Chicago's Cafe des Architectes and My Cardinal Rule of Restaurant Dining

I would like to share with you today my cardinal rule of restaurant dining: food in restaurants should not be difficult to eat. If it cannot easily be cut apart, chewed apart, portioned into reasonable-sized bites utilizing the cutlery at my disposal, picked up as a finger food and bitten into reasonable-sized portions without half of it landing on or around my plate, slid onto a fork, stabbed onto a fork, or in any other reasonable and passingly polite way transferred from YOUR plate to MY mouth, you should not be serving it in your restaurant. Fine dining is already intimidating enough for a lot of people - what's proper etiquette? which fork do I use first? what's the proper way of ordering? how can I not make an ass out of myself in front of this waiter who just greeted me in French and told me he would be my "emissary" to the restaurant for the evening? Really, all these rules of decorum - whether real or simply perceived by the insecure diner - can be daunting, but once you get past all that -- past ordering the wine (oh thank god there's a bin number and I don't have to try to pronounce it!!!), past ordering the entree ("What's 'ratatouille'???" "I don't know, I never saw the movie!"), and are finally at the point of being able to relax and enjoy yourself, your mono-lingual fumbling through the Fratalianish menu comfortably behind you, the last thing you expect to encounter is having to fumble with your food. But too often chefs get a little too stuck on visual presentation and fail to account for any practicality in the act of actually EATING it.

Take for example the "Pintxos" at Cafe des Architectes in Chicago. "Pintxos" is French for "tapas" which is Spanish for "small plates" which is American Bougie for "appetizers." Basically the pintxos menu is a small plates menu, served daily from 4 to 7 p.m. and only available at "Le Bar" (that's what it's called, srsly). The pintxos is a combination of toppings - think chorizo with crushed tomatoes, Manchego with black olives - served on crostini. At only $5 each, they're a wonderful and inexpensive way to sample a number of different items. I always prefer going this route since I like to be able to taste more for less, especially without having to lock into an expensive entree I may or may not even enjoy and will probably get sick of eating after just a few bites. I get bored with food easily. Unless it's cheese.

And yes, I also ordered the cheese plate while I was there.


I selected the asparagus + goat cheese and the beef tenderloin + roquefort pintxos. The presentation was lovely: two large crostini piled high with thinly-sliced asparagus/sliced tenderloin and crumbled goat/roquefort cheese, diced tomatoes, greens, held together (but not really) with a toothpick on a plate EXACTLY big enough to fit the two crostini. So cute! So clever!

How the fuck do I eat it?

At this point in your meal you are intractable ... you've already come this far, after all. You're not about to let it all come crashing down around some damn crostini. With steely determination you grab your fork and butter knife and begin sawing into this pretty dish. The crostini cannot - WILL NOT - be cut. It is toasted but still chewy; as you saw back and forth the only thing you succeed in doing is knocking all of the toppings off of it, which ultimately means they end up all AROUND the plate because the plate is *just* big enough to fit them in the first place. With dedication you decide to pick the crostini up and eat it as finger food - it's only a few bites, really; this seems perfectly appropriate. But alas, the toppings are piled too high and are too unstable--no sooner do you attempt one bite than half of the tiny artfully diced tomatoes end up on your plate, in your lap, on your chest, in your cupped hand and all over your fingers. Pretty much everywhere but your mouth, really. Then one of the large gobs of goat cheese plops onto your phone as you still have the crostini raised to your mouth with which you are trying to gently pull and shake the loose toppings in the greatest danger of going over thereby coaxing them down your gullet, then the crostini itself gives in and the whole bloody mess ends up in deconstructed piles on and around your plate, and despite this place having the word "architect" in the name you're pretty sure it wasn't meant as a Derrida reference.

You are undeterred. It is now a matter of principal.

Surely there MUST be some way of eating this. So now you determine that you must first eat the majority of the toppings off the crostini THEN eat the crostini with just a few sparse toppings on it as finger food because CLEARLY you cannot pick up the whole thing nor can you cut it into manageable pieces for ease of edibility. I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you. So you pick up your fork and resolutely begin eating the individual toppings. Until you get to the thinly-sliced asparagus. Which is too long to be slid onto the fork, and too thin and slippery to be stabbed onto the fork, and too ungainly to be picked up crostini-and-all and consumed as wholly without the fork.


You start to panic. The diced tomatoes are everywhere. It looks like a four-year-old child ate at your place setting. You've stained your shirt, soiled the table linens and the napkin on your lap which thank GOD you remembered to put there or else you'd have to buy a new pair of jeans for the remainder of your stay in Chicago, your food is all over your face and fingers and you STILL haven't figured out just how in the holy hell you're supposed to eat these things and you're humiliated because you KNOW the entire staff has seen your struggle and are probably laughing to themselves about it and you think to yourself, THIS is the fine dining experience??? You're convinced it's you; that you're doing something wrong and that everyone else is effortless and graceful in the way they delicately eat these dishes.

