by Dictionary Scoop
Just like every craft has its own slang, the world of restaurant cooking is an infinite trove of phrases, lingo, and idioms used to describe actions, places, things, and many other aspects that need an accurate description.
Scroll on to see a few of the terms that make up the colorful kitchen slang.
1–Floor
In a restaurant environment, the dining room is referred to as the floor. When anyone from the kitchen walks out onto the floor, their uniforms are supposed to be clean and they should act appropriately in the sight of guests.
Managers typically do rounds and walk the floor several times during a shift to check on customers.
2–Waxing a Table
The act of waxing a table means that a dining space is being prepared for a special guest. This VIP service is usually reserved for important guests like the restaurant owner’s family, a critic, or regular customers known as big tippers.
3–Two-Top, or Three-Top
As it should be, restaurant dining room tables are identified by how many guests they can accommodate. A table that seats two is called a two-top. A table that seats three is called a three-top. Similarly, for example, there are four-top, or six-top, as well. This system of categorizing tables by their capacity helps streamline operations in busy dining environments and ensures a smooth flow of service.
4–Behind
Kitchens can be a very busy place, especially during rush hours. Therefore, to avoid collisions with other staff members scurrying around, it’s considered polite to clearly say, “Behind,” as you pass behind another person.
This is particularly important if you are carrying a full tray of food, a hot pan, or a rack of glassware. Variations of this expression like “Sharp behind,” or “Hot behind,” to indicate someone is passing by carrying an object that could harm another staff member, are also used.
5–A La Minute
A fancy way of saying that something is done in a hurry, the kitchen phrase a la minute is a French term that translates to at the minute or on the minute. It describes a cooking method that relies on freshly prepared ingredients, but it’s also used to signify a dish or condiment must be made to order.
6–Dead Plate
The expression dead plate is used to describe a dish of food that is unservable, either because a customer sent it back or because it was prepared incorrectly. It might be added that, while dead plates are usually considered fair game for servers or cooks to eat, this depends on each restaurant’s policy.
7–Flash
If a dish needs to be reheated quickly, the cooks will flash it with high heat on the charbroiler, or the oven. This usually comes as a request from a server when a dish is undercooked, the customer has asked for it, or it has been sitting in the window too long.
8–Kill It
When you go to a restaurant and ask for a certain food -usually meat- to be very well done, the servers will tell the cooks to kill it. Killing a steak or a chicken breast means to overcook it. What tastes like charcoal to somebody, will be perfectly right for somebody else, right?
9–Dying on the Pass
The pass is the window where cooks leave the dishes ready for the servers to take to the diners. A dish dying on the pass means that it has been sitting for too long in the window and is at the risk of becoming unservable because it’s drying up, getting too cold, or due to other issues.
10–The Rail
The cooks in a restaurant use a rail or board to hold all of their incoming tickets. It’s a strip of metal above the food window that holds tickets in place so anyone on the line can read the orders. Clearing the rail means that all the tickets have been completed. Efficiency and communication are key to a successful service.
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