- Chef Justin Beckett gets his team through it with planning, hard work and leadership.
- It's a huge undertaking, with big risks and big potential rewards.
- For Arizona Restaurant Week, 150-plus participating restaurants offer special prix fixe menus.
Most restaurateurs have something of a love/hate relationship with Arizona Restaurant Week.
Held twice a year, Restaurant Week (technically, 10days) is the time when 150-plus restaurants offer special three-coursefixed-price menus at $33 or $44, in addition to their regular menus. This fall's event runs through Sunday.
For diners, it’s an opportunity to find a good deal on dinner, taste new dishes at familiar eateriesor try out a new restaurant at a promotional price.
For restaurants, it’s an enormous logistical challenge. It brings in new and repeat business. But it can just as easily become a nightmare of overwhelming crowds and tarnished reputations if things go wrong.
I wanted to see it up close.So I asked Justin Beckett, chef and co-owner of Beckett’s Table and Southern Rail and member of the ARA board, to let me observe one of his restaurants behind the scenes on the opening night of this year’s fall Restaurant Week.
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How did it go?
I've broken the 12 hour day down into 30 minute increments (which are detailed in the articlebelow)but here are some highlights:
- Surviving Restaurant Week takes planning. Beckett uses detailedspreadsheets totrack what customers order, which cooks are prepping which items,how much of each ingredient or dish he needs, and more.And what better way to build camaraderie than offering a beer and a shot to the staff when they serve a certain number of diners?
- Prep is about knowing how much to make, and how far to take it.Too littlecan grind the kitchen to a halt, but too much can mean throwing away your margins. Dishes need to be close to completion so they can be finished quickly when ordered, but push too far andyou sacrifice quality.
- The walk-in is piled with stunning ingredients, and I almost absconded with an enormous panof truffles.
- It's all hands on deck. I don't get to use my kitchen knives, but they put me to work helping to make pecan pie. I think I got all the cracked egg shells before any made it into the finished product. Pretty sure. (Hope so.)
- Cleanliness is paramount. Cooks furiously wipe down stations as they work. Messes can build up quickly, and slow the kitchen down.
- The mood changes perceptibly around3:30 p.m.. The chatter dies down and the pace quickens. Front of house staffmaterialize out of thinair, servers inhale fast food sandwiches and Beckett is still trimming upwards of 60 lbs of trout. He knows he'll need to order more by night's end. How many diners will they serve? Could be more than 250.
- “Remember, these guests are our future regulars, so make them feel special. Make them putty in your hands,” Beckett tells his crew at the pre shift meeting just before 5 p.m.
- Everyone feels it coming.The crescendo builds. The crush hits the kitchen.Everyone wants to eat in a narrow window between 6 and 7:30 p.m. The bar is two deep, every table is full and tickets are lining up in the kitchen.
- After the diners leave and Beckett goes home, the kitchen belongs to the cooks and the staff. And there's nothing like a Bee Gees dance party to get you through the home stretch.
- Seven more nights of Restaurant Week to go. Details here: Arizona Restaurant Week.
Friday, Sept. 18, 1:25 p.m. Patio's open
I cruise down Indian School Road through the heart of the Arcadia restaurant scene, pull into the Beckett's Table lot, and hop out of my car with a camera and my knife roll, just in case Beckett really meant what he said about putting me to work. It was probably a joke, but Restaurant Week is an all-hands-on-deck affair. I figure there's a 50 percent chance my knives get dirty.
In the lot, chairs outnumber cars 40 to1. The weather finally is cooling off a bit, and they need the extra seating this week, so co-owner/general manager Katie Stephens and J.C. Swanson are hauling chairs and tables out of the storage shed, setting them up, leveling them, wiping them down, and prepping the patio for service. Swanson is on his back under a table with a power drill while Stephens goes back to the shed for more chairs.
I step inside the front door and am greeted by sheet pans filled with cooling pavlovas and Stevie Wonder’s "Sir Duke," part of a prep-time Motown mix that Beckett describes as “gentlemanly.” Moments later, he comes flying out of the kitchen with more sheet pans, these with pumpkin-seed brittle. After a quick handshake and greeting, we decide to sit down and talk now, before it gets too crazy.
1:35 p.m. Spreadsheet overload
Beckett pulls out spreadsheets. He’s my kind of data geek. The first set shows how many customers ordered Restaurant Week dishes, by day, for the past two years. Fall 2014 was a little fluky, but in general, about half of the people coming in order off the Restaurant Week menu.