I am not a delicate person. Most often I'm a bear with a bullhorn in a china shop full of anthropophobics with sensitive hearing. I'm loud and messy and clumsy. I prefer paper plates over china, licking my fingers clean over wiping them on linens, and eating with my hands over using utensils pretty much always. (I'm not sure how I got this gig as a food writer either. Moving along.) If there is something to be spilled, stained, dropped, knocked off a plate, flung from a plate due to a utensil malfunction, etc., I will be the person who makes it happen. So I understand what's it's like; I do. You don't have to be ashamed anymore! Much as I loathe restaurants that try to sell me on the idea of preparing and cooking my own food at three times the cost of me just doing it at home and having to cut my own salad greens, I ***HATE*** not being able to actually EAT the food I order because it's just too damn difficult to maneuver.

It always makes me think of my days in retail, may I starve and die a thousand deaths before returning to that realm. We would receive new visual directives, like extensive window changes that required 10-ft ladders, fishing line, wooden planks, 5-ft decals, 8-ft foam boards, 2 boxes of straight pins, a roll of packing tape, industrial-strength double-sided tape, 14-ft banners, 27 mannequins each wearing 3 layers of clothing and heavily accessorized, beaded chandeliers and added track lighting we had to install ourselves (go ahead: ask me about my last trip to the emergency room that resulted in 11 stitches), and we would be allocated less than $40 in payroll (or approximately one manager and one part-time minimum-wage associate working two hours each) to implement the directive. And all these times I would wonder, has anyone on the corporate visual team ever actually TRIED to set this within the same set of restrictions in personnel, time, and professional skill sets as they expect us to be able to do? Much like I wondered that I also wonder if some of the chefs in these high-profile kitchens ever try to eat some of their more visually striking creations with a plain old fork and knife.

They tasted great, BTW. Not trying to diminish that. Once I was able to Cirque du Soleil them into my mouth, that is.


All of that being said - and it was quite a mouthful! AY-OOOO! - I feel bad that Cafe des Architectes has to take the brunt of my wrath regarding challenging cuisine. It's not just them. It's actually a very fine restaurant with a clever and inventive French-inspired menu and really wonderful staff (Lisa at "Le Bar" was absolutely lovely: very engaging, clearly able to read her customers well, gave a great wine recommendation - the whole staff seemed excellent in this regard). I came here to try their Chicago Restaurant Week lunch menu, which sounded rather exceptional in a sea of some 200+ rather average-sounding menus. But being the perennially tardy person that I am, I missed the lunch menu and wasn't as excited about the dinner option, so I opted for the pintxos and, naturally, the French cheese plate with Brie de Meaux, Langres, Crottin Maitre Seguin, mango chutney, an OUTSTANDING balsamic reduction, candied walnuts, and crusty breads. The glass of Pascal Jolivet Sancerre Sauvignon Blanc I had to pair was absolutely delightful, and at $19 for a glass I could have bought a whole bottle AND a king-sized candy bar at Costco! Yes, my biggest gripe about this place specifically was the outlandishly overpriced wine list (see: Ravenswood Zinfandel, $14; Cakebread Cellars Merlot, $19...per glass).


It being located inside the ultra-sleek Sofitel Hotel, the decor is done in an edgy, dramatic art deco palette of red, black and white with a lot of play on geometric shapes and patterns seemingly echoed in the presentation of the dishes. Despite my above griping (come on, I NEVERRRRRRR get to do that anymore!), I did enjoy this place and would certainly visit again. Having not been to all the gastro-this-and-thats in Chicago I can still pretty comfortably say that I don't think this place is doing anything so terribly different than the others, but it is nonetheless an enjoyable meal. Check out their Restaurant Week lunch menu below to see for yourself why this place made my short list.

Café des Architectes
French | Lunch, Dinner
20 E. Chestnut St. | Chicago IL 60611
City-N.Michigan | 312 324-4000
Enjoy Executive Chef Greg Biggers' cuisine rooted in French culture showcasing products from Midwestern farmers at Cafe des Architectes. The restaurant is located in the fashionable Gold Coast neighborhood and is a modern restaurant with dramatic appointments created by interior designer Pierre-Yves Rochon. Vibrant colors, overstuffed chairs, sprawling banquettes and lamps that employ upside-down toques as lamp shades grab your attention. The carefully crafted interior's design serves as the perfect landscape for the approachable cuisine crafted from ingredients procured from local farmers. "Top Ten Chicago Restaurant," Chicago Sun-Times, 2009. 3 stars, Chicago magazine, Chicago Tribune. Open Daily. B: 6am-11:30am; Br (Sat. and Sun. only): 11:30am-5pm; L: 11:30am-5pm; D: 5pm-11pm. Reservations accepted for lunch and dinner only.Valet

RESTAURANT WEEK
February 18-27, 2011
Lunch Menu
$22

APPETIZERS
(choice of one)
Celery Root Velouté
truffles / micro salad / fresh herbs
Artichoke Salad
oven dried tomato / carrot mousse / lemon confit
Rillettes of Salmon
chives / crème fraiche / baguette croûton

ENTRÉES
(choice of one)
Shrimp Terrine
avocado / piquillo peppers / lemon
Grilled Red Mullet
dill / cider vinegar sabayon / spinach purée
Stuffed Leg of Lamb
ratatouille niçoise / winter spices / cardamom jus

