HOTEL WAITERS

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXIV, Issue 11930, 23 January 1936, Page 3

HOTEL WAITERS

SI’KCI A L TRAINING The Georges and Jims are ousting the Luigis and Antonios from the big hotels. The Englishman is at last breaking the long-established monopoly of foreign waiters. Before the war Germans were the hotel waiters of England and afterwards Swiss and Italians took their place. The London County Council has a school at which waiting, cooking and all branches of hotel work are taught. During the 25 years it has been in existence they have taught 1,600 chefs and waiters, not one of whom is out of work at the present time. Some of the former pupils have jobs worth more than £ 1,000 a year.

’Varsity Rads, too

The pupils range from elementary school-boys to university men who aim at becoming hotel managers. It is no simple task to become a waiter.

The aspirant must learn, in addition to routine matters of serving, the composition of any dish he may come across, which wines should be iced and which warmed, and the relation of wines to food. Other lessons he must take are in French, English, correspondence and book-keeping. The whole course takes two years. “The demand is for young waiters. ' Englishmen make the best butlers, footmen and valets in the world, so why should they not be equally successful as waiters?

“They have in the past been prejudiced against waiting, but with the disappearance of the large domestic staffs in country houses this prejudice is being broken down.”