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Q: I just want my food

Hi Tom: Love your chats and really appreciate that you’re still at it during the pandemic. Thank you! My question is this: am I crazy for thinking that police should cut motorists a little slack for double parking when picking up curbside at restaurants, especially now when restaurants desperately need the business and traffic is non-existent? I had an unpleasant encounter with a DC police officer at 6pm Sunday in Friendship Heights. Short version: I placed an order online, phoned the restaurant when I was out front so they could bring out my order, and was hassled by an officer for double parking (the curbside pickup space was full). He barked at me over his loudspeaker that I was breaking the law by blocking traffic and that I needed to move my car immediately or he’d give me a ticket. He wouldn’t listen as I attempted to call out that I was doing curbside pickup and would be leaving momentarily. My order was put in my car within 30 seconds. (The restaurant employee who brought it out asked, “Why is he giving you such a hard time?”) When I drove away and stopped at a red light, the officer pulled up next to me and lectured me about DC traffic laws and advised that although he could rightfully mail a ticket to my house, he wouldn’t do so. I attempted to respond but he talked over me, said “have a safe evening” and drove away. You’d think that he would have considered a more charitable approach (“Yes, this person is double parked but she’s picking up an order, it’s not rush hour, and there’s hardly any traffic because of the pandemic so I’ll cut her some slack”). To my thinking, his approach was needlessly confrontational. (Yes, I filed a complaint with the police department.)
A: Tom Sietsema
You have my sympathy. We all need to be a little more patient and understanding of one another. BUT! The cop didn't stick you with a ticket when he could have. So there's that nice little outcome. 

Double parked person files complaint against officer who didn’t ticket said person.  😤
Pandemic is no excuse for traffic violation.

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Q: Including the tip
Might just hurt the servers since I typically start tipping at 30% of the bill for great service. As a former server I know who is at fault for certain things during a meal. And yeah I have been known to stiff a server when we discriminated against and she treated an older middle age couple far better. Always write "Stiff" in the top box and never 00.00 cause it can be aktered by the server

A: Tom Sietsema
You're a former server and you've actually stiffed someone in the industry -- AND scribbled STIFF on top the check? I don't know what to say. 

The OP is referencing The Inn at Little Washington going to a service included pricing.  I'm equally astounded.  I think anyone who starts by saying how great he/she tips is probably bogus.

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1 hour ago, Ericandblueboy said:

I think anyone who starts by saying how great he/she tips is probably bogus.

There's that, the "former server," and the bit about stiffing. The combo is pretty toxic.

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I cant begin to tell you the 1* yelp reviews that had the former servers. "1* and I know bad {choose from food, service, racism}" usually surrounding cutting people off for being intoxicated. Something like 50% of the time we refused service, we got a 1 star review and invariably I received a lesson in how bad my restaurant was from the former server involved. Funny, we never had an issue with a former cook or bartender. 

I remember one time we had to catch a young lady falling down the stairs and we first cut off the young lady. Then her friends poured her a drink and we had to cut off the table. We took the wine and did not charge for it even as it was half drunk. We got 3 DIFFERENT 1* reviews from that one. Oh yeah, I left out one detail: she puked in our bathroom and didn't tell anyone. 

I am so glad to be out of the business on so many levels.  

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34 minutes ago, deangold said:

I cant begin to tell you the 1* yelp reviews that had the former servers.
...
I am so glad to be out of the business on so many levels.  

And yet, Yelp is a multi-billion dollar company, while we're on the verge of shutting down.

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10 hours ago, DonRocks said:

And yet, Yelp is a multi-billion dollar company, while we're on the verge of shutting down.


The chain restaurants proliferate, grocery store wine sucks, and Total Wine is.......
No one ever went broke by underestimating the stupidity of the American consumer.......
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Well except Liquor Barn, Hamburger Hamlet, Minnie Pearls, Lum's, Bennigans, Kenny Rodgers, Steak and Ale, Wimpy's, Chi Chi's, Marie Callenders {the restaurants are gone aad bankrupt, the pies are still for sale at your local chain grocery except Lucky's.} Think of it the next time you stop off at Tower Records or Blockbuster Video!

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28 minutes ago, DonRocks said:

Don't tell me you remember the Ollie Burger.

(Ollie Gleichenhaus 1911-1991)

Can't say that I ever had an Ollie Burger at any outlet. But I remember the Lumsburger of my youth but I could not tell you anything about it. 

My youthful burgers of nostalgia are three:

The Hawaiian Hut: a little old fashioned burger stand taken over by a heavily tatooed ex-fireman who chain smoked as he slapped burgers down on the grill. Hand formed, maybe 3/4 or 1" thick. There was a totem pole out front and the patio was overed in thatch. He wore Hawaiian shirts. And there was that cigarette, the ash always threatening to fall on your burger but never doing so. He would shake his "secret seasoning" out of a dredge which every kid there knew to be Lawrey's seasoned salt. He knew everything about you and he knew your mom from her shopping across the street at Gelson's. They tore the hut down for a gas station expansion. Today is is a luxury car lot.

