Bad dining experience?
So I went out for dinner tonight, picked a Portuguese place in the Ironbound district of Newark that seemed to have a lot of good reviews and an interesting menu.
The service was fine, but when the entrees came around I was extremely disappointed. I had ordered a paella and it came swimming in a puddle of unabsorbed broth. It tasted like someone had dumped a couple of packets of Lipton soup mix on top of supermarket boxed rice then tossed in some frozen bagged veggies and chicken hacked into hideous hunks. There were a couple of anemic looking shrimp of the ilk you might get in bad Chinese take out.
They topped the whole thing off with a mangled piece of beet, some shredded red cabbage and a half a radish.
Very strange and the whole dish just smacked of cheap corner cutting in the kitchen.
My mom seemed to enjoy her bacalao all right.
I hate to waste food so I had half of it packed up to go (don't ask me what will happen to it, I'm hoping someone else will eat it), but the smell of it in the car bugged me. It smelled like airplane food.
The dinner wasn't cheap and the bad food kinda ruined my night.
I'm a little distressed about the fact that I've gotten so picky that I'd let some subpar food get to me so badly.
The waitstaff seemed a little worried that I barely touched my food but I couldn't find it in myself to tell them that I thought the dish was absolutely wretched. The check came with a little comment card and I didn't fill it out. Everyone else seemed to be enjoying their food just fine.
What do you guys do when you get bad food? Bad service is one thing, but what if the food is just not to your taste? Do you say something or do you hold your tongue?
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11 Comments:
I can totally empathise - nothing ruins my mood easier than a poor meal when you're expecting something much better. How I respond depends on my mood and on the circumstances. If the waiter seems to be genuinely interested in what was wrong, I tell him/her, albeit in a diplomatic way. On other occasions I know that there really is no point in complaining.
kasiaw99 at 12:25AM on 11/06/09
If something is cooked wrong, I generally say something. Like if rice was undercooked and hard or the meat was the wrong temp.
If it's a dish that's just not to my taste, then it's not their fault, so I might or might not say anything. If the server asks, I might say that I don't care for it, and maybe give a reason, like it's too spicy for my taste, or whatever.
In the case of the soupy paella. I might ask if it was intended to be that way. Maybe it's their spin on paella, or maybe the cook got it wrong. If it's not their style, then they need to know that it's wrong so they can fix it or not serve any more that night.
dbcurrie at 12:37AM on 11/06/09
There's lots of ways to look at this situation. My favorite quote is 'every Chef has a bad night'!.
So many will say "send it back", "you paid for the product it should exceed your expectations", "they can't improve unless they know something's a problem...." etc. etc. yada yada yada.
And they are correct.
Others will say be sympathetic, patient, give them another try etc. etc. etc. and they too are correct.
I have had wonderful meals in places I swore I'd never go back and lousy meals in very top notch rated multiple star restaurants.
There is no right and wrong way to resolve your evening. It depends so much on a lot of variables. My personal approach is too just not go back for a few months. Watch the online restaurant blogs and reviews, see if it's a common problem amongst others who've eaten there. If it is, there's little chance they will survive as a business entity. If it was just a bad night and reviews are good, I'd give them another try.
It's only my two cents - have a great day.
Ribster at 5:22AM on 11/06/09
I'm a little distressed about the fact that I've gotten so picky that I'd let some subpar food get to me so badly.
So let me get this straight. You consumed a meal so bad you were able to write paragraphs about the depths of its quality - and you think you're the problem? What you describe is not being "picky." It's appreciating quality. Being picky means you'd never truly enjoy a good all-beef hot dog with so much garlic in it that you're followed by fumes after eating it. You could never swoon over a fantastic hamburger with great cheese on a perfect bun. THAT's being picky.
Your dinner sucked. You should have a) indicated this to the waitstaff; and b) filled out the comment card. Further to this, I would probably seek a chargeback from my credit card.
Do NOT settle for shitty food, then blame yourself for feeling it's shitty.
therealchiffonade at 7:39AM on 11/06/09
ooooooh ooooooh! @chiff said a swear! lol--I kid, of course.
I agree with her comments completely. I think it all has to do with the wa we approach making complaint. Making complaint does not require one to be full of piss and vinegar, angry and threatening--those of us who have done that know that once that adrenalin gets pumped up, there's always a swift let down after and we feel, well...shitty.