DESSERTS
Pistachio Cream
chocolate coulis / iranian pistachios / crisp
Pineapple Soup
coconut sorbet / brunoise of exotic fruits / vanilla
Chocolat Moelleux
cakey / creamy / crunchy

Detroit Restaurant Week Done Right: Etiquette

The whole concept of "fine dining" has changed quite a bit over the years. Even prior to the collapse of the housing market, mass mentality toward the implied elitism of fine dining (mmmmyesssss) was shifting. Really you could probably attribute it to the Clintonian days of neverending wealth and prosperity for all when people whose pockets were overstuffed with the spoils of 3-year zero-down ARMs had enough expendable income to dine at those same places that were previously perceived to be only the right of the wealthy. Gone are the days of the Patrick Bateman-era $2,000 lunches on Wallstreet.

You could also explore how media has affected this perception, with such hugely successful shows as Iron Chef, Top Chef, Hell's Kitchen, and the overwhelming popularity of the Food Network. Chefs are the country's new celebrities, thanks to a culture that has become much more curious and knowledgable about all forms of cuisine.

The end result of this cultural shift has meant that more people have had more access and less intimidation to experience fine dining, and so the dynamics shifted, the very definition changed. In the late '80s/early '90s, it was an abomination to walk into a four-star white-tablecloth restaurant in anything other than a 3-piece suit. Nowadays it is a rare thing that any kind of dress code is enforced, and you can just as easily show up in jeans.

There is a part of me that mourns the loss of traditional dining decorum, but sometimes nostalgic traditionalism simply must give way to embracing the new order. I love that I can be out with a group of friends and on a whim decide to get cocktails at the Rattlesnake or have dinner at Iridescence, regardless of how we're dressed. I also love that, in the aftermath of the economic downturn, most fine dining establishments chose to redefine themselves and make their prices more "accessible" in an effort to re-attract that same business from before...which means dinner at a place like Roast will cost me just about the same if not LESS than some of the "casual-upscale" chains like, say, Champps or Kona Grill or anything else on that strip of Big Beaver by Somerset. I love that the people who work in these places are all roughly around my age and all share my twisted sense of humor and most of all KNOW FOOD. I love that, especially here in Detroit, food has almost a cultish following, and people get really excited and passionate about it, blowing up Facebook every time some random decides to serve noodles out of her kitchen or someone hosts a dinner party in an abandoned building.

For this season of Detroit Restaurant Week I was asked to do a piece on fine dining etiquette. I liked the idea, but the more I thought about it the more I realized just how much has actually changed in that arena. With this newfound vibrant youthful energy that exists in the restaurant industry -- that customers now embrace -- the rules simply are not what they once were. So-called "table manners" such as how to properly position your napkin when you get up to use the restroom...no one really cares anymore. These are the rules for a new era.

Attire
Rarely you will find a private club or a particularly old-school restaurant in a very wealthy part of town where there is still a suit jacket requirement. But for the most part, and this includes all of the participating Detroit Restaurant Week restaurants, they'd rather you come as you are. My own personal barometer is that if I'm wearing something I would be embarrased to be seen in if I ran into an old acquaintance, then I shouldn't be wearing it to dinner. Everything else is fair game. Nice jeans, cute flats, a shirt that doesn't have a brewery name on it...minimal effort is required to look presentable, and that doesn't have to mean being uncomfortable.

Table Manners
No one cares if you pass to the right or left. No one cares how many pieces of meat you cut at one time. But there are still some basic rules of etiquette that should be exercised, and they apply to most social situations.

(1) Don't talk with your mouth full. It's gross. I'm sure whatever it is you have to say is of such immediate importance that you can't bear to make us wait, but really -- it's fine.

(2) All that silverware can be daunting. In Titanic Kathy Bates gave the advice to start at the outside and work your way in. That's pretty much how you do it. Things might get a little more complicated if you start dealing with caviar spoons and bone marrow scoops, but I'm thinking you probably won't encounter that problem when ordering from the DRW menus. Cocktail forks, oyster forks...when you order something that has its own specific utensil associated with it (oysters, mussels, crab legs, even steak and lamb) the proper instrument will be brought out to you along with that dish. So just use it.

Also, when you've finished a course, leave the silverware you used on the empty dish. More will come, promise. If you have to ask that's their bad, not yours.

(3) Elbows on the table are still a no-no, just like your parents told you. Feet anywhere else but on the floor are also frowned upon, and I say this as someone who'd rather be curled up like a cat at all times.

(4) Napkins go on your lap. I don't care if it's folded halvsies in a triangle, rectangle, or rhombus -- as long as it makes it to your lap, you're good.

(5) Sneezing and coughing should be done into a napkin and facing away from the table. I'm here to eat the food; not your germs.

(6) Do we need to go over tipping again?

(7) Don't ever shout at the server from several tables away. That's just uncouth. You are not a child.

(8) If you order drinks at the bar first before being seated at your table, it is proper to cash out at the bar and leave a tip with the bartender, even if they offer to transfer the tab to your table.

