Page 69 - Jun-Jul 2024

being in constant use by many chefs
which allows them to focus on
preparing other dishes at ease.”
Consulting Chef Nilesh Limaye,
added: “The chefs have now access to
the guests’ choices and menu
priorities as soon as the guest checks
in based on his history of preferences.
Materials management systems give
more accurate data based on the
previous patterns of stock orders.
This helps us in pointing out critical
areas like controls in wastage of a
particular ingredient, non-usage of “WE ARE SEEING TODAY
any ingredient, near expiry of a THAT PRE-PLANNED
certain stock item, etc.” COOKING PROGRAMMES
Irfan Sayyed, former Executive
Sous Chef at The Westin Mumbai AVAILABLE IN THE
Powai Lake, explained, “Many of the AUTOMATED COOKING
heavy-duty equipment such as the EQUIPMENT ARE BEING IN
combination oven, gravity slicers, CONSTANT USE BY MANY
peeling machines, boilers and
steamers and vacuum machines make CHEFS WHICH ALLOWS
life easy for the chef as they can THEM TO FOCUS ON
produce quality food products with PREPARING OTHER DISHES
minimum manpower involved.”
AT EASE.”
PERSONAL TOUCH Rana Mukherjee, Executive Sous
Technology has certainly been a boon Chef at The Westin Kolkata Rajarhat
in easing complex kitchen operations in
hotels and restaurants but it cannot
fully replace human culinary excellence chefs with tedious manual tasks and
in creating memories for patrons. saving on business costs by providing
While artificial intelligence and detailed performance reports of the
machine learning have greatly system in the kitchen,” he added.
influenced foodservice industry, the Nilesh noted that equipment can
human brain behind creating soon go on to become a liability from
sensorial culinary memories will an asset when one starts abusing
remain steadfast, reiterated Saurabh. technology. “We can say that already
“The smart equipment are here to we have a shortage of skilled
optimize operations for the manpower, and with the advent of the
foodservice business by aiding the use of technology, talented chefs will
become obsolete,” he said.
Rana agreed with Saurabh while
“THE CHEFS NOW HAVE ACCESS saying, “A machine cannot be creative
TO THE GUESTS’ CHOICES AND as it is programmed to perform in a
MENU PRIORITIES AS SOON AS specific way and gives chefs very little
room for improvisation.”
THE GUEST CHECKS IN BASED ON “Mishandling can lead to major
HIS HISTORY OF PREFERENCES. accidents, waste of products and
MATERIALS MANAGEMENT dissatisfaction of the guests. Also,
SYSTEMS GIVE MORE ACCURATE using these equipment needs constant
monitoring as they are not fully
DATA BASED ON THE PREVIOUS automatic and can sometimes
PATTERNS OF STOCK ORDERS.” malfunction leading to producing the
Nilesh Limaye, Consulting Chef wrong product,” concluded Irfan.

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