Restaurant pet peeves.

[TheLollipopShoes]

What are your pet peeves in restaurants?P.S I know what a difficult job working in a restaurant is and how hard it is to run one is but I still want to have a moan.

Over sauced pasta for me. I like a light coating only. I know that most people prefer more sauce than I do which is fine but I don't expect to have to call in Tony Robinson and co to excavate my fusilli.

Food served on wooden boards. They've ruined more than one pizza/sandwich for me. The boards usually aren't aired correctly or cleaned with an old cloth and it leaves a damp smell/taste on my pizza,

Ingredients that aren't mentioned on the menu. I know that they can't list every single item but I hate it when there's an ingredient that I hate that's a major component of the dish but isn't listed in the description so I spend more time trying to avoid olives or raw tomatoes than I do eating.

Check backs - dd and I have started complaining directly to management about these because we know it's not the waiting staff that decide this crap and even if they give feedback to the management, the management don't always believe them. This way we can tell the management that the wait staff didn't do anything wrong or rudely but that check backs in themselves are bloody annoying and largely unnecessary, that we'd rather they were used sparingly if at all and that we'd prefer that if we had a problem we could signal and ask the waiting staff to rectify. We've also on occasion pointed out times where the waiting staff were unable or struggled to rectify due to lack of training/poor communication between waiting staff and kitchen staff. I've worked in hotels and restaurants from waiting to management level and I think it's given me a feel for these things but also some things are just obviously the kitchen staff not paying attention to the waiting staff eg when we've asked for certain
Ingredients to be left out or a side order has been forgotten.

"Service included" no thanks

1 I'll decide what tip to leave and if I leave one

2 it never reaches the staff

3 I'm against tipping as a whole as it keeps wages down. Staff should be getting decent pay!

Not serving everyone at the same table at the same time is very poor.

"Not remembering who ordered what when there are just TWO people at the table" sorry but that smacks to me of someone who's never done the job. Yea there's only 2 at YOUR table but your waiter/waitress is not just serving your table. How large is the place you're eating? How many other customers TOTAL are they dealing with?

"Wait staff not writing things down." That does annoy me and when I was doing the training I used to press this issue. Nobody's memory is infallible, but that goes for the customer too and it's a back up for if you get an awkward one who swears blind they didn't order the whatever - believe me it happens! Customers can be arseholes too. I remember one time I witnessed as a customer when even though it was written down the customer was trying to claim not only they'd never ordered it but that they were allergic - problem was a customer at the next table overhearing the kerfuffle happened to have been recording their child blowing out candles on birthday cake at same time as this order was being taken and the awkward customer could very clearly be heard ordering the thing they claimed to be allergic to! And hadn't ordered! Even the customers companion (I think sister) had a wry grin at that one.

"Waitresses with long hair not tied back." And waiters. That one bugs me too. Places I worked hair was meant to be tidily out the way, nails short and clean (probably ageing myself with that one) I still think long hair needs to be tied back I do not want hair in my food thanks!

"Splashes of unknown brown liquid on the walls and the radiators next to the seats and layers of dust on the skirting board. Chips and peas on the floor under the tables.
Waiters with BO." Sorry but where the fuck are you eating?! Even my local "greasy spoon" isn't that bad! I wouldn't eat anywhere that was!

Calling customers "guys" - again maybe I'm showing my age but this annoys me too, it may seem old fashioned but I'd rather customers were addressed as sir/madam, perhaps addressed when seated something like "good evening/afternoon welcome to ... Here's our menu, would you like to order drinks now or once you've decided upon your dishes?" I'm not keen on "I'm Debbie I'll be your waitress this evening" either, it's overfamiliar.

Understaffed restaurants - agree. Not fair on customers or staff, pure greed.

I've walked out of several places for being kept waiting too long before even getting order taken but other customers who arrived AFTER us have been seen. Totally unacceptable - and I don't just leave I tell the management WHY I'm leaving.

"Also waiters not knowing the soup of the day or what the fish special is." When I was waiting and training it was good practice to have such information at the back of your notepad. Even with electronic notepads there must be a way of holding this info to hand.

Oh god yes... 'slaw. It is not 'slaw. It is coleslaw. Do we have to take on all these stupid words?

Ditto... 'sliders'.
WTAF?

I think they are small burgers. Another stupid word

When they ask ‘was everything ok?’ My husband has started saying something like ‘ok? Surely you serve better than OK food? ‘ Or ‘yes it was just OK so we probably won’t be back’

Also parents who let their kids play on phones and tablet without muting the volume.

When they ask ‘was everything ok?’ My husband has started saying something like ‘ok? Surely you serve better than OK food?

This sounds like he's being deliberately annoying to wrongfoot them.

Constant inecessary topping up of water - I just ask them not to. One restaurant had around 20 various ‘visits’ to table by wait staff (and different people as it was one of those places where roles were very delineated). I ended up leaving table asking to speak to manager to stop it. Completely impossible to chat or eat !!

After having a waiter badger us all night if we need anything, more drinks, taking order etc but then spending forever to get someone's attention to get the bill

Not having child size cutlery

I think they keep asking if everything is OK so that if you go on Trip Advisor and complain, they can say you were asked if all was OK more than once and you said yes it was.

I've been asked as I was paying the bill to leave a good TA review. I think that's a bit much!

As it happens I do occasionally leave good reviews but I'll do it without asking thank you.

Tables which have been wiped down and left wet just before you sit down. Even worse if the wait staff wipe it just after you have sat down.

