Sonoma County restaurants treat servers with a family meal
Sonoma County has its share of talented sous chefs and line cooks, but the only meals that allow them to really make their mark are ones that the public doesn’t get to taste.
The family meal - a rustic repast prepared for the staff, who break bread together before or after the peak hours of service - is a venerable restaurant tradition. During the past week, many of the restaurants who serve their staff family meal have been feeding others in the community as well, bringing comfort food like mac ’n’ cheese and biscuits ‘n’ gravy to shelters from Petaluma to Healdsburg while serving free meals to evacuees who come to their restaurants.
After all, food is the most tangible way to show others that you care, and during difficult times, simple meals of roast chicken and potatoes, pasta and salad can recharge the soul along with the body.
Many of the local chefs who feed their staff on a regular basis were themselves trained in restaurants where the communal staff meal helped create camaraderie and provided a brief respite from the high-stress demands of the job.
“In the kitchens that I was brought up in, you always sat down before service for a quiet time,” said Mark Stark, who oversees two family meals a day at his five restaurants in Santa Rosa and Healdsburg (Willi’s Wine Bar was burned to the ground in the fire.) “You’d sit down with the front and the back of the house, 15 minutes before the chaos ... It’s the huddle before the game starts.”
Family meal fare tends to be rustic and comforting, and often has an ethnic accent, depending on the culture and cooking experience of the person who is preparing it.
“We have some of the best Mexican food for family meal,” Stark said. “At the Steakhouse ... the staff does a lot of different enchiladas with really good sauces. Sometimes they make the sauce at home and bring it in. They are really proud of it.”
The family meal tends to be homey, but that doesn’t mean it’s not delicious, as witnessed by several cookbooks inspired by the tradition, from “Off the Menu” (2011) by Marissa Guggiana to “Come In, We’re Closed,” (2012) by Christine Carroll and Jody Eddy.
In an industry where salaries are relatively low and perks few, the family meal can help boost morale while providing workers with protein, vegetables and maybe even a sweet something before or after their shifts.
It’s very much like the way most families cook at home, created from one-part inspiration, one-part leftovers, and one-part love. Think frittatas and salami sandwiches, pizza and tacos.
“Restaurants operate on such razor-thin margins in general, that it’s one of the perks we can give,” said Josh Silvers, chef/owner of Jackson’s Bar and Wood Oven in Santa Rosa. “Food is love, and you should show people that you love them.”
Chef/owner Dino Bugica of Diavola in Geyserville said at his restaurant, family meal is a casual affair that doesn’t require much planning.
“It all depends on who’s cooking,” he said. “Sometimes the pizza guy does it, and it’s pizza night, and we always do a salad of some sort. For lunch today, the guys made chilaquiles.”
If Bugica is butchering a fresh batch of fish, he will make a favorite dish from his cooking days in Hawaii - a Filipino soup known as sabao, which is traditionally made with fish heads but can also be made with fillets.
“In Hawaii, all the dishwashers would go get the rice,” he said. “Then they used all the leftover stuff, ginger, tomato and fish sauce. Watercress is really good and spinach or bok choy. You put the soup right over the top of the rice.”
At Bistro 29, chef/owner Brian Anderson allows his servers to order something off the menu before lunch, then at the end of the evening, the night shift sits down together to a nice meal with a glass of wine or a beer.
“My sous chef makes it, and on the weekend, it’s usually stuff left over from the prix fixe menus on Tuesday through Thursday,” he said. “We dig around for a protein, then decide from there.”
On a recent night, Anderson had just butchered whole chickens, so his sous chef made some roasted chicken thighs and saffron risotto cakes from leftover risotto, served with a salad.
Anderson will often make a Tortilla Espagnol with potatoes or do a quick, one-hour coq au vin and serve it up with potato puree - made with lots of butter and cream - and a salad.
“Our staff appreciates it,” he said. “They get to eat something, have a glass of wine and relax.”
It’s usually the junior cook’s responsibility to make family meal, and that’s often how a young cook starts climbing the ladder.
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