Anthony Capua, Executive Chef of Sycamore Hills Golf Club, one of the keys to a successful season is a productive offseason.
As the winter season ramps up, most chefs in the north prepare for the last stand of their season—the holidays. It’s the final push before the most welcoming time of year—the coveted offseason when we get a break from the six-day grind of the season. It’s a chance for some days off, relaxation, and a well-deserved vacation.
After spending multiple years in the Florida market, where summer was the slower season, it has been a fun switch to a winter offseason. For me, it’s always been a time of year to relax and prepare physically and mentally for the season to come. I’ve always broken it into three categories: family time, travel, and development for the season to come.
Family First
The most important of all three categories is family time and I hope this is the same for most chefs. As we go through the busy season, so does our family. Most days in season begin by waking up spending some time with my wife and daughter before heading to work until after service. Most nights, I end at the gym before heading home as, by that point, most of my family is in bed asleep. As the season comes to wrap and operational hours start to decrease, this is the time I take the extra hour or two in the morning to go in later or vice versa cut out early as reservations get a little lower. It’s a chance to put my daughter down for bed a few nights a week, to take a family walk with the dog around the neighborhood, and cook them some breakfast. It’s also time to provide my sous chefs with a little more responsibility to grow and learn to manage while I’m not there. The balance is a win on both spectrums for me. I love always coming back after a few days of vacation in the offseason to see the operation running smoothly. The team grows the most when the standards and expectations are set after a long season and the budding managers step up.
Get Inspired
The second is travel, and traveling has always been necessary for both myself and my wife. We both came up in the hospitality industry and have always worked hard. With our off-the-wall schedules, we would take any chance to travel 50 or 5000 miles to experience different food, culture, architecture, and just see other ideas.
As the great Anthony Bourdain said, “travel is about the gorgeous teetering of the unknown.” As chefs, we spend a lot of time in places of work, and it becomes more important to remember how much different culture and food is out there to deliver to our members and ourselves. Traveling is one of the keys to sustaining myself in this line of business. I love that cooking is a skill that can be done anywhere in the world and I enjoy taking the time to see and eat it all, either from a big city like Toronto or the countryside of Spain. As a chef, travel has been beneficial for all aspects of my culinary creativity and mindset.
R&D
The third is the time for some research and development. The offseason is a time to start getting ideas out of our heads and onto paper. It’s a time to open up those 50 cookbooks we have on our shelves, ideas we saw at a conference or through travel, and have some fun. It’s time to try out those staff ideas about gastronomy or maybe take some courses on vertical hydroponics. I love to task out our weekly menu changes to staff and see what they can dream up and create with guidance and mentoring.
One of the keys to a successful season is a productive offseason, and that starts with trying out those ideas and tweaking them, so by the time you start up the season, you are running. From trying out new action stations, cross-training, or just some new recipes, the time to perfect is when our numbers are lower. And to get the members engaged and ask, “What ideas or would you like to see next season?”
In conclusion, these are a couple of ways I prepare for the next season. Whether it’s a few extra hours to be with my wife and daughter or a trip to Europe, it is essential for your family and team to take the downtime to be the best version you can be for your operation, family, and most importantly yourself.
