O HAI!

Yeah, I've been away a while. Sorry. The break-up on the personal side is a big part of this lull but not so much as the frustration of being unable to find a location. Either they're tied to a brewery or the location is shit or the rent is astronomical or the Ablösegeld ("buying out" sum for the fixtures and stuff) is insane.

I was scoping one place a few weeks ago and things seemed pretty good. Excellent location, near public transport, parking, no nearby competition.

"So what's the Ablösegeld?"
"End ess hyoo ken see here zere is motch room for ze kitchen."
"Yeah, I saw already. How much is the Ablösegeld?"
"End ze rent iss very gud and hyoo only heff to pay two munss security payment."
"You've said that already. How much is the Ablösegeld?"
"End hyoo vill not heff to pay ze real estate company because it iss mine direct."
"Yeah, Sparky, I twigged. How much is the Ablösegeld?"
"Ach! Ze Ablösegeld! It is only €900,000."
"What the FUCK? Everything in this place, brand new -- at retail -- isn't worth €120K!"
"But it iss an ideal place. You can make very much money here!"
"You didn't."

And that was the end of the conversation.

But now, things are afoot. New things. I expect to be writing again soon.

Menu -- in progress

This is not final.

Appetizers & Snacks

Nachos (with salsa and nacho cheese) -- €2,90
Topped with melted cheese €0,70
and chili €1,50
plus guacamole €1,00

Homemade Spinach-Artichoke Dip with tortilla chips -- €4,60

Real Buffalo Wings w/ bleu cheese dressing and carrot & celery sticks
6 for €4.50
12 for €8.00
24 for €14.00
48 for €25.00

Baskets:
Steak fries €2,80

add €1,80 each for:
5 mozz sticks
6 jalapeño-cheese poppers
4 chicken tenders (home made?)
6-10 calamari rings

The Game Mix (some of each):
single (1 pers.): €6,50
medium: (2-3 people) €10,50
large: (3-5 people) €14,00

Loaded Cheese Fries
Our homemade fries with Cheddar, Bacon, Jalapenos, Sour Cream, & Green Onions -- €4,80

Chili Cheese Fries
Our homemade fries topped with chili con carne, Cheddar cheese, & sliced Green Onions -- €5,70

Beer-battered Onion Bloom with Creamy chili dip -- €4,60


Quesadillas (with salad):
Veg (spring onion & tomato) -- €4,80
Chicken (veg plus marinated chix) -- €5,90
Steak (veg plus marinated chix) -- €6,10



Soups cup €2,20 bowl €3,10
Served with crusty bread
Classic Tomato
Split Green Pea
Broccoli
Of da week


Salads

Mixed Monk’s
Five sorts of lettuce, radicchio, mixed bell peppers, tomato, cucumber, carrots and our house vinaigrette -- €5,40

Cobb
Lettuce, tomato, bell peppers, cucumber and red onions, topped with bacon, Roquefort cheese, chicken breast, hard-cooked egg slices and original Cobb dressing -- €6,80

Marinated chicken breast
A Mixed Monk’s with two sliced, marinated and grilled chicken breasts, served with a garlic and herb sour cream dip -- €7,70

Taco
seasoned ground beef, tortilla chips and cheddar cheese along with lettuce, tomato, bell peppers, cucumber, red onions and a zesty house dressing, served in an edible tortilla bowl with salsa, sour cream and guac -- €8,20

Burgers Served with a basket of homemade fries and a pickle

The Big Burger
200g Burger with lettuce, tomato, onion and pickle -- €7,80
Double the beef for €1,90

The Super Burger
Bigger than the Big, a whopping 340g burger -- €9,80
Double the beef for €2,90

Fifty cents gets you 2 slices of cheese or 3 slices of bacon

Specialties (add €1,80)
Yodeler: Jalepeño/Swiss
Tex: BBQ/red onion/pickles
Mex: cheddar, jalepeños, guacamole and salsa
Forget-Me-Not: blue cheese, garlic, spices

The Chix Burger
150g chicken burger with lettuce, tomato, onion and pickle 6,10
Add €1,60 for a double

The Veggie Burger
120g veggie (vegan) burger with lettuce, tomato, onion and pickle €5,80
Add €1,60 for a double



Hot Dogs
Regular with ketchup & mustard €1.60
Cheese or bacon -- €0,50 or €0,90 for both

Specialties (add €1,00)
New York Sauerkraut & fried onions
Chicago: Mustard, fresh onion, relish, pickle, tomato, peppers, celery salt and NO ketchup
Coney: Chili & cheese
Iceworks: Hot dog sauce, ketchup, light mustard, raw & fried onions and potato salad.