Woody's: first discovered one day going to a UCLA or Rams game at the LA Coloseum. Huge crowd and we were hungry. You got into a line and chose a large or smaller burger {still large} that were thin pressed and grilled crisp. No rare, medium rare, medium or medium well. Burnt was it. You could get bacon, grilled onions and cheese added. Then you went to a long condiment bar and you could load up as much as you could fit on your tray. Despite all the USC paraphernalia, it was amazing. They later tried to create a chain and it was not the same. There is a huge difference between pulling a burger off a grill just as its outside is perfectly charred and caramelized and just starting to actually burn. It was perfection and their 3 old black guys on the line knew how to do it perfectly. When they went to a chain operation, they were just burnt. And cooked by teen age white kids who didn't give a eff. They went bankrupt.

But the burger of my youth, the non-jewish deli sandwich of my youth was The Original Cassel's. if you didn't go when Alban Cassel himself was running it, you did not have a Cassell's Burger. It was at 6th and Rampart {not positive about Rampart and maybe it was 3rd.} in Downtown LA. There was a smallish shop for the line to order, the salad bar and the cookline. Alban was on the cash register. There were four older black guys who rotated between the order station and cooking. Alban was a perfectionist and he designed his own grill. There was a flattop on top for toasting the buns and grilling the sandwiches. Then there was a pull out grill on the bottom with a broiler on top of that under the flattop. The burger artisan could move that contraption up and down and in and out with a handle with a lever on it that let the grill swing free. 

When you got in line, you had to decide what to order. The entire menu:

Burger
Ham
Tuna Salad
Egg Salad

The sandwiches were served on thin slices of either rye or egg bread, made especially for Alban, by a local bakery. When I spoted the name of the bakery making its very early daily delivery, I went there because they had to be master bakers. They weren't. Their bread was worse than super market bread but the stuff they made for Alban was custom and it was his recipe. The slices were 16" by 9", sliced thin on a deli slicer. The burgers came in two sizes, 1/3# and 2/3# served on the same eggy bun, always toasted perfectly. The entire time for making a sandwich from start to frying it on the flat op in a pool of butter with a flat weight pressing it down, the weight sized to match the bread perfectly, was maybe 3 minutes. The burgers were cooked top and bottom simultaneously so ordered medium rare, they took 3 to 5 minutes.

They had their meat custom grown in Colorado to spec. They used only the chuck, delivered in the morning every day they were open and ground on site. When I was really accepted as a regular, Alban even told me the restaurants that bought the rest of his cows for fancy $30 steaks. This is 1973 so $30 was a big drop of green! But a 2/3# Cassels with the salad bar and a big lemonade was about $5. My mom took me there once before I turned 16 and when I got to high school and had friends who had cars, we would cut school to go to Cassell's as it was open Monday thru Friday 11 am 'til they ran out. 

But the real genius was the ordering system. The gruff guy taking orders would point and say 'whatta ya have?' It was more an accusation than a question. You had to answer with no hesitation or be pushed aside for a regular to explain the system to you. Each item was numbered. 21 was a plain 1/3# burger and 31 was 23. *2 meant Swiss. *3 American. And so on. You knew you were a boring regular when the guy taking your order would say you are always 31 medium. Live a little! They all knew I ate most everything but American cheese and egg salad, so I would be greeted with 'here comes trouble' but I never messed up my orders so I was allright. 

Sandwiches came on an oval platter. Burgers on a square one. So when you ordered, you got a plate put down on the counter. There were strips of hand cut butcher paper in boxes and the rest of your order was coded. If you had a burger, the temp was pink for medium rare, blue for rare, brown for medium. I believe there was a graveyard out back for anyone who ordered their burger more than medium. If you did, you got medium rare no matter what. The strips went on one side of the plate for 1/3# and the other for 2/3#. Cheese was at the back of the plate, pink for Swiss and blue for American. Everything needed for burgerperfection with a plate and 2 strips of paper.

For a sandwich, on one side of the platter, it was pink for ham, blue for tuna. I assume that brown was egg salad but I never saw one ordered. If you wanted your sandwich grilled, you got a pink strip on the other side. Bread was indicated by a paper strip at the back of the plate. No strip was rye, the only real choice.  Burgers were stacked separately than sandwiches. 

When the grill was empty, the cook would come and collect a stack of plates. The oldest order was on the bottom. So he would put his hand on top of the stack and and flip it so all the plates were face down and the oldest was on top. Say the burger grill was empty. He could count out the burger strips and know how many 1/3 and 2/3 he needed on the grill. He knew the temps again by counting another part of the pile. The grill tilted so rare was at the front, medium rare in the middle and medium at the top, closest to the upper flame. A shake of salt and pepper mix out  the dredge was all that touched the burger except the cheese added half way thru cooking. All the burgers cooked at the same time, no matter what temp you ordered because of the design of the grill. When the grill was just about fully cooked, the cook guy spread out the plates with the paper and everything was offloaded in perfect order. I never got something other than what I ordered. Not once. And nothing ever was less than perfect. I think any cook who made a mistake after their first day got shot and put out back in the cemetery along with those who insisted on well done burgers.

