To Ask For An Omelette?!

[MagicalMrsMistoffelees]

Cafe Rouge has a range of menus covering different times. We visited for lunch today at around 12.30pm and I asked for an omelette and fries. It's not on the main menu but is on other menus. I've been to CR twice before and made this request and both times they were fine about it.

Today the waitress said a straight no. She said the breakfast menu was no longer being served (fair enough) and the whisk had been washed up. She was friendly but certain that we could only order off the main menu. I mentioned that I'd been to CR before and it hadn't been a problem but she said they wouldn't have the eggs prepared and it wasn't happening. I shrugged it off, ordered something else and thought no more. But 10 minutes later she came back and said actually I could have an omelette after all, it was no problem. I'd gone off the idea by then. But it got me thinking.

Was it unreasonable to ask for an omelette?! I thought, based on my previous visits both to CR and other restaurants that requests were usually no problem. But this got me thinking. Perhaps it's not as straightforward as it seems?! A couple of eggs whisked in a bowl and heated in a frying pan seems fairly basic but maybe not. (Especially if the whisk has already been washed up. ) Can anyone who's worked in a restaurant enlighten me please?

[oldlaundbooth]

I can hear the whisk right now:

'I want to come back out! Let me be used for an omelet! I'm here!! HERE!'

[CandOdad]

Much easier for them to buy ready frozen omelettes, defrost and then add filling.

[SeaRabbit]

Barbara I can remember seeing frozen omelette mix on sale in Morrisons in Leeds circa 1984. For the reasons you gave it didn't take off but someone obviously thought it was worth trying.

[SparklyPenguin]

Supply chain Barbara . This method makes perfect sense if a centralised factory-kitchen overseen by a decent chef is making several thousand of the same item at the same quality (eg. omelettes) at a time, to go to multiple sites where lower-skilled staff with limited kitchen facilities can simply reheat them. It's cheaper for the company over all. And of course you can quickly knock up a nice omelette for yourself, most people can, but you're not also simultaneously catering to 75 other people having different dishes.

[honeyroar]

That's the trouble when you go the extra mile and do something off menu for a customer, quite often you get it thrown back in your face rather sarcastically when you have to say no the next time. It's often possible but you should understand when they say no.

[BarbaraofSeville]

I'm just stunned that anyone thinks that it's worth going to the effort of pre-preparing an omelette, packaging it, freezing it, defrosting it and warming it up again.

I have an omelette for breakfast nearly every day and it takes about 5 minutes to make and eat.

[SaucyJack]

I tend to assume none of those places have an actual chef cooking in the kitchen, so I'd never bother asking for something that wasn't on the menu.

[CombineBananaFister]

Sounds daft Barbaraofseville but they might not just have been lazy in Morrisons by not selfsupplying muffins from the shop floor. Quite often cafes attatched to other big companies aren't always run by them and are contracted out so their stock can come from a completely different supplier. Even if it is run by the same company they can sometimes use different stock to the shop floor so it would knacker their stockfile - ridiculous, I know

[iwouldgoouttonight]

A microwaved frozen omelette sounds revolting.

I love an omelette though, as a veggie with coeliac disease it's often the only thing on a menu I can eat, and I've often asked for one even if it's not on the menu. There's a greasy spoon near us that does the best ever cheese omelette. I bet they have several whisks.

[SparklyPenguin]

Yanbu to ask, but they're nbu to decline. Maintaining speed of service is key in a high-street restaurant, this relies on selling approximately the anticipated quantities of the listed dishes (based on sales statistics) as this is what the kitchen team will have prepped for. A fully-staffed, well-equipped kitchen should usually have no trouble accommodating the occasional simple 'off-menu' request as you've experienced at CR before, but who knows, that day maybe they might have been a bit short, or already prepping for a big evening event, or have just simply had too many orders on at the time. The waitress was nbu as she would've been going off the manager/chef's pre service instruction (though the whisk thing's just weird!) then when she'd double-checked they'd obviously decided it was ok to accommodate the request on this occasion.

[TheFairyCaravan]

ImNotAMindReader the Menu Rapide is available Mon-Fri so the OP was outside the timeframe.

YANBU to ask but they're not unreasonable to refuse.

[originalmavis]

We stopped off at a cafe for lunch on a long trip - sadly it was the only place for miles so not a lot of choice.

