Question about how a restaurant kitchen works:

Well he's partially right ...

He needs to know how long it takes for a dish to cook so he can pace his orders right. If he fires off something too fast, then they'll come up back to back, and often times the guest will complain.

What I mean is if you get a chips and guac appetizer, and add on a cup of tortilla soup .. but just as you take your first bite of soup ... bam! dinner appears! that's the servers fault.

The cooks, however, are all automated. The items appear on their screen in a manner where if you have a well done burger that takes 10 minutes to cook, and a salad which takes 3 minutes, the salad guy won't see his order until the steak hits 7 minuts, and then they both pop up at the ten minute mark. Does that make sense?

from my experience the only thing a server needed to space out was an appetizer from the meal ticket if the table ordered everything at the same time. However, when I worked at a more chain like place who had a better computer system, you could put in everything at once and it would print the app on a separate ticket automatically. That place had expediters and they would make sure the app ticket was done first.

Ive never heard of servers having to put in several separate orders for 1 table, that sounds like you could get busy and easily forget to put in 1 of the orders which would suck!

Back in the dark ages, through college and grad school and beyond, I waitressesd at many restaurants in different states.

We submitted one handwritten ticket for each table. It was the responsibility of the line cooks to figure out the timing - when to start cooking each dish. It was my responsibility to pick it up on time and do some garnishing. (Food left under heat lamps gets icky, and chefs whose food sits get even ickier...)

The system you describe sounds wacky.

I forgot about expediters! That wasn't a high-end thing, at least in my experience - more high volume. The expediter had nothing to do with food preparation timing; they corralled and garnished plates and bellowed our names.

The swankiest places I worked (team approach with maitre d, head waiter, kitchen waiter, and busser), same thing: the chefs still were in charge of timing. When it was ready, the kitchen waiters picked it up.

I'm still voting unusual and wacky. It makes me twitchy just thinking about it. 

I waitressed and loved it in my 20s, from a family dinner to a fine dining French restaurant.  I never had to assume responsibility for timing, the kitchen did that.  From my experience, they time preparation of everything around the longest to cook item on the order. So a well done steak would be the first item on the grill, and say a BLT would be the very last thing so they were done at approx the same time.  (Most restaurants cook the bacon ahead and just reheat on the grill.) In the French restaurant, the appetizer course usually bought the kitchen some time to prepare the main menu.  (Plenty of escargot in garlic butter!) 

The expo will organize the food and get it out of the window, but they usually have no idea where the table is at in their meals. They just run what's up.

My servers enter orders, and can put the entrees on hold. The table blinks to remind them they have food on hold to be sent. Every time they swipe their card they get the blinky table so they know to fire it.

My first serving job, I had to remember to keep the order sheet and go back and re-ring it. That was nerve wracking. At least the blinky tables reminds the teammate.

I'm kind of curious to know how the computer knows how to send entrees. Who's to say I didn't want the app as my meal? Will your kitchen automatically send my dinner out first assuming its an app? There's gotta be a way to designate that.

Funny how we all operate a little differently.

The server times the apps and entrees. They have to gauge timing based on several things, including the number of apps at the table, how fast they thinK the table will eat it (I.e. a single app for a table of 5 will be finished as soon as the app is set down so I would probably put in the apps and entrees at the same time for a larger table) how many tickets the kitchen currently has (which means they probably won't even start cooking your order as soon as they receive it because they're busy with previous tickets). A server has to know the flow of his kitchen.

Usually there is an expediter and then a chef on point, who directs the cooks on what he needs 'dropped' or start cooking. A grilled chicken obviously takes longer than a mid-rare steak so he'd tell them to start the chicken then know when he needs to tell them to put on the steak, that way it all comes out at an ideal temp at he same time. The expediter/expo helps the point make sure the right sides are on the plate, that the plate looks presentable, and gets the plates to the right seats on the right table in a timely manner. If you're always asking for something to be heated up, they are obviously cooking everything at the same time, someone has an entree that takes longer to cook than yours so your food is sitting in the 'window' under a heat lamp (or not, if it is cold) waiting for the rest of the table.


Maybe in some restaurants, but I have never seen this in any of he restaurants I have worked in. The salads and entrees print at their respective stations at the same time and the cooks make them as soon as they see them (or as soon as they can get to them) and its the expo or point chef job to make sure they're being done in a timely manner. In this case often the salad will be made quickly and will sit in the window (no heat) until the steak is done.

I worked in restaurants and it was the job of the expeditor. On slow nights, we did not have an expeditor and it was the job of the grill cook or whomever was the main cook to call out the orders to other stations to have the food items finished at the same time. This is for the entree or main meal. The cooks time the orders.   

It is the job of the server to get salads, apps, soups, desserts called in to the proper station or prepare it himself or herself.

I worked as an expeditor and it is a very difficult job.

If the customer wants the app as the entree, the server notes that on paper order or in the computer.