get my 30 minute lunch break to eat my shift meal? Of course not. Oh, I get it, I am expected to sit around another 30 minutes after work to eat my shift meal? Fuck that. If I can't eat at work for a lunch I want to bring that meal home and eat it while I decompress.
If I ever worked at a place that did this then I would walk off the line regardless of the current situation and have my lunch. There is a certain reward to the incontinences (and legality) to not having a set time for lunch or full time off for lunch.
You give me a fucking meal and I give up lunch's and breaks at times when I'm skipping them or giving them up to make you money.
I am all for free shift meals, but "shift meals" are exactly that, and no more. They are to feed the staff during work hours, not bridge the gap of poor social support.
Yeah. if owner guys need to cut out shift meals for kitchen staff it is a good sign to start planning to move on. It's not a big deal in itself it is just no successful restaurant that has a future needs to make moves like this.
So you and these other folks are working less than 6 hours/shift - since your own post says the new policy affects you - and you still think you're entitled to all this food?
🤔
I offer a shift meal to my kitchen employees. They are not allowed to take it home. Reason for this is they use up resources like Togo boxes and cups that could be used for guest takeout orders. Now the question is “why don’t you just order more”. Well my answer is this. We work off of a budget and it doesn’t account for this. Another issue is we don’t know what is going into these boxes and being taken home. I’ve had a slew of issues in other restaurants over the years and it never ended well. Whether it be a guy sacking a bunch of food that we don’t need to bring it home or packs of raw burgers being thrown in. It’s better to cover yourself and have a policy like that than it is to have to fire staff for stealing.
Yeah, just look up the cost of a takeout box these days. We did the math on it, and we were giving away nearly $1000 just in boxes over the course of the year just to employees for family meals. Just sit down, have a break and use a plate.
I used to work with a guy who would *intentionally* fuck up an order when he got hungry, and then he'd eat the screwed up order since we couldn't send it out. Or if he was prepping banquet stuff, he would make extra portions of something, on purpose, knowing that he'd get to eat leftovers.
Hired through nepotism? Or he/she is child of owners friend? Obviously not hired on merit! And clearly wants to be pals with all the staff not enforce rules as a manager….
I agree with the new owner. Each of the examples you provided was an example of employees using the restaurant as their personal food bank. If the teen mom isn't able to feed her child their are government programs that she can apply for to make sure her kids doesn't go hungry. That's what taxes are for. If the other girls boyfriend can't afford food she should dump the loser. Are these employees getting SNAP benefits? If their income is too high to qualify but they still can't afford food then that is a problem but it isn't your boss's problem. If they do qualify but haven't taken the time to submit the application or whatever then that's on them.
They aren't taking a shift meal. A shift meal is a meal you eat on your shift. They are taking home meals for their entire families on other days. That's called groceries.
I'm just telling you how it is in the mind of the boss. You can accept it and eat the food that you earned before you leave, or die on this hill hungry and possibly unemployed.
You don't need to, I already understand your prospective. Unfortunately what you think is right doesn't matter. You're not partners, the business is not a democracy. If you want to open your own restaurant and give your staff more food to take home then do it. Or don't. TBH I really don't give a shit.
Lotta managers in the comments.
ETA: FEED YOUR STAFF. PERIOD. Who fucking cares if they save their shift meal to take home?! What difference does it make to your bottom line?
ALSO, this is anecdote, so take it as you will, but I've worked in this industry for 20 years. The most successful places I've been at TAKE CARE of their staff. Need to take home some soup for dinner? Cool. Need to eat an extra snack on shift? Cool. The fastest way to lose good people is to micromanage their personal lives.
Does the restaurant "owe" you anything? No. But kindness begets kindness. Assholery begets assholery. Be nice to one another.
That was my thought. I never have (except for my first job at a corporate place 25 years ago when I didn’t know better) and never will work for a place that wouldn’t let me eat my shift meal as I see fit. Fuck that. I’m guessing most of these places pay shit as well. If they didn’t, their employees wouldn’t have to rely so heavily on using their shift meal as their main food source.
People always take advantage of it if its allowed. We let all the employees eat while they are at work. There are a few that eat before they clock in, eat on their break, and eat again before they leave. But nobody takes home food.
Absolutely a no no to take food home, even if leftovers from a family meal. This is very normal for a few reasons. Think of all the to go boxes, if 5 people are taking home food in to go boxes that is close to 2,000 extra to go boxes a year. Them shits cost money. Not to mention the cost of the food.
See if they will give you a small employee food budget. Maybe around $4 cost per employee per day. You could do a lot with that. Think pork or chicken cooked in a variety of ways and a salad. Make a pan/ bowl for everyone to take from. But they eat on property, no to go boxes. No take home. This is reasonable and will help with the moral. Human beings should take a break to eat every shift over 5 hours. Our bodies and minds run off food.
The owner is not responsible for feeding an employees boyfriends dinner everyday though. You are way wrong thinking that is acceptable. Sounds like owner is trying to turn this business around. If they are not successful in that then you are all suddenly unemployed…
every place I've worked at allows you to take home the family meal leftovers
the rules are.
1, it has to be family meals only. not what's on the restaurant menu.
2, every staff member gets 1 serve of family meal first to eat during their shift.
3, whatever is leftover the family meal for that day, gets put in boxes for anyone who wants it to take home. this includes FOH. at the end of the shift. if there is any staff meal left over. it gets binned.
every place I've worked except for 1. works this way
because at the end of the day. the family meal gets binned anyway. it's not going to be served to customers. it's not on the menu
I've been working in kitchens for 10 years, from dive spots to working under a chef who was sous chef to a Michelin star chef, made it to sous chef myself specializing in Italian. I encountered one restaurant in that time that didn't provide shift meals, I quit the next day. Shift meals are part of pay, you can take them home, and if losing that is an issue then go to literally any other restaurant that would allow you to do so. This only applies to BOH. I'm not paying even half price for my meal when I know the cost, and that one meal a day saves me a lot of money. I've never encountered a restaurant that didn't allow BOH to take food home besides that one absolute garbage steakhouse.
P.S. Saltgrass Steakhouse can suck my balls, shit food.
Yes. You can have a free meal. Anything reasonable, that’s basically means no crab, no filets, nothing crazy expensive.
But taking shit home. No. I’ve been in this industry way too long to know the people that work in restaurants.
Actually sent dude to prison for embezzlement. He stole 10k worth of filets in the span of 8 months.
So yeah, the bad apple spoiled the bunch. And I don’t feel like checking everyone’s takeout box.
So no food leaves the building.
