So many pet peeves, so few numbers
It’s Top Ten Tuesday again, and 10 numbers just might not be enough to cover all the petty and not-so-petty things that irritate me when I eat out – and that irritate the people who have posted or e-mailed me. So let’s get started ...
1) Oversalted food. This is a no-brainer, as far as I’m concerned. I can understand a chef wanting the dish to taste wonderful without the diner having to do anything to it, but you can’t correct too much salt at the table.
2) Loud parties who feel they own the restaurant. I hate to admit this about my own sex, but it’s often a group of women celebrating something and drinking who feel they can squeal, shriek and laugh at top volume with total disregard for the other guests. Get a room.
3) Wait staff who don’t clear off every dirty dish before they bring out the next course. Or who take the dirty silverware off the plate and put it on the table so you can use it for the next course.
4) Cell phone conversations. Kudos to Brightons for banning them. I’m sure there are other restaurants that do, but it’s the only one I’ve noticed. Please e-mail me or post below if you know of any others, or if your restaurant bans them.
5) Servers with tongue piercings. You look great; you look totally fierce, I just don’t want to think about what that feels like while I’m eating.
6) Flash cameras at nice restaurants. I know you’re celebrating your parents' 50th wedding anniversary, but aren’t two pictures enough? That’s the problem with the invention of digital cameras; you don’t have to worry about using up all your film, so you take a lot more shots just in case.
7) Tipsy tables and uneven double tables when they’ve been pushed together to seat four. Don’t manufacturers make the legs the same length anymore?
8) Servers who don’t write down your order and then get it wrong.
9) Innovation for the sake of innovation. I hate it when the kitchen is being too clever so some inappropriate ingredient appears in a perfectly decent dish, like chocolate in the mac ‘n’ cheese. (I’m not making this up.) If it works, OK. But that doesn’t happen enough.
10) Upselling. As when you ask what’s good, and the recommendation is the most expensive thing on the menu or wine list.
Next Top Ten Tuesday: Restaurant Desserts
These will be just the ones I’ve tasted in the past year or so. Feel free to post or e-mail me your suggestions.
2) Loud parties who feel they own the restaurant. I hate to admit this about my own sex, but it’s often a group of women celebrating something and drinking who feel they can squeal, shriek and laugh at top volume with total disregard for the other guests. Get a room.
3) Wait staff who don’t clear off every dirty dish before they bring out the next course. Or who take the dirty silverware off the plate and put it on the table so you can use it for the next course.
4) Cell phone conversations. Kudos to Brightons for banning them. I’m sure there are other restaurants that do, but it’s the only one I’ve noticed. Please e-mail me or post below if you know of any others, or if your restaurant bans them.
5) Servers with tongue piercings. You look great; you look totally fierce, I just don’t want to think about what that feels like while I’m eating.
6) Flash cameras at nice restaurants. I know you’re celebrating your parents' 50th wedding anniversary, but aren’t two pictures enough? That’s the problem with the invention of digital cameras; you don’t have to worry about using up all your film, so you take a lot more shots just in case.
7) Tipsy tables and uneven double tables when they’ve been pushed together to seat four. Don’t manufacturers make the legs the same length anymore?
8) Servers who don’t write down your order and then get it wrong.
9) Innovation for the sake of innovation. I hate it when the kitchen is being too clever so some inappropriate ingredient appears in a perfectly decent dish, like chocolate in the mac ‘n’ cheese. (I’m not making this up.) If it works, OK. But that doesn’t happen enough.
10) Upselling. As when you ask what’s good, and the recommendation is the most expensive thing on the menu or wine list.
Next Top Ten Tuesday: Restaurant Desserts
These will be just the ones I’ve tasted in the past year or so. Feel free to post or e-mail me your suggestions.
Comments
For me, it is wait staff that does not refill drinks often enough. Not just talking about alcoholic beverages, but any beverage, even water. I like to drink a lot of fluids when I eat, and have spent many a meal waiting while my food gets cold to get a refill. I often resort to flagging down another waiter so they can help or at least pass along the message.
Posted by: Phil in Columbia | May 1, 2007 11:44 AM
restaurants that do not take reservations drive me crazy
Posted by: regina shah | May 1, 2007 12:19 PM
Golden West on The Avenue in Hampden bans cell phone conversations. It can make it a little hard if you have alarge party arriving seperately, but its worth it.
Posted by: Patrick | May 1, 2007 12:26 PM
Golden West Cafe in Hampden has always had a strict no-cellphones policy, and they explain it on their menu. It's wonderful!
Posted by: Eric in Hampden | May 1, 2007 12:29 PM
I have a few to add, which I will present in no particular order:
*Serving children's food that is too hot to eat. Telling a 5 year old "don't touch the plate, its hot" is the same as saying "mumble mumble mumble..." Kids are hungry, too. If you have a kid’s menu you should make some accommodations.
*Obscene wine markups. My wife and I went to a restaurant where we saw a bottle of wine we had bought the day before for $9 at a "NON-discount" wine store was priced at $35 and another wine about as cheap went for $7.00 a glass. A reasonable markup is expected, but 600%?
*Serving appetizers only moments before dinner. If we ordered it as an appetizer we probably did not want it WITH dinner.
*Waiters or waitresses DISAPPEARING after the check is delivered. Do you want our money or not?
*Diners who have to have their chairs as far from the table as is possible in a cramped restaurant. Hey, we are all in the same situation! If your neighbor cannot get up from his or her chair without having to ask your permission you are being rude. Plus, I am sure the people you are with might like to occasionally know you haven't left them - slide in!
*Having to wait a long time to get a table, finally being seated and then not seeing another restaurant employee of any type or kind for almost as long a time. Similar to this is trying to seat patrons at unbussed tables - when they do that we should be allowed to keep any tip money we find still on the table.
Posted by: TOM D | May 1, 2007 12:41 PM
Other Pet Peeves:
Servers that do not know what ingredients make up a particular dish... how can you expect someone to accept a recommendation if you do not know how the dish is prepared, or what ingredients are in it?
Posted by: Jason | May 1, 2007 1:07 PM
WHEN YOU GO TO A FAMILY OR BUFFET RESTURANT AND THE CHILDREN RUN THRU THE RESTAURANT LIKE THERE OUTDOORS. KNOCKING INTO YOU, PLAYING IN THE DESSERT BAR, FILLING THEIR PLATES WITH FOOD THEY WON'T EAT AND MIXING SODA'S AND THEN DON'T DRINK THEM. WHERE ARE THE PARENTS AND WHY DON'T THEY CORRECT THEM?
I
Posted by: PAT IN PARKVILLE | May 1, 2007 1:11 PM
I had an experience with a cell phone user at Petit Louis. It was a crowded Friday evening, boisterous and the tables seemed even closer together than usual. An older man at the next table got a phone call and proceeded to talk at full voice to the caller in order to be heard over the crowd. In order not to disturb his table mates, he turned away from them to face US. The tables were so close, he was practically sitting at our table. So I made a loud comment about how rude people with cell phones can be...he gave me a dirty look and then went outside...something he should have done from the getgo. But *I* got the dirty look.
Personally, I think cell phones should be banned from most places.
Posted by: Kathy | May 1, 2007 1:49 PM
Pet Peeve of late-NO spoon with your place setting- even upscale restaurants such as TASTE have removed spoons.I would like a spoon to share a taste of my dish with a companion. I would like a spoon to scoop up a last tasty morsel. I would like a spoon to reposition an ice cube. Please bring spoons back to place settings.
Posted by: Doris Silverwood | May 2, 2007 12:18 PM