[UA] Life with the Scotsman

[Timothy Toner]

David M Jacobs wrote:
> On 03/02/07, *Eslington ~* <eslington at gmail.com 
> <mailto:eslington at gmail.com>> wrote:
>
>     I'm hoping to do something with Mak Attax in a future game, but
>     I'd like some more insight into working in the fast food industry.
>      
>     Can anyone reccomend any good internet articles I can draw on as a
>     resource?
>
>
> It's not the Scotsman (it's Burger King), but you might want to check 
> out http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=1002508 
> <http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=1002508> .
>
Mmm...I don't think it is.  I'm a veteran of fast food existence, having 
worked at a Hardees in a mall (Dante totally overlooked this angle when 
he was composing Inferno) for a month and Burger King for a day.  True, 
it was a 13 hour day, and I was so disgusted at the end of it that I 
showed up the next day and turned in my uniform and never once asked for 
my salary.  Nevertheless, these experiences give me a little insight 
into the inner workings of streamlined fast food, and from his 
descriptions, it wasn't a BK, unless the one he was at was totally and 
completely alien from every BK I've been to.  Consider:

The whole marketing gimmick of BK is 'flame broiled', which consists of 
placing a frozen patty on an odd conveyor belt composed of sections from 
your typical Weber BBQ grill.  The patty passes into the 'flame 
broiler', where it's cooked the correct amount, at which point it is 
indeed transfered over to the burger trays.  He actually mentions 
putting the burger in the 'fryer', a claim so odd, I thought the whole 
thing was BS.  But then again, I realized that he might bed describing 
the 'platen / grill' set-up, seen at McDonalds and Hardees, where the 
frozen patty is placed on the grill, then a platen (a large box with a 
servo arm that drops onto the meat.  The underside has a non-stick 
coating, and heats up to an insane degree.  Keep it clean, but don't 
scratch it) descends and locks into place.  It cooks away until a timer 
goes off, and the servo arm lifts the platen off of the now-cooked meat.

He misses the 'genius' of the BK experience, which is the microwave.  
EVERYTHING passes thru the microwave oven at some point.  He left this 
out entirely.

He takes the apple pie from the freezer straight to the warmer.  BK 
doesn't warm its pies beforehand (unlike the Scotsman's vol au ventes, 
these are actual pie wedges that are nuked before serving).  With the 
Scotsman, he'd first go to the fryer, cook up the pies, then transfer 
them to some warming device.

That being said, he gets some stuff dead-bang on:

The fryer.  Oh, my god, the fryer was the most disgusting thing there!  
If you were the fry guy, you'd have to take an extra shower when you 
went home.  I didn't have a car at the time, so I had to take a bus ride 
that lasted almost an hour.  Almost an hour, sitting there, coated with 
a thin layer of grease.  It almost killed my soul.  Even if you weren't 
working the fryer, it was still a hazard.  It's such an intrinsic part 
of the kitchen that it cannot be tucked away in some corner.  
Subsequently, the floor right in front of it, where most people have to 
pass at some point, is slick, which is convenient, since if you do find 
yourself falling, there are all these protruding handles for you to grab 
onto and try to break your fall.  (Note to the clueless--never grab for 
a handle--just fall on your ass).

The freezer.  Actually, a lot of weird shit found its way in there.  My 
favorite were the cookies that were used to make the 'like homemade' 
chocolate chip cookies that sold very well indeed.  They were 
pre-measured cylinders of rock-hard dough, roughly a half dollar in 
diameter and a half inch thick,  and a thousand times better than 
licking the bowl after making cake.

They also made the cole slaw fresh every day, and it involve a gigantic 
steel bowl that was used only for that purpose, and no other, and only 
one person on the crew was allowed to make it.  She came in pretty much 
every day, just to do that.  The key thing with her was that there were 
no utensils large enough to stir that much slaw fixins', so she'd dollop 
it up together, roll up her sleeve, and have at it.  A word to the 
wise--never eat the cole slaw unless it's made right in front of you.

Finally, the most important thing I learned in my tenure as a fast food 
worker was the existence of odd stripes on the posts of doors that lead 
out of convenience stores, fast food places, and gas stations.  They so 
innocuous, you hardly notice them, unless someone points them out to 
you, and once they do, you can never not see them.  Their purpose is 
simple:  if you get robbed, do nothing to resist.  Give them the money, 
and as they run out the door, compare their height with the markings on 
the door, and voila!  At least you have that to tell the cops.  So 
depressing, in a way.

tt

-- 
You can safely assume that you've created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do. 
   -Anne Lamott, writer (1954- )