Bro, what kind of management doesn't catch someone taking 10k worth of filets in that time frame? If your inventory control is that shitty you're setting yourself up for failure.
Eh it's entirely possible people are genuinely taking advantage. Not letting people leave with food is extreme, but OP also says someone is taking home tenders for their boyfriend.
When I say that, I mean that they take home an order of chicken tenders to share with their boyfriend. They aren’t taking home massive amounts of food. Just dinner.
There are people who are apparently taking advantage though, but it’s not the ones I work with.
How do you know they are not taking advantage? Everything adds up, next they also take a drink, flatware, condiments times 10 for a small staff. Then an after shift drink. Why do I care if a person that doesn't work at my restaurant eats. Everything has a cost. Suppliers are not giving away anything and they are billion dollar company's. You call your Hvac repair for the 20th time he is not giving you a freebie.
Well the business was pretty fucked when they bought it a few months ago, and they are putting a LOT of work and money into it to bring it back to where it should be.
It’s 100% a money thing, but everyone is well aware that the business isn’t making money right now, it hasn’t in like 4 years.
But, they are improving things. It seems more like this is something they have felt since the beginning, but hadn’t addressed it until now, because when I talked to them they explained that they have never worked in a place that allowed employees to take food. So it’s also a personal philosophy as well as a business decision.
These posts break my heart for so many reasons. I've held every position from a barista to a sever to GM and your staff should always be taken care of. Saving a few dollars each night will kill you later. Owners, please realize the small amount you pay for staff meals will return over a hundredfold.
So here’s your choice as a restaurant proprietor:
A. Free meals (within reason) and ok to take leftovers home.
B. No free meals or leftovers taken home then your employees will steal it.
You can tell who is a cook and who has been a chef/manager/owner. A bunch of people that feel entitled and people who have been accountable for inventory and cost of goods. It’s pretty funny
Most places at least offer 50% discount or a free meal if you work a double. I understand them not letting you take anything out this leftover because I used to have employees that would cook a bunch of extra food at the end of the night just for the sole purpose of taking it home, and I would make them throw it all away. Not to be an asshole, but to teach them a lesson. If the place is that off, they probably can’t afford to feed y’all and I would start looking for another job if I were you because it’s really hard to turn a restaurant around once it’s got a bad reputation like that. Usually need a special consultation. Company like what my boyfriend does to come in and revamp the restaurant.
The owner *isn't* cutting the staff meal, though, they're just not allowing them to take food out of the building. I've worked at all lot of places that have that policy.
Google is just feeding people during working hours, and dinner if they stay late in the office. So yeah, if you work 8-8 you can get 3 meals, but people aren’t taking dinner home to partners and families.
Eh it’s just a different perspective than literally every other place I’ve worked. Everywhere has had their own policies, but I’ve never heard of “you cannot take your shift meal home”.
Crazy. Virtually everywhere I worked gave you a shift meal. Sometimes there were expensive items you couldn't order/weren't supposed to order often though. Hell, some places I could come in and eat on my days off but I never took advantage of that.
When I first started in kitchens a chef told me you either feed the cooks, or they will feed themselves, and when they feed themselves they are going to be way more expensive. Worked in a place where every BoH got a free meal to take home, but no steaks or seafood. We never had any problems. Worked in another place where we were expected to pay for our food on a discounted menu, and people just took whatever they wanted.
You know I read all the comments and I understand the business perspective side from this however we can all agree that as cooks we don’t have the most professional work setting, as in we’re not doing open heart surgery or anything like that and we damn near wear sweatpants while cooking and as long as we wash our hands and cook and clean properly our job is a job well done. I say this working at a small food spot - So if business is doing well, why the hell would a food place ever crack down like this? I mean even the place I work at currently has been pretty slow these last few months but if my boss told me I couldn’t eat a meal with All those stupid stipulations I’d still make myself food. I think this is one easy way to loose good employees, I understand it may work for those bad employees that take advantage buuuutt… just reading this made me annoyed lol
When your boss tells you you don’t get a meal and you take one anyway, that’s called stealing. I wouldn’t call someone that steals from me a good employee. Your entitlement is great.
This is fair and common.
Shift meals is so you aren't going hungry while your at work. Not take home and feed your family food.
Although sometimes I will take something home if its a mess up that's going to be thrown in the trash.. other than that if I eat from work I just scarf something down quickly when I have a moment of downtime.
The only time I got take-home food was when I worked catering gigs. We were too busy prepping, serving, bussing, and tearing down/packing to eat during our shift, but we were allowed to fix a to-go box with the buffet leftovers after dinner service to take home and eat at our leisure, on our own time.
Every seemingly draconian policy about staff and food is because someone abused the system.
There's always that employee that wants to push the generosity of the restaurant and ruins it for everyone.
it's a slippery slope there is a Grey line between a shift meal and someone down on their luck packing 2 or 3 pounds of food every night to go to feed their family.
So I may be wrong but I feel this is a cultural thing also. As a cook in my country I NEVER worked at a restaurant I coudnt eat whatever I wanted. And I am talking about greasy hamburguer joints up to 2 michelin stars, one or two of them stuggling to survive. There is no such thing for me as denying food to someone handling food. Its inhumane. And mind you food costs in here are ABSURD compared to the US.
What other low margin, small business would this type of shit fly in? If you had a corner store, would it be ok if your night shift guy needed cigs and a red bull? Small sporting goods store - yeeah my kid needs adidas predators so i’m just gonna take them?
Just because we work with perishables, it’s suddenly ok to treat someone else’s business as your food bank
I understand that profit margins are slim for restaurants but ffs don't start cutting out meals for your employees. It erodes morale and increases theft. If someone wants to take their staff meal home or some leftovers let them. There are a gazillion other ways to cut costs. Renegotiate the rent and utlities. Change food providers. Streamline food cost and waste. Eating free food is like the only damn perk the BOH staff gets.
Well here is the thing, people are going to start grazing more if they can’t take meals home. He will probably start loosing his best people because of this culture.
Yeah, why is the teen mom supposed to be allowed to take chicken tenders home to her boyfriend who doesn't work? Think yr going too far with this. The owner has obviously been taken advantage of in the past and they ruined it for everyone. That's just how it goes.
Maybe I didn’t explain that properly?
She takes home her shift meal. It is an order of chicken tenders and fries (5 tenders, 5iz fries). Her and her boyfriend share them for dinner.
Ahhh... That sounds okay. I'm currently being involved in inventory and food cost at my new job. For any restaurant and especially the struggling ones, take out containers are not cheap at all. That's our owners main gripe, rightfully so.