They called out your number and temp and you grabbed the plate or platter for a sandwich. And then you went to the salad bar. iceburg, sliced onions, none of this grilled onion shit. Yellow mustard made from powder every day. But the star, the best of all was homemade potato salad. it was creamy, spiked with chopped pickle and a ton of horseradish. It brought tears to the eyes like a bottle of Gold's at Passover. 

Drinks were bottled soda and homemade lemon aid and iced tea. They prepped in the morning starting at 5 am {you could go by to see the process, we would go after all night poker broke up, pass by Cassells to watch before going for Chiu Chou noodles in China Town. When they ran out they ran out. If you went late, say 3 o'clock and were standing in line you might hear the mournful cry, no more 2/3# burger and you were eating something else. They would cut off the line when the ends of the prep was in sight. And when everyone was thru ordering, there would just be enough left for family meal.

There was a patio and an indoor dining area. When your food was ready, you would go out and wait for a spot to open. There were two Latina's with brooms and trash bag to clear and clean spots as they opened. if you lingered you would get told to move your culo in Spanish once, then poked with the broom. More than once, the Cemetery.  but the whole operation was set up so that your seat magically appeared as you came with your food. Alban was a genius. And I don't ever remember any staff quitting. 

Alband rules: Never had fries: They are a world of their own. Never had ketchup. Nothing ever changed. Nothing. Except Alban grew older as time went by. 

Downtown redevelopment closed the Original Cassell's. The original Cassels was actually his second place. His first, just Cassels had to move as his legend grew. He said that was it, no more. A few years later someone convinced him to reopen on Beverly in a more high falutin' neighborhood. But Alban couldn't recreate the magic and the black guys took over the business. They recreated the magic but I guess the money part was too hard to make a go of it. Instead of lines with 50 or 100 people waiting {that would take no more than 30 to 45 minutes to clear} they had lines of 10 at peak hours. They sold to their developer for funding and he had visions of a chain. The 4 black guys took their money and left after a very short time. Apparently they did well for themselves. The new place closed in ignominy with people asking what is the deal with Cassel's. It's just a burger!

Sort of like people asking what's the big deal with this Mikey Angelo guy.. Didn't he just pain ceilings and walls? 

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16 hours ago, deangold said:

Can't say that I ever had an Ollie Burger at any outlet. But I remember the Lumsburger of my youth but I could not tell you anything about it. 

My youthful burgers of nostalgia are three:

The Hawaiian Hut: a little old fashioned burger stand taken over by a heavily tatooed ex-fireman who chain smoked as he slapped burgers down on the grill. Hand formed, maybe 3/4 or 1" thick. There was a totem pole out front and the patio was overed in thatch. He wore Hawaiian shirts. And there was that cigarette, the ash always threatening to fall on your burger but never doing so. He would shake his "secret seasoning" out of a dredge which every kid there knew to be Lawrey's seasoned salt. He knew everything about you and he knew your mom from her shopping across the street at Gelson's. They tore the hut down for a gas station expansion. Today is is a luxury car lot.

Woody's: first discovered one day going to a UCLA or Rams game at the LA Coloseum. Huge crowd and we were hungry. You got into a line and chose a large or smaller burger {still large} that were thin pressed and grilled crisp. No rare, medium rare, medium or medium well. Burnt was it. You could get bacon, grilled onions and cheese added. Then you went to a long condiment bar and you could load up as much as you could fit on your tray. Despite all the USC paraphernalia, it was amazing. They later tried to create a chain and it was not the same. There is a huge difference between pulling a burger off a grill just as its outside is perfectly charred and caramelized and just starting to actually burn. It was perfection and their 3 old black guys on the line knew how to do it perfectly. When they went to a chain operation, they were just burnt. And cooked by teen age white kids who didn't give a eff. They went bankrupt.

But the burger of my youth, the non-jewish deli sandwich of my youth was The Original Cassel's. if you didn't go when Alban Cassel himself was running it, you did not have a Cassell's Burger. It was at 6th and Rampart {not positive about Rampart and maybe it was 3rd.} in Downtown LA. There was a smallish shop for the line to order, the salad bar and the cookline. Alban was on the cash register. There were four older black guys who rotated between the order station and cooking. Alban was a perfectionist and he designed his own grill. There was a flattop on top for toasting the buns and grilling the sandwiches. Then there was a pull out grill on the bottom with a broiler on top of that under the flattop. The burger artisan could move that contraption up and down and in and out with a handle with a lever on it that let the grill swing free. 

When you got in line, you had to decide what to order. The entire menu:

Burger
Ham
Tuna Salad
Egg Salad

The sandwiches were served on thin slices of either rye or egg bread, made especially for Alban, by a local bakery. When I spoted the name of the bakery making its very early daily delivery, I went there because they had to be master bakers. They weren't. Their bread was worse than super market bread but the stuff they made for Alban was custom and it was his recipe. The slices were 16" by 9", sliced thin on a deli slicer. The burgers came in two sizes, 1/3# and 2/3# served on the same eggy bun, always toasted perfectly. The entire time for making a sandwich from start to frying it on the flat op in a pool of butter with a flat weight pressing it down, the weight sized to match the bread perfectly, was maybe 3 minutes. The burgers were cooked top and bottom simultaneously so ordered medium rare, they took 3 to 5 minutes.