I HATE when they don't write down the order, it's on my mind until everything has come as I'm expecting something to be wrong and there usually is especially when there are a lot of people together or changes to a dish (no tomato/chips instead of rice/no sauce)

Ordering seafood and not getting lemons on the side with it. Or when they actually do it's the tiniest piece

Anything on the menu listed as ‘homemade’, I don’t want home made, I don’t know what the chefs kitchen is like, I don’t know how long it took them to transport it to the restaurant, I assume they mean hand made or made in house but that’s not what they said.

Also the not writing the order down. Although I get sadistic pleasure out of it when we go out as a group of 13, with 10 different sets of allergies. Cocky bendy down chatty waiter must have made a hundred trips back and forth. I have done the jobs lots so cut wait staff a hell of a lot of slack but we couldn’t be seated till all our party arrived, in an empty restaurant the only 2 not arrived was a 2 y/o and his dad who were in the garden looking at the Christmas tree. Then the waiter tried to sit us in couples, but made some assumptions that were wildly wrong and offensive. We weren’t even trying to be mean. We just have a weird group of food allergies.

When I order a black Americano (shouldn't have to specify black - an Americano is black by definition), being asked 'Would you like milk with that?'

Unfortunately due to other members of the public not understanding what an americano is and being arsey and demanding to know where their milk was I would always offer milk with one and I’d say around half the customers would want milk so it’s not necessarily the servers fault.

THIS 100%!! People don't ask for what they think they want half the time, and get annoyed when it's wrong, so I usually make sure! Someone asked me for a bacon sandwich on a white roll once, so is that a roll or a sandwich? They just don't think about what they are saying

Someone asked me for a bacon sandwich on a white roll once, so is that a roll or a sandwich

I can explain. In Yorkshire at least, if you go in a sandwich shop and ask for a bacon sandwich, it will come in a breadcake (aka what you call a roll ), so that's probably what they wanted.

I had a very surreal experience in Greggs in Birmingham once where I wanted a ham sandwich, ie ham in a breadcake/roll/whatever the fuck they call them there.

So I ask for my ham sandwich and they direct me to the fridge behind me, which was full of crappy sliced bread sandwiches, so I went back to the counter and said no, ham in a breadcake and pointed to the breadcakes I could see behind the counter, but it appears that in Birmingham Greggs, they would not sell me that sort of sandwich, they would only allow a sliced bread one.

This was despite me working in Leeds Greggs for several years while I was a student, where I made absolutely thousands of breadcake sandwiches and every single one I sold was to someone who asked for a ham/egg/tuna sandwich.

But what I want to know is, if you're in the land of calling a breadcake sandwich a roll, how do you differentiate a sausage roll of the bread kind from a sausage roll of the pastry kind?

"When they ask ‘was everything ok?’ My husband has started saying something like ‘ok? Surely you serve better than OK food? ‘ Or ‘yes it was just OK so we probably won’t be back’"

How embarrassing.

Not serving the whole party at the same time. Clearing plates before everyone has finished - such bad manners to make slower eaters feel uncomfortable.

But what I want to know is, if you're in the land of calling a breadcake sandwich a roll, how do you differentiate a sausage roll of the bread kind from a sausage roll of the pastry kind?

Sausage in a bread roll
Sausage bap
Sausage baguette

Unfortunately due to other members of the public not understanding what an americano is and being arsey and demanding to know where their milk was I would always offer milk with one and I’d say around half the customers would want milk so it’s not necessarily the servers fault.

But my actual order is for a "Black Americano", why then am I asked if I want milk with it?

If you order a burger with no bun, are you then asked "would you like a bun with that"?

I have got round the table check when your mouth is full issue, when asked I hold my hand up, finish chewing, swallow and then give my answer.

I think you've missed my point.
Asking if the food was OK is crap. It should be great, fantastic. Thoroughly enjoyable. Even just lovely.
Restaurants that serve 'ok' food don't deserve our business. JMI

No, your point was entirely clear. Your husband is either rude, painfully unfunny, or both. I'd be mortified if anyone I was dining with answered a perfectly civil question with something like that.

It's horribly passive aggressive, Born.

I do get that Americans is black all you ‘offended by being asked if you want milk’ types. What do you suggest I order if I just want white coffee? The only option is Americano but with some milk. Everything else is more milk than coffee and that’s not what I want.

Come to America where you can still order “coffee” and get a cup of filter coffee more or less instantaneously and very cheaply compared to slowly hand crafted barista coffee that you have to wait for.

@borntobeamum, do you suggest they should ask "Was everything great/fantastic? I feel quite sorry for the wait staff serving your husband.

And I'm pretty sure he'd be known by staff as 'that customer'. Does he feel superior in the knowledge that he's driving up standards, one sarcastic comment at a time?

With regards to being asked 'is everything ok?' and other questions mid-meal... I really like the Bubba Gump chain answer to this... they have flip signs on the table, one side says Stop, Forrest, stop and the other says Go Forrest, Go. If you need some attention from a member of staff, you flip your sign to say Stop, and the next staff persom to pass you will stop and see to you (in theory!)
So if you want to be left alone, you will be!

Equally at busy shopping centre being told its a 15min wait for a table when its got empty tables (Zizzi im looking at you)

As explained to the party behind me who’d already heard the greeting person explain on Wednesday lunchtime, there is not enough kitchen staff to cope if you haven’t booked, so there’ll be a 15 minute wait. Or maybe Zizzi just fucked up. I mean, it means willy in French, who names their restaurant after a penis?