Silver Service

When I trained as a chef in England I also did courses in housekeeping and food service. Along with the other students in my class, I was not really turned on by housekeeping but I think all chefs should also learn what it is like to be a waiter, though there are some chefs I have known who would probably make customers run for cover if they ever ventured into the dining room. Anyway, having some food service skills meant that I could always earn some extra money waiting on at functions.

My first experience as a function waiter happened during my first year of study, just after I started to learn to use a spoon and fork for silver service. Egged on by some of my so called mates, I put my name down on a list pinned to the student notice board to do some “waiting work”. When the day came to travel to the venue we met in the college car park and about 12 of us piled into a small bus for the journey from Leeds to a big hotel in Harrogate. On the way, the 2^ndyear student who organised the gig told us we would be doing silver service. Oh shit, I thought, I have only used a spoon and fork a couple of times and never with real food! I thought about pretending I was sick but I probably wouldn’t get anymore work and my mates would have paid me out big time.

We arrived at the hotel and were told we would have a table of 10 and would be serving a poached fish dish followed by grilled lamb cutlets and vegetables and then dessert and coffee. I started to feel decidedly ill and was just thankful that the first course was a cocktail which would be placed on the table before the guests arrived. All too suddenly we were ushered into the dining room to get our signal from the head waiter to clear away the cocktail glasses. This went fairly well though I nearly dropped a spoon or two on the floor as I carried the glasses to my sideboard.

Next the fish course, I lined up in the kitchen, my spoon and fork slipping around in my sweaty hand, as I approached the pass a very hot, heavy, silver salver was thrust onto my left arm which, even though covered with a doubled waiter’s cloth, radiated heat through to my hand. On the salver were 10 immaculately decorated pieces of poached fish, I immediately had a vision of the salver gradually tipping with the weight and the fish sliding onto the dining table as I tried desperately to keep control. Suddenly I was in the dining room, approaching my table, spoon and fork in hand with a frozen smile on my face the muscles in my left arm aching from the weight of the salver. “Serve from the left, clear from the right” was going through my mind like the sound of a high speed steam train. I spied a gap between two people at my table and lowered the salver downwards. My arm ached and my hand shook as I picked up the first piece of fish and plonked it on the plate of the first guest. I started to move round the table gradually feeling a little more confident plonking less and placing more. The salver was getting a little lighter as the fish was removed, and I was starting to think this is easy. I came to the last piece of fish and was feeling so cocky I didn’t even lower the salver down next to the plate, just picked the fish up with my spoon and fork and placed it on the plate. When my spoon and fork reached the plate the fish had disappeared, oh no where had it gone? There it was sitting neatly between the breasts of a rather well endowed, attractive woman with a deeply plunging neck line. I just stared with my mouth open, I didn’t know what to do, I momentarily thought about reaching in with my spoon and fork but luckily was beaten to it. The man seated next to the victim of my incompetence had already grabbed a spoon from the table and was deftly removing the fish, placing it delicately on her plate. He then helped her wipe her breasts with a napkin which they both seemed to find quite amusing. Bright red with embarrassment, I escaped back into the kitchen, looking round in a panic to see who had noticed what had happened, but was told to get back in the dining room to wait for the signal to clear my table. I went back and stood next to my sideboard, making every effort to avoid looking at any of the guests on my table. When the signal came to clear, I approached my table with some trepidation, but it was as if nothing had happened, as I cleared away the plate from the man who had rescued the fish he pressed a one pound note in my hand and whispered thanks for the fun. What a feeling of relief, I managed to serve the rest of the meal without incident and my table had lots of smiling faces and a knowing wink from my generous tipper.

It was a memorable introduction to silver service and I had a great tale to tell my mates, plus an extra pound in my pocket and a definite decision that, whilst I was happy to do some casual waiting, I definitely wanted to work in the kitchen not the front of house.