Restaurants are like airliners: either they are similar to 99% of every airline company, or they are Southwest. They either take reservations or they don’t. Personally, I find restaurants that would prefer the cattle-call system that Southwest uses to be rather primitive, and usually employed by corporate restaurants. They would just rather open the doors and let the stampede of hungry bovine swarm the prime real estate that most in the industry would call “the good section”. If they’re going to do this, why not just set up a trough and let them eat at their leisure? Oh yeah, they have that – it’s called a buffet.

Reservations are crucial in a restaurant for many reasons. I wouldn’t even dare to bring my family out to a restaurant that didn’t have reservations. Walking in and trying to find two or three tables to push together to make a table large enough for eight can be a major chore. A group that size will end up waiting 30-40 minutes at 7:30 just on principle alone. Of course, some restaurants have tables that size that are saved for parties that large, but should a party that size not come in that shift, the server ends up getting the short end of the stick.

Also, reservations generally will let the rest of the restaurant know just how busy the restaurant floor is going to be that night. In a restaurant that has 40 tables and averages 120 covers a night, 15 reservations means that there are that fewer tables in the restaurant, leaving only 25 for walk-ins – the majority of the business a restaurant takes in. To the restaurant, 15 reservations means that the night is going to be rather busy. However, should there only be one or two reservations, the manager can make a decision of whether or not to keep a full staff and perhaps let some of his employees leave early to enjoy SIN night and get hammered by 8 pm.

Reservations are always a good idea and they can affect the customer, even if the customer is a walk-in. There was a recent TV show that paid a restaurant to let them pull a prank on the customers, telling them that every table in the restaurant was reserved, so they had to wait 45 minutes to an hour to be seated. The kicker was that every table in the restaurant was empty. Hilarity ensued as those customers threw a fit. One could take away something important from this situation, other than just a giggle: just because a table is empty doesn’t mean that it’s available.  Many times have customers argued with a hostess or manager because they see an open table that’s meant to be reserved for someone arriving 30 minutes later. The hostess isn’t going to change that reservation to please an angry customer. We’d much rather have one angry customer who had to wait 15 minutes, than having two angry customers, including the person who was smart enough to call ahead a reservation.

Think of it this way: a reservation is a way that a customer can say “I’ve decided when and where I’m eating tonight, so I don’t want to have to wait for a table when I get there even if it’s busy”. How great is that? It’s like being pushed through the velvet rope at a trendy Hollywood Club without sacrificing $100 to the bouncer, or performing some other dispicable act. Even the guy who looks like Bill Gates’ college-day mugshot can get a reservation.

With a possible book being published on the horizon and a confusion about the name of the blog, I’ve decided to rename the blog itself to make it easier for people to find and to relate. Since “You’re My Shadow Today” is nowhere in the website (current and future www.servernotslave.com), I’ve decided to rename the blog.

Friends and family have all suggested that I rename the blog (and pending book) to be “Server Not Slave”, since it’s so catching – and I tend to agree with them. It is rather catchy don’t you think?

Anyone with a link to the site on their blogroll, please go ahead and change the description to “Server Not Slave”.

Thanks to all for the support.

You don’t have to be Mike Caro to be able to tell if someone is bluffing you. You’re an adult, so you should be able to read someone’s response and body language and determine whether or not they are fibbing. Over the years we’ve been trained to be able to spot lies, but a child can be lied to in a complete, bellowing laugh and they’d believe you if you told them that the sky is blue because the smurfs can’t control their flatulence.

However, there are times where the ability to read a lie is important: accusing your philandering fiancee, catching murder suspects, your child tells you he did not put the dog poo on the white leather couch. All great reasons to be able to read a lie, but of course, this is a restaurant blog. So, no dog poo stories here. There are certain phrases and body language that your waiter uses to tell you what you want to hear so that you’re ultimately pleased with their performance, and since it is a top priority of mine to be as honest with my customers as possible, I’m going to educate you about these things.

It’s all good, baby

Everything in the restaurant is good. So, why do you ask your waiter if something is good or not? It’s not your waiter’s policy to deter you from ordering something. In fact, if a manager happens to walk by your waiter and hears him or her say “Oh, no, that’s not good. Don’t order that”, you won’t be seeing that waiter ever again. We’re going to tell you everything is good. What you need to pay attention to is the way your waiter responds to your inquiry. If they respond with either a quick “yeah, it’s good” or a long drawn out “yeeeeaahhh…. it’s good” coupled with the little side-to-side tilt of uncertainty, you might want to order something else. Other phrases to watch out for are “It’s very popular” and “you know, I haven’t had that dish before”. If you pick up that your waiter might be fibbing, go ahead and ask them if they’d recommend something else. I guarantee 100% that they will recommend something entirely different. I’ve always said to take as a maxim, “always trust the opinion of your waiter”. That is, unless you ask them if they “mind if you sit there for a while”.

