Summer Job at Docs

Getting a summer job is easy to do when you live in the small town of Kent, CT. What are your options? You can work as a counselor at Emory Park, in retail, or at one of the many restaurants in town. For my summer job of ’08 I worked at Docs Trattoria. Docs had just moved locations and this was their first summer since opening. Their new restaurant had tripled in size and staff. They were taking on a huge new project. It was going to be a new Italian restaurant, more furnished and pricey then the other restaurants in town. Mrs. Pizzo, the owner’s wife, had offered me a job, and I gladly accepted. I didn’t know what working in a restaurant would be like, but that summer I found out.

I always worked the lunch shift, never once did I work dinner. Kent School gets out earlier for summer than the local public schools, allowing me and a few other prep school students to work the day shift. Black shirt, black pants, black shoes, no jewelry (at first) and hair had to be up, that was the dress code. You had to show up early for work to wash windows, dust the floorboards, sweep, set the tables, get the bread out, and make sure everything is ready for that first customer. I was not a waitress, but a bus girl. I asked the customer what water they would like to drink, brought them bread, cleared plates, made desserts, reset the tables, and did anything else the customer asked. It wasn’t a bad job, Mr. Pizzo (the owner) and I always discussed sports, soccer in particular, and my fellow workers were entertaining. Mr. Pizzo was constantly making sure you were doing something, and doing it right. Standing around was unacceptable, and if you did the order of the powders on one of the desserts wrong, you got yelled at. I can’t tell you the multiple times I had to ask the order of the powders and toppings for the various desserts, to make sure I was doing it correctly. The worst part by far was resetting the tables. Clearing off everything, to set everything up again and when you are the only person busing tables and there are customers waiting, you better hurry.

While working at Docs, I looked forward to three things: knowing I was going to get paid; secretly eating the bread in the back, and the food that they would make for the workers after the lunch shift was over. The cook’s would make special lunches for us. For those who have gone to Docs know that their food is amazing, to say the least. Every bite has an eruption of flavor in your mouth. As much care as they put into their meals for their customers they put into the meals for their workers. Their pizza is thin crusted and cooked until the cheese is golden brown. Their BLT pizza is to die for, bacon lettuce and tomato with Cesar dressing is one that not many will try. But if you want your taste buds to explore something new, this is the pizza to eat. We received pizza on special days the meal was usually pasta. And if we were extremely lucky they would make us sandwiches with homemade chips. The chips are crispy, salty, and oily, a present to your mouth. Their best lunches were their pastas, mixing various sauces and flavors together to make a new creation. You are allowed to take as many helpings as you would like, along with refilling your glass as fast as you drink it. I specifically remember the pasta made of multiple cheeses, marinara sauce with large pieces of tomato, peas, and a couple meats, this pasta set off a bomb in my mouth. It was not on the menu, making it a special treat. I hate peas but with this pasta they added to the flavor. I went back for seconds. Everyone eats together in the back sun room. The family style environment adds to the closeness of Docs Restaurant. I never went home from work tired; I had a full stomach and was always ready to go.

The best thing at Docs by far is their bread. Their bread is made there, along with almost everything else. You watch them roll out the bread, weigh it and roll it into perfect cone shaped loaves. It then goes into the oven, and once it has fully risen it is taken out and put into a bin, on top of the stove, to stay warm. The bus girls/boys, after a customer has ordered their meal, will then place a loaf on the cutting table and slice it into a basket. Place the oil and garlic cup into the bread basket and deliver it to the table. Now, since this bread is so divine, we secretly indulge in eating it in the back room. There is a separate loaf for the workers, and sometimes two or three loaves go by during the lunch period. If you are caught eating the bread you are asked to move on to another activity. Mr. Pizzo looks down upon eating while working, and if you have a drink, you may only drink it in the kitchen, never in the dining room. But how can one obey such an order? To be honest, we didn’t, we continued to eat our secret loaf. It is the best bread in town, and the customers are constantly asking for their bread basket to be refilled.

Overall, Mr. Pizzo takes pride in the appearance of his restaurant. Everything must be clean and presentable. Even though some workers are lazy and not as responsive, the food makes up for this small negativity. The food from the heavily bread to the delicious deserts is a meal that one cannot miss out on. My summer busing tables was an experience. I learned how a restaurant works, and how fast you must set tables when customers are waiting for their table. Docs takes pride in their food and makes sure everything is done in the correct order, all the way from the cooks down to the bus girls who make the desserts.