I always thought the difference between these two ranks was that the Chief & Ships cooked for the crew and Officers/Passengers where as the Ships Cook only cooked for the crew as in passenger ships. Now looking through my discharge book I find that on one ship (Humboldt) I was Ships Cook although I cooked for Officers and crew. Can anyone help this confused old "Babbling Brook"
Extract from the Maritime Skills site here indicates that the names are synonymous.
"Cook (Ship's Cook, Chief Cook)
Food planning, preparation and stock taking/provisions ordering. Beyond the basic training all seafarers have to undertake, the only catering requirement is that the cook must hold a Ship's Cook certificate."
Logic would suggest that a Ship's Cook is someone that has attained the appropriate qualification and Chief Cook has that qualification but is employed as the person in charge of one or more other cooks (2nd Cook/Baker for example).
A lot of chief cooks I sailed with liked to be known as 'the Chef'.
The one on the Nestor insisted that he was the 'Chef de Cuisine'
Whatever he liked to be called, we knew him as 'Oxtail Ollie' because of his fondness for serving us oxtail stew and his resemblance to Oliver Hardy.
Cargo Ships/Tankers I was on always had a Chief Cook and a second Cook and Baker,Cooks were always called Doc.
Used to be said a Ship could sail without a Captains Ticket aboard but not without someone with a Cooks Ticket,dunno how true that was.
Ships & Ch.Cook or just Ch.Cook same on most fgn going vessels except Pax vessel were they had Ex chef and specialist chefs.
Coasters - Offshore PSVs and Standby Cook or Cook/Steward
Specialist vessels DSVs Chef/manager
Doc years since I heard anyone called Doc\)
We were signing on in the Tyne, Xmas time 1970 sailing 24Th for North Africa
the pool informed the vessel that they had no Ch.Cooks available but they could supply a extra 2nd/Cook/Baker and one of the 2nd/Cooks could sail on my ticket as Ch.Cook.(Thumb) We sailed on 27 Th, with a Ch.Cook. alas I was not on the companies Xmas list after that(Thumb)
Anyone remember Mick Hennesey used to work for Union Castle line but ended up offshore on rigs in the North sea smashing bloke lived outside of Southhampton I worked with him in the mid 80s he was a Camp boss I was a steward we both worked for ARA offshore he was a great laugh somtimes you need a crazy bender to break the monotoney couldnt cook for sheet but did a gret tandori everynow and then smoked like a chimney just like most cookies great days....
I only wish I could write better! Ships cooks, the chef de cuisine, always a story always a nickname! "Two pan Sam' 'Cyanide Sid' 'Crazy Horse'. Some of the excellent food I have seen cooked in some cases in difficult and dangerous cir***stances. Terrible cooks who by virtue of a single speciality and a wit could be the life and soul of the vessel. I have even been in the uncomfortable position of being on a small ship at sea with a genuinely insane one! Cooks who made Christmas and then nearly had a nervous breakdown with the complexity of exotic dishes. Cooks who destroyed Christmas by sheer incompetence. To all of them well done lads ! Not a job for the faint hearted.
I sailed with Monty on Esso Tankers.great cook.i was his 2nd cook and fakir.although he was from Manchester originally he lived down in
Falmouth/Cornwall area.I will have to dig out my old discharge books to find the names and dates,it will have been around the late sixties or so and i think it was the Esso Mercia.could be wrong on both counts but will check it out later.
Sailed with a cook onetime (on the BenLawers actually) who cooked a roast on a plastic tray. He thought it was ok because the tray said it was heat resistant......true story!
Is that the same one that tried to squeeze the corned beef out of the narrow end of the tin so that every slice would be the same size.You could write a book about him
The cooks tickets came in three stages you had to have had at least 3years exp experience for the 1st- 2nd cook/bakers cert. 2nd- at least one year as 2ndck/bkr. ships cook cert and 3rd cheif and ships cook cert was an equivelent qualification for the catering city/guilds 706/2.
Two ships cooks tickets had to be held onboard when deep sea trading the other usually held by the catering officer, somtimes by the 2ndcook..........................
