Money is cool and all, but Chef Life: A Restaurant Simulator offers different rewards for those willing to take the risk. After your first couple of days in the restaurant, you will be introduced to Challenges. These can be found on the board in your office and add some breaks in gameplay to the cycle of restaurant life.
Once you have mastered plating food quickly and getting good tips, you might be wanting more. Challenges allow you to work towards different goals in order to expand your store for the better.
Challenge Rewards
Sometimes you need more than monotonously working over the stove every day. If your tips aren't great, you can count on Challenges to get you more change. Completing a challenge rewards you with experience, money, and Gold Coupons. Gold Coupons are for use in the Catalog book in your office to purchase special items.
Completing challenges is the only way to get Gold Coupons.
Each category in the Catalog has something that can only be purchased with some Gold Coupons. Whether it be furniture, hairstyles for your character, or kitchen decor items. Experience allows you to level up, which in turn unlocks new recipes at your Research Table and new items available for purchase in the Catalog.
Gold Coupon usage is not purely cosmetic. You can purchase new kitchenware in the Catalog. New recipes may require an item you don't have yet, such as a blender, and a blender requires purchase here.
Completing Challenges
Challenges typically ask you to cook a specific food a certain amount of times, buy from a specific supplier, or serve four people the same exact dish. These Challenges won't always be doable. They may ask you for a dish you haven't unlocked yet or for a scenario that hasn't happened, such as a group of customers asking for the same thing.
Be mindful of your Challenge progress and what you are able to complete that week before time runs out. Once service is in business, you cannot leave the kitchen to go look at your Request Panel. There are no punishments for failing Challenges. New Challenges will pop up every day, so you always have a chance to earn rewards.
NPC Request Challenges
Similarly to Challenges, you can get NPC Requests. Requests happen when a random NPC shows up before service hours, offering an alliance of sorts. Requests can be found on the same board in your office. NPCs will introduce themselves to you, and you will then receive a challenge from them to complete. Sometimes you must wait to meet the NPC again before you can get a Request from them.
Requests will ask you to do similar things to challenges. Since Karim is your first sous-chef, you must grow his confidence in the kitchen by completing his Request side story. Once you do this, he will be able to perform more complex tasks in the kitchen. The difference between Requests and Challenges is that Requests relate to the story and characters and will unlock your ability to buy certain things.
Completing the request of these NPCs will unlock access to each of their unique properties. For instance, completing Horace's Requests will unlock new decorations, and completing Camila's Requests will unlock new player cosmetics.