The story of a cook

Chapter 601 Zhang Li Goes to Work
The original Laohan Villa in Wanfangmen, Santaizi was converted to a kindergarten and became the largest kindergarten in the vicinity, and children from nearby communities were sent here.In the past two years, with the opening of Metro Line [-] and the increasing improvement of the university town in the north, many real estate developers have set their sights on Beisantaizi, and many high-end residential communities have been developed here in a few years.

With the move-in of high-end residents, supporting shopping malls, hospitals, markets, and schools have also been built, gradually becoming a bustling area, and some kindergartens with advanced concepts have also settled here, while the kindergartens in Laohan Villa are a bit behind .In order not to let their children lose at the starting line, many parents sent their children to higher-end kindergartens, and Laohanshanzhuang Kindergarten went into decline.

In May of this year, the director of the kindergarten could not continue to operate, so he reluctantly transferred the kindergarten to a boss surnamed Xu. This boss Xu has a lot of money and wealth, and turned it into the largest farmyard in the provincial capital——Kandong Family.

The overall style of the Guandong people is mainly based on the folk customs of the Northeast. There are small donkeys pulling mills, water tofu made on site, small stupid chickens are slaughtered on the spot, wild fish in the reservoir, wild big loach, coarse grains in the Northeast, and cockfighting performances.

Mr. Xu's original intention of building this farmhouse is to create a landmark restaurant in the provincial capital. Dining here can not only appreciate the customs of the Northeast, but also understand the cultural history of the old provincial capital.After half a year of meticulous work and more than 600 million investment, it finally opened for business in November.After the opening, the business was not very good. There were two managers changed in three months, and Zhang Li was already the third manager after she came.

Today is her third day at work.

In the boss's office, Mr. Xu looked at Zhang Li in the boss chair behind the desk and asked, "Manager Zhang, you've been here for three days, how do you feel?"

"Very good, our family has great potential." Zhang Li said.

"Which aspect are you referring to?" Mr. Xu asked with a smile.

Zhang Li sorted out her thoughts and said: "Our house has great potential in terms of overall style. I have seen it from the front in the past three days, and Mr. Xu has put a lot of effort into the decoration, showing the old appearance of our old provincial city. As soon as you enter our house, you have the feeling of traveling through the Guandong. The decoration style, the design of the private room, and the design of the kang, as well as the old objects on display, and the old photos on the wall, have a sense of history and memories. If you have a meal at our house By the way, I visited all four floors, which is the same as visiting the old provincial capital in the 30s.”

Mr. Xu smiled. He really put a lot of thought into this store. From the design to the decoration, every detail is his own painstaking effort, especially the old objects on display. He and the head chef Wang Kui personally went to BJ Panjiayuan All of them are genuine.The old objects cost 60 yuan, not including the stone banquet in the hall, which is a big price and a big deal. A table of stones is 40 yuan, all carefully selected.

He wants to create a farmhouse that can reflect the history of the old provincial capital, so that guests can have memories and a sense of substitution while dining.After the renovation, I was full of confidence, thinking that it would be full every day, with a turnover of more than 100 yuan.But the reality is very embarrassing. The most sold is 600 a day, and the remaining average is [-]. It has been open for almost three months, and the turnover has not exceeded [-] million. If it continues like this, it will be closed within half a year, and it will be more than [-] million. The investment will be in vain.

A little angry.

I changed two managers in three months, and each manager came with great ambitions, and left after working for a while, saying that the management was chaotic and I couldn't manage it.The whole thing is that the boss is also very troublesome. If his heart is not in chaos, can he come to you? It is only in chaos that he comes to you.

After Zhang Li came, she said that she would observe for two days first, and then say it after two days. Now it is the third day, and she wanted to hear Zhang Li's thoughts.

"I put a lot of thought into the decoration, just to build the largest farmyard in the provincial capital." Mr. Xu said.

"I think it is not only the largest in the provincial capital, but also the largest in our Northeast." Zhang Li said.

"more or less."

"According to the size and decoration of our house, the business is not very ideal."

"It's not ideal, 3 yuan a day." Mr. Xu smiled bitterly, with a hint of helplessness on his handsome face, and said, "Didn't this invite you here? What do you think is the problem with our family?"

"There are many reasons for the bad business, but in general, there are three reasons. The first is the location of the hotel. The location is too far away. Customers don't like to go, and if there is no parking lot, they don't like to go. Our family is OK , the location is not too remote, there is a detached house, and there is a parking lot, which does not affect the business."