Mains

Currywurst & Pommes
The German classic, a huge currywurst with a plate of chips and curry ketchup -- €5.60

Fish & Chips
Hand-made in homemade batter

NEED PRICES: MAX THREE types

Haddock: Schellfisch
Cod: Kabeljau
Pollock: Köhler
Plaice: Scholle/Plattfisch
Whiting: Weißfisch
Hake: (See-)Hecht
Dover sole: Seezunge

Pie Floater
Pea soup, a homemade pie and tomato sauce, just like on Bondi Beach

Steak served with salad and either homemade chips or baked potato w/ sour cream
Eye of Round
200g €9,80
300g €12,80

Butt Steak
220g €13,80
330g €16,80

Aged Porterhouse steak (hung 4 weeks, aged 6-12 weeks)
300g €21,80
450g €32,50

Homemade Pies (served with a basket of chips) -- €5,60
With two pies: €6,90

Spinach-Feta (vegetarian)
Curried vegetables (vegetarian)
Steak and veg
Chicken curry
Savoury chicken and veg


Traditional British Fare -- €6,80
Shepherd’s Pie
Fisherman’s Pie
Lancashire Hot Pot


Spaghetti -- €6,30
Bolognese
Pesto (check menu board)
Of da week

Lasagne -- €6,80
Veggie
Meat
Of da week


Chili con Carne -- €6,80
Made with five different chilis, beans and no corn, served with bread & tortilla chips

Chili de Veggie -- €6,80
Just like our meaty version except vegan, with veggies and veggie “meat”.

Jacket (Baked) Potatoes with side salad
Sour Cream & Chive -- €4,80
Broccoli, Cheddar & Bacon -- €5,40
Chili, Cheddar Cheese and Jalepeños -- €6,40

Dessert
New York Cheesecake -- €2,80

Kids' Menu (12 & under) -- €4,60

Big Burger Jr (90g), as above
Double Grilled Cheese & Fries
Franks 'n' Beenz (with fries)
Spaghetti
Chili (with tortilla chips)
Salad with Chicken

Bureaucracy

Ah, bureaucracy, the sand in the wheels of business. And when it comes to restaurants Germany is even worse than New York City or London. I went to the Kreisverwaltungsreferat (KVR) -- the seat of licensing and registration for people and businesses -- to get started on the inevitable.

Typically I was sent to one office which then sent me to another. Take a ticket and wait. After a 15-minute wait my number came up, I went in, and I was told to go to a completely different department. That department's door was locked but an atypically friendly woman (she doesn't normally deal with the scum who are forced to visit the KVR directly) brought me to a room next to the room which was locked. In it a friendly blind guy who started 'splainin stuff to me that I already knew.

I was able to save him a few breaths and within 20 minutes had the basic information I needed.

How to start a restaurant in Germany Munich:

1) If you plan to serve alcohol, you need a Gaststättenerlaubnis (Public House Permission) which can only be issued to a specific person and specific bar at a specific location. No booze, no worries... but no booze, no chance. I need this one.

2) Even if you're taking over a place which already serves booze, you gots to get the permission slip.

3) Put up a new building and you're in a world of hurt, especially since you must provide at least one parking spot for each 10m² of space you have including storage rooms, kitchen, bar, bathrooms, basement... all of it gets added up. This is an 850-year-old city. There are no existing places to put cars let alone new places.

4) You have to go to the police and pay €10 or so for a damned print-out to prove you're not a bad boy, or that if you are a bad boy, you're no longer bad enough that the police are terribly interested in you. I was able to stop the blind guy's spiel here with a brief comment and cut him off a second time telling him, "not even a single point on my driver's license". Despite being unable to see my Sideshow Bob hairstyle he sounded surprised.

5) If you're serving alcohol you have to go to the IHK and take a full-day "running a restaurant" course. The IHK is more or less the Chamber of Commerce. The content of they "teach" is the reasons that 80% of restaurants fail. Perhaps not the content but the fact that people actually listen to their barely post-mercantilist bullshit which includes advice to jack up the price on anything popular and even better advice not to ever comp anything. EVAR!1!!11!1shiftone. Because that's giving profits away.

I know the contents of the "course" -- everything from employment methods to pricing policies -- and they're all fucking wrong. That shit might've worked here 30 years ago but no one who wants to survive in the modern world gouges customers. They still think first in terms of entitlements and the Industrial Revolution-era thinking about "management versus employees", a long-dead mindset in most currently successful businesses. But I'm required to go there and do this.

6) Business license. Fair enough, and the price is only €40 for real humans or €50 for fictional humans (a.k.a., businesses).

7) Are you a forinjer? You have to sort out a load of paperwork in a completely different section of the KVR but I've long since done that.

8) Another class! This one is a 3-hour "course" at the Health Department but worse, it has to have been completed it within 90 days prior to the application for everything else. Apparently it's so stupid that on day 91 people have forgotten "Wash your hands", "Don't leave broken eggs and ground beef out overnight" and "Don't smoke in the kitchen."

9) The place must be inspected by a building inspector.

10) The place must be inspected by a health inspector.

11) The place must be inspected by an is-it-safe-to-be-a-bar/restaurant inspector.

12) There's a one-time fee of more than €12/m² of total area (including kitchen, bathrooms, storage, broom closet, etc.) giving the city even more incentive to help businesses in their quests fail.

13) You have to close between 5:00a.m. and 6:00a.m. for "cleaning time" whether or not the damned cleaning woman actually comes at 9:00a.m. when there's no one actually there. I know Burger King has gotten around this one so there have to be exceptions and they're no doubt expensive.

14) New place? Barrier-free. Doesn't matter if no one in a wheelchair would set foot in your place (so to speak). And "barrier-free" rules in Germany are sillier than those in the US.

15) Boys' and Girls' bathrooms and a separate employee toilet. With a sink inside. Hands must be washed before opening the door (never mind that the door handle is the same one the dirty hands touched while going into the room). this one's a no-brainer; I've screamed at idiot personnel for being lazy and walking into customer area cans. It just looks bad.

