When you tell someone who’s been in the restaurant business 25 years he has to change the way he cooks, he gets a little nervous. But in 2015, Frank’s Place owner Frank Cerminaro knew he had to make the change from convection ovens to combi oven technology so his family restaurant could keep up with customer demand.
Cerminaro and his brother grew up living above Frank’s Place; his parents, Frank and Joann Cerminaro, opened the restaurant in 1968, cooking mostly his mother’s family recipes which are still used today. After two expansions that increased the number of seats from 28 to 250, he needed to maximize productivity and make the most efficient use of limited kitchen space.
“When I first saw RATIONAL at a show, I was impressed, but I thought it was a little out of my price range,“ Cerminaro said. “Now I’m on my fourth RATIONAL.“
Cerminaro trains his chefs and line cooks to use the RATIONAL SelfCookingCenter®, most of whom haven’t worked with a combi oven before. As they grow familiar with its operation, they get nothing but rave reviews from guests saying the food is the best they’ve ever had.
“We could not have grown without RATIONAL,“ Cerminaro remarked. “We would have needed a 20-burner stove, and the footprint and the manpower just would not have been possible.“