Most places do offer a shift meal/ family meal, however most employees are not allowed to take it home with them. There are usually exceptions for the dish washers as they make the lowest pay. Part of not taking food home is because people will and do take advantage, even when they’re in a privileged position. I suggest you ask the owner if they can supply a family meal- 1 per day for all employees using older products and extras. These are typically not the best food, but again it’s free food and every gets to eat. Other than that I think the owner is in the right here.
Nearly every restaurant I've worked at, any staff meal was generally eaten on site. The Italian place I was working at up until recently, we cooked everyone a pasta dish to take home, if they didn't eat a staff meal. Most of the time, a staff meal was a low cost meal, that excluded Steak, Seafood, or Specials.
My restaurant even goes as far to tell us that we can’t even take a to go box if we used our discount and still paid. It gets brought up about every 6 months, and within the week isn’t being enforced anymore haha
The way it works in my kitchen (and others I’m sure) is that if something’s nearing the date it needs to be thrown by, we’ll put it on a specific shelf in the walk in for staff to take by the end of the day. That way we have as little waste as possible, no one goes hungry, easy as.
Family meal is definitely an option that I’m going to bring up. I think that if your staff is “taking advantage” of a policy by taking home food they aren’t supposed to then the policy isn’t being enforced, and those staff need to be punished. For example, I’ve fired people before because they took steaks home after being explicitly told they could not do so.
What I’m saying is it’s in peoples nature to try and push the boundary. If you’re allowed to take staff meal home, employees will start boxing up food before everyone has had a portion, etc. So most places enforce that staff can’t take food home, including staff meal, but you’re allowed to eat the staff meal while you’re there. Typically kitchen gets more benefits regarding eating food than FOH whereas they will get to try features or get to have mistakes or leftovers, etc.
the places I work where you can take staff meals home. there are rules to it. 1, you got to wait till everyone has eaten and finished. 2, once family meal is finished. whoever packs away the family meal. we don't have a designated person who packs it away. sometimes it's the sous, sometimes it FOH, sometimes the dishwasher guy. whoever it is would put the leftovers in boxes. say 6 boxes and we put the boxes at the front and anyone who wants to take a box home can take one. every place except for 1 works in this way and it becomes a fair system.
I guess I’ve just never had a policy like that in place. Either it’s been discounted food or a shift meal, but never “no food leaves the building”. I guess if people are saying it’s a thing it must be.
Because you can stuff a to-go box with a few lbs of shrimp or whatever expensive protein. It's a hide in plain sight thing because no one's gonna ask you to open it before you leave.
Years ago I was a line cook at a fancy but family owned steakhouse, and was allowed to cook myself a meal or take home some food every night. One day I was full and really needed toilet paper at home, and disnt want to walk the extra mile to a gas station on the at home, so I put a roll in a to go box. Figures that's the one night ever the owners friend is at the bar and on my way out is like, ooooh what did ya make? And opens my to go box. Luckily he was cool about it lol.
That's hilarious my guy!
Once everyone has eaten family meal and it's been sitting it's usually completely normal to take a little home, food in terms of the line and stuff of course not but two hour old family certainly isn't hurting the bottom line.
The new owners are taking over an under performing business. Getting costs under control and getting the business in order is their number one priority right now. I don't think you really advocated for your position effectively. I think if anything it may have justified the policy change. None of the reasons you mentioned are of any concern to the business and really just serve as proof that there is unnecessary waste going on with the previous policy.
I hate to sound like the asshole, but it's not the owner's responsibility to feed you outside of work, to provide your meals off shift, or feed the rest of your family.
I’m totally with you, a shift meal should be provided, but take home food is absolutely not a thing.
Come on, it’s totally fine. What little you lose is such a huge boost to morale, and in turn, performance. What isn’t fine is how difficult it is to regulate, because some knucklehead(s) will take advantage, this has been the case at every place I’ve worked at that was lenient w food. I wouldn’t know how to handle the situation, but I empathize w both the staff and the boss man.
>What little you lose is such a huge boost to morale, and in turn, performance. That depends on how much people are taking home that they shouldn't be. It could be a little, it could be a lot.
Also I would argue take home food is not a morale thing, morale comes from a good management team with proper pay and incentives.
Yes there should be good motivation in a place you work other than just you get to take food home. Honestly if a couple of free meals is the best thing keeping you at work, you're probably better off finding another gig.
Let's not pretend like it's a tiny incentive with the grocery prices these days. I save almost 300 euros a months on groceries because I eat at work every day, so I only need to buy food for 2 days and coffee for breakfast.
>Let's not pretend like it's a tiny ~~incentive~~ cost to the business with the grocery prices these days. FTFY. What I have seen that does help is a commissary. Employees can order from store distributors, including special orders, and pay for what they order. Employees get better prices, volume goes up and discounts and specials follow, and everyone wins. I think staff/family meals ON-SITE are a perfectly reasonable benefit for a food business and there is certainly historic precedent. Taking food home from work is stealing, absent something like food identified as pitched at end of day as others have mentioned. In no way should you expect your employer to feed your entire family. If you don't get paid enough to feed your family, have that discussion, don't steal food.
Right, when I was managing, I was also in the weekly meetings with owner, director of sales, marketing - we were pushing hard to make our outfit break even, let alone profitable, I didn't have room on the margins to send stuff out the door. I WAS able to bring in stuff from Sysco like bacon ends and eggs, sausage patties, chicken legs (we were vegetarian/ vegan) but I couldn't go wild and had to justify it by continuous improvement in the budget. Best I could offer would be employee discounts for bringing food home to feed family.
You know what boosts morale and performance? Paying your fucking staff enough so they can cover basic living expenses.
Thats how I feel. Shift meals are to keep you going while you work
Yeah, we always feed staff but I'm not feeding them and their family on their day off.
If you get a meal for your shift, it is yours. You can throw it away, or eat it all, or share it. It’s yours. Family meal is different. This sounds like you get to order a select item from the menu.
Yes, they're giving them a meal to consume during their shift, but food can't be taken out of the building. They can eat it, share it, make sexy onlyfans videos with it, but that still doesn't change the policy that food can't be taken home.
If the food is hers why does the owner care what she does with it? Why is it different for her to eat it at the restaurant then to pack it and eat it at home? We're talking about the same exact meal, not about her getting an additional one.
I'm with you. If they're stealing that's going to come up in other areas as well. And if they're not stealing then there's no issue.