16) Proof of financial capability

17) Registration with the Chamber of Commerce.

And that's only the start.

This cake needs icing? No problem. It takes at least two weeks to schedule an inspection which can only be done once the lease has already been signed, and gettig a tentative lease with an exit clause should the inspection fail is impossible here. One faces paying at least one month (and more likely two or three) of astronomical rent costs before the doors may be opened to earn the first penny.

What the hell am I thinking?

A Fireproof Bridge

"Andy, I need to talk to you for a minute before we split."

It was 1:30a.m. and I'd walked a whole 62m up the street to to pick up my girlfriend at the bar and talk to the owner.

"What's up?"
"I gotta stop. I can't do this anymore."

He was taken aback and had a look of surprise on his face. The cigarette almost dropped from his mouth.

"Two or three shifts a week are really taking a toll on me at the office. But mainly I'm sick of the bullshit, the cliques here at the bar, the games that a few of them play. I'm out."
"I see. So right away?"
"Nah, I won't leave you in the lurch. You need to find a couple people. It's June; I can stay through August if you need."

It wasn't just the other people working there, most of whom I'd rarely see anymore as everyone migrated into "teams" of a sort, terribly clique-ish and incredibly back-stabbing. It was also him.

Andy had reluctantly hired me as a barman back in 2003. I needed some extra cash and more importantly I needed to get out of the house and back into something resembling a social setting after three years of sitting in the office or at my computers after a particularly painful and nasty divorce.

The then-manager had quit shortly before to open his own Thai restaurant having failed to convince Andy to try and make this bistro in a dead part of town where one-third of the housing is subsidised into a three-star, fine dining experience. This was after blowing around a hundred grand of the owner's money on a rehab of the place, which among other things covered the old, famous wooden lattice ceiling with beautiful white gypsum board and white paint. Gone were the pin spots everywhere and in their place some dust-collecting globes hanging halfway down from the ceiling.

Not surprisingly Andy was a bit gun-shy after this. Still, I took to the job like a duck to water despite some problems with a few of the employees which I was able to resolve over the next two years. I was there for everyone, having fallen back into my old ways from some seven years ago in a different town where I'd rescued a bar's business. I impressed regulars with American-style service and surprised regulars by learning their names and drinks quickly. This just isn't normal for Germany. The tips we received (and still do) reflected that.

After about a year I started thinking of opening my own place. I'd tried to implement a few ideas at Andy's but was blocked at every turn. Never again would this be anything but Andy's bistro. The one thing I was able to convince him to try by throwing down with my own cash was a flop. Only afterwards did I find out he'd tried it a few years ago and blown it. Had I known then I would've tried to find out what he'd done to combat the problem. We don't see eye-to-eye on a lot of things; I know what he did wrong.

And now more than a year later I'm still there every Monday night, every other Saturday night, and occasionally on a Friday or other night when all his shit staff bail an hour before opening. I told him about my plans and he knows it's even more important that he find new staff, something he's failed to do since my announcement last June. There's one new guy but Andy decided to let Mary train him.

I remember well when Mary came in for her first night. I trained her and saw immediately that she has no business in the business. For one, she can't add. She couldn't figure out the total of two €2.80 beers without running back to the bar for a calculator. I had to make her a cheat sheet. She thinks that Rachmaninoff and Chopin are suitable music for a bar. She has no overview of the location or the customers. She lets regulars wait 20 minutes for a beer.

I told Andy she was nice but not cut out for it. He sees it now but, pigheaded as he is, always does the opposite of what I say. He can't bring himself to fire her. In a fit of inspiration one normally associates with the effects of Thorazine, he had her train the new guy. To do a job she's wholly incapable of performing herself. So of course the new guy was incompetent and on a night that was so slow that any other person could've worked it alone and still been bored, the two of them crashed and had to call the owner for help running the place.

The new guy has since been re-trained by my now ex-girlfriend who I still intend to make the manager of my place. She worked one evening with him and undid all the damage. He could yet work out, but I won't be stealing him away. I'm leaving the place and only taking my ex-girlfriend. She wouldn't be there if it weren't for me. I've got dibs.

I haven't really enjoyed working there for the past year (with a couple of exceptional nights), but I've been there for Andy. So it was no surprise that he was willing to take me along to the business-only supermarket in order for me to price out items. With a tentative menu I was able to break everything down into individual ingredients and now I know what everything costs, so it's time to get to work on finalising the menu and pricing.

Of course there's a bit of Schadenfreude; Andy doesn't want me to fail per se but since I plan to follow the policies he's rejected, he really can't wait to say, "I told you so". And so it goes...

Toys

Sweeeeeeet! Based on Anthonly Bourdain's praise of it in his book, Kitchen Confidential I went to the store to pick up a new toy. They didn't have any veg for test cutting but they have a cutting board and you can get a feel for the thing. At first glance it seems like little more than a short bread knife and the balance is a bit odd with more weight than I'd expect in the handle. On second glance, too. I was wondering if I was about to shell out €50 (after professional discount) for something I didn't need; Wüsthof calls it a "deli knife" and their own description only describes bread and sandwiches.

