A Cheesy Affair
Lesson to learn: don't be in cahoots with cheese suppliers when you are a pizzeria...
This short story is based on this prompt, which I crafted in response to a post by
:Watson's Pizza has long been the town of Fairtree's favorite pizzeria. Why is this? It's because of the cheese blend that they use for most of their pizzas. A luscious blend of mozzarella, Havarti and Parmesan is placed on top of their secret sauce blend, before a dollop of herbs and the customer's choice of toppings is placed on top of the cheese. This increases the price of the pizzas relative to other pizzerias in the town, but the people don't mind – the taste of the food more than makes up for the price.
The pizzeria is open from 11 to 9 every day, provided that they have all of the prerequisites to make pizza. One day however, there was an issue in the kitchen that the cooks had never seen before.
Thomas was taking inventory of all the ingredients inside of the store roughly an hour before the restaurant was about to open. Fresh dough? Check. Marinara sauce? Check. White sauce? Check. Cheese…
“Where is the cheese?” Thomas said out loud.
Thomas began to scurry through the kitchen, trying desperately to find a bag of the famous cheese blend that they used. During this search, the restaurant owner, Giorgio, came in to the kitchen.
“Everything okay?” Giorgio said in a friendly tone.
Thomas narrowly avoided banging his head on the island where the cooks put all the fixings on their pizzas, and then said in a panic: “Giorgio! We have a problem! It appears that we are out of cheese!”
“That can’t be. I must check the cellar downstairs.”
Giorgio went downstairs to search for some cheese. Meanwhile, Thomas was stricken with fear. How can we open, if we are missing a crucial ingredient for our signature dish?
Several minutes passed. During this time, some more staff members came in, including two other cooks. There was tension in the air, as the possibility of having to close down for the day loomed on everybody’s mind. Eventually, Giorgio emerged from the downstairs cellar with some bad news:
“Guys, we are out of cheese. We can’t open.”
Everyone gasped, save for Thomas, who was determined to rectify this situation. He didn’t want to miss out on work.
“There must be a way for us to open up on time,” Giorgio said.
“That’s impossible. The cheese blend that we use is proprietary and you can’t just buy it from any old cheese shop or supermarket. It has to be custom made, and custom blends take a while to ship over.”
“Wait!” said Charlie, the newest cook on the crew.
“You have an idea?” Giorgio said, enthused.
“There’s a cheese factory in town that I used to work for before I switched over to the restaurant business. Maybe they could help.”
“Give me their contact information, if you still have it.”
Charlie produced a business card which had the information for Cheese Buster, the local cheese factory. Giorgio took the card and thanked Charlie for giving him the information. He ran off into his office so he could make the phone call in private. He did not give the workers any further instructions.
“So now what are we supposed to do?” said Joelle, a cashier.
There was no response. All of workers were confused.
Meanwhile, at the Cheese Buster, a problem was brewing. The Cheese Buster is a cheese factory that produces a variety of cheeses, including cheddar, mozzarella and feta. Usually, cheese is produced, packaged, and then held in a chilled warehouse before it’s shipped to places around town and in the region. Recently, the factory upgraded their production lines, which has enabled them to produce more cheese. However, a few days ago, there was a bug in some of their computer systems, which has caused their machines to produce cheese at a heightened rate. This has caused the warehouse to slowly fill up, as the demand for their cheese has remained the same. Now, it has reached a breaking point.
Sensors throughout the factory have sounded, warning that the warehouse will overflow within the next day or so, if the problem is not resolved. Some workers in the factory are working on fixing the issues with the computer systems, while the sales department are offering their product at a discount in an effort to push it out as quickly as possible.
At approximately 10:23 am, one of the sales staff received a phone call.
“Cheese Buster sales, this is Florian, how can I assist you today?”
“Hello, this is Giorgio Watson, owner and proprietor of Watson’s Pizza. We have a problem that threatens our business. We have run out of our signature Watson’s cheese blend, which we use for our pizza. We need to replenish our supply, otherwise, we will not be able to open today. Can you assist us?”
Florian replies: “Okay, let’s see how I can assist you. One moment please.”
Florian searched through some records on her computer, trying to locate Watson’s Pizza. Eventually, she found the appropriate records. There was something shocking in them. The pizzeria owed approximately 1200 dollars to the factory, and all of the debts were accrued within the last couple of months – which, coincidentally, aligns with when Charlie was hired at the pizzeria.
“Giorgio, you still there?”
“Oh yes, I’m here,” Giorgio said, a bit flustered, “can you help us?”
“Well, I wish I could, but we can’t serve you.”
“Why?” Giorgio said, with a bit of frustration melting into his voice.
“Your company owes us some money, and it’s not an insignificant amount.”
“What? That’s preposterous! My restaurant takes great strides in assuring that we are not in arrears with anyone.”
“Well, you are with us. Our records indicate that you owe us about $1200 - $1189.48, to be exact. It needs to be paid, otherwise, we can’t help you.”
Giorgio’s voice began to fill with rage.
“What! I haven’t even made contact with this place before. Can’t you…”
Florian cuts Giorgio off: “Sir, I will not tolerate being yelled at.”
The act of Florian cutting Giorgio off made Giorgio even more enraged.
“Come on! This is important! I’ll even give you guys free pizza!”
“Sir, I will not be bribed here. You either pay up, or you get lost.”
The call hangs up at this point.
Giorgio storms back into the kitchen, his face red like the marinara sauce that the chefs use. He points at Charlie, who was busy gossiping with his fellow co-workers.
“You.”
“What did I do?”
“I believe you stole some cheese from your former work place.”
Charlie was in panic mode. He was looking around like a maniac, hoping that one of his co-workers could be used as a scapegoat. However, this proved to be in vain. Eventually, he confessed to the crime. With a deep sigh, Charlie said:
“You got me. I really like the cheese products that the Cheese Buster made. In fact, that establishment would give the workers small samples of cheese if we asked for it. This benefit ended when I left the company, however, I was addicted to it. So, I would sneak into their factory at night, take some cheese, and I left a note there saying that you would pay for it in the future. The factory never said anything to me.”
Giorgio’s anger softened somewhat.
“Well, because of you, we can’t buy cheese from them, and so we can’t make our pizza. This is inexcusable.”
Charlie tried to plead with Giorgio, but Giorgio was having none of it:
“Charlie, you are ordered to go over to the Cheese Buster and pay them for the damages you caused them. It comes to $1189.48. Also, you are fired. Please give me your apron.”
Charlie nods his head solemnly and complied with Giorgio’s instructions.
Back in his office, Giorgio called the Cheese Buster again.
“Cheese Buster sales, this is Florian, how can I assist you today?”
“Hey it’s Giorgio. Sorry for going off on you earlier. I determined that Charlie was the culprit behind our arrears. He went into your establishment during the night to steal some of your product.”
Florian took a moment to open up Watson’s Pizzeria’s records. She then replied:
“I see. Is he going to pay up?”
“Yes. I told him to come over to pay off the debt, and that he was fired. We can’t have people who steal on our employee roster.”
“Understood. Once he comes over and pays up, we’ll make sure to trespass him, so he can’t cause any more harm to us.”
“Great! Now with that settled, can we talk about a cheese shipment?”
Florian was initially hesitant, but eventually she agreed:
“Alright. Let’s talk cheese. What do you need?”
Giorgio, now in a better mood, goes about telling her his needs. The rest of the conversation goes by uneventfully.
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So glad I could inspire a great story!