On the other hand, if you view complaint as a real desire for communication, rather than letting your ire be known (not that I assume you were), often times the whole experience becomes much more positive. Chiff's right, we should never apologize for 1) having an opinion or 2) voicing it.
That being said...I know it's often daunting--I for one have this problem more when I'm sitting in the hair stylist's chair than in a restaurant.
BananaMonkey at 9:40AM on 11/06/09
I really hate conflict and confrontation so I rarely complain or send my food back, but I would at least have filled out the comment card. The restaurant deserves to know your opinion so they can avoid losing business.
emgroff at 11:22AM on 11/06/09
I think what I fear is coming off as a food snob. I like good food, but I don't want to scoff at low brow stuff either.
There were families all around us that seemed like regulars and were really going at their meals with a gusto.
The waiters were so earnest I felt bad about what I was really thinking.
fuuchan at 12:08PM on 11/06/09
Any place can make a mistake or send out a wrong dish. It happens. And sometimes you just don't like the way a place makes a particular dish. To me, the way a place handles a complaint can be more important than that the mistake was made in the first place.
For example, at one restaurant that we otherwise enjoyed, a waiter argued with me when I said he brought the wrong dish. "See, I wrote it down here. This is what you ordered." First, it was an illegible scribble, second, what he wrote doesn't mean it was what I said, and third, I'd been thinking all day about the other dish that I really wanted, so I was darned sure what I ordered. But he disagreed, and that was the end of that.
At another place with the same situation, the waitress apologized, packed up the wrong dish to go (there was nothing wrong with it, but it just wasn't what I wanted at the time) and put in a rush order for the new dish. The owner came over and apologized and comped our drinks. The server who brought the new dish also apologized. I left there perfectly happy, and with free lunch for the next day.
dbcurrie at 12:48PM on 11/06/09
I think I know where you're coming from fuuchan. I don't think you're "picky", but knowing good food, you expect it to taste a certain way when you're out dining. I think sometimes the restaurant just isn't capable of putting up a dish as we expect it and I'm not sure commenting to the wait staff about it would help. It's like when you ask someone to recommend a great restaurant and they advise a certain place, saying it's fabulous. You go there and realize it just isn't. Some people just don't have high food standards. Of course that sounds snobby, but as I consider myself a fairly decent cook and savvy diner, I guess that's just the way it is.
kalajo at 2:57PM on 11/06/09
LOL@ Banana Monkey! I know my comment might have sounded like one made by a person who would complain like a small nuclear device but I don't do that anymore. (Did in my younger years...)
A well-worded complaint includes a) the reason a person was unsatisfied; b) a personal opinion (nicely!) and c) what could have been done to make it right. You'd be surprised how many places actually pay attention to customers' concerns that elaborate enough to make sense to the person reading the complaint. Simply saying, "The food sucked," isn't quite enough and will likely be disregarded.
therealchiffonade at 6:41AM on 11/07/09
To pick up on dbcurrie's point - as customers, we get coached on how to make a valid, intelligent complaint but I think restaurants (and all businesses for that matter) should know how to field a complaint.
If a patron complains, 9 out of 9.5 times, the restaurant did something the patron is NOT imagining to warrant this complaint. Do NOT defend. This is a lame attempt to deflect blame and it never works. Accept that the customer is not happy, take away the offending item, and make it right.
I went to an awful wedding last year. The venue was beautiful but everything went downhill fast. The "catered" food was a small, miserable array of exactly 4 items. It seemed more like a prison feeding line than a wedding buffet. But insult was about to be added to injury.
A fellow guest and good friend found a long hair in his food. His wife, having worked in restaurants, approached the manager about it. The manager came to the table and said this: "All my servers have short hair so it must have been cooked into the food back at the catering kitchen." WTF???? You don't defend your servers by throwing the catering company under the bus - it does nothing to rectify the situation. Here's what he should have said: "I'm sorry about that sir, may I assemble another plate for you from fresh trays of food?" One sentence. The manager would have a) accepted the blame, b) given the guest a workable option and c) rectified the situation. Not rocket science.
therealchiffonade at 7:11AM on 11/07/09