Heat is on at restaurant
'It's a pretty good gig' in kitchen
Edward Fennell
The Post and Courier
Pete Smith, kitchen manager for Taco Boy restaurant on Folly Beach, sizzles some shrimp while, behind him, Delores Mancha prepares some onions and garlic for a sauce.
They say that if you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.
But Pete Smith isn't backing out, even when the summer air, plus ovens, grills and griddles, push the temperature to more than 100 degrees in the kitchen at Taco Boy on Folly Beach.
The kitchen, at Taco Boy on Center Street or at Smith's James Island home, is where Smith thinks he belongs. He is kitchen manager at Taco Boy, a national chain that, at Folly Beach, serves as sort of a vortex where Lowcountry seafood meets and becomes Tex-Mex cuisine. The grilled fish taco is the most popular item on the menu.
"It's a pretty good gig," Smith, 29, said of his job.
Smith came to Charleston from Atlanta. He said he puts in 65-70 hours weekly in the summer and can scale back to 40 in the off-season. He said he really likes working for Taco Boy.
"It's a small, privately owned company and they treat upper management very well. I do a majority of the cooking in the summer and in the off-season do more management," he said.
Smith attended the College of Charleston for two years before switching to Johnson & Wales University, where he majored in food service management and minored in culinary arts. Just over a year ago, he left a banquet management position he had held for five years at Kiawah Island for the kitchen at Taco Boy.
He said he finds the work and the challenges at the restaurant a good fit for him. The best times on the job, he said, are when "everybody is on point and doing exactly what they are supposed to do."
The most challenging part of the job is in the summer, he said. "We serve 350 people an hour, and there is hardly room in here to even walk. That's when the job becomes a lot more difficult, but that's probably true in any restaurant when you are really busy."
Smith said he enjoys getting feedback from restaurant patrons. He says the comments he hears are positive.
On sizzling summer days, the kitchen can become a broiler, but Smith said he's gotten used to it.
Even after a long, hard day at work, Smith still craves the kitchen. "I like to cook at home, anything and everything. It depends on what kind of mood I am in."
Reach Edward C. Fennell at efennell@postandcourier.com or 937-5560.
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