History YMMV / CookServeDelicious

** Any level in ''3'' with the "Angry Customers" modifier, which sends order patience into the red zone as soon as they come in. Cramming your Holding Stations with foods that have complex prep stages is flat-out ''suicidal'' on these shifts, since you'll end up spending so much time prepping that orders will start slipping away faster than you can serve them. Your only hope is to pack your Holding Stations with as many "instant serve" foods as humanly possible, filling any remaining slots with dishes that have minimal prep involved. Got a menu theme that doesn't allow for this strategy? Prepare to lose copious amounts of hair.

** In [=CSD3=], nearly any level that doesn't have a minimum point requirement is this, since there's nothing stopping you from just picking the easiest dishes from the choices available and calling it a day. This combined with "Entire Menu" in particular can be a godsend, since you end up with literally no restrictions on what you can serve.

** Also in ''[=CSD2=]'', the restaurant mode descriptions mislead you into believing that Super Rush Hours are exclusive to [[HarderThanHard Stress Mode]]. In reality, Super Rush Hours are triggered by your Buzz reaching 150%, meaning that once it hits that threshold, they will start happening in ''any'' mode (barring Zen by virtue of eliminating Rush Hours altogether). This has the nasty side effect of rendering Classic Mode - ostensibly the mode that most veterans of the first game will naturally gravitate towards - virtually unplayable due to the way Buzz accumulates - most players (''especially'' skilled players and those who try to maximize their Buzz via boosters) will find themselves hitting the 150% mark after only a dozen or so shifts, leaving them in for a nasty surprise once they get slapped with a Super Rush Hour and their performance subsequently tanks due to their menu being literally impossible to serve under the single second of patience Super Rush Hours invoke. The only way to avoid this is either [[DoWellButNotPerfect to deliberately perform poorly in order to lower Buzz from bad orders]], or to load up the menu with detractors that negatively affect Buzz, both of which [[ViolationOfCommonSense fly directly in the face of what most players would logically do]].

** In the sequel, the sheer volume of chores one is assaulted with. It's not uncommon for the serving of a single order to generate up to ''four chores at once'', and because chores decay much faster than orders most of the time, shifts tend to devolve into "serve dish, fight off chores, serve dish, fight off chores, repeat ad nauseum", especially during rush hours. The biggest offenders are the Trash and Dishes chores, since not only are they the most time-consuming, but they're also the most frequent of the lot, meaning that while you're dealing with them, orders or ''even other chores'' are slipping away before your eyes, and you may even have two trash or dishes chores queued up at the same time! On the whole, it ends up feeling like FakeDifficulty at its most blatant. It's no wonder, then, that much of the fandom heaved a sigh of relief upon learning that ''[=CSD3=]'' jettisons chores altogether.

*** Secrets of the Deep and absolutely are surprisingly easy given how late in the Chef 4 Hire campaign they appear - the latter in particular has several shifts where the only ways ''not'' to get a [[NoDamageRun gold medal]] are either to screw up a drink order or to let an order or chore expire, something which is next to impossible given the glut of sides at your disposal. However, these are just the calm before the storm that is Sebucosto, UEIYAV, and Executive's Decision, the final three restaurants in the campaign which are ''[[NintendoHard very much]]'' worthy of their end-game status.

*** Secrets of the Deep and absolutely are surprisingly easy given how late in the Chef 4 Hire campaign they appear - the latter in particular has several shifts where the only ways ''not'' to get a [[NoDamageRun gold medal]] are either to screw up a drink order or to let an order or chore expire, something which is next to impossible given the glut of sides at your disposal. However, these are likely just the calm before the storm that is Sebucosto, UEIYAV, and Executive's Decision, the final three restaurants in the campaign which are ''[[NintendoHard very much]]'' worthy of their end-game status.