Zhang Li went on to say: "The rest is the service and the dishes. I have been at the front for the past two days, and I feel that there are three things that are not done well. The first is that the management is chaotic. The managers don't know what to do. The foreman , The minister is quite capable, but he doesn’t know how to manage. He has committed the common fault of many hotel managers, who regard being able as ability and taking the lead as management.”

"The second is that the service can't keep up. Customers have to shout for service. If they don't shout, there is no service. This is related to management and training. That is to say, the training in the early stage of our business is not in place, and the waiters have not developed a sense of active service. The third is The connection between the front desk and the kitchen is not good, the dishes are served slowly, the quality of the products is not stable, the rate of customer complaints is too high, the satisfaction of the customers is low, and the customers cannot be retained.”

After Zhang Li finished speaking, Mr. Xu didn't say anything immediately. The two managers before the three points also said, and he also knew that what he wanted to hear was not the problem, but the solution to the problem and how to do it.

"Manager Zhang, how do you think these three problems can be solved?" Mr. Xu asked.

Zhang Li smiled and said, "Mr. Xu, you hope our house will sell for more money."

"Of course the more the better."

"That's true. I mean, based on the current situation of our family, we can sell as much as we can without losing money."

"Thirty-eight thousand."

Zhang Li said: "I can solve two and a half of these three problems. First, train and select the front-end management personnel, who are suitable for management posts, and remove those who are not suitable. I need to have the right to appoint and remove personnel, and I can’t do it without this right. The second problem of not being able to keep up with the service will be solved with the solution of the first problem.”

"The waiters are all good. The reason why they can't provide active service is that the management staff are not good enough. The ability of the management staff will improve, and the business skills of the waiters will also improve. The service quality will naturally improve. The third question I can talk to the kitchen Take the initiative to communicate and connect well, but I can't control the quality of the dishes and the speed of serving them, after all, I am not professional and need the cooperation of the head chef."

"Product quality is a major issue. No matter how good the service at the front desk is, the product won't work. I can only guarantee that the problem at the front desk will be solved. Based on the current sales volume, it will rise to [-] within three months. The kitchen has cooperated. If you want to sell more than [-] yuan, you need to stabilize and improve the quality of the products, or else you won’t be able to."

"The ideal turnover of our family should be [-] to [-]. This requires the entire management to go up, have its own brand, and have its own corporate culture, otherwise it will not be achieved."

After Zhang Li finished speaking, she looked at Mr. Xu calmly.

Mr. Xu also looked at Zhang Li. He felt that the manager in front of him was available, calm-headed, clear-cut, neither humble nor overbearing, and his image and temperament were also excellent.He said to Zhang Li: "Well, what you said is very good, then do it, I support you."

Zhang Li said with a smile: "I'm a straightforward person. Before working, we should talk about salary and treatment. When I come out to work, I want to support my family. Let's be a villain first and then a gentleman."

"How about temporarily setting the salary at [-]?" Mr. Xu asked.

"Acceptable. That's all I have to do. I have nothing else to do. I'll go back today and tidy up the house, and I'll be on time tomorrow."

After Zhang Li finished speaking, she stood up and shook hands with Mr. Xu across the boss's desk. Mr. Xu said, "Happy cooperation! Manager Zhang."

"Happy cooperation!"

After waking up in the morning, he asked Mr. Wang to go out for breakfast, and he asked Yan Li if he could eat, and if he wanted to eat, he would go together.Before I could call Yan Li, she came first. She told me and Mr. Wang that something happened at home, and she went back first, and told us to continue the investigation.

It is estimated that her husband is narrow-minded. A female boss and two male subordinates came out to investigate, and they haven't brought him with them. This is worrying.Although Yan Li is not very beautiful, she has a temperament, and it is normal to be worried, but calling her daughter-in-law back like this is a bit too young for a man, and he can't do big things.

Yan Li left 1 yuan and asked Mr. Wang and I to inspect and travel and relax.

After a simple bite of breakfast, we separated from Mr. Wang. I went to the raw material market, and he went to the hot pot restaurant.

Fuzhou's raw material market is small and scattered.

First came the meat market.I found a total of seven stalls selling yellow beef, five selling fresh meat and two selling cold fresh meat.Cold fresh yellow beef is shipped from Hunan.There are not many yellow beef locally produced in Fuzhou. Many yellow cattle are sold in the local county after being slaughtered, and they cannot reach Fuzhou at all.The price of fresh yellow beef is between 25 and 30 yuan. 25 is miscellaneous meat, which has muscles and brains, 28 is fat and thin, and the upper part of the brain is [-].Cold and fresh ones are cheaper by one yuan per catty.

