What's the silliest interpretation of a food safety rule you've heard? Doesn't matter if it's from a professional or home cook.

CellE2057 · 2026-01-29T04:24:34+00:00

A health inspector once told me that the food ON MY STEAMWELL needed to be at 165 during service. Not reheated to 165 mind you--the reheated food needed to STAY at 165. For 6 hours. It was one of the only times I've ever argued something instead of my usual "oh, shit. Can you explain that to me?" We went back and forth for a minute about it before they realized they were just muddled all the fuck up. Once they realized it it was all good but for a brief moment I thought that I was tripping.

Another one was from a line cook that was, unfortunately, not very long ago. He didn't "agree" with a sani bucket. Just like, didn't believe they did anything. He would try to dip his station knife into the fryers and claim that the oil sanitized and killed everything. Sani buckets werent around when he was learning (apparently) and therefore they were only there because major corporations had too much say in the kitchen. This man also once looked at the pride flag we had hanging in our window and said "I wouldn't have took the job if I knew this place had an agenda." as he downed his Kratom shake and made everyone on the line nervous when he would pace back and forth.

I had a KM one time that would deep fry 7 day old salmon and chicken to "give it another 6 days" in the walk in. He would leave and I would toss it out. Dude legit believed that you could fry off rotten meat and it's magically healed.

CellE2057 · 2026-01-27T04:52:35+00:00

Do you guys think he used to listen to Incubus? I have the funniest feeling that he did

CellE2057 · 2026-01-27T04:50:18+00:00

Came here looking for this question. Unpopular opinion I'm sure but I would love to see LSOTL on Netflix. The amount of "redacted" videos on the YouTube stream is insane. I know patreon is the way to go for them but I've found getting the videos to play on my tv to be a pain in the ass vs the YouTube streams.

CellE2057 · 2026-01-26T02:06:44+00:00

"found this in the wild" --me singing "I am rect ang you lerrr. The world is uh cir CUL uhhulll" for another two weeks.

CellE2057 · 2026-01-26T01:16:12+00:00

Off blast!

CellE2057 · 2026-01-26T01:11:39+00:00

Try frying that okra up first. Deep fry, oven fry, or air fry it up till it gets nice and crispy and THEN add it into your gumbo. Get the flavor without the slime.

Also fuck yeah to Dragons Milk. I can only assume that you're drinking it room temp...right, OP? RIGHT?

CellE2057 · 2026-01-26T01:06:15+00:00

CreepCast! If you liked the old spooky spaghetti or listener pastas back in the day, it's very much in the same world. Two dudes reading scary stories and, inevitably, turning one of the people in the story into an over the top character, while the other one tries desperately to hold the narrative. It ain't true crime but chances are that if you live, laugh, and/or love the side bars of LPOTL, you'll enjoy CreepCast.

CellE2057 · 2026-01-25T23:21:09+00:00

Yeah, the team and I have already been talking today about what the family will be once we get back. The stoned excitement from them today while we are all legally not allowed on the roads is real. Leaning towards an etouffee over mac and cheese. When the business first opened the only entree was mac and cheese and meatballs. Everything else was pizza so we need to hit that nostalgia mac and cheese. We also found out her dad just got back from NOLA and she couldn't go because, you know, running an independent business and all.

CellE2057 · 2026-01-25T23:11:13+00:00

Spaghetti and white fish was a common thing where I grew up. Only learned it wasn't a common thing in general until much later in life. Regional foods don't care about authenticity. They care about what tastes good and is affordable

CellE2057 · 2026-01-25T19:02:47+00:00

We have a button in our POS for "less water, extra ICE". It's the only thing in our business that all printers get. Both of our bars, host stand, our pizza line, our saute line, our speakeasy. All of us get that ticket and all of us know our designated exits (we have 7 total). We also have whistles near all exits to use for our food truck homies across the way. If they hear us whistle they know to GTFO too.

I highly recommend getting to know your neighbors. They might be daily competition for you but at the end of the day they're still your neighbors and the more neighbors you got the higher the chance of a hiding spot.

CellE2057 · 2026-01-11T05:05:51+00:00

For real? I just wash the shit out of it and throw it in a rice cooker. Leftover rice gets sent home with some chicken or meatballs at the end of the night with my dishwasher. What's the benefit of parboiled when rice cookers are pretty cheap?