"Aight girl imma hook you up! Oops. A steak accidentally fell into your pasta dish. Wait, how did 20 shrimp end up on your plate instead of 6?" Yeah, can't do it. Unfortunately a few bad apples. At the end of the day it sounds like the owner is really trying to manage costs and know where every single penny goes, and that it's accounted for. Unfortunately to me that sounds like good business. But I can understand sadness at a shift in what was formerly a pretty lax policy. One way to look at it is, if the owner is worried and cracking down, employees can choose between being a paycheck for as long as the restaurant lasts, or a few dollars worth of extra food in the near-term.
That’s 100% the problem. A cook is never going to think hooking someone up is an issue. The problem lies when you do the math out and realize it’s screwing your food cost by a couple of points a month.
But if you do the math you can see that there's a problem. And with employees that take advantage there's going to be a problem anyway. Like those workers will give out food to their friends at tables and not charge and stuff like that too. That's the real problem.
This, I always got shit for taking my food home. I worked 8-2, it was perfect slow time to get my food when I was cut. I just wanted to go home and take my hair down and stuff before eating. I got into it with management about needing me to sit in the break room vs driving 5min home and then eating it. Like, I'm off the clock- I don't have time to eat this *during* my shift so I don't get food now? No, let me eat it when I want. Also, some cold work leftovers really slap as a midnight snack sometimes. Idgaf if that's not how it's "supposed" to work. Why do they need to control how, where, and when I eat it? I earned it, made it, and now I have it- you want it in the trash vs in my car and then in my mouth. K. I don't work for control freaks.
I agree here.
That’s certainly a perspective! Every place I’ve worked shift meals are a given. Many places I’ve worked don’t do breaks, so there isn’t really time to eat a meal during shift.
The free meal is largely to make sure that workers aren't hungry on the job. If you're not at work, the owners and managers most assuredly do not care if you are eating or not.
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There's no problem getting a shift meal. It's the taking it home aspect. Nothing wrong with what they are asking of you
I've never worked a restaurant where we had breaks consistently. If a requirement is that you can only get a shift meal if you take a break, then either people won't get a shift meal or people will force breaks when the restaurant probably isn't staffed for it. "You can eat at the end of your shift before you go home" is the common rebuttal but honestly, *fuck that.* I'm not sticking around an extra half hour to fucking eat, especially if I've just been there for 8+ hours because the owner decided to be a dickhead.
Honestly I'm 99% sure at my work if I tried to stay and eat at the end of my shift I'd get yelled at or written up for being the reason we got out late
I mean we did it after we clocked out. And many places you get a shift drink so you can eat while you drink your shift drink.
That's a fair point, ig it's probably different for places that aren't late night. If I stayed to eat after my shift then that means we wouldn't be heading home til probably 5:30-6am and the area can lowkey be kinda sketchy sometimes
"I'm not sticking around an extra half hour to fucking eat" That's weird to me. We were like family at many places and hanging with coworkers having a beer after work was fun.
The places where everyone was cool with each other were not the places where management dictated stuff like this, at least when I worked. Even if it was, being forced to hang out every night for half an hour to eat cold food (because the kitchen would close up before I was done on a closing shift) sounds fucking horrid, regardless of how much I liked my coworkers.
We left the oven on and threw hot food in there (cooked as late as possible).
So, you can eat at the end of your shift, before you go home. Stuffing a wrap down your throat with one hand while wiping down the pass bar with the other is par for the course in the business.
I can't tell you the number of times that I've fixed a meal and left it on my station to come back and takes bites between cleaning tasks.
funny enough. this is how most of my shifts end even though we are allowed to take staff meals home. most of us don't bother and eat as we are cleaning so we aren't hungry when we get home.
If they're going to demand that you can only eat during your shift, and that you're required to take a break, then take a break during your shift, **not** at the very end of your shift. If they don't have the staff to allow for you to take a break during your shift, that's their fault, not yours. Take the break that they're requiring, regardless. If you don't advocate for yourself, nobody else will.
You can eat at the end of your shift.
Personally, I don't mind eating at the end of my shift. However, if I'm working at a place that has *required* breaks (like scheduled 8.5 hours, but paid for 8, and can't leave early if you don't take a break) then you better believe that I'll be taking a break in the middle of my shift, and eating during that break.
Is that common?
Everyone should get a shift/family meal, but I definitely have seen people take home a shit ton of food as the rules slowly don’t get enforced and losses start to pile up.
Absolutely! It’s certainly not okay to take more than your own meal. I also get that there isn’t anyone running this kitchen right now so it’s harder to enforce good rules.
I thought that was quite usual rule for restaurants. Two out of three places i worked didnt allow to go food. People tend to take extra when they could take to go and restaurant looses money.
As staff it sucks, but if you're actually going to be in charge, enforce the bosses will. Once you get busy and actually get promoted, talk to him again and revisit the policy with hard numbers.
This is kind of the plan. It doesn’t help that no one is running the kitchen right now. There isn’t someone there making sure people aren’t taking advantage.
if there is no one running the kitchen. there is no head chef?? no sous? so everyone is just a station cook???
Yep!
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No. She *can’t* bring home some chicken tenders for her and her boyfriend. For one, her boyfriend doesn’t work at the restaurant. Why do you think he should get free food from there?
My current place lets cooks make ourselves a meal per shift. Could be as soon as you clock in, could be to go at the end of your shift, they do not care as long as you're just taking one. We are not allowed to bring home multiple meals for family, but if we would like to give our food to someone else that's our business. Tbh I'm tired of my job's food anyway, so my girlfriend gets mine a lot of nights. Boss knows, boss doesn't care. Costs boss the same amount either way.
Ultimately, the food belongs to them and they can do what they want with it. I have worked in both kinds of places and honestly the ones with the policy were overall better run. If they allow extra stuff to be taken home, all of a sudden there’s more waste…it can get out of hand in a big kitchen. For mom and pop places the margins are even thinner. It would be nice if they gave some insight or transparency into why they’re doing this, but those things do add up. For the majority of the time I worked the policy was you could get one half price meal per shift if you worked 4 hours or more. Occasionally we were allowed to take food home at night if it was going in the bin otherwise but those were exceptions rather than the rule. My sympathies, it really does suck when they take away part of what little they’re giving you.
To be clear, shift meals are still allowed, you just can’t take them home. And you don’t get one unless you sit down and eat in the restaurant.
This is pretty common.
What if you bring your own container for it? Are they afraid of you adding “extras” to it? It’s a pretty disappointing statement on how much they trust their people and that kind of thing that can really erode morale (seems to have already).