They had their meat custom grown in Colorado to spec. They used only the chuck, delivered in the morning every day they were open and ground on site. When I was really accepted as a regular, Alban even told me the restaurants that bought the rest of his cows for fancy $30 steaks. This is 1973 so $30 was a big drop of green! But a 2/3# Cassels with the salad bar and a big lemonade was about $5. My mom took me there once before I turned 16 and when I got to high school and had friends who had cars, we would cut school to go to Cassell's as it was open Monday thru Friday 11 am 'til they ran out. 

But the real genius was the ordering system. The gruff guy taking orders would point and say 'whatta ya have?' It was more an accusation than a question. You had to answer with no hesitation or be pushed aside for a regular to explain the system to you. Each item was numbered. 21 was a plain 1/3# burger and 31 was 23. *2 meant Swiss. *3 American. And so on. You knew you were a boring regular when the guy taking your order would say you are always 31 medium. Live a little! They all knew I ate most everything but American cheese and egg salad, so I would be greeted with 'here comes trouble' but I never messed up my orders so I was allright. 

Sandwiches came on an oval platter. Burgers on a square one. So when you ordered, you got a plate put down on the counter. There were strips of hand cut butcher paper in boxes and the rest of your order was coded. If you had a burger, the temp was pink for medium rare, blue for rare, brown for medium. I believe there was a graveyard out back for anyone who ordered their burger more than medium. If you did, you got medium rare no matter what. The strips went on one side of the plate for 1/3# and the other for 2/3#. Cheese was at the back of the plate, pink for Swiss and blue for American. Everything needed for burgerperfection with a plate and 2 strips of paper.

For a sandwich, on one side of the platter, it was pink for ham, blue for tuna. I assume that brown was egg salad but I never saw one ordered. If you wanted your sandwich grilled, you got a pink strip on the other side. Bread was indicated by a paper strip at the back of the plate. No strip was rye, the only real choice.  Burgers were stacked separately than sandwiches. 

When the grill was empty, the cook would come and collect a stack of plates. The oldest order was on the bottom. So he would put his hand on top of the stack and and flip it so all the plates were face down and the oldest was on top. Say the burger grill was empty. He could count out the burger strips and know how many 1/3 and 2/3 he needed on the grill. He knew the temps again by counting another part of the pile. The grill tilted so rare was at the front, medium rare in the middle and medium at the top, closest to the upper flame. A shake of salt and pepper mix out  the dredge was all that touched the burger except the cheese added half way thru cooking. All the burgers cooked at the same time, no matter what temp you ordered because of the design of the grill. When the grill was just about fully cooked, the cook guy spread out the plates with the paper and everything was offloaded in perfect order. I never got something other than what I ordered. Not once. And nothing ever was less than perfect. I think any cook who made a mistake after their first day got shot and put out back in the cemetery along with those who insisted on well done burgers.

They called out your number and temp and you grabbed the plate or platter for a sandwich. And then you went to the salad bar. iceburg, sliced onions, none of this grilled onion shit. Yellow mustard made from powder every day. But the star, the best of all was homemade potato salad. it was creamy, spiked with chopped pickle and a ton of horseradish. It brought tears to the eyes like a bottle of Gold's at Passover. 

Drinks were bottled soda and homemade lemon aid and iced tea. They prepped in the morning starting at 5 am {you could go by to see the process, we would go after all night poker broke up, pass by Cassells to watch before going for Chiu Chou noodles in China Town. When they ran out they ran out. If you went late, say 3 o'clock and were standing in line you might hear the mournful cry, no more 2/3# burger and you were eating something else. They would cut off the line when the ends of the prep was in sight. And when everyone was thru ordering, there would just be enough left for family meal.

There was a patio and an indoor dining area. When your food was ready, you would go out and wait for a spot to open. There were two Latina's with brooms and trash bag to clear and clean spots as they opened. if you lingered you would get told to move your culo in Spanish once, then poked with the broom. More than once, the Cemetery.  but the whole operation was set up so that your seat magically appeared as you came with your food. Alban was a genius. And I don't ever remember any staff quitting. 

Alband rules: Never had fries: They are a world of their own. Never had ketchup. Nothing ever changed. Nothing. Except Alban grew older as time went by. 

Downtown redevelopment closed the Original Cassell's. The original Cassels was actually his second place. His first, just Cassels had to move as his legend grew. He said that was it, no more. A few years later someone convinced him to reopen on Beverly in a more high falutin' neighborhood. But Alban couldn't recreate the magic and the black guys took over the business. They recreated the magic but I guess the money part was too hard to make a go of it. Instead of lines with 50 or 100 people waiting {that would take no more than 30 to 45 minutes to clear} they had lines of 10 at peak hours. They sold to their developer for funding and he had visions of a chain. The 4 black guys took their money and left after a very short time. Apparently they did well for themselves. The new place closed in ignominy with people asking what is the deal with Cassel's. It's just a burger!

Sort of like people asking what's the big deal with this Mikey Angelo guy.. Didn't he just pain ceilings and walls? 

