Knocked over a 5-gallon stockpot of veal stock 20 minutes before service started

This happened at a busy Saturday night service in Chicago about two years ago. I had just finished straining a big batch of veal stock, probably 4 gallons worth, and it was sitting on the edge of the prep table cooling. A line cook bumped the table reaching for something and the pot tipped. Stock went everywhere across the floor, under the reach-in, and splashed up onto my pants and shoes. I had about 20 minutes before the first tickets came in. I grabbed every clean towel we had, sopped up what I could, then salted the floor heavy to pull up the rest. I told the sous what happened and he just pointed at the floor and said "fix it." We ended up running a thin beef base with water for the braised short ribs that night. It worked fine but I was embarrassed for weeks. Has anyone else had a big ingredient disaster right before service and had to fake it with a backup?

2 comments

2 Comments

michaela161mo ago

Man I feel your PAIN on this one. But here's the thing nobody talks about - you actually made the right call by using beef base instead of trying to stretch that spilled stock. If you had scraped it off the floor and strained it again you'd be serving floor bacteria with your short ribs. That's a health code violation waiting to happen and a lawsuit if anyone found out. You did the smart thing by biting the bullet and admitting you needed a backup. I bet that night nobody even noticed the difference in the final dish anyway. The lesson is always have a backup base in the walk-in for exactly this reason.

rayc381mo ago

Right on @michaela16, nobody ever talks about having a backup base ready to go for exactly this kind of disaster.

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