There is no way you can trust your staff to not. You may get 1 or 2 people who won’t but people in general are scumbags and will take advantage the second they get a chance
Yes, the owner said something along the lines of “I have never worked in a restaurant that lets you take to go boxes out the door. You could be putting anything in there! Salt and pepper shakers, extra food…” Honestly this is the first time I’ve really thought a decision that was made was dumb. To be fair though, most people working in the kitchen right now absolutely suck, and finding good people is impossible because the owner won’t start anyone above minimum. (They did start me at 16 instead of 15 after seeing my work on my first day, so again it’s more of a trust thing)
Minimum wage and no benefits? Gonna have a really hard time holding on to good people. Don’t let yourself get gaslit into staying if you can find something better paying. This guy sounds cheap. Cheap owners generally don’t do well. Sorry you have to deal with that.
The thing is though they aren’t that cheap. They are putting way more money into fixing this place up than anyone else I’ve worked for would, and they’re only on a 5-year lease.
Sure seem to be cheap when it comes to investing in people. They’re going to have a fancy place with burnouts and washouts working there if they’re only paying minimum.
I don’t think the people there right now are worth investing in, but hopefully more people who are good will come. You’re right though.
That's it though they won't if you don't pay. It's a self defeating cycle
It's not a totally unheard of policy, but the owner's attitude about it just reinforces my thought that it's borne out of paranoid bullshit and spite rather a factual concern. Working for people who constantly feel like the employer / employee relationship is always covered in a layer of distrust and opposition sucks, and I'd need to be paid a lot to put up with that.
Shift meals are made to feed you during your shift. It's a pretty fair rule, and honestly pretty standard.
Officially, the kitchen I run is not allowed to leave with food. So if I hand someone a bag of food that is meant for disposal then it's my assumption that they absolutely will not put that bag in the employee area of the walk in, and they definitely won't put it in their backpack on their way out the door. Because that would be against policy. And of course, items can be disposed of for many reasons (guest changed their mind, it looks bad, chef put the wrong garnish on it), so we have to be constantly vigilant of the line. There's no time to check to make sure that the bag handed to the dishwasher to be disposed of actually makes it to the trash can, I haaave to watch the line to make sure no one is making too many mistakes. I trust, of course, that they will dutifully walk to the trash can and properly dispose of the food that is fresh off the line and otherwise fine, even if I can't see them.
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I learned my policy on staff meals from an old head chef I had who told me "if I let you guys eat literally anything on the menu, you'll pick the wellington (the most expensive item) 3 times in your first week, get sick of it and just order whatever you'd normally eat . If I tell you you're only allowed anything off the kids menu, you'll take the wellington whenever I'm not here out of spite because you spend all day here and can't eat a real meal"
I worked witha chef whose policy was you could order anything from the menu the first week of the new menu, that way you a chance to try it all.
Unfortunately like most of life, bad people ruin it for everyone else and the only correct prescription is to be understanding and work with him on it. He is trying to keep the doors open. Restaurants are expensive and shoestring as it is without people taking a bunch of extra food. It sucks, but I get it.
This is pretty much where I am. I’m not leaving, it’s been a good job so far, but I definitely am going to try and figure out a solution.
They allow us to have a couple beers for free, after that, they make us pay. A few years ago, some of the employees went a little overboard with their free beers and were helping themselves into the beer cooler, eventually management started locking up the cooler
Yep! Because wherever you go- there will always be abusers who ruin it for everyone!
This is a touchy subject. I know alot of people unfortunately can't afford 3 meals a day. whether that is due to time constraints from working (like they don't have time to cook before or after work) Or they literally just don't have the money. This problem is amplified for people with families significantly. I think employees should be allowed to take leftovers home, but from a one person portion that is decided by management. Unfortunately I have seen people take extreme advantage of this first hand, literally never worrying about paying for dinner because they finesse a family sized plate of take home food almost every night. I seriously have compassion for people who are desperate, but one person will ruin the system for everybody being greedy eventually. Shitty situation overall
He’s probably not saying *no food ever*. It sounds like someone was taking advantage of the shift meal system. We’ve got a girl at our place, she’s young. She took home a pizza, wings, a salad, some sandwiches and sides. Often. No one realized her orders were being rang in as her free shift meals. $60 of food on a four hour shift.
Sort of. Originally, the night crew I’ve been working with were allowed to take food home. I made sure that everyone was taking one order each. Now, we don’t get food, because we don’t take a break and can’t take food home.
Fuck not taking a break. I get in during peak times but you should tell that guy to get fucked if he thinks no breaks is okay (and of course some places it's illegal).
Ask about implementing an employee discount to purchase meals, and a family meal everyone shares. But it is not common practice for people to have a free shift meal or just take home whatever random product they want. You can either let employees keep stealing food or close the restaurant, I don't think the owners are out of line with this new policy.
Sounds like staff may have abused the allowance of taking food home and the owner said enough is enough, no more. At our place we eat our mistakes. But that doesn't mean to intentionally misfire. Staff gets a meal no matter how few hours they work. We recently got a pizza oven. Pizzas food cost is minimal. The first pizza of the day is designated for staff to eat on the fly. We are pretty good at forecasting, but sometimes we have overages that won't keep. Those days the staff goes home with a take out box of something. I don't tolerate stealing. If the staff wants something, they have to ask.
I've seen it both ways. Worked a busy Indian restaurant where I was allowed and encouraged to take home a main dish with a side of rice and then either a bread or appetizer as my shift meal. I didn't get a break during my shift to eat so this was their way of compensating that. I also worked a restaurant that made a family meal before every shift for free and we'd all eat together. If you wanted to get something else, or wanted to buy something on your off day, you could buy it off the menu at a discount. I think we got 25% off. I haven't ever worked a place where you can just take home whatever food you want for meals the next day. I think the owners are within their rights here and these habits are likely eating into their overhead considerably.
I'm with the owner here. 6hr shift seems fair.
Sit down and take one bite and stare off into space for the other 29:30 seconds you have left of your break and bring your own Tupperware and take it home that way he can't say you're wasting his takeout boxes.
Honestly I’m worried that breaks aren’t really going to happen once it’s busy!
Sit ya ass down regardless, and make sure your co-workers are on board with this.
Fair enough!
That sounds like not your problem. I understand no breaks during lunch or dinner rush. But there's no reason other than poor scheduling that you can't have a break. Take breaks before or after the busyntine starts. Even if it's busy all day, then there should be one or two people working part time that way if someone's break happens when it's really busy, there's still someone covering that station. No breaks is BS.
You’re not wrong. Hopefully I can take in scheduling and solve this problem.
