Awilda Campbell, left, with Pamela Silvestri for a one-night stint tending bar at Doc Hennigan's in Westerleigh. (Staten Island Advance/Pamela Silvestri)

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — By the time August rolls around and the sycamores shed much of their bark, summer is over by my standards. Memory-wise, summer never ends — especially if it’s an uncomfortable, almost silly kind of summer in the service of a restaurant. I was reminded of this while working as a guest bartender at Doc Hennigan’s last Tuesday night.

Yes, pull up a barstool — because I can tell you stories from my food service career in the Dog Days of the season from inside four walls. And let’s just say the heat builds character.

In my mid-20s my husband David and I ran the concession at Hillside Swim Club in Travis. One day when temps hit about 110 degrees inside that hut with the grill and deep fryer going, the only source of cool was the walk-in box. The staff took turns standing in the midst of beer kegs and cases of beef patties to absorb some of the chill.

Although it wasn’t a kitchen grunts’ rightful place to use the pool, that beautiful, chlorinated thing beckoned. The manager at the time said one night if we wanted to take a swim we could do so. No one took the invitation. But after a stretch of 14-hour days, like this weather we find ourselves in currently, I just couldn’t stand it anymore. After closing down the snack bar I walked off the diving board fully clothed and sat for awhile at the bottom of the pool. And it was a great reward.

The next summer when we had both the Hillside concession and our restaurant American Grill in West Brighton, I opted to work in the air conditioned dining room at 420 Forest Avenue. It sounded like the better end of the stick to work at an indoor restaurant in heels and a suit.

Yet when the sun baked Staten Island to 100 degrees and upward, at our place there would be a contest between the exhaust, front door opening and the cold air pumped into the building. The hot air always won in the kitchen and that’s when I learned my chef colleague could not tolerate such an inferno. Down, down, the chef would go, like a mighty oak.

American Grill, 2004, in West Brighton (Staten Island Advance File Photo)Staten Island Advance

The first time it happened, our salad guy, Cirilo, calmly walked up to me into the dining room. It was a busy Saturday evening and still early. In checks and an apron, Cirilo gestured with a hand side-to-side to the neck and said something to me like, “Chef...he no mas.”

Indeed, our top guy was “no more” for the night. All six-or-so feet of him were on the floor while an aghast kitchen crew looked down at his soaked chef body. In subsequent heat waves we’d joke about the incident, admittedly with some fidgeting and nervous giggles from the servers. As insurance to get through the night, we’d send a busboy to the deli across the street for Gatorades. It generally did the trick.

I’ll tell you about the time we had a fire on the roof one August at American Grill another day, like I did at Doc’s when I had my apron on.

Pamela Silvestri is Advance Food Editor. She can be reached at silvestri@siadvance.com.

A night at Doc Hennigan's (Staten Island Advance/Pamela Silvestri)

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