What does working as a cook in America entail? For those planning to work as a cook, here is the scoop. In the kitchen, there are 3 main work areas: the line, prep, and dish pit. The most important one is shown in the photo below—the line. It has 3 positions: the grill, the middle, and the window.

The grill—naturally, fries patties and other meats and sends them to the middle station.

The middle position—is the leader of the whole operation, taking orders and giving instructions to both the grill and the window. At the same time, the person in the middle toasts bread and buns for the meat.

The window—manages the deep fryer and fries the fries. They also make salads, chips for nachos, and many other small items.

Together, the three of them are a team that handles order after order smoothly and collectively, considering that during the peak of the season, there were sometimes 10-15 orders at once. And that was a normal occurrence.

Besides the line and the dish pit, there is prep, which involves preparing all products for use on the line. There are 1-2 cooks there as well, and during the peak of the season, help would come from other parts of the cafe, for example, from the ice cream shop.

The menu mainly consisted of burgers and sandwiches of various types, which were significantly tastier than at some hypothetical McDonald's. Besides that, there were several salads to choose from, as well as steaks, trout, and chicken. I loved our food. I'm fine with fast food. Moreover, we, of course, received our one-time free meal, and sometimes more often if there were mistaken orders, so as not to throw them away. Another bonus was a 35% discount on all goods in the building. That is, in the ice cream shop, coffee shop, souvenir shop, and grocery store, as well as just in the restaurant, we got a third off, which was also nice. And one more small dessert—there were several free bicycles at the dorm, which we used to get to West Glacier, the nearest small town.

On the first day, they put me at the window, and Evgeniy in the middle because of his good English. Jason, a very big and bald guy, our Head Chef, directed all the actions. The boss of the kitchen, who immediately didn't like me. Why? Because on the second day of work, he sent me—a contract cook—to the dish pit. Even though he moved me from the morning shift to the evening shift on the very first day, and then put me to wash dishes. Back to the topic of my problems, right? But what can you do? Tip #13: Forget about pride for a while. If they tell you to wash dishes, wash dishes. Managers in the States will never overlook good workers, or so it seems to me.

That's what I did. I worked as hard as I could. Yes, it was difficult, yes, I was terribly nervous, but I kept calm and just washed dishes. Even though I was supposed to be cooking. It is worth noting that a few weeks later, Jason began to appreciate me and even started to praise me periodically. Although he still wouldn't let me near the line.