Order Up

Service Included
by Phoebe Damrosch

With all the hype about celebrity chefs these days, we tend to overlook one very important component of any restaurant crew – the server. While cheffing is most definitely hard work, it can pay off in cookbooks, endorsement deals, TV shows or at the very least, chef groupies.

No fame and fortune awaits the humble server – the front line contact for any restaurant meal. Yes, servers generally get paid better than kitchen staff, but they’re also the ones who are forced to navigate the choppy waters of unruly customers and egotistical chefs.

Phoebe Damrosch’s Service Included tells the tale of a server at Thomas Keller’s New York restaurant Per Se, dishing the dirt on the goings on front of house where so many others have written about what goes on behind the pass.

While this is Damrosch’s own story, based on her experiences as a server, it is actually the personal bits that drag the book down.

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