Here's what Bourdain had to say about it:

A genuinely useful blade, however, and one that is increasingly popular with my cronies in the field, is what's called an offset serrated knife. It's basically a serrated knife set into an ergonomic handle; it looks like a 'Z' that's been pulled out and elongated. This is a truly cool item which, once used, becomes indispensable. As the handle is not flush with the blade, but raised away from the cutting surface, you can use it not only for your traditional serrated blade needs-like slicing bread, thick-skinned tomatoes and so on-but on your full line of vegetables, spuds, meat and even fish. My sous-chef uses his for just about everything.

Wicked sharp with a scalloped blade it's certainly most excellent for tomatoes. I'm not sure how I feel about it for potatoes which I normally cut with a santoku. I'll give it a couple weeks and see how things go.

With a serrated edge this thing can't be sharpened at home. It cost me €7.50 to get a new edge put on my santoku after someone dumped it into a drawer full of unsecured steel things. Actually it cost me €15 because the store double-charged me and I couldn#t find the original receipt -- they're out of business now. I don't know whether this blade can be sharpened even by a pro but with care it should last a few years, after which I'll wrap it up and send it to Solingen with a pretty-please letter on restaurant letterhead. It's worth a shot.

Oddly, on the cardboard sheath is printed standard instructions for sharpening the balde which would be applicable to a normal flat blade but which are impossible for a rounded, scalloped blade, both steeling it and sharpening it against a stone: After extended use the blade may be easily resharpened on a WÜSTHOF steel. Simply hold the blade at a 20 degree angle and draw down and across each side of the steel.

Umm... no.

Appetizer Junikies

Well, boy howdy, that worked! My second attempt to make a perfect, addictive-like-meth spinach-avacado dip worked like a charm. The only problem is that prepping it takes a while because spinach is too damned wet, even after it's been chopped and sqeezed to death in cheesecloth. Still, I've confirmed the addictiveness quotient (very high) and tastiness (very high) and will stick with the recipe even though it takes around 45 minutes to make.

Prep is simple but cooking is time-consuming. The real downside (because there's always one) is that the base probably won't freeze well due to the sour cream. Final presentation takes about 10 minutes in a home kitchen and not even five in a restaurant with a salamander (the broiler, not the amphibian).

Cost per portion is reasonable (under €2/per) but will continue to increase due to dairy and artichoke costs. I should be able to keep the price under €5 for now.

Next stop: chili, both veggie and meat. There's a Munich chili cook-off in a month or so and if I can win or at least place in the top three it'd score the bar some serious points.

Problem 1: my chili takes around 14 hours to cook. I could do an easy version in under 45 minutes with another hour of 0simmering, but the version with all the chilis (guajillos, pasillas, chipotles, anchos, Californias and others) and the mixed meat takes time. And all the tomatoes.

It's hard to get even half-ripened tomatoes and the ones which are at least starting to leave the green spectrum before being picked are terribly expensive. I'll probably have to use a mix of fresh and canned. There's a big Italian supermarket which serves both home and restaurant customers. I've picked up four different recommended brands of canned tomatoes from there and have to try each one. Chili con carne (or "con veggie") is actually pretty cheap to make in large batches, save for the cost of the chilis which I have to import.

The only chilis which are finally available here are chipotles in tiny cans packed in adobo sauce, and only a few specialty stores have them. Maybe I can use some of the more readily available Turkish and Indian chilis along with the chipotles. There are also the dried Thai and Chinese ones for heat but I love the ancho flavour. Gonna be eating a lot of chili over the next month...

Monkey Wrench

This is going to be a problem.

I've been informed that getting three months' leave of absence from my day job is extremely unlikely. Were my mother terribly sick (she's been dead for three years) or if there was a baby on the way (my now ex-girlfriend is moving out next month) it should be rather easy to get approval, but because I want leave for "personal reasons", I'm unlikely to get it.

I could play the German medical system and claim burn-out but I'd rather not go that route. For one I'm still self-insured. More importantly that would some sort of record with both the firm and the medical system. But I have to do this. I have to open a restaurant.

I need to do this because financially I'm hosed. Having only really worked and contributed to the social system here since I was 35 and with a contractual obligation to relinquish my current job at the age of 62 (despite the ever-increasing age of retirement, now 65), I won't have enough pension built up to pay even the rent.

I will work until the day I die. I've always known this and in and of itself it's not a necessarily a bad thing because after 10 days of vacation and doing nothing I'm champing at the bit to get back to being productive in some way. The cold, harsh reality is that whether or not I want to, whether or not I'm physically able, I will have to work.

I work in the software industry. I'm very good at what I do but it's getting harder to remain this good because there's always more to learn and this dog can only absorb so much information. I can still learn but it's harder; I'm on the wrong side of 40 and getting further from that every minute.

Yeah, I could probably tend bar until I stop breathing but who the hell wants a 60-some-year-old schmuck standing behind the bar? Not me, and I'm old enough not to make jokes about that age anymore. How long would I actually be able to hold up doing that physical work? Working at someone else's whim? For a pittance?

Why a restaurant? Because I know what I'm doing. I've chosen to take the safe route of working for someone else to relearn how the business works here in Germany. I've moved to (quasi-)management and picked up much. There are a couple restaurants I'd really like to open but this sports bar seems the safest way to begin as an owner and the least likely to be able to bankrupt me quickly.

