Knife's Edge - Restaurant Rants & Raves

Salt House Redux

Reinforcing that Doug Washington is a class act. I sent letters to both Cyrus and Salt House, thanking them for aspects of our recent visits. I enclosed a little something for the children of both Mr Washington and Nick Peyton.

A couple of days after my letter I got a very sweet handwritten note from Doug Washington.

The Punk Rock Martha Stewart

I'm posting this pic of me at the ripe age of 13 or so to impress upon you, dear reader, the utter ridiculousness of my being a standard bearer of etiquette.

That disclaimer out of the way, my time on the floor of the restaurant perpetually leaves me shaking my head at the sorry state of public behavior. I'm not talking about the large rude behaviors; the snapping of fingers at waiters, the inattention to out of control children or loud, drunken cursing. Nor am I talking about rules like which fork to use when, or whether it is acceptable to saw back and forth at your meat, (it's not) or to stroke the knife away from you (there ya go). I'm talking about behaving well with your dining companion.

Now the GM may stiffen when she reads this because our recent wrangles have been about how we sometimes treat each other (poorly) and how we express ourselves with each other. We do try however, to revisit the situation at a later time, figure out what the heck was going on and seeing what we can do to not have it happen again.

I understand that with long partnership comes familiarity, which can on occasion, lead people to act indifferently, or casually with their partner. I am guilty of speaking to the GM in ways I would never have dreamed of when we first met. Honey, I'm sorry. With long partnership also comes deeper understanding and greater love. I hope I can express those feelings as well as I can dissatisfaction.

My own family aside, people please, when you are eating with other people, don't push your plate precariously to one side of the table. You are in a restaurant. We will take your plate. When everyone at the table is finished. Try not to ask for the check while your partner is still chewing, unless you have very pressing business. And try to leave yourself enough time to attend to your pressing business. Believe me, I want to turn the table. But I also want you to enjoy yourself. And enjoy your companions.

I've been called the punk rock Martha Stewart. Talk about warring impulses. But it's true. My style might be a little weird, but I know how to behave and how to make you feel welcome and taken care of.

I write this because I watch my son and wonder who he will be. And wonder how he will conduct himself in the world. And wonder, where in my upbringing did I absorb the lessons of civility. And how far from them did I stray when I was looking like I looked above. And how far do I stray today?

The Truth Will Set You Free

We have a long history of taking on young people who need a little direction. In fact, the local high school has allowed students who have been asked to leave school re-enter upon hearing of their employment with us. It's been a while since we've had a project, but it seems we have one now.

One of our new bussers fits the mold perfectly. Heavy teen-aged girl, lives with her grandparents because her tweaker parents can't handle the responsibility of raising her. Eager to please; she brought a card and stuffed animal for the Sardine on Easter.

We reward our staff when they receive compliments. Both informally with the pat on the back and formally with gift certificates they can spend at the restaurant. We keep tally of compliments, mailing list sign-ups, new customer referrals ,etc. and when people reach 100, they get a $100 gift certificate. It's harder for the bussers to get to 100, because they tend to have more limited customer interactions so we usually cash them out at $50.

I got an email, complimenting our new busser, telling me what a good job she did, and how the customers would be back because she and the waitress did such a good job. The only hitch, the email came from the girl's boyfriend and purported to be from a Mr & Mrs Jones. I didn't know if this was something he did on his own initiative, or if she participated.

When she came in I told her I had something for her to read. She read it with interest and then said it was from her boyfriend's grandparents. She said they had been in the night before. "Oh, where are they from?"

"New York, or Washington, DC, I think. I saw them at the baseball game today."

"Hmm, why did the email come from your boyfriend?"

"They used his email."

"I have a hard time believing that this email, with so many misspellings, and such poor grammar, came from his grandparents."

"No, it did. I didn't do it. They've been in one other time since I've been here"

"OK."

She is of course lying. I wanted to believe her, but alas. Not only would she have introduced me to her boyfriend's grandparents, but in the email it says they noticed the busser and asked her her name. Now if they had met her previously, and knew her to be their grandson's girlfriend, why would they ask her name?

I'm a little disappointed, and alarmed. The lies came so quickly out of her mouth, and she just kept digging. Not that I've never lied mind you, but I can usually tell when I've been busted, and when you've been busted, it's time to come clean. I feel for this girl. She's obviously been in an environment where the truth doesn't matter much and where she has gotten so little in the way of encouragement and support. She does do a good job. We've told her so, and will continue to do so.