Proust>The Madeleine = Dean>The Original Cassell's

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Q: Service and Tipping

I note that Danny Meyer has announced that his places will revert to tipping when they reopen. My prediction is that ending tips in the US won't happen unless, like in Europe, everyone has basic needs met, especially health insurance and a guaranteed retirement. And maybe not then.

A: Tom Sietsema

New York restaurateur and hospitality maven Danny Meyer famously ended tipping only to re-start it following the pandemic. Closer to home, I've noticed more players -- Thamee in DC, Flamant in Annapolis --  incorporating hospitality ("living wages") into the price of a meal, and I applaud the thinking.

As I've said before, Americans are used to cheap food. The pandemic, which has exposed all sorts of cracks in the system, is changing that. Restaurant prices are going to go up

What does @Tom Sietsema mean?  Will restaurants finally go to a tip-free system?  But the example of Danny Meyer is going the other way.

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Q: Wait staff turnover

I've been to many restaurants since Virginia's phase one on May 15th (yes, numerous restaurants have been serving meals at tables for three months now...) but I have noticed a trend. I don't recognize many of the staff. Help wanted signs are everywhere. Several restaurants, at least in Alexandria, have held job fairs -- trying to hire employees. What is your take? Are you hearing wait staff have moved to different industries? Decided unemployment checks were more than regular take home pay? Staying home and deciding against a paycheck? I am really curious about what I see as a massive turnover in the industry.

A: Tom Sietsema

More than a few chefs told me they had a hard time retaining or hiring staff when unemployment checks were $600 a week. That may well change now. But another consideration is safety. For a variety of reasons, not every server, cook or manager is comfortable working in a public space. They may have pre-existing conditions, elderly dependents, etc. 

Economists says the $600 unemployment benefit does not deter job seeking.

I dunno...

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7 minutes ago, DonRocks said:

Anyone who counts on that $600 lasting long-term is being short-sighted.

I don't think anyone is thinking long-term.  You can get $600 a week to not work, so why work if the work pays less than that (and you put yourself at risk)?  When the benefit runs out, you can always go back to your old job or get a new job.  There's not a shortage of lower-wage jobs.  

I guess one way to reconcile the findings is that if you were making more than $600 a week before, then you would keep looking for a new job.  If you were making less than $600 a week before, then why work when you can get more not to work.

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16 minutes ago, Ericandblueboy said:

I don't think anyone is thinking long-term.  You can get $600 a week to not work, so why work if the work pays less than that (and you put yourself at risk)?  When the benefit runs out, you can always go back to your old job or get a new job.  There's not a shortage of lower-wage jobs.  

I guess one way to reconcile the findings is that if you were making more than $600 a week before, then you would keep looking for a new job.  If you were making less than $600 a week before, then why work when you can get more not to work.

I saw the Yale study and had the same initial thought - why did they get those results?  It's not the latter explanation, by the way, 2/3rds of people got more than their prior income in unemployment benefits ($600 federal plus the normal state benefit), and the result was statistically significant, meaning 2/3rds would have been irrational in the short term.  I think what they're actually seeing is people thinking longer term combined with states that threatened to withdraw benefits if people didn't return to work.

Anecdotally, servers and others locally are absolutely making the rational, short-term decision to stay home and accept more money.  I've spoken to several restaurant owners that are dealing with this - I should add that most completely sympathize with the servers, who would see their actual earnings when they return plummet not just from the benefit level but even from their actual earnings prior to Covid.  My guess is that they'll have to return in the absence of a benefit extension and we'll see a second leg down in consumer spending.  I haven't heard this about cooks, though, interestingly.  Perhaps it's the tips (and previously higher take home pay) that make the difference?

I do think though that it's important to remember that all this behavior is exactly why experts argued for larger unemployment benefits - to incentivize people to stay home to flatten the curve.  Framing benefits as a percentage of prior earnings would have worked at a lower cost, but the unemployment systems simply didn't allow for it.  Sometimes policies are whatever works and is implementable rather than what's the absolute best way to accomplish something.

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On 8/5/2020 at 2:52 PM, zgast said:

I do think though that it's important to remember that all this behavior is exactly why experts argued for larger unemployment benefits - to incentivize people to stay home to flatten the curve.  Framing benefits as a percentage of prior earnings would have worked at a lower cost, but the unemployment systems simply didn't allow for it.  Sometimes policies are whatever works and is implementable rather than what's the absolute best way to accomplish something.

These are two very important points. It was and remains important that some workers, especially those who are immunocompromised or those living with immunocompromised persons, do not have to make the difficult decision between providing for their families or risking their health. Were there better ways to do that as @zgast mentioned? Certainly. However, state unemployment systems would not be able to implement anything more complex that plus or minus an amount. Twelve state unemployment systems still run on cobol. Heck, the $600 on top of regular benefits and expanding the pool of people eligible to receive benefits (two seemingly simple adjustments) in addition to the sheer number of people applying for unemployment caused enough chaos. The extra $600 is gone now so we will see what happens with both the unemployment numbers and the number of COVID-19 cases. 