If it ain’t broke, don’t order it

The cappucino machine is probably 8% of the time actually broken when your waiter tells you that it is. Of course, 64% of all statistics are made up on the spot just to prove a point, so the percentage of times that the machine is actually borked is probably closer to 12%. It really is just a moderate inconvenience to your waiter and is usually not worth the effort to your waiter for the extra $3.99 on the bill. These machines are notoriously slow to poor the espresso and it almost takes a Ph.D. in physics to get milk to froth properly (okay, that was an exaggeration. It’s probably a B.A. difficulty at the most). It takes more time to throw together a cappucino than it does to make hot tea (please, don’t comment about this, thank you). Plain and simple, we just don’t want to make it for you. No offense.

Patience, young padawan

It takes at least 6-8 months working in a restaurant to be able to accurately gauge how long food will take to make and reach your table. We do our best to time the food so that it reaches you in a timely fashion, but sometimes there can be things that will set back your food a couple minutes.

It will happen that your waiter lies to you in these situations, especially if it was their fault. Why? Do you enjoy taking blame when the ability to pay your bills is on the line? No, of course not.If your food is taking a seriously long time to reach your table, 20-30 minutes, then it probably is your waiter’s fault. I admit my humanity, there are times where I’ve forgotten to put in an order, but I will always do my best to pay extra attention to that table (bringing bread, drinks, offering a salad) to keep them occupied and not thinking about their food. But if you should ask your waiter why the food is taking so long and your waiter says “I’m not sure, let me go check for you”, then they are probably lying. Either they will come back with the food (because they forgot to deliver it), or they come back with a story about a kitchen mistake (passing the blame on).

If your waiter is worth their salt in that restaurant, they will know how that kitchen works and should be able to determine what’s going on and why your food is taking so long. Just like in any situation, the more details you get out of your waiter the more likely they are telling the truth. “I waited a bit too long to put in the order, trying to give you time to finish your appetizer and salad, but also because a medium-well done steak can take a little while, it just pushed the time back a little. It’ll be out in the next few minutes, I promise” is a lot better than “there was a kitchen mix-up, let me go check on it for you”.

I would apologize to my restaurant family for letting out the secrets, but you and I both know it’s for the best. Readers who read my blog end up being smarter customers, and smarter customers leave better tips. Don’t you agree?

Here is the next installment of Restaurant Nightmares. If you’d like your experience put on the site, email me your story, 250 words or less in one paragraph to Servernotslave@gmail.com.

The Mad Meat Man

Hi, so here is probably one of a servers worst nightmares. My friend and I both work at the same restaurant, it’s a Logan’s Roadhouse in Memphis, TN. He was waiting on this table of about 5 I think, and when the first guy got there he asked him if he could get a drink, well the guy says, “Why don’t you wait until everyone gets here before you start getting drink orders!” and believe me, it was not in a nice way at all! Well he decides to order and appetizer, he ordered nachos which we had run out of earlier that night, so he starts yelling about how he doesn’t want an appetizer then and how he’s going to tell Tammy, whom I assume he thought was our general manager who is not. So then when everyone finally gets there and orders ,about 15 min. later, the guy orders a steak and he says it’s tough so he makes a big scene and orders another, different steak. Well when the second one comes out, it comes out medium rare instead of medium, the guy takes the steak, tells my friend that he should throw it at the manager, then he goes into the kitchen yelling at the managers and anyone who will listen making a huge scene. They ended up comping the whole meal which was over 100 dollars, giving them all free dessert, the guy keeps yelling about how he’s going to call corporate and so on and so forth. The guy left about 5 dollars which was pretty ridiculous after not having to pay for anything, and making such a huge scene, they take all of the leftovers home with them as well, who knows why since, apparently, it was so terrible!

- IB, from n/a

The Breakfast Alcoholics

I was working at a high-end breakfast restaurant in a popular vacation town. It was not uncommon to have customers walk directly across the street from the bar at our five am open. A particularly sloshed party ordered mimosas, and after letting the host/manager know in case I needed backup, I politely informed them that we would not be serving them any alcohol. They were irritated, but didn’t press the point. Twenty minutes later, I was walking by their table with a tray of mimosas for another party (carried low as it wasn’t crowded and I was lazy), and one of the men turned in his chair and hit the tray up into my face. I wasn’t injured, but all the glasses were broken and I was covered in champagne and orange juice. I was rather stunned, but my wonderful manager flew across the dining room and let them know they had two minutes to leave the restaurant before he called the cops. He gave me the rest of the shift off.

