That's where they spotted an unusual offering on the dessert menu. They saw that, for an additional $20, they could "buy the cooks a round of beer."
She wrote me, "I am lucky enough to eat in a lot of different restaurants, and this was a new one for me! (And yes, the food was amazing, and yes, we kicked in the $20!)"
I had to know if the restaurant acknowledged it in some way. I mean, adding an extra $20 to your bill is not exactly chump change.
We were chatting in real time, so at first she said there was "no acknowledgement yet, but they're busy." Then, a few minutes later, she exclaimed, "They cheered loudly!" and then "We're seated at a big table near the open kitchen, so it was a nice little celebratory moment!"
I did a little digging around and apparently this is a thing. A 2011 article in Kansas City's alt-newspaper The Pitch describes the practice:
Matt Hyde, the manager and co-owner of 715, says his business partner, executive chef Michael Beard, got the idea to add the option of tipping the kitchen crew with beer from the Publican in Chicago -- one of the several restaurants around the country featured in yesterday's Inc.com article by Clarissa Cruz on this very subject.There are some rules to the practice at 715, Hyde says: "The kitchen crew isn't allowed to drink while they're working, of course," he says, "and we have a policy that they can only have two beers after their shift in the restaurant. This way, the after-work beers accumulate."
Hyde says as many as 10 customers a night will buy six-packs of Miller High Life (it's the only canned beer sold at 715) for the kitchen: "It prints up on the ticket that the servers turn in, so the cooks know right away when a customer has bought beer for them. It's a real morale booster and helps build a sense of community among staff and patrons. Sometimes the kitchen crew will come out and thank the customers."
Cool, I'm glad this is still a practice, some seven years later.
photo by Jenny Slater