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Q: Very Small Wine Pour - what to say?
Hi Tom! My husband and I experienced a situation recently I'd like your take on. We recently dined outside at a fairly well-known restaurant. The experience was lovely, except for one thing - we ordered two glasses of sparkling wine and the pours were TINY. I'm talking maybe 4oz, but probably closer to 3.5. The waiter poured the wine, and pulled the bottle back as the fizz decreased, and honestly, I thought he was going to pour more but he didn't. My husband and I were pretty shocked, but didn't say anything - I know these places are struggling. I guess the question is - would you have said something, and how would you have phrased it? I honestly can't think of what to say without sounding like a total jerk - and again, totally get that these places are trying to survive so I'm trying to be lenient in letting things go more often. I'd love to hear your perspective! Thanks!

A: Tom Sietsema
Generally, a wine pour is five or six ounces, an amount that can appear small in large stemware. Next time this happens, you can ask ,nicely, "I'm just curious, what's the typical pour here?"

 

A proper pour of champagne and sparkling wine is 4 oz.  I know this because I've thought the pour is stingy when I had champagne in Europe and I looked it up.

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11 minutes ago, Ericandblueboy said:

A proper pour of champagne and sparkling wine is 4 oz.  I know this because I've thought the pour is stingy when I had champagne in Europe and I looked it up.

It is, but most places in the US do pour 5-6 oz, so 4 oz looks stingy, as you said.  

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So someone with a small appetite (and apparently no appreciation for dine dining) has suggested it's okay to order from the kid's menu.  That apparently touched a nerve with @Tom Sietsema and his response invoked Homer!

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Okay, I was trying to be diplomatic earlier. But the bottom line is, restaurants are businesses, they need to make a profit and having an adult order from the cheap end of the pool, for whatever reason, isn't going to keep the lights on. If you're not that hungry, don't go out! (Okay, that was a rant there.) But can you imagine if more than a few adults consistently ordered from the kids' menu? Jeebus.

 

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Meg:

A group of friends have been dining out, for outdoor seating, during the pandemic. Had a very disappointing experience at Cooper's Hawk Winery & Restaurant in Reston. Made a reservation through Open Table and indicated an outdoor seating in the comment box. Upon arrival, was told that the patio was not open and that restaurant won't open - even though the day was sunny and in high 50/low 60. I understand the decision is the restaurant's but disappointed that restaurant did not bother to call or text in advance to indicate that there would be "no outdoor dining" option. If informed we would not have wasted time and effort to get there. Rather than giving an apology (e.g., we apologize for the lapse in informing you in advance), the restaurant's prerogative was to cancel the Open Table reservation, presumably to head off any negative review as Open Table always sends a post dining survey rather than owning up to its mistake. Seems like a bad management policy as I will not patronize a place that does not respect customer's time and plan.

Tom Sietsema:

The restaurant failed you, for sure.

This poster's bitch-fest is so wrong and @Tom Sietsema just enabled her.  As a frequent user of Opentable, I know how it works.  If you want an outdoor table, you can specify it in your search by checking the box that says "Outdoor" under seating options.  And when you make a reservation, you have to select an outdoor table.  You cannot make an indoor reservation and just put you want an outdoor table in the comment box.  

Same with Resy and Tock - each reservation time states specifically if it's dining room or outdoor.  

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11 hours ago, Ericandblueboy said:


 

This poster's bitch-fest is so wrong and @Tom Sietsema just enabled her.  As a frequent user of Opentable, I know how it works.  If you want an outdoor table, you can specify it in your search by checking the box that says "Outdoor" under seating options.  And when you make a reservation, you have to select an outdoor table.  You cannot make an indoor reservation and just put you want an outdoor table in the comment box.  

Same with Resy and Tock - each reservation time states specifically if it's dining room or outdoor.  

I had lunch yesterday at Circa Foggy Bottom. I made an OpenTable reservation indicating "outside seating". We got there at noon and were seated immediately at a nice table on the patio. Unfortunately, the Foggy Bottom Metro has daily buskers. Yesterday, there was what I called a "wedding singer" belting out horrible songs, plus there was a guy playing the mandolin in front of the restaurant. The noise was too much. It made the outdoor tables unpleasant. We moved inside, which was quite empty and had a nice lunch. 

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On 3/3/2021 at 8:22 PM, Ericandblueboy said:


 

This poster's bitch-fest is so wrong and @Tom Sietsema just enabled her.  As a frequent user of Opentable, I know how it works.  If you want an outdoor table, you can specify it in your search by checking the box that says "Outdoor" under seating options.  And when you make a reservation, you have to select an outdoor table.  You cannot make an indoor reservation and just put you want an outdoor table in the comment box.  

Same with Resy and Tock - each reservation time states specifically if it's dining room or outdoor.  

As a counterpoint perhaps, I recently made a reservation at some place which I no longer remember, on an app which I no longer remember for an indoor table, but when I got the confirmation email, it was for an outdoor table.   This was in January and not in a warm spell, so I called the restaurant to try to get this changed, and the person on the phone basically said, "Yep, we have you down as inside, but the app doesn't allow the distinction" or something like that.   

Apologies for the fuzzy memory, but the gist of it was, I reserved an indoor seat, and was given an outdoor seat, but the restaurant knew what I actually selected.  So maybe the apps are not always as straightforward as they could/should be.  

