TV chefs

My pet hate is watching chefs prepare food in everyday clothes and no coverup, I do wear a clean apron each day as I’ve been out and about. I’ve done this for years much to the amusement if my family.

I never watch any TV chefs now. All they do is rehash recipes which have been around for decades. I think hygiene has gone down the plughole in recent years.

In the 1970s I worked in a factory making chocolate items. Any spilt chocolate was scooped up and put back in the machine, irrespective of where it fell. A lady used to use her finger to put a stripe on the back of chocolate brazil nuts. I won't tell you what she did with her finger every so often. In summer, the factory windows were open and wasps used to sit on the (still liquid) chocolates. We were instructed to flick the wasps off and put the chocs back under the sluice.

A friend worked in a factory making sticky nut bars. They had to cool overnight. Her job in the morning was to remove the dead cockroaches stuck in the toffee before sending them to the packing department!!

It WAS a long time ago but I wonder if anything is any different now.

This is nothing new either. I remember reading George Orwell's "Down and out in Paris and London" at school where he jobbed in kitchens. OK, different times, but, it would seem, maybe not so different!

My cookery teacher would be furious if you so much as touched food with your fingers - how standards have changed!

In 1946 because I was alone I took a job as waitress in a cafe. The boss would take the leavings off customers plates and serve on another customers.
To get away from my father when he retired my mother took a job in a pub restaurant. She perspired a lot and was in the habit of wiping the sweat from her brow with the tea towel. Food was arranged on the plate using hands and after using the toilet none of staff washed their hands. My husband and I never ate out.

Kitty I too heat my plates. When I see TV chefs decorating a minuscule portion of food with drops of this and that then adding leafy stuff I think to myself thry should be running art classes not kitchens.
As for hygiene, never thought everything would be pristine and hygienic and the hair being allowed to flow here and there confirms that for me.

We heat our plates - not sure if AC do. We have those black ring things that go between the plates and go in the microwave.

kittylester

Do people heat plates nowadays? None of our children do. We are a bit fanatical about it

This really irritates me to. You go out for a lovely expensive meal, carefully prepared, and it comes tepid on a chilly plate.

Remember watching a bake off programme with guest celebrities, one was one of the performers from Diversity.

He had a mass of Afro hair, no head covering, I kept imagining all these hairs dropping in his cake mixture!

Should have proof read first para

When I was 13 and working in a cafe at the weekend, when any bread and butter was keft by customers it was collected up for making if anyone didn’t eat or half ate their bread and butter they used the leftovers for bread pudding.
my mil worked in a well known cake Co (still going strong) . She was on jam rolls. Instead of using equipment provided men with hairy arms spread jam along their forearms and as the sponge went by just stuck their arms out.

Remember when your mum licked her hankie and scrubbed something off your face? I once saw a very famous chef lick his tea towel (tucked into the waistband) and then run it around the rim of a plate that was about to be sent out. It was obviously done unconsciously as he was raving at the time but no one dared say anything and the dish went out to the customer.

Aveline

Despite all this millions eat out every day and somehow survive!

It’s a miracle, isn’t it 😂

I heat the plates unless it's something like a cottage pie straight from the oven, which needs a bit of cooling down.

I heat my plates kitty. 😁

My children heat plates, even when we’re not with them. We’ve always done it. It’s why any side salad served with a hot meal comes in a little dish. I hate food that’s already cold underneath.

Despite all this millions eat out every day and somehow survive!

I always heat the plates either in the oven or the warming drawer. I hate cold food.

Do people heat plates nowadays? None of our children do. We are a bit fanatical about it

I always think it must be cold by the time they have fiddled about with it. I much prefer to just put food on the plate and then serve it hot. The plates never seem to be heated either.

Masterchef et al are good examples of all the fiddling around/handling of food that goes on to present those fancy dishes.
I never handle food after cooking, just use spoons or tongs.

I dont think people would eat out so often if they had been in a restaurant kitchen,I have seen returned food being given to other diners, kitchen staff rarely washing their hands and plates wiped with cloths that have been used for other things.

This has been in expensive restaurants with 5* hygiene ratings.

The Gorden Ramsey Hell’s Kitchen is a true reflection of many restaurant kitchens.

The lack of very basic food hygiene is so off putting. I don’t understand why they feel the need to dish up food with their fingers when they are in a well equipped kitchen with an array of utensils next to them.

I can’t stomach watching James Martin separating egg whites by cracking them into his hand and letting it run throw his fingers. But his worst kitchen habit is how he goes from handling raw chicken to serving up food with no more than a token 2 second trickle of water over his fingers and dried in the tea towel .

When I worked in a restaurant the salads were made on a work surface under a window. Pigeons would walk in and pick bits of salad off the plates and walk out again. It was all served up to customers.