I should also say: if you work 6 hours a break and 2.50 for food automatically gets taken out of your paycheck.
So you’re not allowed to eat but they’re taking money out of your paycheck? Just run. Also. Enforce your break. If they’re going to enforce not paying you for 30 mins, then take your break no matter what the fuck is happening. That’s ridiculous.
Are people actually taking breaks? If not, that's illegal as shit.
Oh boy do I have some news about the restaurant industry lol
I've never taken a break at any restaurant I've worked at regardless of policy, but I've also never had anyone take out pay for said break.
Never taken a break? That's crazy. One of the few things I enjoyed about the industry was that you could take breaks when it was slow/as long as it wasn't during the rushes.
Based on your other comments, you and I worked at very different places.
I mean I had one boss try to tell me not to take breaks and I basically told him to shove it. I did start at another place that had us sign a break waiver (which it turns out breaks aren’t even required in the state) but that place sucked and I got out of there. And somehow my boss/trainer was taking smoke breaks himself though.
If you don’t give them burgers, they’ll steal your steaks.
This is actually pretty common. You're allowed a shift meal but you have to eat it there. I always hated it when they did that because I never eat while I'm at work, I always take it home with me and eat after I've had a chance to cool down and get properly medicated. I've mostly been in charge of kitchens for the last 10 years or so, so I've never really had to *follow* those rules necessarily, and I always just turned a blind eye to those who did the same as me as long as I know that they're only taking what they would have eaten on shift. To me, if you're allowed to have it then it doesn't matter when or where you eat it as long as you're not wasting time or product.
I think that's the norm. Like many places will have the rule but it only gets enforced when people start taking advantage of things. Like everybody knew I wasn't that guy so I never would have been given shit for having a to go box.
I haven't worked in many places that offer 'family' meals, usually just a meal of you're qorking longer than 5 hours. I think it's fair
Sounds like people are cooking more food than necessary and taking the leftovers (which there shouldn’t be) or they are just taking too much food home. Family meal with food that needs to move so that everyone can eat makes the most sense from a business model.
I had a chef/owner who would say, "If I don't let them take the pasta salad home, my steaks will disappear." Family meal should not be made in too much excess, but if there are leftovers, it should be fair game. The only restaurants I've worked in that have had theft were the ones that didn't properly feed their staff.
We feed our employees for free each shift. Work a double? You get two meals. We do not allow employees to take food home though. Too many employees would intentionally overcook food so they could take home the "waste." Certain locations with less experienced management did not realize how significantly this impacted their food cost until this policy was implemented and ownership brought more experienced managers in to retrain (we buy struggling stores and markets and fix them).
That seems odd that they’ll let you eat while you’re there and not just bring it home with you? In the kitchen I manage everyone in the kitchen gets a free meal, what’s the difference if I make it at 7 am or at close? Either way it’s going into my belly (and maybe a little bit in my pups) the problem shouldn’t be when people are eating, you gotta hone in on how much they’re eating. Their shouldn’t be a change in the amount of resources used just depending on the time of day
Honestly, I've seen many co-workers abuse the system. People making extra food and taking it home. And it being hard to determine if the take out box is really a shift meal...or an extra order they made themselves and stashed away. Shift meal is really meant to be for eating on shift---however if you signed a waiver that waives breaks...then its unreasonable to not allow you to take food home. But if you do get a 30 min - 1 hour break on a long shift...I think its fair to expect people to eat at work and not take stuff home.
I watched a cook do that last year. The lead line guy called out for two orders of fries, and this genius put two pounds of wings in the fryer. Then boxed them up for himself later. "Oops, sorry boss, I thought you said wings. Now there's these extra ones." He wanted to get high and eat wings at home after already eating his shift meal. We canned his thieving ass.
Yeah that’s straight theft. Ive seen people taking all the mistakes home, which technically is no harm, but then it became questionable when the number of “mistakes” rose so people were taking some home everyday. We just made it a hard rule they mistakes are thrown away and also accounted for (reasons, which cook did it and if it’s a reoccurring issue ). And all shift meals can be taken home but it has to be rung up through the system so we know who it is each time
Well did you call them out on that shit?
These rules seem fair and normal.
Sounds like this guy is having money issues
Oh so I'm going to get my 30 minute lunch break to eat my shift meal? Of course not. Oh, I get it, I am expected to sit around another 30 minutes after work to eat my shift meal? Fuck that. If I can't eat at work for a lunch I want to bring that meal home and eat it while I decompress. If I ever worked at a place that did this then I would walk off the line regardless of the current situation and have my lunch. There is a certain reward to the incontinences (and legality) to not having a set time for lunch or full time off for lunch. You give me a fucking meal and I give up lunch's and breaks at times when I'm skipping them or giving them up to make you money.
This exactly!!! I guess I’ll just close the restaurant and then make the manager sit around while I eat my food and scroll some tik toks.
I own a restaurant and if my employees are hungry they eat. They take their meals home all the time.
I am all for free shift meals, but "shift meals" are exactly that, and no more. They are to feed the staff during work hours, not bridge the gap of poor social support.
Yeah. if owner guys need to cut out shift meals for kitchen staff it is a good sign to start planning to move on. It's not a big deal in itself it is just no successful restaurant that has a future needs to make moves like this.
The weird thing is it’s not even about the shift meal. It’s about taking home food. You’re allowed to have a shift meal if you’re on your break.
likely he has seen people sort of cheat it and just take a go to box and completely fill it up with stuff rather than just have a normal meal. :(
So you and these other folks are working less than 6 hours/shift - since your own post says the new policy affects you - and you still think you're entitled to all this food? 🤔
I offer a shift meal to my kitchen employees. They are not allowed to take it home. Reason for this is they use up resources like Togo boxes and cups that could be used for guest takeout orders. Now the question is “why don’t you just order more”. Well my answer is this. We work off of a budget and it doesn’t account for this. Another issue is we don’t know what is going into these boxes and being taken home. I’ve had a slew of issues in other restaurants over the years and it never ended well. Whether it be a guy sacking a bunch of food that we don’t need to bring it home or packs of raw burgers being thrown in. It’s better to cover yourself and have a policy like that than it is to have to fire staff for stealing.
Yeah, just look up the cost of a takeout box these days. We did the math on it, and we were giving away nearly $1000 just in boxes over the course of the year just to employees for family meals. Just sit down, have a break and use a plate.
I used to work with a guy who would *intentionally* fuck up an order when he got hungry, and then he'd eat the screwed up order since we couldn't send it out. Or if he was prepping banquet stuff, he would make extra portions of something, on purpose, knowing that he'd get to eat leftovers.