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I don't always read the chat but sometimes there's gold in them hills.  In this case, a person read @Tom Sietsema's  review of Heirloom.  Said person apparently knew more about Heirloom than Tom and posed the following question:

Quote

 

Heirloom Review
Carson

As you might have seen in the comments to your recent review of Heirloom in Lewes, DE, many people mentioned that in response to negative reviews on Yelp and Trip Advisor, the owner of Heirloom comes roaring back like a furious, demented bully. Do you ever check reviews from the plebes before you write yours? (Serious question, not sarcasm.)

You always suggest that diners tell management during their meal if they have an issue with the food or service. But it seems one does that at Heirloom at their grave peril. According to reviewers, complaints or negative comments mean you are likely to be yelled at, have expletives hurled at you, roundly humiliated, called a liar, told to leave, and still be expected to pay the full bill for food you found inedible or wine you didn't order, all served in an 87 degree room.

Also, you are all in favor of pay equity and a living wage for restaurant staff. Did it not strike you as odd that the owner of Heirloom considers the occasional free taco or pizza from a local joint to be part of the compensation for kitchen staff? You laud the owner for providing one free trip to Charleston for staff to sample food, which is a total tax write-off for her, not part of a living wage for the employees.

Perhaps you were one of the lucky (majority) who had a great meal and had no issues to take up with the management. Or perhaps you were recognized. How can you be so certain that "She had no idea there was a critic at the table."? You've been doing this for many years. You think no restaurateur knows who you are? Especially one who allegedly goes to the trouble of using the internet to troll unhappy customers and write negative comments about them in their professional capacity.

 

 

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I thought Tom's answer was fine.  He wasn't aware that the owner went on Yelp and TripAdvisor and created a shit storm directed at anyone who said anything that wasn't a glowing rave about the place.  

If you're looking for some entertainment(?) scroll through some of the Yelp reviews and the owner's responses.  They are beyond bizarre.

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On 8/12/2021 at 7:48 AM, Bart said:

If you're looking for some entertainment(?) scroll through some of the Yelp reviews and the owner's responses.  They are beyond bizarre.

Wow, that was like a car wreck. I couldn't stop reading the owner's responses! She called one customer a douchebag!!

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Some hints for finding good food in unfamiliar environs:

1) Restaurants named for actual people tend to be worth checking out
2) Seek out anything unusual on the menu, like a hamburger on an Afghan menu or a Peruvian dish on an American list. There's usually a story (and deliciousness) behind it.
3) For suggestions from locals, try wine shops, book stores, antique shops and beauty salons.
4) A parking lot with lots of local license plates can be promising.
5) Know the right question to ask. "What's the best restaurant?" often leads to something fancy. "Where would you eat if you'd been away a year?" tends to garner more personal spots.

 

1) No clue.  I can't remember the last time I ate at a restaurant actually bearing a person's name.  Izakaya Seki is named after the chef - the only one I recall.

2) I would never order anything that sticks out like a sore thumb, in fact, I'd avoid that restaurant altogether.   

3) Never occurred to me to ask random people about food suggestions.  Most people aren't foodies and will give shit recco.

4) You probably end up at a chain restaurant.

5) But that doesn't mean it'll appeal to you.  

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Some asked for recommendations for places open Sunday nights, and this was a chatter's response:

Petworth Diner
 
11:40 a.m.
Kinship is open on Sunday nights.

This has to be @saf, right?!?!?!

When I saw "Petworth" and a Kinship fan, my first thought was @saf !!!

 

 

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On 7/5/2022 at 11:39 AM, Bart said:

This has to be @saf, right?!?!?!

When I saw "Petworth" and a Kinship fan, my first thought was @saf !!!

That was indeed me. (Had my husband been online, he would have said that before I did.)

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2 hours ago, Keithstg said:

A little surprised that Tom Sietsema (foolishly, IMO) decided to drop stars from his reviews and no discussion of it on Dr.com...

I don’t really read his reviews anyway but I would prefer stars so I don’t have to read his reviews.  In any case, his latest dining guide is atrocious.  I think Wapo needs a new critic.

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3 hours ago, Ericandblueboy said:

I don’t really read his reviews anyway but I would prefer stars so I don’t have to read his reviews.  In any case, his latest dining guide is atrocious.  I think Wapo needs a new critic.

While I understand his Fall Dining Guide is not supposed to be a "best of" list, I agree that some of the selections are odd. I live 5 minutes away from Himalayan Wild Yak, and ordered delivery once. I don't judge a restaurant on their take-out, but nothing made me want to try it again. Yak is a stone's throw from Ahso, which I think continues to be the best restaurant in the Ashburn/Leesburg area, bar none, but the place doesn't get a mention. 
 

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Let me count the [wayward] ways:

1.  Hitching Post.  Orly?  Fried chicken huh?

2.  Queen's English.  Hit or miss.  My last meal there was mostly misses.

3.  Andy's Pizza.  Decent pizza.  Not great pizza.

4.  Annie's Paramount Steakhouse.  WTF?

5.  Art and Soul.  Again, WTF?

6.  Artie's.  Third time, WTF.  Might as well include all the GAR group since they all serve pretty much the same food.

7.  Bar Chinois.  Not even close to being good. 

8.  Shilling Canning.  Never been.  Winner of the most boring menu for me.

There are many restaurants on the list that I have never even considered going because they just don't sound good or have no reputation for good/interesting food.