(9) Those valets really hustle and even if the service is complimentary, you should still give a few dollars' tip -- especially if you closed the restaurant down and they have your car pulled up already and are clearly waiting for you to leave so they too can go home.

(10) If your table is full of smokers and you decide to leave the table during a lull in the meal to step outside, it is polite to make your server aware of this.

(11) If you're unsure, ask. You might find it embarrassing to admit you don't know what something is, but it would be even more embarrassing to stumble your way through the pronunciation and order it only to find it completely unappetizing ("these sweetbreads aren't very sweet..."). No one's going to make fun of you; junior high is a long way behind us all.

(12) Ditto with the wine list. Not everyone's a conoisseur, but the sommelier sure is. Don't hesitate to ask him/her for a recommendation.

(13) If you're really blown away by your meal, send your compliments to the chef. It's always nice to hear when someone else thinks you've done a good job, and no one ever really hears that enough.

(14) This is my own personal behavior guide, but it's one I'm very strict about adhering to: when the server comes to your table, make eye contact. Listen to him as he speaks. Don't thumb through your menu disinterestedly as he rattles off the night's specials. Maintain eye contact, smile, and say please and thank you. ALWAYS say please and thank you. You can shuck every other rule here right out the plate-glass windows (except for tipping) as long as you ALWAYS say please and thank you. This level of politisse may seem excessive, but trust me--it can make your server's whole night. Busboy fills the water: thank you. Server asks to take your menus or remove your plates: yes please, followed by thank you. It's simple. It takes no additional effort on your part. It's mindless grade school etiquette. It's a very small thing, but it shows respect -- both that you are a respectful person and that you respect the hard work that your servers are doing for you. Beyond that you could use a butter knife to spear through the tomatoes in your salad and I'll be straight with you.

There are volumes of writing, whole "rule books" dedicated to the subtleties of fine dining etiquette, right down to how you butter your bread (don't butter the whole piece at once, egads! and so forth). Ignore them. The rules are archaic; dated. They apply to a time when dining was still an exercise in elitism, which it no longer is. Be polite. Be respectful. Bon appetit.

Detroit Restaurant Week starts in one week; have you made your reservations yet?

Detroit Restaurant Week Done Right: Tipping

As I promised you earlier -- and I ALWAYS make good on my promises* -- we're switching things up a bit for the blogging component of Detroit Restaurant Week. You'll still get plenty of my snappy wit and I might even talk about food (crazy, I know), but I'd like for you to think of me as more of your ambassador to DRW, if you will. We'll talk not only of the menus, but of different DRW-related points of interest as well.

Let us begin.

Chapter 1: Tipping

Don't end up like Mr. Pink.

JOE
Alright ramblers, let's get rambling. Wait a minute, who didn't throw in?

MR. ORANGE
Mr. Pink.

JOE
(to Mr. Orange)
Mr. Pink?
(to Mr. Pink)
Why not?

MR. ORANGE
He don't tip.

JOE
(to Mr. Orange)
He don't tip?
(to Mr. Pink)
What d'ya mean ya don't tip?

MR. ORANGE
He don't believe in it.

JOE
(to Mr. Orange)
Shut up!
(to Mr. Pink)
What d'ya mean ya don't believe in it? Come on you, cough up the buck, ya cheap b-stard, I paid for your g-ddamn breakfast.

MR. PINK
Alright, since you paid for the breakfast I'll put in but normally I would never do this.

JOE
Nevermind what you "normally" would do, just cough in your g-ddamn buck like everybody else. THANK YOU.

^You see how I edited that? I did that to be polite.

This here's a post on ETIQUETTE.

Let me start by saying any job in the customer service industry is the worst job in the world. The hours are long, the customers are endlessly tedious, and the pay is usually for shite. I speak as a decade-long retail veteran with many friends in the food & bar industry. It SUCKS. You're on your feet running around your entire shift, you're exhausted by the end of it, the hours are long and grueling, you don't get to just peace out when your scheduled shift is over but instead have to stay until the last customer is gone and all your clean-up is done (sometimes as late as 4AM), you can just go ahead and kiss your nights and weekends goodbye since those are your peak worktimes (family dinners ... friends BBQ-ing at the beach ... weekend getaways up north ... nope, not for these guys). And the worst part of ALL of it is that no one respects you professionally even though you probably work infinitely harder than most desk-jockeys who turn their nose down at you for "not doing anything with your degree" (I speak as a person who is now and has previously been a desk-jockey and knows first-hand how much easier it is to sit around, eat and look at Facebook all day).

Oh, and also, YOU the customers (and I am pointing my finger here at the whole class because a few bad apples had to go and ruin it for everyone), YOU don't make the job any easier. I became convinced during my days in retail that people specifically go shopping at the mall or go out to eat when they're at their absolute ANGRIEST just to abuse an annonymous employee. And said employee must take all this with a fake smile and dead eyes as they think "This f*cking b*itch..." (<---SEE! I did it to be polite AGAIN!) but because their financial security is dependent upon groveling for the so-called generosity of such double-chinned beasts they must suffer through it ALL with dignity and poise, their only reprieve coming from chain-smoking cigarettes out back with the other servers as they rehash the evening's horror story highlights and then go to the nearest bar to do a few shots before bed and coming back and do it all over again the next morning for Sunday brunch and OH what a delight THAT crowd is to deal with!

