Clean up, Clean up.

I think sometimes people who don't work fast food don't realize that there's a lot more work that goes into it than just talking to customers (lord knows this is difficult enough though), punching buttons and putting meat, lettuce, and cheese in a shell. There's dishes (which isn't too bad if we stay caught up on them). ((I bet we do more dishes in a day than some customers do in a week.)) There's also cleaning. Lots of cleaning. Which usually gets done after we close.


So my restaurant closes at 12 am on weekdays and 1 am on weekends. But just because that's when we close does not mean that's when we leave. When we close the store, we have to clean the entire store. This takes approximately an hour, sometimes less if business is slow and we get jump on certain things.


What we have to do:

• Store all the cold food in a walk-in refrigerator so it stays cold.
• Make all the left-over hot food 40 degrees or less so it can be saved and used the next day.
• Clean out the places we store the cold food.
• Clean out the places we store the hot food.
• Clean the grill we warm the tortillas on. (approx. 150+ degrees)
• Clean the grill we use to make quesadillas and other various items. (approx. 300+ degrees)
• Wipe down counters/work stations.
• Stock wraps, sauces, and napkins.
• Do all the dishes we didn't get before.
• Clean the dining room if it's not already done.
• includes wiping down tables/benches
• wiping down soda station
• stocking
• take dining room trash to the back.
• sweeping and mopping the dining room.
• also included is the bathrooms.
• sweeping
• mopping
• getting trash
• wiping down sinks, mirrors and toilets
• Sweep everything from the entire day off of the floor.
• Take the trash to the back.
• Do a (good) mop job.

Now, I'm not whining here, but we have a lot to do at the end of the night. Some of it is really easy, and some of it takes some time.

And I'm only telling you this because a lot of people don't know, and that leads to a lot of phone conversations like this.

*Phone rings*
Me: *restaurant name*, How can I help you?

Customer: What time are you guys open 'til?

Me: We actually just closed about 20 minutes ago.

Customer: Oh yeah? Then why are you still there?

Me:

Me: *trying to talk to him like he's not stupid* Because we have to clean up the store... 

Customer: Yeah alright.

Me: Sorry about that. Have a goodnight.

It's a little frustrating sometimes. This place isn't magic, y'know. It doesn't clean itself. We have no little squirrels or deer to help us do it faster. We're just people, man.