The second set shows prep lists —which cook is responsible for what dish, which station will be preparing which dishes, which orders need to be increased or cut back to accommodate the unusual week. It’s extremely detailed.
“That’s just how I don’t freak out,” Beckett says, “because if I didn’t have all this on paper, at 4:30 we’d be missing half the stuff.”
I count 88 items on the day’s prep list, and ask him what aspect of Restaurant Week is most difficult. Is it the unusually big crowds? That they come every night for 10straight days? Working the extra dishes into the menu? All of the above, he says, but the first he addresses is the last.
“You’re adding basically a third onto your menu,” he says. “On a busy night when we’re all hopping in the middle of season, we do one, maybe two specials. We’re doing nine specials tonight, for the next 10 days.”
He’s happy that Beckett’s Table is closed Mondays, giving them a day to take stock and reload after the first weekend. And the numbers on most nights aren’t crippling, but tomorrow is looking like a monster.
Arizona Restaurant Week guide: 10 days, 10 spots to try
“If we hit 300 covers, back of house (the chefs, cooks, dishwashers and other employees dinersdon't see)gets a beer. If we hit 350, they get a beer and a shot.”
Reservations suggest the kitchen might get a shot Saturday, which means they have one busy — if not crazy — night to get a handle on the temporary menu. He thinks they’re prepared, but history suggests that’s never quite the case.
“You prep and say, 'I’m going to make 100 of these and 100 of these and 50 of these and that’ll get me through today and tomorrow.' At the end of tonight, you’re like, 'Where did it all go?' So I came in early today thinking I could get ahead, and by tomorrow morning I’ll have the same projects, and I’ll have to do it again. That’s the hard part.”
The thought seems to make him a little anxious. I tell him I haveenough background,and we head back to the kitchen.
2p.m. Chopping, searing, simmering
This is when the cooks usually roll in, but it’s Restaurant Week, so they’ve already been around for a couple of hours, chopping, searing, simmering, mixing and blanching. They’re led by Beckett’s young sous chef, Malone Deever, who sports a Superman T-shirt, a Perry the Platypus hat and iffy dance moves as he preps in time to the music. He’s making veloute(stock thickened with roux) for tonight’s chicken and dumplings, while chicken stock for later in the week simmers away in a pot large enough to hold both my kids with room to spare. Ernesto Moreno, the self-proclaimed “old man” of the bunch, is carefully prepping butter lettuce for salads, while Mike Learned is making a chopped vegetable-and-grain salad that will be paired with oven-roasted trout. Some of the morning prep crew is still here — later than usual — so all told, there are six people cooking.
Beckett talks about what goes into designing the Restaurant Week menu, explaining that it’s a matter of choosing dishes that fully represent the restaurant’s stylebut are quick to finish when the order comes in so they don’t fall behind.
The cooks are busy pushing components as far as they can without sacrificing quality, then loading them into the walk-in refrigerator to chill until service.
2:10 p.m. Tempted by truffles
We tour the walk-in, and I make a mental note to bring a lounge chair in here the next time it’s 115 degrees outside. Speed racks (slotted to hold stacks of sheet pans) are loaded with dumplings, spaetzle and other dish components that will be demolished by night’s end. Shelves are loaded with gorgeous produce, and I spy a pan tucked away in a corner labeled “TRUFFLES —DO NOT DISTURB.” It’s all I can do not to grab the pan and run.
2:20 p.m. Cracking eggs for pecan pie
Deever is roasting enough mushrooms to fill a 20-gallon aquarium, while Learned is tending the wood-fired oven where Deever will smoke four huge pork loins. Beckett calls me over to help him make pecan pie. I’ll do a bit of symbolic work, but the knives will stay clean. Apparently, I can’t even be trusted cracking eggs. I’m pretty sure I got it all, but if you had some shell in your pecan pie, send the complaints todominic.armato@arizonarepublic.com instead of Yelp.
2:30 p.m. Wine time
I mosey out to the dining room where assistant general manager Pamela Johnson is setting out flower arrangements and hauling cases of wine out of storage. The Restaurant Week menu at Beckett’s Table includes a glass of Arizona wine (you choose red or white, they choose the wine), so they’ll blow through a lot more than usual.