Few are turned off by an old owner. On the contrary, whether it's a 3-star palace or a sports bar, the old guy who runs the place is respected.

I need around three months to rebuild this bar, rip out, replace, rehab and refit everything that's currently keeping the customers away, and get everything running smoothly after which I shouldn't have to show up more than a few a week. I'm not in this one for the cash any more than Apollo 8 was in it for a landing.

They paved the way for Apollo 11 by testing and observing and learning. Despite a free-return trajectory to bring them home automatically in case things went badly, the Apollo 8, 9 and 10 missions were busy and difficult and necessary for the eventual Moon landing.

I'm trying to play it safe as well. Tend bar, manage, learn what's necessary with bookkeeping, taxes, inspections and other gubmint matters, get to know other owners; I've done my Mercury and Gemini missions. I've experienced my own Fire on the pad and I've rebuilt from there. It's time to break out of orbit. While I won't have any free-return -- I stand to lose a lot of money -- it shouldn't be able to bankrupt me.

This is the only way I know to secure my future and I can do some good for others at the same time.

Starting Point

Gotta figure out the menu. Christ! Burgers, burgers... gotta have burgers. The place used to have a reputation for really good burgers and I know I can get that back. They just have to be damned good burgers... better than Big Kahuna Burgers (but we have no tasty Sprite beverages here with which to wash them down). I can't get any further until I put together a potential menu. Once I have that I can then figure out my pricing structure and see try to figure out where the ideal profit point is. Thank fuck for Professor Gigi having made econ courses interesting enough that I paid attention.

OK, so we have to have a really high-quality burger. Do I give a list of potential ingredients? Can those ingredients be used for other menu items? Do I cut choices an just offer three or four burgers with various shit on them?

Gigi taught me, among other things, the difference between sunk and operational costs in a way that let me better figure restaurant costs. If I have a full-time cook it's a sunk cost. He's getting paid whether or not he cooks anything. I therefore have even more incentive to keep the bastard busy, not hard to do in a place where I plan to promote fresh, home-made food. Having the bar staff also cook is possible -- especially with a piss-easy menu -- but completely impractical if the place is full. It also looks like shit to the guests. The barman pours beer and makes drinks. I need a cook.

Hot dogs? They'd probably go well with the Americans, and maybe the Aussies and Kiwis will like them. Should I also offer Bratwurst to give the Krauts what they like? They don't require that much space. But if I do that then maybe I should offer the very German standard "Currywurst" with chips? Except now I'm deviating even further and adding more items I have to buy and store and try to flog. Kitchen and counter space is limited.

Do I do hot dogs from the kitchen or offer them in one of those countertop display units on the back bar? Should I offer a tray of toppings or do I again make a few basic variants? Hot dogs are great because they're not too filling and offer something that the fried stuff doesn't without being a full meal. I could also do "beer and a dog" specials. Or "dozen dogs" for a tenner. A hot dog shouldn't take more than 30 seconds to serve but people are pretty fussy about what they want on them. Maybe a few "base versions" and a condiment tray.

Show me a non-Chinese restaurant with 100 items on its menu and I'll show you an owner bleeding money and facing bankruptcy. Non-Chinese because Chinese restaurants can cook more than 100 different dishes from a pool of around 25 ingredients. It's tempting to turn this place into a really good Chinese restaurant (and heaven knows we need one here) but the kitchen belongs to the building and can't be ripped out without incurring storage charges for all the old equipment he can't let go of.

Pies. Meat and veg pies. Home-made, easy enough. Fillings can be made in advance and portion-packed in the fridge or freezer. Pull out, pop into dough, seal, bake for seven minutes, serve with chips/fries. But what about Shepherd's pie? Steak and Kidney? Lancs hotpot? All simple enough but kidney? Steak and kidney pie is one of the penultimate classics but then I've got yet another ingredient which isn't used in anything else. Would there be enough demand for it?

You can't please everyone so there's no point trying. One mistake so many restauranteurs make is putting too much on the menu to ensure that everyone will find something he likes. What they end up with is a menu which is too confusing and impossible to actually prepare in a running commercial kitchen. Logistics. It always comes down to logistics. The kitchen has to be able to prepare and serve 1-12 different dishes concurrently. Meals for each person at any table must be ready at the same time.

If everyone orders something different not even the best chefs in the world can put it all together when the menu is too varied and complex. More importantly, a kitchen doesn't necessarily run orders in FIFO (first-in, first out). If my cook's making one spaghetti for a table with a couple burgers and another table wants nachos and two pastas, he needs to be able to optimise his work and make all three spaghettis at the same time along wiht the burgers and nachos.

Sandwiches? I guess I could do a grilled cheese for kids. What about tuna fish salad? Fuck. Yes I could use the tuna in a spaghetti sauce and maybe even a pie or casserole, but everyone likes tuna salad made differently and most complain bitterly if what they're served isn't what they grew up with. Fuck that. Maybe a grilled ham and cheese? I don't think I need ham for anything else, except maybe a breakfast fry-up... but that would be a different kind of ham. Bacon & cheese? The "bacon butty"? How much shit can I fit on a menu? How much shit should I fit on the menu? If I limit myself to what would fit on the front and back of a standard piece of paper that should be OK as long as I don't cheat and shrink the font. 20-point type for the names, 12-16pt for the descriptions.