If it is delivered, it must be more than [-] catties at a time, otherwise it will not be delivered, and the delivery will be cold fresh meat.

Cold fresh meat is all produced in Hunan. Now that it has been released, why not go to Hunan to see, the yellow beef there will be cheaper.

After coming out of the meat market, we walked for 10 minutes to the seasoning market.

The seasonings normally used in restaurants are almost the same across the country, there is no difference, and you can buy them anywhere, so you don’t need to look carefully.What to look at is the local specialties, as well as dry raw materials.

I saw a lot of dried bamboo shoots and ham in the dry goods area.There are a wide variety of dried bamboo shoots, fresh bamboo shoots, bamboo shoots, and barreled bamboo shoots.The old ham is very good. Some shops specialize in selling ham. As soon as you enter, you can see that half of the room is full, neatly stacked up to the roof, with a strong smoky smell.

I wanted to buy some dried bamboo shoots and ham to go back. Considering that Qinghua Pavilion is a Northeast restaurant, no matter how good these two items are, I would never need them back, so I gave up the idea.

Wander around the market.Women like to go shopping, and chefs like to go shopping in seasoning and tableware markets. They like to go shopping even if they know they don’t want to buy them. When they come across unknown things, they go up and ask them to learn more about them and give themselves a lot of insight.

It was past twelve o’clock when I came out of the market. I took a taxi back to the hotel. I found a snack bar near the hotel and ate a bowl of noodles. I thought that a bowl of noodles would be enough, but when the noodles came, I found out that they were small bowls. I only had three bowls. Feeling full.

Maybe southerners have small appetites.

In the afternoon, Mr. Wang came back and told him about the inspection trip to Hunan, and he agreed, so he bought a train ticket to Changsha the next day.

We went out to play together in the afternoon.I didn't go anywhere, even though it's the south, it's not warm in winter, I only went to Sanfangqixiang, and I finished my shopping after an afternoon, which was not a waste of time.

Depart by train the next day and arrive in Changsha at [-]:[-] pm.The ghost weather in Changsha is very bad. It is cold and drizzling in the winter, which made me and Mr. Wang extremely depressed when we got off the train. Stay at the hotel.

The third day was a non-stop inspection day.

First, I went to the meat market and negotiated a deal with a seller of cold fresh yellow beef. It costs 25 yuan a catty, which is [-] yuan cheaper than Fuzhou, and the supply is sufficient, and it is always available at any time.The oxtail is the lowest price, and the ox bones are given as a gift.

Then I went directly to Takahashi Dry Tune Market.

Takahashi Market is much larger than Fuzhou’s Qiantiao Market, half a block smaller.The more I visited such a big market, the more excited I became. It was a bit of a pain for Mr. Wang. It was not enough to walk with me for an hour, so I told him to go back to the hotel and continue shopping alone.

After shopping for four full hours, still not satisfied, Mr. Wang called to say that he was hungry and waited for me to go back for dinner.So I bought a chopped pepper, local pickled pepper, dried white pepper, bacon, wild bamboo shoots, packed a large bag full, and went back to the hotel.

We arrived at the hotel at four o'clock in the afternoon.I didn't feel tired when I was shopping in the market, but when I lay down on the bed, my legs hurt and I couldn't walk anymore.

After resting for a while, Mr. Wang and Mr. Wang went out to find a restaurant with local characteristics to eat in, and specially ordered Changsha's special dish - stir-fried yellow beef.It is very well done, spicy, tender, refreshing, and the more you eat, the more you want to eat.

Changsha’s Chiyan Shidai has made the fried yellow beef into the United Nations, which is loved by international friends. It can be seen that the unique charm of the fried yellow beef is well-deserved.

I have plans to learn this dish, and this dish will be popular in Binhai as well.If you come out, you have to learn something and go back, or you will come out in vain.

"Mr. Wang, what do you think of this little fried yellow beef? Can it be sold at our house?" I asked.

"This dish is guaranteed to work. I love it, and people in Binhai can also accept it." Mr. Wang said.

"I'm going to learn this dish, go back and serve it."

"I think it's okay." Mr. Wang nodded, and then asked: "Where are you going to inspect tomorrow?"

"The beef problem has been solved. I won't go to other places. I will send out [-] catties of yellow beef first, and then I will find a few restaurants with flavors to eat well. I will spend a day to fully understand this little fried yellow beef."

Hearing me say that he no longer inspected his face with a smile, he began to plan which scenic spot to play tomorrow.I'm not interested in this, so I asked the waiter about local flavor restaurants and famous restaurants while eating, and planned to go tomorrow.

(End of this chapter)