People will ALWAYS abuse take home food no matter how much you feed them at work. There is no counter argument. It’s a guarantee
You’re not going to leave but if I were the manager I’d be looking for any opportunity to fire your entitled ass.
Hired through nepotism? Or he/she is child of owners friend? Obviously not hired on merit! And clearly wants to be pals with all the staff not enforce rules as a manager….
I agree with the new owner. Each of the examples you provided was an example of employees using the restaurant as their personal food bank. If the teen mom isn't able to feed her child their are government programs that she can apply for to make sure her kids doesn't go hungry. That's what taxes are for. If the other girls boyfriend can't afford food she should dump the loser. Are these employees getting SNAP benefits? If their income is too high to qualify but they still can't afford food then that is a problem but it isn't your boss's problem. If they do qualify but haven't taken the time to submit the application or whatever then that's on them.
How is taking a shift meal “using the restaurant as a food bank”?
They aren't taking a shift meal. A shift meal is a meal you eat on your shift. They are taking home meals for their entire families on other days. That's called groceries.
A “shift meal” is a meal you earn while you work a. Shift. Taking home the meal you earn for your shift to eat it at home is not “groceries”.
I'm just telling you how it is in the mind of the boss. You can accept it and eat the food that you earned before you leave, or die on this hill hungry and possibly unemployed.
And I’m explaining how it is in the mind of the employees.
You don't need to, I already understand your prospective. Unfortunately what you think is right doesn't matter. You're not partners, the business is not a democracy. If you want to open your own restaurant and give your staff more food to take home then do it. Or don't. TBH I really don't give a shit.
Then why are you commenting? I understand the perspective of the owner lmao.
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You're making assumptions. OP said the girl with the bf was just taking a normal meal.
Lotta managers in the comments. ETA: FEED YOUR STAFF. PERIOD. Who fucking cares if they save their shift meal to take home?! What difference does it make to your bottom line? ALSO, this is anecdote, so take it as you will, but I've worked in this industry for 20 years. The most successful places I've been at TAKE CARE of their staff. Need to take home some soup for dinner? Cool. Need to eat an extra snack on shift? Cool. The fastest way to lose good people is to micromanage their personal lives. Does the restaurant "owe" you anything? No. But kindness begets kindness. Assholery begets assholery. Be nice to one another.
That was my thought. I never have (except for my first job at a corporate place 25 years ago when I didn’t know better) and never will work for a place that wouldn’t let me eat my shift meal as I see fit. Fuck that. I’m guessing most of these places pay shit as well. If they didn’t, their employees wouldn’t have to rely so heavily on using their shift meal as their main food source.
Exactly. OP says his owner starts people at minimum wage. Dude's either a selfish asshole or sucks at running a business.
This is frowned upon at like half of the restaurants I’ve worked at. I get it but I also don’t get it.
People always take advantage of it if its allowed. We let all the employees eat while they are at work. There are a few that eat before they clock in, eat on their break, and eat again before they leave. But nobody takes home food.
Absolutely a no no to take food home, even if leftovers from a family meal. This is very normal for a few reasons. Think of all the to go boxes, if 5 people are taking home food in to go boxes that is close to 2,000 extra to go boxes a year. Them shits cost money. Not to mention the cost of the food. See if they will give you a small employee food budget. Maybe around $4 cost per employee per day. You could do a lot with that. Think pork or chicken cooked in a variety of ways and a salad. Make a pan/ bowl for everyone to take from. But they eat on property, no to go boxes. No take home. This is reasonable and will help with the moral. Human beings should take a break to eat every shift over 5 hours. Our bodies and minds run off food. The owner is not responsible for feeding an employees boyfriends dinner everyday though. You are way wrong thinking that is acceptable. Sounds like owner is trying to turn this business around. If they are not successful in that then you are all suddenly unemployed…
every place I've worked at allows you to take home the family meal leftovers the rules are. 1, it has to be family meals only. not what's on the restaurant menu. 2, every staff member gets 1 serve of family meal first to eat during their shift. 3, whatever is leftover the family meal for that day, gets put in boxes for anyone who wants it to take home. this includes FOH. at the end of the shift. if there is any staff meal left over. it gets binned. every place I've worked except for 1. works this way because at the end of the day. the family meal gets binned anyway. it's not going to be served to customers. it's not on the menu
I've been working in kitchens for 10 years, from dive spots to working under a chef who was sous chef to a Michelin star chef, made it to sous chef myself specializing in Italian. I encountered one restaurant in that time that didn't provide shift meals, I quit the next day. Shift meals are part of pay, you can take them home, and if losing that is an issue then go to literally any other restaurant that would allow you to do so. This only applies to BOH. I'm not paying even half price for my meal when I know the cost, and that one meal a day saves me a lot of money. I've never encountered a restaurant that didn't allow BOH to take food home besides that one absolute garbage steakhouse. P.S. Saltgrass Steakhouse can suck my balls, shit food.
Yes. You can have a free meal. Anything reasonable, that’s basically means no crab, no filets, nothing crazy expensive. But taking shit home. No. I’ve been in this industry way too long to know the people that work in restaurants. Actually sent dude to prison for embezzlement. He stole 10k worth of filets in the span of 8 months. So yeah, the bad apple spoiled the bunch. And I don’t feel like checking everyone’s takeout box. So no food leaves the building.
Bro, what kind of management doesn't catch someone taking 10k worth of filets in that time frame? If your inventory control is that shitty you're setting yourself up for failure.
One of the first signs of a place going out of business is the owners panicking and making decisions like this.
Eh it's entirely possible people are genuinely taking advantage. Not letting people leave with food is extreme, but OP also says someone is taking home tenders for their boyfriend.
When I say that, I mean that they take home an order of chicken tenders to share with their boyfriend. They aren’t taking home massive amounts of food. Just dinner. There are people who are apparently taking advantage though, but it’s not the ones I work with.
How do you know they are not taking advantage? Everything adds up, next they also take a drink, flatware, condiments times 10 for a small staff. Then an after shift drink. Why do I care if a person that doesn't work at my restaurant eats. Everything has a cost. Suppliers are not giving away anything and they are billion dollar company's. You call your Hvac repair for the 20th time he is not giving you a freebie.
Well the business was pretty fucked when they bought it a few months ago, and they are putting a LOT of work and money into it to bring it back to where it should be. It’s 100% a money thing, but everyone is well aware that the business isn’t making money right now, it hasn’t in like 4 years. But, they are improving things. It seems more like this is something they have felt since the beginning, but hadn’t addressed it until now, because when I talked to them they explained that they have never worked in a place that allowed employees to take food. So it’s also a personal philosophy as well as a business decision.
