Sn0wball - first off, one thing to understand is that, unless you are cheffing as a 1 person operation (say, your own tiny restaurant), no one chef would usually be doing all these things by him or her self. that said, any chef should have no trouble doing so.
when you come onto a shift, you start prepping. generally, whatever takes longest comes first, something like a brown sauce for example. on the other hand, you have to balance this against what can be finished ahead of time and what has to be freshly prepared at the last moment. for example, if your dessert were a choc. mousse, you'd get this done as one of the first things, as it has to be well set before serving whereas for a choc. souffle, as auntdot mentioned, would be popped in the oven a bit before the wait person cleared the plates. even then, though, you might be able to have part of it prepped so that you only need to beat and fold in the whites.
not knowing anything about your menu, a "typical" chef's prep in a "typical" kitchen might go something along these lines:
- get to work on on what has to be finished before it can be used, for example sauces,soups, clarified butter, rice, most desserts, etc. priortize these by doing what takes the longest first.
- next, do the items that can be prepped all the way to the point just before cooking. some examples would include stuffed items that would later be sauteed, baked or broiled.
- lastly, prep all the individual ingredients you will need, again balancing what will take the longest against what has to be done just before using. typically, these will include your diced onions, tomatoes, mushrooms, minced parsley, pre-portioned items, garnishes, etc. these will go into your bain marie or chilled inserts.
when to start what often depends on good communication with the wait person. for example, if something is going to need 15 minutes in the oven just before serving, you need to let the waiter or waitress know. some tables are fast and some slow (eaters, that is), and they'll let you know when a table is half way or nearly done and it's ok to fire something up. in large kitchens, they'll communicate with the expediter, who will then just bark out orders.
while i hope this helps you out a little bit, it essentially is a hands-on learning experience that pretty much also entails learning from your mistakes. you wouldn't become much off an athlete just from reading, and cheffing is no different. blowing things and being nervous when you're learning is a given. i laugh every time i remember my first time on a line and i got all of 4 orders at one time. i was running around like a chicken with its head cut off, so the head chef stepped behind the line to back me up. lol try to relax.