2:45 p.m. Clean as you go
As the cooks complete tasks, they meticulously wipe down their stations. Messes build up quickly and slow you down. The dishwashing station is buried in the detritus of the day’s prep. It looks like the aftermath of my craziest four dinner parties combined, minus the empties.
The morning crew starts to wrap up their work for the day, and the last line cook for the evening, Brian Messier, shows up. He started at the restaurant four days ago. His second day manning the grill station will be the first day of Restaurant Week. Thrown into the fire, indeed.
3 p.m. Pate de fruit = frustration
Beckett is frustrated. He thinks the peach and white-balsamic pate de fruit tastes great (they do), but they haven’t quite set up properly. They’re too soft. He tosses them in the freezer.
There’s a different intoxicating smell coming from every corner of the kitchen, and coming to the restaurant on a empty stomach is one of the dumbest decisions I’ve ever made.
3:30 p.m. The pace quickens
The pace in the kitchen has quickened noticeably. The crew is working smoothly, but with much greater urgency than an hour ago, and the chatter has lessened.
“All right, guys, we’re getting down to it,” Beckett calls out, as he trims fish. He pulls Learned aside. “At some point tonight around 9, I’m going to have to jump offline to order more fish, and I want to know how fast we’re blowing through it.” He returns to his station and mutters to himself, “I don’t think I’ve ever cut 60 pounds of trout at one time.”
3:50 p.m. 'A little behind.'
I overhear Beckett talking to one of the cooks in the next room.
“You ready?”
“I feel like I’m a little behind.”
“What do you need help with?”
No drama.
3:55 p.m. Front-of-house arrives
The front-of-house staff materializes out of thin air and swarms the dining room. Stephens is asking a couple of servers to detail the chairs and tabletops on the patio. Johnson is buzzing around, straightening chairs and checking to be sure everything is in place. One of the bartenders, Toby Moniz, has quickly set up his station and is cutting citrus, while a couple of servers sit across the bar, inhaling Chick-Fil-A sandwiches before they get started.
4:10 p.m. Last minute reservations
The phone starts ringing with people seeking last-minute reservations. Both lines are tied up. Beckett steps out of the kitchen to ask how many reservations there are (135 and building). He thinks they might hit 250 for the night with walk-ins.
4:15 p.m. Wash, wash, wash
The dishwashers have arrived and are tearing through the mountain of tubs and pans.
Beckett glances at the time and seems surprised, saying the kitchen needs another half hour. One of the cooks shouts back, joking, “Sorry, folks, we don’t open until 5:30 tonight!”
4:20 p.m. Time to buckle down
The music is off, which means it’s serious. The kitchen crew is cranking. Nobody is talking. I blink and suddenly everybody is wearing crisp shirts and matching aprons. In the dining room, nearly 20 servers and runners are getting dressed and folding napkins. The kitchen is behind and Beckett asks Swanson's help to pack up the pavlovas and brittle that still are lying out in the dining room.
4:30 p.m. Pre shift meeting
“All right, if you’re a white shirt, I need you,” Beckett calls out, referring to the service staff.
They all gather in one corner of the dining room, still folding napkins. Decorative pigs adorn the rafters, overlooking the scene. Beckett reviews dish changes and points out specific issues they might encounter with the Restaurant Week menu. The pork loin retains some pink color because of the reaction involved when it is brined and smoked, not because it's raw. He also notes that the staff might encounter me. I introduce myself and tell everybody to give me a swift kick in the shins if I get in the way. Beckett reminds his staff to help the Restaurant Week crowds with the same enthusiasm they would the restaurant’s regulars.
Beckett hustles back to the kitchen, and Stephens takes over the meeting, handing out tasting notes for the Restaurant Week wines, which Johnsonhas been pouring for the entire staff to sample. Katie notes the patio is open for the season.
“Patio dining should never be a secondary experience,” she says. “It is just as much a part of the restaurant as the dining room.”
4:57 p.m. The calm before the storm
Three minutes before doors open, and the crescendo that’s been building for the past hour and a half suddenly turns into an eerie hush.
“You ready for the craziness, Rachel?” Moreno asks as server Rachel Nugentglides by.
“Bring it on, Ernesto!” she responds.
Learned has pulled out an 18-quart Cambro (a plastic storage tub) and is using a huge whisk to mix up a brew of Tang and Monster energy drinks. He grabs a spoon to taste the concoction, then gives a wry smile as he cracks two more cans of energy drink and dumps them in. He portions the juice over ice into 1-quart deli containers — the round plastic tubs that Chinese restaurants use to deliver wonton soup — and hands one to each of the cooks, plus me.