I have competition, none of which are in a basement forcing their smoking customers to climb a rather long flight of stairs. None of them are prevented from putting tables outside in the summer. Who the fuck goes into a basement bar in the summer in Germany? Unless I can offer them something that they can't get elsewhere I'm hosed. I need more sports than anyone else, fair-priced food, cheap drinks, and good service. These I can offer but are they enough?

Fried food: chips/fries, chicken tenders (breast meat also used in a salad and as a sandwich, breaded with corn flakes), mozz sticks maybe, no fucking onion rings (too much effort) but maybe one of those onion blooms which never made it over to this country. But then I need to find a source for Bermuda onions. Proper Buffalo chicken wings with real blue cheese dressing and the veggie sticks. Blue cheese would be another unique ingredient but wings here suck and if I offer 'em, they will come. Except that the blue cheese could also work on one of the specialty burgers...

Then it's a trip to the commercial markets to price all of this out, figure portion sizes and costs, determine if I can charge at least twice my cost and slash another third of the items off the menu. And only once that's done can I try to figure out what pricing level will maximise profits while keeping in mind the sunk costs of rent, utilities, licensing and food/drink costs along with the possibly variable costs of labour. Will labour profit-share on the night's gross receipts as is so common in Germany?

The answer is a cross between a rhinoceros and an elephant: Fucktifino.

Whoops! This was supposed to run a few days ago before the sausages and steaks.

Sausages

Sausage, sausage... I need sausage. This shouldn't be a problem in Germany, but I need British sausage, tubes of fat, water, filler and slaughterhouse by-products. About a year ago I risked physical violence by getting into an argument with a street-side purveyor of so-called sausages in the United Kingdom. Yes, I'd had a few beers and then a few more before this engagement. I posited the idea that sausages should consist primarily of meat. British sausages tend to comprise 30% fat, 30% rusk, and the remaining contents tails, snouts, ears and the other such similar objects, with possibly a few muscle-y bits thrown in for good measure.

Bangers and mash. The mash is easy. It gets used for a couple items, including shepherds pie. Based on my estimations I'll go through at least three tons of potatoes a year. But the bangers are a problem. There are a couple of services which will import British sausages and deliver them. Their reliability is on par with that of most national postal services.

A friend suggested that I make sausages myself. He even supposed I could sell them on their own to a limited but desperate market. This would be an incredible mistake. The instant I start selling unfinished products is the instant that the regulations change. There is a huge difference between the regulations for the kitchens of restaurants and those of butchers. I couldn't even sell the sausages on their own; they'd have to be sold -- cooked -- as part of a finished meal as listed on the menu.

Where do I find rusk? Bread crumbs from bread made without yeast? The very idea of grain filler in a sausage is anathema in Germany. And yet this is what many of the customers want. I've found a couple recipes for Cumberland sausages and my kitchen at home may yet be host to numerous experiments. Good thing I have an American fridge.

But do I really need sausages on the menu? Do I really need British sausages? I can live without bangers and mash on the menu but what about a breakfast if I have to open up early in the morning because of some world cricket final? Would the Brits be willing to make do with the German equivalent, perhaps a white bratwurst? And how much would each serving cost me in ingredients and in time?

Sausages! What the hell am I getting myself into?

Big Mis-Steak?

How important is it to have steak on the menu? Steaks are a tough call. Some of the meat is used in a steak & kidney pie and I could grind anything before it gets too old for the pasta, pies and chili, but in order to do that I'd have to also buy some fattier meat cuts to mix in. One of the most ideal cuts of meat from a restaurant is the eye of round. Unlike the rump and top sirloin which are so common in Germany, the muscle is pretty much a uniform diameter across its entire length making portion control a snap. Boneless, it requires much less space in the fridge. It's a very good-looking piece of meat, easy to prepare and present. So of course there's a catch.

The way one cuts up a cow is different in the U.S., U.K., Germany, France, Italy and many other countries. All will quarter the animal the same way after slaughter but there are differences even in the sub-primal cuts. Getting the eye of round isn't as easy as it is in the US but it's available. Germans think of it as only a cut to be roasted or braised. The continuing modernisation of meat production is making it hard to obtain non-standard cuts; butchering is done at the slaughterhouse and meat is sent out display-ready in protective atmosphere packaging. I have nothing against modernisation but I don't like the way they cut up cows here. Still, I can get my hands on Rindersemerrolle (even though the Germans themselves can't agree on how to spell it).

Try and find a flank steak bigger than your hand in Germany. That's London Broil out the window. T-bone? Not a chance unless you're a specialty steakhouse buying 100kg each week of that alone. I can't buy huge quantities because I'm not trying to run a steakhouse and doubt that I'd sell more than a dozen or two steaks a week. But I want the eye of round. If it's even €10/kg I'm looking at a portion cost of at least €3 just for the portion of meat on a dish I want to keep under €10 because really, I don't want anything to hit the €10 mark for at least a few more years. A large steak would run me close to €4.50.

If I had my druthers I'd have a fancy restaurant and be buying the cow parts directly from the farmer who raised it, with pictures of the cow and one of the ear tags as further proof of quality and origin for the guests. But this place isn't going to be anything fancy; it's a sports bar. I have to provide what the guests want and that means offering them good, honest, simple food at a fair price.

