Obviously in kitchen the priority is to cook what food you have to with as little effort as possible. The golden rule in all instances is therefore, “more food less often”. Always cook in the highest runs possible. So, depending on your store, you should cook big macs in runs of 6 or 12, regulars in runs of 9 or 18, etc.

Kitchen should function as a team, it should be non-hierarchical and based on direct democracy. If the person on wrap and call is being a dick then the others should vote to replace him or her. If the person doesn’t comply then immediately everyone should go on a go slow. At busy periods a five minute go slow can lead to production being completely lost. Our collective strength is never more obvious than when a group of friends work together in kitchen. Here are a few specific notes:

Wrap and Call

This position, if occupied by a penis, can fuck up everyone’s day. When you’re on wrap and call your main objective is to make sure that everyone in kitchen has as easy a day as possible. So, “two sandwiches please” isn’t going to make any friends is it? Also, don’t tell people what to do, make suggestions. Don’t turn into a petty tyrant burger boy. In order to perform your role to the best of your ability you will need to cheat with time cards- when the food goes out of time, replace the time card, when the new card is out of time, replace it again. Keep this going until all the food is either sold or grows legs and runs away of its own accord. If you want this to go unnoticed then a good trick is to ask managers to throw token bits of food out from time to time- “could you throw out the first quarter please” makes it sound like you give a fuck and the manager doesn’t know the quarter she throws out (and all the others in the bin) saw action in Vietnam. The food tastes like shit whether it’s fresh or has just got its bus pass.

Grill

It’s pretty self-explanatory, you slap down meat when you can be fucked. One little thing, if you’re using a damaged Teflon and it’s ripping all the meat but you can’t be bothered changing it, just sprinkle salt liberally on the frozen patties before latching the grill. The meat will come up in one piece and the customers will eventually die of heart attacks which means there will be less of the bastards to serve. If you have to clean a grill, then don’t worry about the top platen, just change the Teflon round and claim you’re helping the openers. This saves a lot of time and has the added advantage that over time it can lead to carbon build up which can warp a grill causing McDonalds considerable expense. Bonus!

Dressing

The pickle just gets thrown on the ground anyway so don’t bother with it. There’s probably no need to use mustard either. Also, you know how your hands end up stinking of onion, pickle, mustard, all sorts of shit? Well especially if you’re going out later, wear plastic gloves so you don’t smell so bad when you’re trying to pull someone.

Buns

Be creative, Mac crowns can go in the regular toaster, regular buns in the Mac toaster, use your imagination.

Chicken

Keep your holding levels very high and cook everything in big runs.

DPSC

Everyone else just copies it from a couple of days ago..

Filtering

The equipment will almost certainly not all be present in a useable condition. So refuse to do it. If they complain then ignore human resources and go straight to the health and safety executive (UK- 0171 717 6000) or the equivalent organisation where you work. If you do, do the filtering, a good trick is to get a metal jug and (very carefully!) scoop hot oil from other vats and pour it down the sides of the vat you’re filtering clearing any debris.

Anyone working on front counter should read our humorous, just for entertainment piece on stealing.

Your other main concern here is the customers. It seems that all the scum on earth eat at McDonalds from time to time- don’t take shit, never apologise and above all else, never, ever smile unless YOU feel like it.

You should work out with kitchen staff signals to deal with objectionable customers. For example, ‘extra bacon’ as a grill order might mean the order is for a police officer. It’s then up to kitchen to do their worst. Or, a ‘big Mac extra cheese, extra milk’, might mean ‘an abusive customer has ordered a big Mac extra cheese, please spit in it’. Abusive customers very often order grills because being awkward is their raison d’être.

However, you should never, ever encourage people to do horrible things to burgers randomly. This is because lots of customers are actually really nice people. Give free food to anyone who is pleasant or looks like they are short of cash. Be careful giving free stuff to middle aged, middle class people because they just don’t get it and will stand there saying “I don’t think you charged me for this”. If you make a habit of giving free stuff to regular customers who work in local shops, pubs, etc. then you will hopefully find that visiting their workplaces soon results in the favour being reciprocated. Workers solidarity against the bosses!