I'm trying to use this episode as a lesson for her. To let her see that she doesn't have to lie to be noticed or appreciated, but when she kept going, I realized this will take a bit more time.

I sent a reply to her boyfriend. I said, "That was very sweet. She does indeed do a good job. However, next time please compliment her under your own name. We place a high value on honesty here." We'll see what happens next.

In other news, major events. The Sardine is crawling. Vigorously. Our pre-mobile peace has ended. And we finished a small project that you'll soon be able to read about, but not here.

Service Styles

Our last trip to SF mostly involved the company of friends who prefer the company of adults to children. And of course the Sardine is now 8 months old, more mobile and vocal than previous visits. And as restaurant owners we've made a lot of noise about how parenting in public should be conducted. So we got to test our theories a little. We also got to see different styles of child restaurant management.

We met Sam & Fred at Salt House where partner Doug Washington told us if there was anything we needed, something warmed up, pureed, whatever, to just let him know. He offered to carry the Sardine around the restaurant so we could eat with two hands. The Sardine was fine in the high chair and enjoyed the broth from my halibut and artichoke dish, sampled Fred's foie gras and was seriously into the short rib gravy on the GM's poutine. Salt House is noisy, not deafening, but enough so that any shouts of fussiness or delight from the Sardine could go unremarked. He did attract a good amount of attention from neighboring tables and Mr Washington checked in a couple of times. He told us about his 6 year old and 14 month old and we had a brief conversation about how the restaurant lifestyle and the parenting/school lifestyle might not be a perfect match.

Our explorations with Meloukhia went well. Land's End is filled with tasty things, it was a wonderful sunny day and the Sardine was pretty companionable until he got tired of being in the car seat on the way to Treasure Island and started screaming.

When I made our reservation at Cyrus I was thinking it might be the last time we would be trying haute cuisine as a family for a little while. The Sardine is now mobile and it won't be long before he's somewhat hard to contain. After dinner the might changed to definitely. Not that it was a disaster. In fact he was quieter and better behaved than at Salt House. But the atmosphere and noise level of the two places is so different that he was much more noticeable at Cyrus.

The food was everything I had heard it was. Refined, playful, perfectly executed. And the service was professional. The difference between Cyrus and Salt House though was at Salt House they were friendly, seemed glad to see us, and wanted us to return. They were there to make us happy. At Cyrus, though technically "better" service, the focus was on the restaurant, not the customer. We were there for the experience, and they knew it.

The Sardine did make some noise and the GM was really tense. We each took a turn taking him outside and finally she got him to sleep so she could enjoy the cheese course and desserts. As we were leaving we talked a little with Nick Peyton and told him how much we enjoyed his remarks at the Zagat forum on hospitality a few years ago. He remarked how different everyone on the panel was, and that though each were committed to great service, their styles were totally different. Since Doug Washington was also a panelist I was able to compare styles side by side.

A clear case of apples and oranges. Two totally different restaurants. But I remain a little non-plussed at how little use some restaurants make of the information they have. For instance, my email to Cyrus came from my business email and told them we were bringing an 8 month old infant. From that info alone a few things they could have done would be: have a high chair or some other infant device available (they did seat us in a booth with the idea the Sardine could be in the middle, and give the GM a pillow to prop him up with so they did make some effort to address our child) and to really go a step further to realize, hey, these people are in the business, they are bringing their infant, wouldn't it be great if we sent out a course of something the infant could eat. That's a family story for a lifetime. "Yes, dad. I know I was eating sweet potatoes at Cyrus when I was 8 months old. You've told that story a million times." Even to just acknowledge that we were in the same business would have gone a long way.

I'm not knocking Cyrus. They did great. But when expectations are higher, great is just the standard. To wow, you really have to go out of your way. I also don't expect special treatment because we are restaurateurs. Everyone should get some acknowledgment of who they are, what they do or something personal when the restaurant has the information available. If you know your guest is a lawyer from Altoona, PA, there's something you can do with that information. The internet has made it possible to find out a little something about anywhere and nearly everything.

In the spirit of using the information, when I send thank you letters to both restaurants I will be enclosing the temporary tattoos that we put in our check presenters for Doug Washington and Nick Peyton's children.

Speaking of thank yous, a major one goes out to Fred. Just remember no good deed goes unpunished.