To not want him to complain in restaurants?

I think if he finds fault in every meal when you eat out then maybe eating out isn’t for him.

Once went to a restaurant and asked for the Aubergine Parmigiana

I got at best Zucchini Parmigiana

Waiter tried to tell me that the green courgettes, were aubergines.

Waiter went in the kitchens and chef came out to argue with me. Chef said that courgettes were just baby aubergines.
Trying to tell him that they were baby marrows if he was going to go down that route wasn’t going to work.
I think we ended up leaving because I didn’t want the chef to adulterate my food if I did order anything else.

I have been served a ham salad as a vegetarian because apparently being a vegetarian means you just don’t eat beef and that was at a 5star very posh place.

I grew up in this industry and have worked in it as a student.

I have seen staff piss on food and drinks, wipe their arse with it, put bogies in it, spit in it, and in one memorable case, wank into it.

Suffice to say, if I ever have to complain about food (rarely) I then refrain from eating or drinking anything else.

Yes, this is what I was referring to when I said it may come back 'modified'. I have heard about this kind of thing from other people many times over the years, so I'm sure it happens a lot.

In the case of your friend, it does sound like karma. I wouldn't have such a person as a friend, though. I find I can learn a lot about a person's character by the way they treat people working in service jobs such as wait staff.

I’m sure the food at his Michelin-star restaurant is waaaaay more on point.

He sounds insufferable.

Unless the diner is a Michelin star inspector or a food critic (and sometimes not even then), the chef in a very posh restaurant doesn't want your opinion or 'useful response' or 'shit sandwich' about the food.

Their opinion very much is that this is the way they intended the food to be and if you don't like it, well you know not to order it/come here, again.

If you liked it, you ate it all.

If you didn't eat it all then you probably didn't like it (they might come out and ask you what was wrong, they may actually want to know or they may want to see what heathen pigdog doesn't like their food so they can blacklist you, hunt you down... I've been to too many french restaurants with psychotic chefs)..or you were full.

If there had been a serious issue, you'd have said so fairly early on.

This isn't like a friend or partner honestly asking 'oh I had a crack at X dish, what did you think?' where the 'well the carrots were great, but the beef under seasoned, loved the parsnips' is useful and wanted.

So someone making 'constructive comments' about the food in a high end restaurant, particularly where this makes other diners in their party feel uncomfortable, is not behaving reasonably. They're being a twat, showing off, deluded in the misconception their opinion carries any weight or will even make it back to the chef (unless as a joke 'haha, the troglodyte on table 3 thinks the beef was a shade over and the consomme could have been clearer, he'd like to show you how he does it when he cooks it for his Mother In Law... NO CLAUDE PUT THE BONING KNIFE DOWN we only just got the blood out of the carpet from last time...')

This thread is amusing. All the pearl-clutching and ‘ooh don’t make a scene or your food will get spat in’ as a response to the idea of honest feedback is so British. I’m British myself and not the world’s most assertive person, but even I can manage an honest yet polite (and hopefully useful) response to restaurant staff when asked my opinion on the food.

of course you tell people you know how you are - if you want to. But not waiters/bank tellers/shopkeepers etc who are saying it as a sort of Hello. Well you could but I doubt they want to hear that you're a bit stressed by work and worried about your teenager's school report.

Interesting… I didn’t realise that lol.

When strangers ask me how I am I say I’m fine but when people I know ask me I usually tell them the truth, should I not? 🤔 They don’t really care and all think I’m weird?

I am not from the UK btw, is this a British thing or an international thing?

It is just a polite thing to say as you hand the bill to the customer. If there was something wrong with your meal they expect you to tell them once you realise it so they can sort it out for you.

When the waiter says "How are you this evening?" when he seats you, do you think he really wants to know exactly how you are?

What’s the point of them asking you how’s the food if they just want you to say fine? Don’t they want to know what you think?

She also gets her food spat in. Trust me on that. I have a friend who is an INCREDIBLE snob, rude to wait staff etc. posh boy with no manners for anyone hhe sees as beneath him.

As someone who worked in restaurants and kitchens for years I have warned him about the fact his steak might .dropped' on the floor etc. he doesn't believe, but when you put up with this sht@t for years from people behaving like this - it's happens... a lot...

Because if it really isn’t, you send it back. If one’s eaten a meal, I don’t believe it’s correct to then begin to criticise it if it wasn’t to one’s taste. I think it’s bad form. But we don’t have to agree …

I'm dying to know what "direct" culture your DH is from where it's acceptable to be a gourmet-bore-twat in a restaurant!

Why is it obligatory to say a meal is lovely if it's not?

I think there is an obligatory ‘lovely’ response unless it’s bad enough to send back. I would be cringing too. I’ve eaten in an awful lot of restaurants - Michelin and otherwise - in my pretty long life & I’ve had many thoughts on what I’ve been served. I share them with my dining companion … but no chef wants a diners negative critique of their offering. Taste is subjective. I’d refuse to dine with my DH if he continually did this …

If he sends food back and is rude about it, it may come back 'modified'.

Ask him to do the positive feedback sandwich, the carrots were fabulous but I wasn't keen on the cabbage that way, I really loved the berries on that desert though.

It just comes across better

OMG at the carpenter thinking he could be a spinal surgeon!

As the T shirt says "May you have the confidence of a mediocre white man"

Eating out isn't just about the food.

I would find that super embarrassing.

personally id just leave him too it, as the chances are its unlikely the server will relay to the chef and even then your Dh could be correct about the food etc @FirecrackerK

Is it a way of him signalling to the server that he REALLY knows what he's talking about? Is it important to him to demonstrate his foodie-ness?

He's criticising Michelin starred restaurants 😂

I'd have to say something - he's making himself (and you in the process) look ridiculous.

I'd genuinely be embarrassed.

My ex-husband is a covert narcissist, he is a carpenter/joiner.

Whilst speaking to my spinal surgeon about how he was going to do the operation, my ex genuinely said 'oh so the same as putting plasterboard fixings in, similar to what I do' - I was absolutely mortified AND he genuinely believed he could perform major spinal surgery 🤣.

Some people are deluded.

Tell your husband, once he's earnt his own Michelin star THEN he can critique.