A Food Critic Intervention

August 31, 2010

Above My Computer

There have been several instances while writing posts for this blog where I have felt the need to place blame for the things that drive me crazy about the restaurant business. I have always managed to stop short of that because I do not want this to be a blog that complains about the problems we are all aware of. My mission is a little different. I want to help servers make more money by exceeding their guests’ expectations. Whenever I find myself kvetching too much I only have too look at the Woody Guthrie quote that I keep hanging above my computer to get me back on track.

I consider myself fortunate to have worked with some great “old school” waiters who instilled in me a respect for the industry and the way things used to be. I have heard tales of the days when people dressed for dinner, left the kids at home, and did not ask for ranch on their Caesar salads. Since I did not cause the mass corporate casual restaurant to become the norm, I do not complain about it. I try to adapt to a world where anyone with a yahoo username can be a food critic and hundreds of cooking shows allows everyone to consider themselves a chef de cuisine. I do so because this is an industry that I love and respect.

Read the full post at The Manager’s Office

Jeff
Aug 31, 2010 @ 15:54:44

I’d say that I have served at least 5 “caesar salads” with ranch in the decade I have been doing this. This man is out of touch.

pren
Aug 31, 2010 @ 16:18:03

i REGULARLY was asked for ranch on Caesar salads. or asked “what kind of dressing comes on the ceasar salad?”…uuuhhh….ceasar dressing. anyhow i wont go read his article cause you know me, i have anger issues and id probably make you look bad when i flipped out at his pompous windbaggery, being a regular reader and all im sure hed trace my path of destruction back to this blog. hahaha

pren
Aug 31, 2010 @ 16:33:51

oh i hate myself. i went and read it AND commented. why?! hahaha. jk. i DID have the common sense to delete the 3 paragraph rant i went on and just stick to the basics of my point though.

Becky
Aug 31, 2010 @ 16:36:43

Well, I agree with Jeff that he’s out of touch in many ways. In the current economic state, we all have to be careful – restaurant owners included. And as a local critic and former server, he might want to be kind enough to complain about the crappy croutons or crummy service to the people who can do something about it and improve the situation for everybody.

I work for a guy who hates when people come to him with nothing but a complaint. If you don’t have a possible solution to the problem, don’t bother. But if you never go to him with the problem, there’s probably nothing ever going to be done about it.

We don’t serve caesars, but I’ve served plenty of scotch and sevens, bourbon cranberries and vodka cokes to know that when someone wants something a certain way, you go out of your way to do it if you can.

I have a feeling that our local critic finds so many things wrong in his outings that to complain to all the owners would make him sound like a whiny little kvetch, and he knows it, so he writes about it instead. I don’t think he realizes that it makes him look like a snob.

Someone needs to don the apron and get his hands dirty again.

yellowcat
Sep 01, 2010 @ 01:40:45