Unlike in kitchen, there is usually no point trying to do things quickly on front counter- it rarely buys you a break but just means more punters want served. Remember- if the queue gets long enough then people are less inclined to wait which ultimately means less people to serve. Try to leave your till whenever possible, go to the toilet, wash your hands excessively, claim your trousers are falling down, anything to break the tedium. Try talking to customers (!?), instead of “can I take your order here please?”, try “all right there, just finished work?” “er... yeah” “Looks like it’s been a rough day...etc.” Just serving food robotically is dehumanising for you and the customers.

Oh, and never use the ice scoop!

Remember: never wear decent shoes to work as they will just rot with all the grease and skank that floods about the floor.

Backroom

If you have to move heavy stuff and you don’t have a trolley then improvise with bun wheels and a bun crate (for bringing out boxes of fries, for example). Don’t put yourself out for McDonalds.

Delivery

As long as it’s not you regular job then you wont need to rotate stock properly. Just put a few older boxes on top to make things look right. By the time anyone notices it’s all fucked nobody will remember who did the last delivery. Nick a few boxes of stuff and claim the were never delivered (just joking, that might be illegal!). When you’ve chucked everything away slap a bit of ‘do not use’ tape about randomly to make it look like you’ve tried. Drag the whole thing out as long as possible. If anyone does notice how badly you’ve done it then hopefully they wont ask you again.

Pulling stations

Think what can be seen when the station’s back in place (sometimes just the floor) and clean it. Do the floor with a litre of APC (or local equivalent) and a damp mop. Some people like to pour salt on grease spills, I’ve never thought this was very useful but I suppose it wastes lots of salt. When you’re ‘finished’ quickly push the station back into place really fucking tightly so that no one will pull it out and see that you’ve actually done fuck all.

Cleaning

If you have to clean a greasy surface, don’t try and clean it properly with soapy water, just wipe it with a DRY grill cloth.

If you get sent to lobby to clean walls or something similar then make a big show of filling up a bucket of clean water then take a couple of cloths and a newspaper round to the wall. Splash the clean water about a bit then look for a plant (almost every McDonalds will have real or fake plants somewhere). Scoop some of the earth out of the plant pot and mix it well with your water. Sit back with your newspaper. After a while take your bucket and clothe back and make a big show of having to change this very dirty water- “fucking hell, when were those walls last cleaned?”. The manager will feel like a good burger slave and will ask if they’re scrubbing up all right, “yeah but it’s a lot of work” and with that you go back to your paper. Keep this going until you’ve at least read the sport, the cartoons and have had a go at the crossword. This really works!

Dining Area

Skive, read the paper, talk to random members of the public, it’s boring as fuck out here but it should be a bit of skive. If you get really bored then go to the shift runner with a really disruptive request from an imaginary customer- someone wants to check a rule from a now closed promotion or something. After the manager’s pissed about for a while, found the relevant file, searched and been unable to resolve the enquiry, looked up the number where the customer should direct enquiries, noted it down and took it out to the customer, you go “fuck- they were sitting right there, they’ve just left, that was so rude, etc.”

Trash Walks

Trash walks are great- empty one external bin and leave that bag somewhere you can find it, then compress the rubbish down in all the other bins and go to the pub, do your shopping, whatever. Come back and carry the bag you left earlier around to the front of the store and in full view of management chuck a few things in the bag. A manager (who had probably forgotten you were out there) will come to ask why you’ve taken so long. Look frustrated and ask when the last trash walk was done. “Just an hour ago” “Fucking hell, messy bastards today, this is the second bag I’ve filled,. I mean it’s still not great but you should have seen the mess before, etc.”. If anyone was out looking for you while you were in the pub, just claim you were along the street picking up litter in line with McDonalds community friendly policies.