My parents liked taking my fiancé and me out to a local chain restaurant that prides itself on authentic Italian food. We went to this place about twice a month and usually had great service and heavenly food. One time, however, the waiter was so rude and prissy that it made me consider switching to a different place for our get togethers.
On this day we were in the middle of a heat wave. The temperature that day was in the high 90′s, close to 100 degrees. We went to eat with hopes of having a light lunch and finishing with some ice cream. When we got seated, we were directly below a vent for the air conditioning. Considering the temperature outside was so high and the kitchen was full of boiling pots and pizza ovens, they needed to have the air conditioner set to Arctic Blast just to make it comfortably cool inside the restaurant.
I was on the receiving end of the freezing air, which was blowing directly down my shirt! My teeth literally started to chatter. When our server came to the table, I planned to ask for us to be moved to a table that wasn’t directly in the path of frigid air. I began by saying “I’m a bit cold here…” and before I could even finish my sentence, he snarled “Well, didn’t you bring a coat!!!” His tone was so snide and snippy that my mouth fell open in shock. I mean he literally barked at me like I was a panhandler or something.
I replied “It’s a hundred degrees outside…” while looking at him like he had 3 heads. Who in world walks around with a coat in the middle of a heat wave???
Tagged as:
server
Our recent experience at this Jamaican themed restaurant in North Pinellas County Florida right off the Pinellas Trail was like a scene out of Abbott and Costello’s classic clip – “who’s on first” …but with waitstaff instead. We had visited a new beer bar next door, and decided to catch a bite to eat at this place. It was over a year since we ate there last because at that time we had also received somewhat bad service. But we decided to give it another try. Well, bad choice on our part.
Yes, the place was busy outside, but inside there were plenty of tables and that is where we decided to sit. After three different waitstaff said they would “be right with you” finally a fourth actually stopped and took our drink and appetizer order. We specifically said we would order dinner right after our appetizers came out (this is something we always do to avoid our main meal coming on top of the appy’s). Note: another couple sat down at table next to us about this time, more on that in a minute. Another server brought our appetizers. We finished these up, and sat there for about 40 minutes watching servers go by us, no one stopping to take our dinner order or clean our plates. Remember the other couple? They sat there ignored and visibly annoyed, and got up and left.
At about the 45 minute mark, we contemplated getting up and just leaving, as we would be sure no one would notice at all. But being good citizens, we didn’t. I got up and went to the bar, stood there for a while until I caught someone’s attention and demanded our bill. I was asked who our server was… and that gave me the opportunity to tell them not only did I not know… but that we were pretty much ignored. One server had the nerve to go over to our table and tell my husband “oh if I would have known I would have waited on you.”
We paid our bill, left no tip of course. No one was very apologetic for ignoring us. Basically this was a case of complete discombobulation in the dining room, and no one knowing who was covering what…”who’s on first.” LOL. Another note, we went to another place after, and when telling our story, heard that this is a common complaint at the first place. Maybe they thought we were tourists and didn’t care… but we are locals, and of course will tell everyone who asks how horrible the service is here. Lesson learned.
Tagged as:
server,
tipping
A few years ago, I took a friend to a well-known Hunan-style Chinese restaurant in San Francisco. The restaurant is very small, with only a dozen or so tables and a counter where you can also eat. Behind the counter is the “kitchen” where the cooks wok up the orders. Hunan food is very hot and spicy, but the problem with this particular restaurant, I’d explained to my friend, was that the cooks could see you. If you were not of Asian ancestry, they would figure that you couldn’t take the heat, and would make it mild. I’d told my friend that in order to get the food as hot as it was supposed to be, you really had to insist that you liked it that way.
So we sat at the counter and ordered. I told the waiter that we truly did enjoy it hot and spicy, so go ahead and make it that way. When the first dish arrived I tasted it, and it was far too mild. So I called the waiter back over and told him that this dish was not spicy enough and to please make the rest of them much more spicy. He walked a few feet down the counter to where he was opposite the cook, a grandmotherly looking woman who was cooking our next dish in a big wok. He said something to her in Chinese, which caused her to put down the spoon she was cooking with. She looked down the bar at us, regarding us for a moment, and then got this faintly evil smile. She then reached underneath the stove and pulled out a big jar of red “stuff.” She scooped out a big scoop of this red stuff, and flung it into the wok, all the while looking at us with this evil smile.
Now, I really do like hot and spicy food – much more so than the average person. But when this food arrived, it was absolutely inedible. Within a couple of bites, my entire mouth, throat and the rest of my upper digestive tract was on fire! My friend and I each drank a six pack of beer choking down that food, while the waiter and the cook laughed at us. But there was no way, having insisted, that we were going to wuss out – so we ate the whole thing.
We then thanked the cook for making it “just the way we like it,” and she just laughed. Needless to say, we paid for it the next day too.
Tagged as:
chef,
food & beverage issues,
server
I was dining at a restaurant on Cape Cod. One of the items on the menu was a 10 oz steak. There was a couple at the next table, and when their dinner was brought to the table, the man complained to the waiter that his steak was too small. The waiter assured the man that the steak was indeed a 10 oz steak, and the man insisted that it wasn’t. After a few rounds of this argument, the waiter went to get the manager. The manager explained to the man that 10 oz was the uncooked weight of the steak. But the man insisted that his steak was too small to even have been 10 oz before cooking. The discussion got a little bit heated, to where both parties were talking loud enough for the whole restaurant to hear.
At this point, the manager turned heel and stalked back into the kitchen. A few minutes later, he returned carrying a box and a food scale. He put the box and the scale down on their table, and proceeded to pull raw steaks out of the box. One after another. Each time, he took a steak out of the box, he threw it on the scale, pointed, and yelled: “10 ounces!”. He then would throw that steak on the table, get another one out of the box, throw it on the scale, and again, exclaim: “10 ounces!”. After the 10 steaks had been so weighed the diner told the manager that he’d had enough of his bad behavior and the couple left. The manager shouted after them that they had not paid their bill, and the man shouted back something that I can’t repeat on a family site. It did add some significant entertainment to our meal, but I decided against having the steak.
Tagged as:
food & beverage issues,
owner/manager,
pay refusal/discount demand,
server