I wanted the omlette as it was the only remotely veggie food on the menu but it was a 'ham omlette'. I asked if it could be just plain as I was vegetarian. So the waitress sent to ask the chef. 'No he can't make a plain omlette'.

After a while probing why, she told us that they bought frozen ready made omlettes and microwaved them. She offered to pick out the ham. Bleugh.

[TheDetective]

YANBU to ask. Not at all.

I often order off menu, particularly for my dairy/soya intolerant child.

I went to some tea rooms with him this week, and they were absolutely lovely at making him something up to suit. He ended up with crumpets and jam, cucumber and a little pot of beans. Random, but he doesn't mind that kind of thing! They had run out of alternatives (bagels, and the gluten free bread, which would make it soya free also). But nothing was too much trouble to organise for him.

I love a good omelette. Fancy one now. Damn it!

[Anniegetyourgun]

My omelette story: Years ago I went to Corfu with a couple of friends. One friend, a sorely tried veggie, tried to order a plain omelette and chips. The waiter simply could not get his head around the concept of an omelette with nothing in it, and the language barrier didn't help. "No chis? No cham? No prawn?" "No cheese, no ham, no prawns, just an omelette please." "Omelette, no chis, no cham, no prawn," repeated with bewilderment as he pottered off. Eventually her order turned up, a rather fat omelette in a bowl. Friend looked at it with deep suspicion. But where were the chips? Answer revealed on investigation with a fork: folded inside. The chef had managed to work out a way to prevent the universe imploding by filling the anomalous naked omelette with the chips. Ingenious. Friend with omelette was rather nonplussed, while other friend rolled about laughing helplessly.

[BarbaraofSeville]

This thread has reminded me of the time a few weeks ago when I wanted eggs benedict in morrisons cafe, which I couldn't have 'because they had run out of muffins'.

While I was sat there waiting for my inferior alternative, I looked at the adjacent supermarket which probably had a whole shelf full of muffins and thought why didn't they offer me them and I wish I had thought to ask for them to get muffins out of the shop.

[tibbawyrots]

I'm out of eggs and really fancy an omelette now...

[BarbaraofSeville]

Crazy. Omelettes have to be one of the quickest, lowest effort things to make. If they can't manage that, I don't know how they manage anything more complicated.

[TendonQueen]

Sw the thread title and thought of Gavin and Stacey . I bet Gwen would never tell anyone 'no, the whisk's been washed up now. ' I do understand that a place can't necessarily always do stuff that's off menu, but it would be better just to say that, than to come up with bizarre-sounding excuses.

All this notwithstanding, I do now want to call in at CR some lunchtime soon for a mushroom omelette. I love them.

[Gwenhwyfar]

"If omelette isn't on the menu, why on earth would you ask for it? The menu's there for a reason; you can't ask for whatever you fancy. YABU."

Any proper restaurant can make something simple like an omelette or a cheese sandwich on request. It doesn't need to be on the menu.

[PegsPigs]

I asked for a bacon sandwich once in a £150 a night hotel. They had bacon and bread/toast but no she wouldn't serve me one. I confess I wasn't much up for eggs benedict or some of the other fancy breakfast offerings. I was very pissed off though.

YANBU to ask and actually fair play to her for coming back and admitting she was wrong.

[VoldysGoneMouldy]

YWBU to ask for something that wasn't on the menu, and the "it's never been a problem before" style comment probably made her uncomfortable, which is why she came out with a silly response.

That said, "the whisk has been washed up" is possibly my favourite quote from anyone in a restaurant ever

[TiredButFineODFOJ]

I had a nice imlette in CR when I didn't fancy any other veggie choices. I find most places happy enought to chuck together an omlette if you don't fancy the (butternot squash pasta) veggie option.
I do suspect that powdered egg/liquid egg/frozen omlette hadn't been "prepped" or waitress had been bawled at by the cook for asking for a special order in the past

[Viviennemary]

I think it's fair enough to ask for something that isn't on the menu. But if you are refused it's not reasonable to say oh but last time it was OK. But generally I think it is a bit cheeky to ask for things that aren't on the menu. I've only done it once or twice.

[lorelei9]

Stinker - you mean some catering company is delivering pre done croque monsieur to cafes all over town - they just stick under a grill?

wow. I really thought it would be more cost effective to just, er, make them onsite.