All of this headache and all of this suffering and all of this loss of time and youth and independence and sanity (can you tell I'm super-happy to be out of retail?) is all for one thing: TIPS. These people depend on TIPS. To pay their rent, to pay their school, to pay their bar tabs and who are you to judge -- this is how they make their living, and it all starts with YOU. The beauty of Detroit Restaurant Week is that it IS all discounted prix fixe pricing, significantly cheaper than what you would pay if your ordered it all a la carte. $28 for three courses is a steal at any one of the 18 participating restaurants, but note that it DOES NOT include tax or gratuity. Okay, with tax (and not factoring in any alcohol) you're hovering around $31 ... now the question is, how much do you leave for tip? 20% would be $6, right? So $6 would be okay?

WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG. WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG. YOU'RE WRONG. YOU'RE WRONG. YOU'RE WRONG.

Whenever one receives a discounted price on a meal, be that with a gift certificate or special offers from such places as Half Off Depot, you should still tip based on what would have been the full amount pre-discount. Now for something like DRW it can be hard to figure what the pre-discount price might have been, so let's do some quick hypothetical math. Your standard soup, salad or appetizer will cost usually $6-$12 dollars, depending on the item. An entree at most of these establishments will be somewhere in the ballpark of $18-$28, conservatively speaking. Desserts are usually $6-$8. Now let's take an average ($9 + $23 + $7), and you're looking at around $40 per person before tax (let's round up to $45 with tax). 20% on that is about $9 (and my thinking is that 20% should be a base amount; exceptional service should look more like 30%). For a table of 4, the difference between a $6 per person tip and a $9 per person tip is $12. Multiplied by let's say 10 groups of 4 in one night and that's the difference of $120. Multiplied by the Ten Days of Restaurant Week (but let's go ahead an give them 2 days off) and that's a TOTAL difference of about $1,000 in the server's pocket. Do you see how quickly it all adds up? Do you see how important it is that everyone understand the difference here?

Let's also bear in mind the fact that Restaurant Week is like Fifth Avenue the week before Christmas during the Clinton administration. Do you remember the hysteria when Tickle Me Elmo was released? 12/14/1996: never forget.

It's kind of like that.

Since this year will be the first year in a decade that I will not be forced to spread good cheer during the holidays with a fake smile and dead eyes, I am paying it forward by petitioning all of you to please PLEASE tip your servers well during Detroit Restaurant Week. If they did more than slingshot your food at you as they ran to take the orders of the party of 15 that came in without reservations at 9:45PM, they deserve a minimum 20% tip pre-discount (that includes booze, too). You don't want to end up like Mr. Pink, do you?

Detroit Restaurant Week runs September 24 - October 3, 2010.

*Valid only before 11PM Sundays-Wednesdays, 2AM Thursdays-Saturdays. Not valid with any other offers or discounts. Not valid on holidays or on Sunday brunch buffet. With coupon only. Some restrictions may apply. Only available where not prohibited by law.

Opinions are Like Vegetarians

I don't believe in vegetarianism. Much like the concepts of God or global warming, I just don't believe that the arguments in favor of this lifestyle choice and value system outweigh the much more sizable arguments against it...for me, I (a) don't care about the animals (and recognize that there wouldn't be a whole lot of cows, pigs, or chickens running around if we didn't raise them for slaughter), and (b) believe that since the human body is built to digest such animal products--and in fact, needed such products for survival back in The Day of hunter-gather societies before cheap, pre-packaged, mass-produced foods--it therefore stands to reason that we are meant to be eating them.

Now. I'll give you the growth hormone toxins/excess of consumption arguments. Those I will give you. Because of the scarcity of meat back in The Day, our ancestors' bodies were not conditioned and did not evolve to be able to process large quantities of meat regularly consumed. Our American meat-and-potatoes diet is surely detrimental to our health--as is the growth hormones used in the livestock and the pesticides used in the livestock's feed, etc. No argument from me there. (Plus, organic beef really is that much better.)

What I can't stand are the self-righteous "meat is murder" types, or those who argue that the human body isn't "meant" to digest animal fats and proteins. Homosaywhat? The human species is classified as omnivorous for a reason--we eat things that are dead. And get by the interim periods with things grown in the ground. But I suppose those hunter-gatherers must have had it wrong, eh? If only they had been enlightened enough to realize they could survive on nuts and berries.

I long ago surmised that ailments such as insecurity, anxiety, and the complusion to yammer to a therapist about them are distinctly White People Problems. I'd actually like to see a breakdown of psychologists' clientele by race: I'd wager that the white-to-brown ratio reads like the Lions' losses-to-wins. By extension, these are also the afflictions of wealthy people in a welathy country with nothing else to worry about...if you spent a majority of your time worrying about how you were going to put food on the table and pay your gas bill, you probably wouldn't spend so much time concerned over how you interact in social situations and whether or not your parents didn't love you enough or loved you too much.

White People Problems.

