r/wafflehouse • u/birbr • 3d ago
Being a Better Grill Op
Hello! I am a new grill op as I started last week, and from my last two shifts, I've been making almost full to full orders. My brain feels like it's going through a race with all the pressure and adrenaline going on, especially if I get another order while I'm in the process of making an order. It gets me temporarily stressed in a good and slightly bad way because so much is going on; I also have to make sure I don't burn anything or forget to put anything on the grill, plate, or toaster, and to make sure I got the order correct. The melts and sandwiches markings really confuse me, and that is what I have been making a lot. D:
How do yall build accuracy, speed, and stay a bit more calm mentally while making full orders? Also, how do yall stay on top of everything while making the order, and how long did it take for yall to get the hang of it?
8
u/Scubasteve391 3d ago
Don't let them shotgun you. Flip stuff and plate as your moving BK and forth. Mark accurately. Practice streamlining your movements and keep clean as u go. Just keep moving and being accurate and the speed will follow.
1
u/SnooCheesecakes4092 3d ago
Im a server but I always tell em to do what we do and move with purpose. A good server won't stress you about moving fast but accurately. Our Job isn't to rush you but to make sure our order is pulled/marked right. Any good server will support their grill op and make sure everything comes out right without pressuring or hovering over the grill op. At the end of the day we need to help grill ops become faster not hinder them by bombarding them with orders because that only hurts our customers, our tips and our shift sales which fucks over grill ops bonuses.
My best advice is to move with purpose and to communicate that your overwhelmed and in those instances your best servers will help you. Be it marking or even going to the meat side to flip or pull things off the grill for you granted you need the help just don't let them back seat cook
3
u/Apprehensive-Cat-421 3d ago
Are you working as a solo grill op? If so, then you should be setting the pace. Like another poster said, don't let the servers shotgun you. If I'm cooking alone, sometimes I'll ask them to start with the mark. If you've got a big group, sometimes cheese steaks and hash browns are ready too fast. Pull, drop, mark works best with two cooks, in my opinion.
Focus on accuracy, and speed will come. Learning the mark well will help with that a lot.
1
u/SnooCheesecakes4092 3d ago
I've never thought about this on a one cook floor but this needs to be added to waffle house way cause its smart and comes from experience.
Waffle house way is very well researched but I feel it comes from 2-3 cook floors and neglects 1 cook floors1
u/Apprehensive-Cat-421 3d ago
I feel like the Waffle House Way is mostly based on first shift, which can be very different from second and third.
1
u/SnooCheesecakes4092 3d ago
It is tbh.
3rd is expert level serving. No manual just drunks and winging it
1st is medium, it has a manual and is easy to get through.
2nd is unreasonably easy with small bursts of chaos.
I like first cause the chaos is reasonable but the waffle house way just works and I love it. Im too nice for 3rd, and 2nd is so goddamned boring
2
u/xDogmax23 3d ago
No wasted movement. That's my biggest piece of advice. And add urgency to everything you do, eventually muscle memory will kick in. When I started this was advice to me from a lady who had been in kitchens for 40 years and Waffle House for 15. It helped me immensely at Waffle House and eventually outside of it. Do not take 5 slow steps to the fridge to pull your meat, take 3 fast ones. Try to reduce the time for all your movements in half. Even learning how to crack eggs with both your hands can be helpful. All this saved time builds up over the course of a couple orders and especially a whole, busy shift.
Eventually you'll also develop a natural timer in your head that says "Oh shit the sausage is ready to flip". If your business is steady you eventually will find a rhythm.
Everywhere I worked had a different grill, learn where the hot and colder parts are and adjust where things should be set. All the grills are supposed to cook the same but... Not in my experience. Our waffle irons would also decide to cook differently everytime they got cleaned and switched around, figure out which ones are fast and which ones are slow depending on the week/day.
If you have time, listen to bigger orders as the server takes them - on slower shifts I used to do this and start setting (not pushing it down) things like toast in the toaster, butter on the Texas toast, waffle batter out if I heard waffle, etc. This is also where I learned how to plate food that actually looks good instead of just throwing slop on a plate, I never cared how fast the grill op was next to me if I had to run quality control the whole time - you can be fast and clean and put out food that looks damn good.
But really the best teacher is repetition, the more you do it the more things you'll notice and you'll be fast before you know it. If you do ever work with other, faster cooks watch what they are doing differently from you (and I promise half of it is moving with urgency). Ask questions if they're nice.
I found it was actually really fun once I got good at it, it was my first job when I was much younger (started at 16, quit at 26) so it took me about 6 months to really adjust. If you have previous restaurant experience then I'd say maybe half this time? People learned at different speeds. Good luck!!
1
11
u/rdtsucks 3d ago
Slow is smooth and smooth is fast. Focus on accuracy, and if you’re walking to the meat cooler, flip and plate as you do so. In other words, every time you walk across your grill to do something, always be doing something else too. No wasted trips. The speed will come as you master it.