Title.
The strange thing is that they treat me quite well. My wage is ABOVE industry standard (baking) and outside of one narcissistic small-person on the floor, nobody really gives me any trouble.
However, the reason why the title says what it says is basically this:
This place has no form of AC at all. In the summer, the MINIMUM temperature in the place is 35 C. It can get up to 50 depending on what we run and how hot it is outside. It is nasty. In winter when it is -40 outside, it's never below 20 C inside.
When it is hot, we have major production issues with our product. It's dog sh!t, simply put. At least 25% of it will end up in the garbage because the dough is overheated, overmixed and overproofed because of the temperature.
The people that run the place ask me every time without fault, why is the product garbage, what's going on? Why why why…
And I say literally the same thing every time.
“It is hot and humid in here. Look. It's 40 C, and humidity is 80%! We need to reduce mix time and reduce water to make the dough what we want it to be.” Mix time = friction, which = heat. Water = fast proofing dough and extra friction, which = extra heat. The hotter it is, the faster a dough mixes. It is a chemical reaction, fundamentally. Remember chemistry class? Heat = faster chemical reactions.
The response I get when I say this is basically a non-answer – “we'll look into it.”
They don't look into it, and the problem gets worse as the day goes on and it gets hotter. 25% garbage turns into 30%, then 40%, then 50%…
Then the people that run the place come rushing to me and ask me to reduce water and mix time to what I suggested. 1 hour later after the change, our garbage rate goes to 1% or less.
And this pattern of events and conversations happens the same way, every time, every day.
I guess I went to culinary and baking school and done my apprenticeship and worked at a high level for 6 years for nothing, hey? I'm the only accredited baker in this place. I know more than anybody else when it comes to baking and what I can do with the product puts the other folks that have been here for 20 – 30 years to shame.
There are also many other problems with this place that stem from the fact that it is a bakery run by people who aren't bakers. When these other problems arise, I again say the same thing I always say about the problem every time and in the same way. Does it get fixed? Nope. I mostly get non-answers, run-arounds, etc… And they go out of their way to make simple, easy work, as tedious, inefficient and wasteful as possible,
Man, I wish I had the $$$ to run my own place. The work is EASY for me. And unlike many in the food industry, I have no desire to treat others like garbage or underpay them.
/rantover
EDIT: grammar, odd words.