Vegetarians have much in common with the kind of people outlined above. In fact, I'd clump "vegetarianism" (and oh by God veganism) into the "Stupid Shit White People Do" categorization. How many black vegans do you know? (Aside from the occasional Earth Mama and slam poet who claim Nation of Islam but have mostly Caucasian dread-sporting, patchouli-stinking friends.) How about strict vegetarian Latinos? Ever met a hungry African who refused a slab of beef, citing animal cruelty and the poisoning of the body's temple?

No. No, you haven't. Because those are White (American) People Issues, that the Rest of the World couldn't give a pig's entrails less about. The French eat fresh monkey brains, for chrissakes. Leave it to greedy, slovenly, self-serving Americans to give the world McDonald's and then judge everyone for eating it. This rampant spread of fad vegetarianism is also a uniquely American symptom: see, in other countries, where traditional cuisine has been stabilized over centuries, people didn't pump their cattle full of growth hormones that gave them all cancer a few decades later and excess has never been a way of life. In America all we ever seem to want is everything in the extreme: extreme sports, extreme home makeovers, triple beef patties wrapped in a quarter pound of bacon and slathered in special sauce for $3.99.

And then you have the extreme reactionaries, the people who think the only solution to the problem they see is to fling themselves in the polar opposite direction. And so we have vegetarians (or, in the most extreme, vegans). The solution can't simply be "eat less meat," no. Now the solution becomes "eat no meat at all" (or, in the most extreme, eat nothing made from an animal, including dairy and eggs).

But you know what? Whatever. I'll quietly judge you and think to myself how ignorant and misguided you are, as I do most people. I'll mostly keep it to myself unless I find myself in the vicinity of a friend who finds my hypercritical observations humorous. BUT. When you make a decision to go all polar-opposite extremist on everyone, DO NOT EXPECT EVERYONE TO CATER TO YOUR SELF-IMPOSED DIETARY RESTRICTIONS.

Case in point: prix fixe menus. Says one vegetarian to another, "Oh! This really nice restaurant is offering a fixed-price menu for pretty cheap! I've always wanted to check that place out; we should go!" Says the other in response, "Well. They aren't offering any vegetarian options, so we can't go." And the other says back, "The nerve. How dare they offer a special tasting menu at a fixed price and not include a vegetarian option. I hate it when places don't take us into consideration."

*Ahem*

Your self-righteous diet is none of the chef's concern (in fact, I often wonder if [white] people don't make the decision to be vegetarian in order to justify increased levels of self-righteousness). When you visit a 4- to 5-star dining establishment, you do not expect the Michelin-rated Chef de Cuisine who trained at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris to completely rearrange his specially-prepared dégustation menu designed based on what his personal specialities are, what ingredients are in season, and what dishes best represent his restaurant and the region to suit you. You pompous pain in the ass.

I am dating a person who unforutnately has a number of food allergies, and even he isn't nearly as demanding or self-entitled as these people are. For them, it is not a matter of it being a favor on the part of the chef to prepare them a special meat-free dish just for the sake of their incessant whining, no...it is an expectation that this will be done, and further an inconvenience when they are forced to ask.

These people, much like the people who whine about prices, need to stay out of fine dining restaurants. You don't belong there, you don't appreciate it, and your loud demands sully the dining experience of all those around you. I'll make you a deal: I'll stay out of your PETA meetings and your various greening initiative grassroots organizations if you stay out of my restaurants. Go bother the people at Whole Foods, and leave me to my sweetbreads and foie gras drenched in thick, rich cream-and-butter sauces. Deal?

No, of course not, because you think the whole world needs to cater to you, you useless American.

Next time you see an announcement for one restaurant or another offering a limited prix fixe menu and you see it does not include a vegetarian option, instead of showing up anyway and demanding one, just don't go. Just don't go! See how easy that was? Or go, but order off the regular menu and do not demand the prix fixe menu be altered for your sake. If you have religious reasons for not being able to eat certain animal products at certain times, don't go during those times! See??? See how easy????

Much like my boyfriend does not have a hissyfit everytime he sees a menu heavy on nuts, dairy, and shellfish (he had a hell of a time in New Orleans, let me tell you) because he understands that the majority of the rest of the world is able to digest these items without issue and does not expect culinary artists to alter their creations for his benefit, so should you refrain from doing so.

Thank you, and happy dining.

"I'm not a vegetarian, but I eat animals who are." --Groucho Marx
"'Vegetarian'--that's an old Indian word meaning 'lousy hunter.'" --Andy Rooney

The Bridge and Tunnel Crowd

Originally published in D-Tales here.

Yesterday I was reading through the Discuss Detroit forums and found a thread on Iridescence inside the Motor City Casino. Some Bridge and Tunnel type made a comment about the food quality not being worth the price. I hammered out a response only to get denied at the point of posting because other people were posting at the same time. It was probably for the best anyway; I decided to save it for my blog instead.

