I’m generally easygoing when it comes to service. I like it humane, competent, and gracious. At a big-ticket joint, I’d also like it a little bit formal.
But the past two weeks have been astonishingly bumpy, service-wise, for me. Five of my top pet peeves were illlustrated, vividly and disappointingly, in Denver restaurants.
Pet Peeve No. 1: The sympathy-grab. “Bear with me,” said the waiter at a French restaurant in north Denver recently as he handed over the menus. “I’ve had a crazy night. Restaurant week, you know.”
Indeed, it may have been a rough night for him. But, at the risk of sounding insensitive, what did that matter to me?
His busy night was not my problem. Cold, but true. (And having spent more years than I’ll admit waiting tables, I’ve earned the right to say so.)
What I wanted to say is, “If, at the top of the meal you’re already warning me that my experience here will likely be compromised because you’re in a mood, then, well, what sort of discount are you offering me to stay here?”
Pet Peeve No. 2: The lie. “This plate is really, really hot,” said another waiter at a downtown lunch spot, handing over the dish of risotto. “Be extremely careful.”
“Thanks,” I answered, touching my finger to the freezing cold plate. “I’ll try.”
Pet Peeve No. 3: The health risk. “Your venison,” said the waitress at the South Pearl Street restaurant waving a dish at me. “Here.”
She was holding the dish with a kitchen towel as she handed it across the table to me, which I found curious until I grasped the bowl and realized it was searing hot.
“Ouch,” I said, trying desperately not to dump the dish into my friend’s lap.
Pet Peeve No. 4: The buck-pass. “The kitchen already fired your short-rib entree,” said the waiter at an East Colfax eatery as he set appetizers in front of our party. “So, do you mind if I just put it down?”
I looked at him quizzically, then chose the path of least resistance. “Fine,” I said, when really I should have just kept up the quizzical expression until he went away.
Whether the early arrival was the kitchen’s fault or his own didn’t matter. I didn’t want to know anything about it, I just wanted my dinner to be delivered in the correct order.
Pet Peeve No. 5: The scolding. “You’re a little mixed up,” said the waiter to my oenophile friend when she ordered red wine to go with her Dover sole entree at that same north Denver French restaurant.
“I’m not as dumb as I look,” she muttered back, quiet enough so that he wouldn’t hear. She’d already commented that she quite liked the wine. And, outside the lines or not, she knows what she likes, and she expects it to be delivered graciously, not with an admonishment.
The tenets of good service are no mystery, but the blame for service foibles rests only partly on the shoulders of the servers themselves. Managers, do us all a favor: Have a meeting, today, with your staffers to remind them what good service is. We’re more likely to spend our money in your restaurants if you do.
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