The cooks tickets came in three stages you had to have had at least 3years exp experience for the 1st- 2nd cook/bakers cert. 2nd- at least one year as 2ndck/bkr. ships cook cert and 3rd cheif and ships cook cert was an equivalent qualification for the catering city/guilds 706/2.
Two ships cooks tickets had to be held onboard when deep sea trading the other usually held by the catering officer, sometimes by the 2ndcook..........................
Pre part one cooks certificate, you only had to do the Ships cooks certificate, and spend twelve months in the galley before becoming eligible to sail as Ch/ships Cook. Also you had to be over twenty one years of age. Today or for the last thirty odd years you now have part one and two of a full ships cooks certificate. If you get a higher Cooks certificate that is somewhat similar to the C&G 706/1 not 706/2.
Hi maybe I come from an older generation but I went from Assistant steward and got my cooks ticket ,not in stages but in a oner. Sailed out of Leith as A/steward with a cooks ticket until the opportunity came to go as second cook on Charlie Hills Toronto city. Regards Ronnie
I did my second cooks ticket at Paradise St in Liverpool in 1980 and my cheif cooks at the college of the sea in 84. Whilst there I signed up to do my 706/1 & 2 as a correspondence course and completed them three years later.
All for nothing really, because when I came ashore cooking jobs were so badly paid it wasn't worth it.
sailed with a lot of good ch.cooks ( Doc as they liked to be called ) but one
of the best must be Pat Croarkin - sadly deceased. Sailed with him a couple of
times on the Box boats and Forest ships - a bit unorthodox but great food.
He would have surpassed many a chef in the so called michelin restaurants.
In the fifties, Union-Castle wanted passenger ship cooks to sit for the Board of Trade Ship's Cook 'ticket. They paid an extra two pounds a month to ticket holders. I passed my exam, August 1957, I was born September, 1937, therefore, I was nineteen years, eleven months old. I served as temporary Ship's Cook for ten days on the Athlone Castle when the ship's cook died...never so glad to scurry back to the passenger kitchen. I was told at the time I was the youngest seaman to have my ticket, and to have actively served as a ship's cook.
Got my 2nd Cook & Bakers ticket after 18 months at sea (1964) then my Cooks Ticket in 1968 and sailed as Chief & Ships Cook foreign going 3 weeks before my 22nd birthday, looking back I will admit to being a bit inexperienced for the job in hand. Over the years the experience came with knowledge gained and I,d like to think I was a pretty good "Doc"
An admiral visited one of the ships of the line under his command.
While eating breakfast with the crew in enlisted mess, he was impressed to see the Naval insignia stamped on every biscuit.
He went to the Chief cook to ask how this feat was done so it could be used on other ships under his command.
The Chief replied, "I’d be glad to share that with you, Admiral. After each biscuit is cut, I just slap it here against my belt buckle which bears the Navy insignia".
Horrified the Admiral exclaims, "That's very unhygienic!"
The Chief shrugs and replies, "Well, If that’s the way you feel, sir, I suggest you avoid the donuts."
Alex, regarding the washing of things I remember going absolutely barmy when my first trip galley boy washed my omelette pans. Pans I,d painstakingly got a good "skin" on so the omelettes wouldn,t stick!! This was obviously in the days before Teflon!!
When I was a Stwd. if any ot the Mates or Engineers mucked
us around in the Saloon we used to put a small amount of Plate
Powder in their food and after a few doses it would take effect
and give them "you know what" (Smoke)
When I was a Stwd. if any ot the Mates or Engineers mucked
us around in the Saloon we used to put a small amount of Plate
Powder in their food and after a few doses it would take effect
and give them "you know what" (Smoke)
Hamburgers are so called because originally they derived from Hamburg Steaks made from the finely diced tails of whole fillets.Likewise doughnuts were called Berliners in their home country `Ich bin ein Berliner`so famously claimed by JFK means`I am a donut`
i was 2cook/baker on the br character early 50s. the ch .steward one of the old school.if i was making custard.he would bring the sudar in to the galley and put it in the kit that was going to the saloon. none for the crew.those where the days.lots of similar storys to tell.
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