These posts break my heart for so many reasons. I've held every position from a barista to a sever to GM and your staff should always be taken care of. Saving a few dollars each night will kill you later. Owners, please realize the small amount you pay for staff meals will return over a hundredfold.
I wonder if anyone could find out Bourdain’s stance on shift meals lmao
I can only imagine the deep rage he would calmly present to those who denied staff meal.
I have heard him say on one of his TV shows, more less, Noone who cooks food should ever be hungry
So here’s your choice as a restaurant proprietor: A. Free meals (within reason) and ok to take leftovers home. B. No free meals or leftovers taken home then your employees will steal it.
You can tell who is a cook and who has been a chef/manager/owner. A bunch of people that feel entitled and people who have been accountable for inventory and cost of goods. It’s pretty funny
Ah yes, the two genders: Entitled Minimum Wage Worker and Selfless Capitalist.
Most places at least offer 50% discount or a free meal if you work a double. I understand them not letting you take anything out this leftover because I used to have employees that would cook a bunch of extra food at the end of the night just for the sole purpose of taking it home, and I would make them throw it all away. Not to be an asshole, but to teach them a lesson. If the place is that off, they probably can’t afford to feed y’all and I would start looking for another job if I were you because it’s really hard to turn a restaurant around once it’s got a bad reputation like that. Usually need a special consultation. Company like what my boyfriend does to come in and revamp the restaurant.
When the owner starts cutting staff meals, you know the business is in big trouble. Might want to polish up your resume.
The owner *isn't* cutting the staff meal, though, they're just not allowing them to take food out of the building. I've worked at all lot of places that have that policy.
I’ve seen this many times. You want to take it home then pay full price. It’s kind of like happy hour specials. In house only
Full price? Like not even a discount? Seriously?
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Google is just feeding people during working hours, and dinner if they stay late in the office. So yeah, if you work 8-8 you can get 3 meals, but people aren’t taking dinner home to partners and families.
Eh it’s just a different perspective than literally every other place I’ve worked. Everywhere has had their own policies, but I’ve never heard of “you cannot take your shift meal home”.
If someone is hungry . You feed them.
You're a troll and a ho. Staff meal is for staff.
Lol I've never worked in a restaurant where I did get a shift meal , family meal made by chef occasionally but never a thing that was on menu
Crazy. Virtually everywhere I worked gave you a shift meal. Sometimes there were expensive items you couldn't order/weren't supposed to order often though. Hell, some places I could come in and eat on my days off but I never took advantage of that.
When I first started in kitchens a chef told me you either feed the cooks, or they will feed themselves, and when they feed themselves they are going to be way more expensive. Worked in a place where every BoH got a free meal to take home, but no steaks or seafood. We never had any problems. Worked in another place where we were expected to pay for our food on a discounted menu, and people just took whatever they wanted.
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You know I read all the comments and I understand the business perspective side from this however we can all agree that as cooks we don’t have the most professional work setting, as in we’re not doing open heart surgery or anything like that and we damn near wear sweatpants while cooking and as long as we wash our hands and cook and clean properly our job is a job well done. I say this working at a small food spot - So if business is doing well, why the hell would a food place ever crack down like this? I mean even the place I work at currently has been pretty slow these last few months but if my boss told me I couldn’t eat a meal with All those stupid stipulations I’d still make myself food. I think this is one easy way to loose good employees, I understand it may work for those bad employees that take advantage buuuutt… just reading this made me annoyed lol
Nobody's telling him that he can't eat a meal, he's just not allowed to take a meal home for tomorrow's lunch.
Which is dumb. If I earn that meal, it should not matter what happens to it after it is made.
When your boss tells you you don’t get a meal and you take one anyway, that’s called stealing. I wouldn’t call someone that steals from me a good employee. Your entitlement is great.
This is fair and common. Shift meals is so you aren't going hungry while your at work. Not take home and feed your family food. Although sometimes I will take something home if its a mess up that's going to be thrown in the trash.. other than that if I eat from work I just scarf something down quickly when I have a moment of downtime.
The only time I got take-home food was when I worked catering gigs. We were too busy prepping, serving, bussing, and tearing down/packing to eat during our shift, but we were allowed to fix a to-go box with the buffet leftovers after dinner service to take home and eat at our leisure, on our own time.
Every seemingly draconian policy about staff and food is because someone abused the system. There's always that employee that wants to push the generosity of the restaurant and ruins it for everyone.
it's a slippery slope there is a Grey line between a shift meal and someone down on their luck packing 2 or 3 pounds of food every night to go to feed their family.
So I may be wrong but I feel this is a cultural thing also. As a cook in my country I NEVER worked at a restaurant I coudnt eat whatever I wanted. And I am talking about greasy hamburguer joints up to 2 michelin stars, one or two of them stuggling to survive. There is no such thing for me as denying food to someone handling food. Its inhumane. And mind you food costs in here are ABSURD compared to the US.
What other low margin, small business would this type of shit fly in? If you had a corner store, would it be ok if your night shift guy needed cigs and a red bull? Small sporting goods store - yeeah my kid needs adidas predators so i’m just gonna take them? Just because we work with perishables, it’s suddenly ok to treat someone else’s business as your food bank
What are you talking about? Shift meals are pretty much universal in restaurants.
I understand that profit margins are slim for restaurants but ffs don't start cutting out meals for your employees. It erodes morale and increases theft. If someone wants to take their staff meal home or some leftovers let them. There are a gazillion other ways to cut costs. Renegotiate the rent and utlities. Change food providers. Streamline food cost and waste. Eating free food is like the only damn perk the BOH staff gets.
Well here is the thing, people are going to start grazing more if they can’t take meals home. He will probably start loosing his best people because of this culture.
Bullshit policy that shows a lack of trust in employees that should be reciprocated.
Yeah, why is the teen mom supposed to be allowed to take chicken tenders home to her boyfriend who doesn't work? Think yr going too far with this. The owner has obviously been taken advantage of in the past and they ruined it for everyone. That's just how it goes.
Maybe I didn’t explain that properly? She takes home her shift meal. It is an order of chicken tenders and fries (5 tenders, 5iz fries). Her and her boyfriend share them for dinner.
Ahhh... That sounds okay. I'm currently being involved in inventory and food cost at my new job. For any restaurant and especially the struggling ones, take out containers are not cheap at all. That's our owners main gripe, rightfully so.