I spend three minutes trying to find a spot to put my drink where it won’t get in somebody’s way. This is harder than you think. I finally ask a server. “Over here,” she says, before leading me back into the kitchen, through the dishwashing station, to a utility room where there’s a ladder propped up against the wall. The ladder’s rungs are covered with a dozen cups, glassesand sports bottles.
5:02 p.m. First customers
The first customers of the evening walk in and take a seat at the bar where Monizand Justin Felicetti, another bartender, quickly strike up a conversation with them. Light, peppy vocal jazz plays in the background.
5:16p.m. Let the tickets begin
The first ticket hits the machine. Two Restaurant Week menus. Beckett shows Learned how he wants the salmon rillettes plated, while Moreno drizzles a salad with apple gastrique. Beckett has tried to balance the Restaurant Week dishes across the five stations so that no one cook gets overwhelmed.
Beckett gives me a taste of the sauce for the pork loin. “This is our version of chimichurri,” he says. “Not too spicy.” I like mine with more zip, but the flavor is nice.
I notice that he’s wearing a Millennium Falcon bandanna. Pretty sure it’s Deever's.
5:45 p.m. Always taste
The dining room is starting to fill in, and all five stations in the kitchen are engaged. They burn through scores of plastic tasting spoons, constantly checking sauces as they go out. Runners line the pass, waiting to pick up dishes and rush them to the tables. Almost every plate is from the Restaurant Week menu.
6 p.m. Diverse crowd
I chat with a couple at the bar. Lindsey Moses and Frank Serafini recently moved to the neighborhood from Cave Creek, and they’ve already made Beckett’s Table a regular haunt. They’re big fans of the place, and although they didn’t come for the Restaurant Week menu, they’re all too happy to take advantage of it.
Elsewhere, it’s a diverse crowd. A group at the communal table includes a guy in a white tux and a woman draped with enough pearls to fill a gum-ball machine. A few tables over, a couple in shorts and T-shirts are out to dinner with a toddler in tow.
6:20 p.m. Adapting to cooking challenges
Beckett pulls the pate de fruit out of the freezer and hands me one, smiling. The texture isn’t perfect, but it’s much better, and the flavor is great. He’ll serve them cool. It’s nice on a hot day. He turns to Messier. “Make sure we get plenty of herbs in the saute on the pork, OK?”
Learned'senergy drink is taking hold and my heart is doing the paso doble.
6:50 p.m. Time for a pep talk
Dishes are hitting the pass at a fair clip, but it’s still smooth sailing. Beckett sees the dining room getting crowded and warns the crew to stay sharp.
“OK, guys, don’t get lulled to sleep. Make sure you’ve filled up on everything. It’s coming.”
7:30 p.m. The waves come crashing in
It comes.
In Phoenix, though restaurants wish it weren’t so, everybody wants to eat in a narrow window between 6and 7:30 p.m.The bar is two deep, the dining room is full, the pork loin is popularand Messier's grill station is slammed. There are a dozen tickets on his rail and eight or nine more on the printer. The kitchen puts on the defensive shift. Deever scoots over to help Messier, and Beckett juggles his station and Deever's. Tomorrow night they’ll have a sixth man —a floater to move between stations as needed —but tonight, they have to make it work with what they have. Messier and Deeverdance around each other in the tight space, working as quickly as they can. Nobody in the dining room seems the wiser.
7:45 p.m. Community dining
One couple leave, and as they pass the kitchen, Beckett calls out and greets them warmly. I catch them on their way out the door. Linda Scott and Michael Ziffer live a stone’s throw awayand have been coming almost since day one, in 2010. They love the food, they love the room, but mostly, they love that it feels like a part of the community, where they’re treated like family. They came for the Restaurant Week menu but didn’t need the excuse.
8:15 p.m. Falling intoroutine
Deeverhas returned to his station and Messier no longer is under water, but he has a long string of tickets coming off his machine and the crew remains in high gear.
I catch Johnson in a momentary lull and ask how it feels to be kicking off the season with Restaurant Week.
“When season starts," she says, "it’s like putting that old pair of Levi's on again. It’s like, yeah, this is good. This works.”
8:45 p.m. One by one, diners leave
Barely an hour after the peak, the bar is deserted, the dining room is half-emptyand things are slowing down. Phoenix diners strike in force, then quickly disappear.
