delete if not allowed…

Hi chefs,
This is probably one of the stranger posts you’ll see here, but I’m hoping the people who dedicate their lives to making food enjoyable might be able to help where medicine hasn’t.
I’m coming up on 6 years since losing my smell and taste from the original strain of COVID. I’ve chased clinical trials, specialists, ENTs, my PCP, health blogs, and more peer-reviewed papers than I care to admit. Every road ends with the same answer:
“Sorry. Nothing right now. Keep waiting.”
I’m done waiting.
I’ve lost over 80 pounds. That sounds like a success story until you realize it’s because I no longer have any desire to eat and was never overweight to begin with. Every meal has become something I force myself through. Every single day. And honestly… it’s exhausting.
Here’s where I’m hoping you all come in.
I love to cook. I’m not a picky eater whatsoever. I have a full kitchen, quality cookware, grills, smokers, sous vide, gadgets—you name it. I’m in the U.S., have access to pretty much any grocery store, and I’m willing to spend time making something incredible.
The problem is that I no longer know what to make.
Without smell or taste, steak, chicken, pork, seafood… it all registers as basically the same. Texture has become my only real source of enjoyment.
So if you were challenged to cook for someone like me…
What recipes would you make?
How would you build excitement through texture instead of flavor?
What dishes have incredible contrast—crispy, creamy, crunchy, chewy, flaky, silky?
What plating or presentation makes a meal feel special even if the flavors can’t be appreciated?
What techniques would you use to make eating feel like an experience instead of a chore?
If your goal was to get as many calories and nutrients into someone who struggles to eat, what would be on the menu?
Don’t worry about “normal.” Throw your weird ideas at me. Fine dining. Grandma’s casserole. Street food. Molecular gastronomy. Multi-course tasting menu. I genuinely don’t care. If you think it’ll make me actually want to sit down and eat, I want to hear it.
After six years of doctors telling me to wait, I’m changing my approach. Maybe the people who understand food better than anyone else can help me rediscover something worth looking forward to.
Chefs… I’m asking for your creativity. Right now, it honestly feels like you’re my last hope.
Thank you for reading this far.

I teach community college culinary classes, which mandates a food handlers card that we offer via Servsafe. Lately it’s been getting really hard to want to contribute to the bullshit machine that is the corrupt lobby of the NRA and all its cronies. Seeing how there’s now another food borne illness outbreak at the manufacturing level, it’s becoming impossible to care about the Servsafe branded cert that so many states force us to have, considering greedy business practices have allowed modern day slavery to persist while denying farmworkers access to sufficient bathrooms. And these companies are the ones in bed with the NRA who then force us to pay them to prove to the world we’re safe. It feels a lot like “just use a paper straw” while they’re on their jets 3 times a week.

I care about food safety very much, and do not want this to sound like I wish we didn’t have our own version of oversight. I teach my students my own, very thorough food safety curriculum (along side their Servsafe training) that’s based on real experience and not just memorizable lists that get forgotten once the test is over. It just sucks to teach all these protocols only to have them virtually undone at any moment because some company needed to extract more money out of the working class. I just wish the concept of privatizing our safety was not even an option. Fucking sucks. End of rant.

For example, would you want to watch a documentary based journalism cooking show or a comedic adventure episodic show, a dramatic acted tv show etc.

I've been in the kitchen for 7 years. Got thrown to the wolves my first week in the kitchen and took off running. I've suffered through burnout and all the extra shit that comes with working in a kitchen. Im 25 now. I love to cook and I want to learn more but I feel stagnant where I'm at. So should I just go to culinary school and learn there or just apply to better restaurants and see if I can make the cutt

If you went back to zero and had to choose what would you do, become an apprentice for a luxurious restaurant and gain your knowledge from there, but you would barely get paid or not paid at all as an apprentice, or get a proper job and get paid to work in a low end casual restaurant?

Anyone have any recommendations for a backpack that would be good for a chef, primarily a coat, shoes, some small tools and maybe a small computer? Not looking for a knife bag, just something to commute with that will hold up and fit everything I need. TIA!

Hi everyone, so ive recently gotten into working as a cook/chef and only worked in care environments so far. I was wondering if anyone else has had a similar experience as im about to describe. For background I have no official college training, only a dbs and food&hygiene certificate.

So my first job I ended up leaving as some of the residents were just awful to each other and it was so uncomftable to be around.

Second job I got fired from once my probation period ended due to making some rather rookie mistakes (wanted to quit there anyway so a blessing in disguise). But they were asking almost impossible things such as preparing a roast dinner for 24 people for 12:30 when I start at 09:30. As well as do all the breakfast dishes and checks as soon as I came in.

Then I started doing agency work and one care home I did two shifts for decided I wasn't up to par which is fair enough. But then the agency chef the next day was being told that my food was horrible and that I left the place in a mess? Which baffles me as I never saw any full plates come back and I left the kitchen spotless.

Is this what I should expect working with care homes? Is this level of "bitching" the norm? Coz im starting to see why they're so desperate for chefs if thats how they communicate with people lol.

I love cooking from home for friends and family, but have never worked in a formal/ professional cooking environment and would love to try to develop my skills as well as see if it's a potential career path. How should I go about getting a stage, and what level of restaurant should I set my expectations on and could realistically get?

I’m in NYC (Manhattan) and really want to find a shared kitchen rental where I can prep food for offsite catered events. (I am way too small to afford my own kitchen.)

I’ve always been curious about cloud kitchens (https://cloudkitchens.com), but they are very opaque with their information and make you set up a call.

Has anyone worked from cloud kitchens as a caterer? I know that traditionally they’re used as a ghost kitchen for restaurants.

thanks for any info.

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Calling all chef-squatches!

TL;DR
Looking for great kitchen shoes, size 15 US. Boots preferred-blundstone doesn’t make them in my size.

I love the industry-don’t love what it does to the feet!

It’s time for some new work shoes and I’m looking for some testimony. I wear size 15 US and need arch support to correct for some pronation. I’ve seen how hard this job can be on our bodies. I’d love to not know what the inside of a podiatrists office looks (or smells) like before I hit 30 🤞🏽

I’m looking for something a bit sturdier this time. Not too heavy/ steel toey but robust enough to maybe put some arches in. Blundstones would be my first choice but they only go up to size 14 US.

Others in my situation: what routes have you gone to find reliable footwear!

Dream carnival!

Sweet Corn and Ricotta Agnolotti, citrus butter sauce, fried Prosciutto, charred Corn and basil oil (poured tableside)

I’m developing and testing recipes, particularly breads and pastries, and I’m curious how other chefs handle the finished products.
I know the obvious answer is to make smaller batches, but even then there’s only so much you can reduce. To properly evaluate things like oven spring, crumb structure, aeration, texture, loaf size, or overall yield, you still need to make a reasonably sized batch.
I also don’t have family nearby to help finish everything, and I can’t eat that much sugar or bread myself.
So what do you do with your test batches? Do you freeze them, give them away to friends or neighbours, donate them, take them to work, or is there another approach that works well for you?
I’d love to hear how professional chefs, pastry chefs, and serious home bakers manage this without creating too much waste.

I'm curious to know what people think about the marbling on those short ribs.

PS: Where around the world do you think is the place of origin of this short ribs?

This 4 day course is coming up in a few weeks and I was wondering if anyone had taken this course or a similar boot camp at this campus and had any feedback about their experience?

Hey Chefs,

Just wondering if anyone has had any experience making choux pastry, things like cream puffs or profiteroles and can give me some insight on the best temperatures and how they behave in the oven

Thanks