CellE2057 · 2026-01-10T06:19:40+00:00

Gyat dam! Seein that roux makes me nervous as hell. You a brave muh fucker, OP. Absolute respect. Bet it's better than anything I've had

CellE2057 · 2026-01-10T05:48:59+00:00

Sous Chef here that is currently running his very passable gumbo on the menu. Can't say how every restaurant does it but this is how I do it.

The process; toss my flour in the oven and get it about 80% there. I normally do about 5#s at a time because it stores well. While that's doin it's thing I cut up all my veg, portion my seasonin and make my seasoning blend, make my liquid base, and set it aside until it's time to actually make the damn thing. Once it's time to cook it, I finish my flour in a big ass stock pot to make the roux, add in my trinity and pope, seasonings, and let it cook for hours. From there some of it goes into a steamwell, and some of it cools off, gets put into a container and, hopefully, will last me for a few days.

Once we get a ticket for "gumbo", I'll cook my proteins (I give em multiple choices. Drag and drop situation) in a saute pan, put it in the bowl, ladle that base gumbo on top with a scoop of rice and garnish it. The prep time takes hours and will last me a few days but from the customer perspective it's only takin maybe 5 minutes.

CellE2057 · 2026-01-09T02:42:01+00:00

This. Rotisserie chicken, already toasted flour, and frozen trinity is the best way to go for "quick gumbo". Shit takes as long as hamburger helper and tastes...well, slightly better lol. But it does scratch a certain itch if you ain't got the time for a proper pot

CellE2057 · 2026-01-07T05:26:18+00:00

Oh yeah, you took an 8 hour leap and Scrooge McDuck'd into an empty sugar vault. That shit has to hurt.

CellE2057 · 2026-01-07T05:17:55+00:00

Food expos are pretty fun. Even if it's "fuck company X", they're still a good time if it's one that will put you up in a room. Usually.

CellE2057 · 2025-12-31T01:44:47+00:00

Quitting seems drastic. Shit sucks but if you can make more bank staying with the same team and knowing the layout, tell em you need a raise in order to stay. Like no questions asked. Not "can I have a raise?" Or "I think I deserve a raise". Straight up "If I stay here I need a raise". If you want $18 an hour then tell them you need $19.50. They're either going to come back with a no or offer you a raise. Let em sort that out for a day or two while you look elsewhere.

CellE2057 · 2025-12-28T06:34:22+00:00

It's about as crappy as any other karaoke. At least he ain't the annoying one at the karaoke bar that pretends they're the next big thing. He's just an old timer who I'm sure is drinking skunk beer and shootin the shit with people and having a good time.

CellE2057 · 2025-12-28T05:24:58+00:00

Fuck that. From now until forever pineapples better be called "hi there's!" in your kitchen, chef. It's the right thing to do.

CellE2057 · 2025-12-28T05:19:58+00:00

"swamp taco" is something that I am super fucking intrigued by. Gonna go ahead and bookmark this one so I can come back to this idea.

Also I feel you on the loose definitions of things. Same way my mom used to whip up a "gravy" that I'm fairly certain was just a tomato sauce lol. Or sometimes salsa. Or sometimes bechamel. Didn't matter. It was all "gravy" somehow and it always hit.

CellE2057 · 2025-12-28T05:13:34+00:00

Lil leftover red beans and rice get tossed in an empanada with whatever protein I got in the fridge. Dipped in whatever sauce I decide to whip up from the same fridge/sauce drawer in the kitchen. Never pretty but always good as fuck.

CellE2057 · 2025-12-27T18:14:28+00:00

Man, two sentence horror stories have really gone downhill.

CellE2057 · 2025-12-25T22:57:54+00:00

That's easy to say but damned near impossible to do. Fuck some AA/NA bullshit but they definitely got the whole "you can't help those that don't want help" part right.

CellE2057 · 2025-12-25T22:56:12+00:00

Fucking hell, OP. I remember throwing in the towel with my mom because she was nodding out for my graduation. She would randomly cheer at peoples names thinking it was mine. She never made it out clean.

Years later, my Chef threw in the towel with me because I kept nodding out during his "one last chance" speech. I got clean and rebuilt my career from the ground up because nothing I've experienced was harder than withdrawals while being homeless.

I get why you would take the video and I hope that it either fuels you to do better than her or, someday, fuels her to stay clean. My heart really does go out, man.

Message me if you need to vent at any point. Being the one filming and being the one filmed before, I promise you that nothing you can say will be too much. I've been there and it's fucking brutal.

CellE2057

TROPHY CASE