9p.m. Textbook success
I find a table of first-timers. Jenny and Curtis Fenton are from south Scottsdale. They try not to spend their restaurant dollars on places they aren’t certain they’ll like, but they’ve been wanting to try Beckett’s Table and are taking the opportunity to give it a spin at a bargain price.
They loved their meal and will be back. Jenny notes that sometimes, chimichurri is too spicy and overwhelms the meat, but she thought Beckett’s was just right. They walk out smiling. A textbook Restaurant Week victory.
9:15 p.m. My turn to eat
The roar of the dining room has quieted to a lively hum, and any front-of-house staff not actively helping diners are polishing or wiping down something, restocking and getting ready for Saturday.
I sit down at the bar and order three Restaurant Week menus and a lot of takeout boxes. I’m reminded of how wonderful butter lettuce is when it’s fresh and crisp and gently dressed. And the crowd’s collective wisdom is on point. The pork might be the best item on the Restaurant Week menu, though having smelled Deever's velouteall afternoon, the chicken and dumplings really hits the spot.
9:30 p.m. Break down
The kitchen crew starts breaking down what they can, packing components and moving them to the walk-in. Moreno points to piles of pavlovas, brittleand croutons.
“We’re going to have to remake all of these in the morning. It’s too humid in here today. They won’t be any good tomorrow.”
9:45 p.m. Birthday wishes
Two stragglers walk in and sit down for dinner at the bar. One of the last remaining tables sings happy birthday when the staff brings out a wedge of pecan pie with a candle in it. The front-of-house staff begins slipping away one-by-one as they finish their duties.
10 p.m. Captain says farewell
Closing time, and the chef has left the building. Beckett packs up, says his farewells, and heads out the door. On the way, he shows me the night’s numbers. They come up a little shy of 250. And despite early indications, the number of diners ordering the Restaurant Week menu finishes at almost exactly 50 percent.
The front-of-house staff that remain still are shining up flatware and divvying up tips. Morenoand Messierare hunkered down in a corner of the kitchen, grabbing a plate of food before starting their cleanup. In the enormous pot, 5 inches of stock have simmered away since I got here.
10:15 p.m. Moreno's calling
Simon and Garfunkel’s "Bookends Theme" gently drifts from the speakers, followed by a crooning Ray Charles with "Georgia on My Mind."
The mood has turned mellow, and I chat with Moreno as he cleans his station. He came to the business late, after spending 30 years working for Phoenix. He’d never set foot in a professional kitchen until four years ago, and caught on with Beckett two years ago. He loved how his mother cooked when he was growing up. They didn’t have much money, and although she wasn’t a pro, she’d improvise and turn pantry scraps and refrigerated leftovers into delicious dishes. Moreno thought maybe he could do that, too. He talks about how he loves the job, and how determined he is to work as hard as it takes. Answer: It’s backbreaking work, and Moreno had already broken his back once, while working for the city. I’m 38 and I can barely imagine working as a cook now, much less starting as one in my 50s with a bad back.
10:55 p.m. Closing up
The couple at the bar leave. Johnson locks the front door and lowers the blinds.
11p.m. Dance party
“Feel the city breakin’ and everybody shakin’ and we’re stayin’ alive, stayin’ alive.”
Somebody fires up the sound system, and suddenly the energy is back. Nothing like a Bee Gees bass line to get you through the home stretch. The kitchen crew dances around with buckets and rags as they scrub. “Yeah, Brian! Tear it up, Brian!” Deevershouts.
11:25 p.m. Cleanup finished
Scrubbing is done and so is the dance party. Learned and Messier stumble out the front door, followed by Morenoand, finally, Deever.
11:40 p.m. Not a peep to be heard
Felicetti, the bartender, finishes closing out and leaves, followed by the dishwashers. Johnson is the last one standing, and I catch myself straightening chairs while she closes out the drawer and finishes paperwork in the office. The pigs in the rafters are kind of ominous when the dining room is deserted and silent.
12:10 a.m. Sleep, wake and do it all again
Johnson shuts off the lights and locks up as she leaves. She’ll be up in the morning to drop her 4-year-old at day care and come back for more. We’re both working through the weekend, but I’ll get to do so from my sofa. In a couple of hours, the cleaning crew will come through, followed by the morning prep crew at 8a.m. Then everybody does it all again.
First day of Restaurant Week down. Nine to go.