** As of the Barista update, Contrast Coffee is a particularly nasty one. While many of the new menu items are fairly straightforward (espresso shots in particular are literally ''one ingredient''), nearly all of them have ''extremely'' short cook times (said espresso shots go from started to overcooked in about ''eight seconds''), requiring intense babysitting of your prep station queue to ensure nothing gets ruined. Even worse, the final two shifts use ''thirteen'' and '''''fourteen''''' prep stations respectively; the only other restaurants that ever go above twelve are UEIYAV and Executive's Decision, the final two restaurants in Chef 4 Hire. If you can manage to all-gold Contrast Coffee, most of the remainder of Chef 4 Hire will likely pose little challenge for you.

** ''[=CSD2=]'' has the dreaded burritos, a dish which just ''screams'' FakeDifficulty. Not only does it have ''dozens'' of recipes and have several ingredients with unintuitive default key bindings (one example: corn chips are assigned to ''H'' for some reason), but it is absolutely ''loaded'' with "gotcha" ingredients whose sole purpose is to trip you up. Have fun spotting the difference between trick ingredient pairings like "chicken fajitas" and "breaded chicken", "white rice" and "black rice", and "pinto beans" and "black beans", and remembering which key goes with which ingredient, all in the span of mere seconds you'll have to serve it up. And just to add insult to injury, burritos are one of the ''worst'' contributors to trash, with it taking no more than four orders before a trash chore is coming your way. The inclusion of this dish is the single biggest contributing factor to the off-the-charts difficulty of the final few shifts of Esteban's and ''especially'' Burrito Time; not only do burritos tend to be served alongside other tough items, but the ungodly amounts of trash piling up mean you could very easily be staring down ''three'' trash chores in your queue ''[[ThisIsGonnaSuck at the same time]]''.

** Esteban's in the sequel. Sandwiched between the simple, straightforward Pie Right and the [[BreatherLevel comparatively simple]] Firekickers, Esteban's is a nightmare of complex, multi-ingredient foods loaded with multiple prep/cooking steps and insidious "gotcha" ingredients with unintuitive default key assignments. It starts out simple enough, but towards the end it reaches maddening levels of difficulty that will test the skill and patience of even the most seasoned ''CSD'' veterans.

* AluminiumChristmasTrees: Casu marzu. While this cheese isn't used as a wine flavor like the game suggests, such a variety of cheese does exist. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casu_marzu And it's a little squickier than the game implies]].

* AuthorsSavingThrow: After many players criticized the lack of a sense of progression in ''[=CSD2=]'', especially in comparison to the first game, ''[=CSD3=]'' has been revealed to have a fully fleshed-out campaign mode with a wide variety of progressive upgrades.

** There's also the "Fiesta!" theme, which, as you might guess, limits your menu choices to Mexican foods. If you want to earn a decent amount of money/experience, you'll have to put tacos and the aforementioned burritos on your menu. Fortunately, the gameplay overhauls in ''3'' make these ''much'' more manageable than in the previous game; not only is the amount of each dish you'll have to make drastically reduced due to them only appearing in between stops, but the chore problems these dishes presented in ''2'' are gone entirely.

* FridgeHorror: On your first shift in Marietta, OK, Cleaver recalls a story during the Blue War where she tore off a robot's arm and then ''[[GrievousHarmWithABody beat it to death with its own arm]]''. When you remember that the robots in this world are [[WhatMeasureIsANonHuman borderline sentient beings]], it suddenly seems much less different than if a human being were to do the same thing with another person, and you realize that Whisk has ''damn good reason'' to be horrified with [[ComedicSociopath how flippantly Cleaver tells the tale]].

** The third game has the "Burgers and Patties" theme, which limits your menu choices to burgers, chicken sandwiches, and breakfast sandwiches. It requires a ton of ingredients properly placed, and missing even one will lock you out of a perfect score, making any level with it significantly tougher than most others. Quite notably, if a gold medal is obtained on the first shift to use this theme exclusively, it unlocks a decoration screaming "no more burgers!"