With these Bridge and Tunnel types, it isn't that they lack culinary knowledge and walked into a fine dining establishment expecting to pay Applebee's prices and complain when their flat iron steak isn't mounded with mashed potatoes and gravy with a side salad swimming in ranch...no. It's that they have so much expertise in fine dining that they are disappointed by the quality in lieu of all the buzz; they are beyond a simple 5-star and cluck their tongues at the rest of us for being so easily duped.

It's not that fine dining establishments are all perpetually deserving of and entitled to the glowing reviews they typically receive...they're not. Mario's downtown? Horrible. Andiamo's? Varying levels of bad to awful depending on location. The Lark? Not as good as it is made out to be.

No, it isn't that a 5-star restaurant can't not live up to its hype. The problem with these B&Ts is that they inevitably endcap their argument with a "...for the price."

True foodies never talk about price. They speak of the experience, the art, the creativity, the boldness, the ambiance, the presentation, the service, the atmosphere, the compliments of textures and flavors, the adventuresomeness of the executive chef...but never the price.

So let this be a lesson learned: when you find yourself in the middle of a conversation with someone and they endcap their complaint about a high-end restaurant with a "...for the price," you now know you are dealing with a B&T type and you should proceed no further. They have about as much knowledge of fine dining as you do about caulking and soldering. You have two options: (a) nod politely and try to gracefully bow out of the conversation as quickly as possible, or (b) swifly redirect their line of thought by stating how great you think Obama is and how he is going to save the world and end all war and find a cure for AIDS.

So where does the "Bridge and Tunnel" come in, you ask? It's a pithy turn of phrase remnant from my days in Manhattan, taken from people who work in the fine dining industry in reference to the people who do not live in Manhattan but instead Long Island or New Jersey or elsewhere in the burroughs who take the bridge and tunnel into Manhattan every weekend to whip out their Visa Aspire cards and complain about the prices.

This is Manhattan. A cocktail is going to cost at a minimum $10.00. This is simply just how Manhattan is. If you don't like it, I suggest you go somewhere other than Manhattan.

So these Bridge and Tunnel types infest the island and overtake the high-end restaurants in their backwards baseball caps and flip-flops and jeans and ponytails, then order by pricepoint and complain about quality and service in an effort to make themselves look less cheap.

I've had one significant experience with a B&T. I was at Felidia, the flagship restaurant of Lidia Bastianich and one of the most renowned restaurants in New York (which puts it in the top 50 in the country). There I had the most culinary orgasmic experience of my life, beating out the former title holder Spiaggia in Chicago (for a black truffle risotto). It was a duck ravioli with shaved white truffles--and when I say "shaved white truffles," I mean the server stood tableside and shaved mounds of white truffles onto my dish, coating it as if I were at the Olive Garden getting my gluttony on with mounds of parmesan being shaved on top of my bottomless house salad. I'm talking more white truffles than I have ever seen in my entire life.

$150.00 worth, to be exact. That little dish was $185.00 total, and worth every penny. My orgasmic experience was interrupted, though, by the B&Ts sitting next to me.

I was there with my BF at the time. He was an arrogant prick and I both loved and hated him for it. Eventually the hate won out, but for this particular moment in my life there is no one else in the world I would have rather had with me to share it.

I'm in the midst of my foodgasm when this uncouth B&T bitch next to us starts yapping about the prices and how she didn't know how much the white truffle ravioli cost and how he (the server) should have told them (yes, that would be classy--"Tonight we have a special duck ravioli with shaved white truffles." "Oh, that sounds great, I'll have that!" "Yeeeeeeeah, it's going to be about $185.00 though, soooooooo...you sure about that?" Um...tacky?). This dough-faced boorish troll of a woman (with her douchey denim-wearing boyfriend) pitched such a fit that she got the white truffles comped. COMPED! $150.00 worth of white truffles COMPED!

(SIDEBAR: This is why I never bend for customers--human beings exhibit all the same Pavolvian conditioning patterns as those infamous dogs, and the general consensus in this service-the-customer country is if you piss and moan loud and long enough you'll eventually get what you want. My favorite things to say are, "Look, these are your options, and that's it. And I don't even have to do that much." and "I'm just not gonna do it." They usually back down when you look them dead in the eye and say "No." But you cannot show fear...they can smell it and will seize their opportunity to pounce.)

It was embarrassing to be sitting next to her during this display of why Marx was clearly wrong, so much so that I had to put down my fork in the middle of my foodgasm and sit there playing telepathic disgust with my boyfriend. So this squawking, yelping, pudgy little harpy finally stomps her way out of the restaurant and the rest of us are allowed to continue with our meals.But...but...not only did she get $150.00 worth of white truffles comped, she continued to complain about the restaurant (because it's the restaurant's fault for her unhappy existence), then she STIFFED THE SERVER.

YOU DO NOT STIFF THE SERVER IN A FIVE-STAR RESTAURANT. Hell, you do not stiff the server period. I don't care if it's Coney-fuckin'-Island and the woman forgot to refill your coffee and fucked up your order twice. YOU DO NOT STIFF THE SERVER.

Not only is it a show of your complete lack of etiquette and class, but it also shows your total failure in common human decency.

Because of this whole intensely awkward and unpleasant episode, my boyfriend decided to overcompensate with his tip, which was already going to be about 30% to begin with because the service was top-notch, by adding another $50.00 to it. Hell, I think I even contributed an extra $20.00 to the cause, and I hate paying for anything ever.

