Culinary School Diary: Week Nine

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By OWEN MORRIS

I woke up Sunday with a mild stomach flu, and things were worse by the time class rolled around last night. I probably should have stayed at home and been relatively miserable in private. Instead, I decided to chance it and just wash my hands a lot during class.

Mine was a dilemma that many people face every day going to work but is especially important for restaurant workers. Even if they are careful they can still spread disease. In a previous class on restaurant health and safety I learned how restaurants are supposed to follow an “exclude and restrict” policy. Depending on an employee’s symptoms, you either restrict them to an area of the kitchen and an activity where they won’t make anyone sick (i.e. taking the sick guy off of salads and putting him on inventory), or send the worker home. It’s all theoretical, though, because restaurants aren’t required to follow this policy and many workers hide symptoms because they can’t afford to lose a shift or don’t want to let down the kitchen staff.

My symptoms would have placed me into the restrict category. But I wasn’t going to a restaurant, I was going to a classroom where I was either all in or all out. If I had been cooking for other people I would have stayed home. But because I was only preparing food for myself (I didn’t even the teacher sample my dishes) and I didn’t want to miss the lesson, I decided to go to class.