** In [=CSD3=], any level that lets you choose from the entire menu is generally this, since with so much to choose from it's not hard to put together an easy menu if you want to, even if it has a high point requirement.

** The third game has the "Burgers and Patties" theme, which limits your menu choices to burgers, chicken sandwiches, and breakfast sandwiches. It requires a ton of ingredients properly placed, and missing even one will lock you out of a perfect score, making any level with it significantly tougher than most others. Quite notably, if a gold medal is obtained on the last shift to have this theme, it unlocks a decoration screaming "no more burgers!"

** The third game has "Burgers and Patties", a level that only allows for burgers, chicken sandwiches, and breakfast sandwiches. It requires a ton of ingredients properly placed, and missing even one will lock you out of a perfect score. Quite notably, if a gold is obtained, it unlocks a decoration screaming "no more burgers!"

EvenBetterSequel: The third game, which most players agree improves and expands upon the previous two games in nearly every way, making it easily the best in the trilogy.

** In the sequel, the sheer volume of chores one is assaulted with. It's not uncommon for the serving of a single order to generate up to ''four chores at once'', and because chores decay much faster than orders most of the time, shifts tend to devolve into "serve dish, fight off chores, serve dish, fight off chores, repeat ad nauseum", especially during rush hours. The biggest offenders, however, are the Trash and Dishes chores, since not only are they the most time-consuming, but they're also the most frequent of the lot, meaning that while you're dealing with them, orders or ''even other chores'' are slipping away before your eyes, and you may even have two trash or dishes chores queued up at the same time! On the whole, it ends up feeling like FakeDifficulty at its most blatant.[[note]]However, as the mass generation of chores seems to be linked to holding stations, it's possible to mitigate the issue in ''CSD'' mode by relying on holding stations as little as possible, though you're SOL when it comes to Chef 4 Hire mode.[[/note]] It's no wonder, then, that much of the fandom heaved a sigh of relief upon learning that ''[=CSD3=]'' jettisons chores altogether.

* ContestedSequel: While the vastly expanded food choices and the new Chef 4 Hire mode have received nearly universal praise, there is heated debate on whether the sequel’s main restaurant mode is a worthy successor to the original game. Some enjoy the new version for being more streamlined with fewer distractions and gimmicks, whereas others feel it to be so stripped down in comparison to the original that there's no reason to play it over the more engaging, fleshed-out Chef 4 Hire.
** [[EvenBetterSequel Averted with the third game]], which most players agree improves and expands upon the previous two games in nearly every way, making it easily the best in the trilogy.

*** Firekickers is also significantly easier than Esteban's, the restaurant that immediately precedes it (see ThatOneLevel below), featuring much simpler menu items with far fewer "gotcha" ingredients. One can easily gold-medal the entire former restaurant in less time than it takes to gold-medal just the final three shifts of the latter.

** The final three shifts of Esteban's are absolute ''murder'' for anyone trying to get [[NoDamageRun gold medals]]. Imagine a menu full of complex foods with multiple ingredients and absolutely ''loaded'' with "gotcha" ingredients (i.e. ingredients with unintuitive key assignments - have fun remembering that black beans is A!). Even if you rebind the keys to make the more repetitive foods like sopapillas, fajitas, and tres leches easier, and to cut down on some of the "gotchas", it's still far too easy to screw up or take too much time to serve one of the more complex dishes like tacos, burritos, or nachos. And if that wasn't bad enough, these dishes also generate an absolutely ''brutal'' number of chores, to the point where it's entirely possible not only for a single dish to generate ''four chores at the same time'', but also to have as many as ''three'' garbage and/or dish chores queued up at once! And if that ''still'' wasn't bad enough, you have 12 prep stations for all three shifts, making it all too easy to get overwhelmed and accidentally pull up an order that isn't finished cooking yet, thus ruining your entire run. It will take literal hours and an ''immense'' amount of skill and patience to complete these three shifts perfectly, after which you likely won't want to set eyes upon Mexican food, be it in the game or in real life, for a long, long time.