Steaks would be served with a pile of fries and a salad OR with some other sort of spud and veg (mash and mushy peas?). Serving them adds another single-use item: steak knives. A dozen of them. It's not the cost but rather the storage space. That and the probability that at some point some idiot will stab himself or someone else accidentally and then sue me for his incompetence in handling basic eating utensils.

On the plus side, I can use the meat for a salad, for quesadillas, and grind up anything reaching its use-by date for other items made with mince. I could also offer steak & eggs on any breakfast special (during the 4th quarter of the Super Bowl, for example) Fajitas? I'd have everything else I need, from peppers and onions to the tortillas... wait a sec. No, I'd need small tortillas for those. And the meat would have to be marinated. And I'd need the fucking sizzle pans and tortilla trays. And how many of these could I sell in a week? Ten? Five? While we could really use good Tex-Mex in this town, this one goes on hold. Maybe run fajitas as a special-of-the-week and see how well they do. If there's room in the kitchen and enough demand then maybe they could go on, but for now: bar food. Sports bar food. Pub grub.

Simple steak with salad and chips/fries? Looks like it.

Lettuce Rejoice

Salads. I need a few salads. A Cobb would be good; it uses everything I've already got: bacon, eggs, chicken. A Greek salad might be nice but that won't work because I don't need the feta cheese or olives or pepperoncini for anything else. Maybe a taco salad... I'd have to get tortillas as well as one of those frying basket thingies which forms the tortilla into a bowl but it would be easy enough to make. I'm already making chili and I'll have nacho chips. The veg -- lettuce, tomato, onion -- could simply ring the plate, then fill the basket with more salad and chili, top with cheese, under the salamander, dishes with salsa, sour cream and guac.

But now I've got to get tortilla shells. I could always put quesadillas on the menu. A simple veggie quesadilla with spring onions and tomatoes, and a version with meat, just chicken using the same chicken breast I've got for the other salads and tenders. That could work.

So there need to be basic salads, some basic veggie: mixed lettuce, tomato, red onion for garnish, cucumber, shaved carrots and various seasonal stuff. Need a couple of dressings: blue cheese, Italian, some sort of balsamic vinaigrette. And every single dressing is one more pain in the ass that I have to make and find room to store in the fridge. How the hell do I make an Italian dressing which matches the kind that I like from of the States? I can't get Kraft Foodservice items here so their Zesty Italian is out, which means I have to figure out how to replicate that.

So along with three salads I'm now looking at possibly a fourth which is only halfway salad, and on top of that I then have quesadillas to the menu. The quesadillas are easy enough to make and don't require any ingredients I don't already use elsewhere. They're cheap, tasty and offer a completely different direction while still remaining "pub grub", at least to some degree. The ones with chicken will use the same marinated chicken breast I'll use for the salads and chicken tenders, and if I do steaks, I can marinate that meat, too.

Steaks... do I want steaks? Yes I want them but are they feasible?

I'm trying to get away from the software industry with a restaurant and inside four days I've already got feature creep. I half expect the building's owner to talk to me about "harmonizing synergies" when we meet in a week or two.

Reaching for the stars

Yes, I know Ramsay et al. keep going on about using locally-produced ingredients. Yes, I realise that tire-making food critics make a big deal out of that as well. Yes I would like to support our local farmers especially since a couple of them are good friends. Yes, I know I'd win favour with the greenie weenies for only using products produced within a radius of 15km.

It's a sports bar, people. Not a fine French restaurant, not a fusion-cooking glass palace, not a molecular-cooking Fat Duck. A sports bar. That's the only thing I can see using this place for and the only thing I can afford to make it, mainly because it's already one (albeit one which is failing in a particularly drastic and stunning manner).

People who know me know I'd love to grab a star. Those who have had my food know I have a shot at one. I have a full plan for a "fine" restaurant and have been looking for the space for a while now. But here's an opportunity to get my feet wet with ownership in a place which simply can't bankrupt me nearly as quickly as the fine restaurant could. And what's more suitable to a sports bar than simple, honest pub grub?

None of the following will be prepared in the kitchen^*: roux, reductions, zests, infusions, emulsions, composite sauces, chiffonades, concasses, nor any other word we had to steal from the French because British and German cooking couldn't be bothered to get past "roast meat and veg" a thousand years ago.

That's not to say there won't be any cooking. Far from it, there will be a full-time cook and I intend to keep him busy. Unfortunately that very busy person will be me at first and I've got a full-time office job from which I can only take a few months' leave of absence, after which the place needs to be able to run without me. The sauce for the spag bol (should the dish make the final cut) will not come out of a jar, even if the portion cost is only a quarter of what it is to make the stuff fresh. Hot pot, pie fillings, home-made chocolate and cheesecakes, hell -- maybe even some bread.

There are a few reasons for this, not the least of which is "quality". Tinned spag sauce sucks, even if you "doctor" it. If I take this bar I have a hellaciously bad reputation to undo and a plan to ensure people will once again eat in this place. Part of that includes offering real food.

Karl: when people are only ordering bottled beer and telling you they don't need a glass, perhaps you should entertain the notion that something may be amiss with regards to your sanitation and the general perception thereof. As for actually eating something from that kitchen... yeah, I just don't need to go there, do I?

