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The Bilko Syndrome
The restaurant manager is often a tragic and debauched figure, an object of ridicule for the floor staff and a figure of fun--if not contempt--for the kitchen. Living like animals in their fetid cellar offices, beset by rodents and backed up sewage. Besieged by requests for schedule changes, light bulbs, profit and loss statements and inventories--as well as having to be psychiatrist for a dangerously unstable and transient work-force. Understandably, they are often the first to fold up their tents and disappear. One place I worked recently went through FIVE General Managers in the space of a single year. Near the end, we veterans rarely bothered to learn their names, so certain were we that they would soon be no longer among us. And they're annoying, of course, with their new ways and their new ideas which most of us who've dug in for the long haul can hardly take seriously, knowing as we do, their eventual fate. A new manager is a liability to the veteran employees. So, of course in moments of extremis, we turn to the inevitable Bilko, the shadow manager--be it an assistant manager, host, a particularly competent busboy or bartender, usually a person far more efficient--but too untrustworthy or unlovely in their demeanor to merit the job. Or maybe they just don't want it. We look to them to cut that corner, make the fast decision, pull us out of the weeds. Fix the unfixable. And they usually do. Such persons have always existed in restaurants--there is an entire tradition of Bilko-esque behavior, of being what the French have termed a "debrouillard"--an extricator, a master of "System D" as the Froggies call it. In the kitchen, this is a highly respected thing to be, a debrouillard", a person who people look to get them out of the shit. A person who can "demerder" when called upon to do so. A Bilko sous chef, serving at the pleasure of a hyper-organized, hard-working, control freak paranoid chef can be a thing of beauty; a relationship of extraordinary intimacy and promise. I always compare my long time relationship with my sous-chef Steven (a scrounger, spy, break and entry specialist, and debrouillard extraordinaire) with that of Michael Corleone and his bodyguard Rocco. You know the scene in Godfather II where Michael, hugging his brother Fredo, just glances over at Rocco and lowers his eyes for a second? That's the perfect chef/sous chef communication. Michael, without speaking, is saying, "Whack Fredo." And like a good Bilko-esque sous-chef, he will get the thing done. A good Bilko as a sous chef watches your back. When equipment breaks he can mysteriously produce a replacement. Need steaks at 10:30 on a Saturday night? He can get them. Want to know what they're saying in the office behind your back? Bilko knows. He's been sleeping with the office help, or keeping them supplied with hydro weed, so he knows--or can find out. He can solve situations, brace people for information or correct behavior in ways and at times that the chef's fingerprints need to be undetectable. A loyal Sgt. Bilko, a talented sous chef, a man or woman with personal skills to match their criminal skills can be a great asset: A Hidden Hand for the chef. --Tony Bourdain |
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