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We recently open a restaurant for BBQ in South East Asia, and have been using Mangrove hardwood charcoal for the BBQ. However, I noticed the fire goes out easily when we use a normal starter, and we have been considering adding oil or fluid on the charcoal which will assist in the burning. We need something that will not spoil the taste of the food, at the same time being safe and not containing any dangerous chemicals since we will be using it for cooking. Any recommendations ?

Theres a movie that came out quite a while ago, prolly around 10 yrs or so. It’s about a female chef, and there’s something about her cooking, that affects peoples feelings/emotions when they eat it. I remember something about a boyfriend in the movie supporting her cooking.. and… something at some point where the whole restaurant just freezes, time stands still almost, in the movie…. Any ideas/help/answers would be appreciated I remember I loved that movie when I was younger and would love to watch it again. Thanks!
Thanks mystic!!! That’s the exact movie I’m looking for! I’ll select yours as best answer as soon as it lets me thanks a lot!

We are going to have dinner at a restaurant and just inviting a few close family and friends. Is it rude to ask the people attending to pay for there own dinners since we are on a budget? I decided not to do a cook out bbq at home too much work cooking etc. A restaurant will be easier and we can all have cake afterwords.

I want to study restaurant & culinary management because I love food. However, it’s gonna be better to have another job such as a chef or a cook to support my management career. I know there are college that have both of these majors but I’m not so sure they will let me study both at the same time. Please tell me if you know one that meet my requirement. Thanks!
P/s: I’m going to study at 2-year college and get my AA degree starting this fall (just let you know).

I see a lot of Asian Americans and they work such as nail salon, donuts, restaurants, hi tech and education. Hispanics often do a lot of work in construction, janitorial-maintenance-cooking. What about black people? My neighbor works as a nurse, but I can’t really say that is a job black men commonly do?

My fiance is currently in the Navy. He is not sure what he wants to do when he gets out, but he knows that he does not want to make the Navy his career. He is interested in cooking and music. He is also really good with kids and is very personable. He also has tattoos on his arms and leg if that might make a difference. He has cooked in restaurants before but he never worked anywhere high class. He was just a line cook. He is very, very musically talented but he is not classically trained and he does not know if he will be able to master reading music for all different instruments. Do you know what careers he should consider? It has to be a job that makes a good salary (like $50,00 or above) and that will have a lot of job openings. I would prefer that he doesn’t have to work nights, but we are flexible. I was thinking a high school band teacher but he is thinking a culinary arts instructor. I just don’t know how available these jobs are. Oh and benefits/pension are good too! Thank you so much for any input!

I’m a manager at a restaurant. It is a small business so a cook’s responsibility entails cooking, prep and cleaning. Most restaurants have separate people to do this but not here. The main cook here is awful.

He thinks he’s too good to do cleaning so when there’s no food to cook, he’ll just stand there. If I tell him to get to work he’ll say he is waiting for a food order. He is dirty. He’s been spoken to about this many times and it will either improve for bit or he’ll just ignore the comment. His plate presentation is usually messy with greasy finger-prints all over the plates. He is rude to other co-workers and if there is any sort of mistake with the food order he will ALWAYS blame everyone but himself. He hardly does any work but goes out of his way to complain when anyone else has even slightly slacked off.

He has been talked to many times but he’ll either find excuses for how it’s not really a problem or becomes childish and spends the rest of the day sulking. Even when I DO manage to get him to do something other than cook, it’s done half-as.sed. Like putting away food deliveries - he’ll just place the product randomly in the freezer and then I spend 30 minutes re-organizing everything anyway.

The only thing that is good about him is that when the restaurant becomes busy, he is able to cook orders fast. Much faster than any other cook.

Like I said it is a small business and he is the only main cook. So even if I were to can him, a replacement would be hard to find. In the many years that I have worked there, we have had maybe 1 out of 10 people who were good. And those people quit and move on to better-paying jobs.

Any advice? On how to either deal with him or find a good replacement?

I work in a restaurant with this guy, he’s the only guy I work with in the kitchen, along with the boss, and this guy has started doing this recently, I began to notice it 2 weeks ago.
Whenever I’m in the area where I cut and prepare vegetables, meat, etc, he never coughs, but when I leave the area to the cooking area, then he would cough, but not every time I go to the cooking area, rather he do it occasionally throughout the day, at least 5 times a day, sometimes more, but when I as in the cutting area he never coughs but in the cooking area he coughs, I think this isn’t any coincidence, he’s doing it on purpose to piss me off, what should I do?
I mean every time I hear him cough when I was in the cooking area, I can feel some sort of rage from my heart, and is not a pleasant feeling whatsoever, I told the boss about his weird cough and the boss say it was just coughs and tell me to get over it, but it’s not that, the guy only does it when I’m in the specific area, what gives?
I don’t ask him, because I dont get along with him, we argue and fight in the kitchen before and we never talk, the only time we talk was when it involves work.

A girl my family knows asked if I could cook for her at the local steakhouse here, I am a waiter and was a busboy before and I’m also a personal trainer, however I only work once a week and it is looking like I won’t be a waiter soon. Finding a job is hard to find (small town, no opportunities) so I kinda need this but I’ve never cooked for a restaurant, I can cook well enough but I’d like some pointers.

Here is the situation: My boyfriend and I are going to be spending a lot of time working for the next month, maybe 2 months. We’re talking like like 80-90 hours a week. But the main thing is that this is also going to involve lots of weird hours, pulling all nighters, working through standard meal times, that kind of thing. This started this week and I’m a little confused how to deal with the seemingly basic problem of feeding myself.

Some info: We live in a European city where eating out regularly is not really an option. It’s very expensive. Also, we will (with the long work hours) be working well after things (restaurants, grocery stores) have already closed. So we can go to the grocery store maybe 1-2 times a week. We’d like to eat at least kind of healthy. I don’t want to feel ashamed if my mother asks me what I had for dinner. Our fridge and freezer (especially freezer) are small. The reason I mention where we live is that when I lived in America this was easy. There are late night restaurants/fast food joints, grocery stores are open late, convenience items are a lot easier to come by (decent frozen meals available even at regular grocery stores), and I had a comparatively massive fridge and freezer. But now I don’t have those options, so I don’t know what to do.

I guess what I am looking for here is a sort of novel solution about the food problem. I mean, we do have to eat. But it literally feels like there is no time, not just for preparation, but for actual purchase of food as well.

What do you do to avoid cooking? Any specific meals that you turn to? Or do you have a good system of avoiding cooking? I thought about freezing meals but our freezer is small and we basically have 1 day off. I don’t want to spend it slaving together in the kitchen to generate food for the rest of the week. I would love ideas on at least somewhat healthy meals that can be made in less than 20 mins without a ton of chopping or shopping. 1 pot-bowl-plate meals also appreciated, since it’s fewer things to wash. We’re not picky eaters.

And if you have some tips on keeping the apartment reasonably tidy you can throw those in as well.

Oh, and I would really appreciate strategies or meals that you’ve actually tried, not just a recipe off the internet!