 

 

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11 hours ago, reedm said:

While I understand his Fall Dining Guide is not supposed to be a "best of" list, I agree that some of the selections are odd. I live 5 minutes away from Himalayan Wild Yak, and ordered delivery once. I don't judge a restaurant on their take-out, but nothing made me want to try it again. Yak is a stone's throw from Ahso, which I think continues to be the best restaurant in the Ashburn/Leesburg area, bar none, but the place doesn't get a mention. 
 

The best restaurant in Ashburn/ Leesburg is a very low bar, but Ahso is criminally underrated imo.

I think the "budget conscious" focus of the guide was a great idea. Tom just mostly forgot about the good food piece of it.

I read Tom's reviews, and am generally a fan. But no more stars is a massive cop-out.

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On 10/5/2022 at 4:51 PM, Ericandblueboy said:

I don’t really read his reviews anyway but I would prefer stars so I don’t have to read his reviews.  In any case, his latest dining guide is atrocious.  I think Wapo needs a new critic.

I would agree with this. I was shocked by some of his selections. 

On 10/5/2022 at 9:27 PM, Ericandblueboy said:

Let me count the [wayward] ways:

1.  Hitching Post.  Orly?  Fried chicken huh?

2.  Queen's English.  Hit or miss.  My last meal there was mostly misses.

3.  Andy's Pizza.  Decent pizza.  Not great pizza.

4.  Annie's Paramount Steakhouse.  WTF?

5.  Art and Soul.  Again, WTF?

6.  Artie's.  Third time, WTF.  Might as well include all the GAR group since they all serve pretty much the same food.

7.  Bar Chinois.  Not even close to being good. 

8.  Shilling Canning.  Never been.  Winner of the most boring menu for me.

There are many restaurants on the list that I have never even considered going because they just don't sound good or have no reputation for good/interesting food.

 

 

Art and Soul is right by my office and we don't even consider it when going there for lunch or dinner for work. We gave it another shot earlier this year, and have no cycled it back out of our rotation. This was the restaurant I was most shocked to see in there. 

I like Andy's Pizza quite a bit, I think it's very good, and I like that they sell by the slice. I have no problem with it being in there. 

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On 10/5/2022 at 4:51 PM, Ericandblueboy said:

I don’t really read his reviews anyway but I would prefer stars so I don’t have to read his reviews.  In any case, his latest dining guide is atrocious.  I think Wapo needs a new critic.

That's exactly the reason he got rid of the stars......to force people to read the review to get the true story he's trying to convey, rather than just look at the star rating and move on.

I liked the stars as well, but it gets messy when you are rating a super high end place on the same scale that you rate a tiny mom and pop place.

 

On 10/6/2022 at 7:28 AM, Keithstg said:

I think the "budget conscious" focus of the guide was a great idea. Tom just mostly forgot about the good food piece of it.

He was going for "value" this time.  He was trying to read the room I suppose.  Inflation, higher restaurant bills, lots of changes due to the pandemic, etc.

He had some $100+ places included because he felt they gave a lot of bang for the buck.

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4 hours ago, Bart said:

That's exactly the reason he got rid of the stars......to force people to read the review to get the true story he's trying to convey, rather than just look at the star rating and move on.

I liked the stars as well, but it gets messy when you are rating a super high end place on the same scale that you rate a tiny mom and pop place.

 

He was going for "value" this time.  He was trying to read the room I suppose.  Inflation, higher restaurant bills, lots of changes due to the pandemic, etc.

He had some $100+ places included because he felt they gave a lot of bang for the buck.

As attention spans shorten, it's anachronistic to think that people are interested in the "true story" without a summary bottom line.

Also obvious - small "mom & pop" places can be high end. See: Blacksmiths, Three; as one easy example.

I'd wager that while largely interested in shorter form content, most readers can calibrate the difference in one star for El Pollo Rico and one star for Art and Soul (examples only, no clue of what stars each had/ has).

Yeah...I understood the focus on value. He just missed the mark.

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Anyone read the chat this week?  He opened with this note about Mark Slater among others, but I don't understand what he's saying.  The link doesn't have any info on Mark.

 

The food world has lost of number of beloved DC-area figures recently, including wine master Mark Slater , cooking school founder François Dionot and baker Gerard Huet . I’m sharing links to some of their stories .

Since I haven't seen anything about it in DR.com, I'm assuming "lost" means left the DC area and not the worst case scenario.

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15 hours ago, Bart said:

Anyone read the chat this week?  He opened with this note about Mark Slater among others, but I don't understand what he's saying.  The link doesn't have any info on Mark.

 

The food world has lost of number of beloved DC-area figures recently, including wine master Mark Slater , cooking school founder François Dionot and baker Gerard Huet . I’m sharing links to some of their stories .

Since I haven't seen anything about it in DR.com, I'm assuming "lost" means left the DC area and not the worst case scenario.

Dave McIntyre posted this in his blog.  I only met Mark in person a few times but he struck me every time as just a genuine mensch.

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