Marco started in dish at 19. The hot water, the industrial detergent, the steam — within a month, his hands were wrecked. Cracked, bleeding, painful. But dish was the entry point. If he wanted to cook, he had to survive dish first.
"Everyone said your hands toughen up," he remembers. "Mine just kept getting worse. I'd go home and couldn't close my fists without the cracks splitting open."
Surviving the Pit
Marco learned to protect what he could. Heavy moisturizer before and after shifts. Self-adhering tape over the worst cracks, because adhesive tape just made things worse when it got wet and had to be pulled off. Gloves whenever the chef wasn't watching.
Eight months in the pit. His hands never fully healed during that time, but they didn't get worse. He protected them enough to keep going.
Moving Up
When the prep cook position opened, Marco was ready. His hands, finally free from the dish pit's constant assault, began to heal. New calluses formed — knife calluses now, from the tools of his actual craft.
He still tapes sometimes. Before heavy prep. When his hands are particularly dry. When he feels the old cracks threatening to reopen. It's a habit from the dish days that still serves him.
Two Years Later
Marco runs the sauté station now. His hands bear the marks of his journey — scars from dish, calluses from prep, small burns from the line. He's proud of every mark.
"These hands got me here," he says. "I took care of them when they needed it. Now they take care of me."