(Yes, I can walk by Beggars' Row and avoid eye contact and insist I don't carry cash--which is actually true--but the second a server at a 5-star restaurant who probably makes 6 figures a year--because in Manhattan they do--gets stiffed, I'm getting all causeworthy about it. And I am totally okay with this, because I believe in Darwin and the GOP.)

After the troll left, we engaged the server in conversation about the little episode and he simply shrugged politely and said that these are the kinds of people he has to deal with on weekends. He then hooked us up fat with glasses of wine, port, and a dessert platter all on the house. Catch more flies with honey, no?

This is what I mean when I say "Bridge and Tunnel." These are the kinds of people who should never leave the comforts of the Olive Garden, with its $11.95 entrees and bottomless salads & breadsticks and carry-out boxes. These are also the kinds of people who would be fatally insulted if you were to treat them the way their behavior demands them to be treated, and then would proceed to squawk endlessly about that.

Yes, you're right--I'm the asshole here.

And so, going back to the "bad experience" at Iridescence. You did not have a bad experience at Iridescence. Iridescence doesn't have bad experiences. And trust me when I tell you that you can squawk all over the forums about it as much as you want, the only people whose business you're driving away are the people who shouldn't have been there in the first place. Really, it would be doing everyone a favor. So keep squawking.

Your lobster tail was not overcooked. And if it was...if it really, really was...it was because you ordered the Jumbo Western Austrailian Lobster Tail, which is very difficult to cook properly. This isn't so much the fault of Iridescence's preparation as it is their fault in catering to the American fascination with all things big.

In the future, I hear Red Lobster has a very fine lobster tail, and it's only $10.00. You can also shovel down all the cheesy biscuits your plaque-filled heart desires.

And this brings me back to basic fine dining knowledge and the B&T crowd's lack thereof. White truffles are very very expensive. If you order something that has mounds of shaved white truffles on it, it's going to cost you a car payment. This is something you need to know before you go somewhere that serves shaved white truffles. Your ignorance in this matter is not the fault of the restaurant.

Same goes for Overcooked Lobster Tail. It's a 10-oz. jumbo lobster tail. It is next to damn impossible to cook all the way through without the outside getting a little rubbery--not unlike a 10-oz. filet, which would be charred black on the outside and runny red on this inside if not butterflied prior to cooking. This is something you should know. Much like you should know what an amuse bouche is so that you're not sitting there staring at it wondering if you're going to be charged for it (a discussion I've also heard before).

If these are things you do not know, I will not, in fact, judge you for your lack of knowledge. Provided you stay the hell away from such situations in which you have no such knowledge. Much like you will never catch me at an Obama mob rally with Obama-head-shaped fireworks and styrofoam Obama fingers, or on a mission with the Peace Corps to save poor people by spreading Christianity (back in the day it was called a "Crusade"--a much more honest phrasing, don't you think?), I never want to see you at five-star restaurant acting as if your malcontentedness is intentional and not the result of you feeling painfully, awkwardly, angrily out of place.

Overcooked Lobster Tail is probably one of the same people who complained about Tribute not "meeting expectations" back when Takashi Yagahashi was there--in my own humble opinion, the most brilliant chef whose creations I've ever been fortunate enough to experience in my lifetime. I've had truly orgasmic single dishes in other restaurants in other cities in other countries, yes. But Yagahashi is the only chef from whom I've ever experienced a truly perfect meal. (In Las Vegas, I made it a point to visit Okada while he was still there, and now he has opened Takashi in Chicago which just might make it worth a day trip, despite the fact that I don't think Chicago is all that great.)

And yet--people complained. And always, inevitably, it was "...for the price."

If I ever open a restaurant it will be strictly a vanity project. I would have money coming out of my arse from other sources and the intent of the restaurant would not be to actually make money, but to be elite. There would be a 5-table/20-person capacity, and all potential diners would first have to pass an entrance exam just to be allowed inside. This exam would include questions like, "Name five worldwide celebrity chefs (Emeril Legassi, Bobby Flay and Wolfgang Puck do not count)," and "From which body parts of what animals are foie gras and sweetbreads made?" and also "Name two of the top ten culinary training academies in the world." Perhaps I would round it out with "Name five different types of mushrooms, not field or Portabella." Perhaps also "Name the top 5 French wine producers." For shits and giggles, I would also ask "What is your favorite Italian dish, by region?" just to weed out all those Veal Marsala assholes.

Oh, there would also be an oral portion to the exam. People would have to properly pronounce the following: Foie Gras, Au Poivre, Meuniere, Buerre Blanc, and Dauphinoise, AND know what they are/what style of preparation they refer to.

These are all rather easy questions to answer, if you are a foodie. If you cannot answer them, let's make a deal: I'll stay out of your Obama-head pool party with Obama-shaped burgers if you stay out of my restaurants. Deal?

(Though I'll still make fun of you for voting for him. Or maybe I'll just let her do it.)

On a related note, yes this is currently the most offensive, insulting thing on television.