But there's another catch. While I've driven more than two million kilometers in my life in more than a dozen countries, my license is no good in Germany anymore and I don't have the time to suffer through their excessive, required (and expensive) driver training courses... which means I need everything possible delivered. My storage is also limited; the fewer items I have on-hand the better, and that means raw, basic ingredients and no cases of cheap-ass spaghetti sauce. Cans of two types of tomatoes and one really good tomato sauce from Italy are all I need for tomato soup, chili, spaghetti sauces, BBQ sauce and more.

So no, if I take this place it's unlikely that my mug will appear in any foodie magazine. But with fresh, honest, good basic food prepared in a clean kitchen by a proper cook and not a bartender running back to nuke everything (and with a fair pricing structure) I can easily feed 30-100 people each night. Whether I can get 30-100 people in each night is the big question because the place can't survive without that.

^*Many of these might be made if I have a private party, but none are necessary for a menu full of burgers, pies and finger food.

So You Want to Start a Restaurant

There are few businesses as unforgiving as gastronomy. The restaurant and bar business takes no prisoners, offers no quarter and shows no mercy. In its wake are countless thousands, millions whom it has bankrupted. The line between success and failure may be determined by a single person, and not necessarily a critic or even regular customer.

There is a good reason Ramsay is so vicious. There is a good reason Bourdain is so harsh. It's a matter of life and death... that of the restaurant and the solvency of its owner.

I'm going to interject occasionally with stories about Karl. Karl bought a successful restaurant and drove it into the ground. Only those who know the gastro industry well and know Karl believe these stories aren't manufactured. They're true. Every Karl anecdote can be verified.

In Munich there is an 80% chance that a restaurant which opens today will not be open 365 days later. Five to one, baby. One in five. No one here gets out alive. From this statistic comes the blog's title. About two-thirds of these owners are clueless jackasses. They fall into four primary categories: dreamers, schemers, steamers and creamers.

Dreamers: People who have never worked in the industry but see how successful those who make it might become and want to get in on the action.
Schemers: People with an ego who hope -- as restauranteurs -- to mingle with the rich and famous.
Steamers: People who want to be in charge of something, never mind they don't know the proper way to sit on a bull much less hang on for eight seconds with one hand.
Creamers: People who can cook well for friends who then egg them on to open a jernt.

The Dreamers are just cluess fuckwits. That's it. 'Nuff said. Many have never even worked a single day at McD's much less worked in the kitchen or front of house to understand even the most basic concepts of how a restaurant works. A large percentage of this group are also Steamers. They buy a place which is going under or has already died without knowing the first thing about how to decide what to charge or what should be on the menu. Hi, Karl!

The Schemers have no chance. They're in it for the wrong reasons. They may also be Dreamers. They can and will spend their life savings and incur a metric fuckton of debt in order to hire the best of the best of the best, sir. And they will fail.

Steamers are easy to identify: they go through staff faster than they go through rolls of toilet paper. God complexes. When Steamers are offered help by those in the know they ignore the advice and may well do the exact opposite just to demonstrate they're in charge. Karl is also a Steamer.

I really feel sorry for Creamers. Honestly. This is the only group who are in it for the right reasons -- a love of food &/or service -- but have no business running a commercial enterprise.

A buddy of mine once told me that he never plays poker with friends. "If you're not there to rip the other guys' hearts out and bankrupt them," he explained, "you're there to throw away your cash." Black and white, day and night, 100% spot on. Even if you're playing for pennies, you're either there to take the copper or lose your brass.

Most Creamers get into the business because they can cook well at home and host nice dinner parties. Their friends convince them of their excessive talent and push them to go into business. They do so... and fail. Cooking for friends is not the same as cooking in a restaurant, not even cooking a holiday dinner for 24. Not even when you serve restaurant-style on plates rather than with large serving dishes to be passed around.

Running a restaurant is first and foremost a matter of logistics. If you can't organise and plan, you can't own a restaurant. If you try you'll be just so much canon fodder, a cheap supply of barely-used equipment which the rest of us (along with some of the next crop of dreamers, schemers, steamers and creamers) will pick up at half price at auction when your place goes under. And while I appreciate your willingness to subsidise my equipment costs, there's a very small part of me buried deep within that wishes, for your sake, that this hadn't happened to you.

Consider two cooks for a Thanksgiving meal: Alice and Bob. Alice starts checking her recipes and begins shopping a week before, starts her preparations on Tuesday, wakes up at 4:00a.m. on Thursday and slaves in the kitchen all day to serve the meal. Bob gets drunk every night, goes shopping the day before, grabs a pile of meat and veg thinking, "Ah, fuck it. I'll come up with something," then wakes up around noon Thursday to serve dinner before 6:00p.m.

Alice has worked hard and prepared her meal with care and consideration. Bob amkes sure everyone eats. Of course I'd prefer Alice's meal but if I go to a restaurant, I'm getting Bob's food. Alice is a "creamer"; Bob is a cook. The biggest difference is that Bob will be able to make the exact same thing taste the exact same way next year. This is vital for a restaurant.

Just as you don't want to see how that cow in the pasture next to the highway becomes a steak in a shiny plastic package at the supermarket, you don't want to know how your food in a restaurant is prepared. Know that it tastes good and that a professional made it, tuck in, and enjoy.