- AC, from Maine

The Broke Caveman

There was a table of about 5-6 younger guys – I would say they weren’t quite 20 as none of them ordered any beers. But one of the guys I will never forget. He acted completely chauvinistic the entire time – talking down to me because I am a woman (which just irritates the crap out of me). He then orders the Porterhouse – the largest steak on the menu – and asks for it “very rare”. Even a bad steakhouse can cook a steak rare – it takes pretty much no effort at all. So they eat their first course and appetizers, and on come all of the meals. As I set the douche bag’s plate in front of him, he took on an almost “caveman” personality. Whereas everyone else was using their silverware and acting decent in public, this dude proceeds to pick up his porterhouse with his hands, and eat it like he hasn’t eaten in 10 years. However, after his first few bites he grabs my apron as I’m walking by to greet another table, and says that his steak is overdone. I thought he was kidding, until he nearly threw the plate at me. So I go back into the kitchen, tell the owner of the restaurant who was working on the line that night what happened, and we make him another porterhouse. Literally, the steak was cooked on one side for 15 seconds – maybe less – and then the same on the other side. It was still blood red on the outside for god-sakes. So I take the new plate out to the neanderthal, and he starts eating like a caveman again – but this time it was okay. It was totally disgusting. Then the table orders desserts and it’s then that I hear Mr. Loudmouth say that he’s paying for all of his buddies – he says it real loud so everyone at the other tables could hear him. When it comes time for the check….he conveniently “forgot” his wallet. He can’t pay for everyone let alone his own meal, and makes his friends all put together their measly allowences to pony up for the bill. Needless to say my tip was ziltch, but I had the satisfaction of watching that First Class Asshole walk out of the restaurant with his tail between his legs. That….was priceless.

- HJ, from n/a

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Welcome to the inaugural post of the weekly series called “Restaurant Nightmares”. Here, servers from around the country submit their own stories about the crazy things that have happened to them while working in the restaurant industry. I thank those that submitted stories for this week and continue to encourage more people to submit their stories to Servernotslave@gmail.com. So, here we go.

The seven-digit tip.

“Last night I was ready to leave work but I (a female) had a table of three guys that had been hitting on me since they came in & wanted to camp out. One had paid with a credit card so I had to wait for his slip before I could do my checkout & leave. The other two paid with cash, & there was none left on the table. After a couple minutes, I went over there to “strike up conversation” hoping to catch a glimpse of the slip so that I could enter my tip & bail……but he had it covered up. After a total of 45 minutes they left, with still no cash on the table, & I finally got the slip. On the tip line, he had left his PHONE NUMBER & yes no tip!!!!!!!!”

- QF, from Lexington, KY

White Chicken Chili

“In my fifteen years in the Restaurant Business, this is one of the more bizarre stories that have happened to me.  About five years ago I was a shiftleader and trainer at a casual  dining concept we all know well…  Picture stained wood, brass finishing, and non-sensical crap on the walls.  I had finished training this new server the day before, and the manager had asked me to keep an eye on him on his first busy Saturday night.  He had a two top, an elderly couple in their mid-seventies that seemed to be enjoying their dining experience.  About an hour after they had sat down and ordered a frantic busboy summoned me to the Men’s room.  There was diarrhea everywhere, on the toiletseat, on the floor and…  leading out the bathroom door and into…  THE DINING ROOM…  I followed the trail like Hantsel and Gretel and where did it lead me?  To the elderly couples table.  Apparently the gentleman was incontinent and had an “Accident,” that he trailed through the dining room.  The trainee looked panicked as we both watched in horror as the hostess who, in a rush to turn the table, cleaned the chair with no gloves…  After she was done crying I asked her why she didn’t at least use gloves to clean up the mess, and she told me that she thought that one of our bussers had spilled some, “White Chicken Chili!!!”"

-PM, from Virginia

The Voyeur Valet

“The most disturbing incident was conducted by a yet to be caught perpetrator that I named the Marauding Masturbator.  One entire side of the dining room comprised of booths with floor to ceiling windows that looked out on the drive into the parking lot.  A car could pull up to the windows and watch the guests. The Marauding Masturbator would pull up to one of the booths and while peering at the guests enjoying their 20oz cut of rib or stuffed lobster, he would begin playing with his thing.  He always got away before the cops arrived and no one managed to get a plate number or good description on the car.”

-MM, from n/a

I hope you enjoyed these stories, and look forward to next Sunday’s installment of Restaurant Nightmares, Part II.

You would blog too, if it happened to you.

Taking you way back with that one, but it was the funniest reference to a song I could come up with to discuss the subject of parties. Okay, keep in mind, this is a restaurant blog. I’m not talking about laser light shows and ravers, so let’s stay on the subject at hand.

Of course, I’m talking about large groups of people who come in to dine at the restaurant. We will generally consider anything over seven people to be a “party”, but at my particular restaurant, a “party” is anything that requires an entire room/section to be closed. Often they will have pre-set menus that have been discussed when they make the reservation. Parties in the restaurant shouldn’t be confused with banquets. It may be a corporate event, wedding rehearsal dinner, Nana’s 90th birthday, or even the occasional pharmaceutical sales meeting. Those medical meetings are the worst, and believe me, the subject they discuss often shouldn’t be done at a restaurant. There was once a party going on in the room next to my section and through the blinds on the doors I, and my customers, could see that the subject was – get this – vaginal diseases. Would I lie to you?  Why on earth would you have a “dinner” for nurses on vaginal diseases at a fine dining restaurant? Disgusting. But, I digress…

Parties are generally great. You’d come in, set up for the party, then wait around until they show up an hour and a half later. It’s a great way to catch up on some reading. When the people arrive, serve them drinks and water, take the orders – you get it all done in just a few short minutes. The interesting part is watching the kitchen churn out 40-50 small salads, soups, entrees and desserts while the rest of the restaurant has to wait behind it. Believe me, they don’t enjoy doing that. So, here is how it affects you, the customer:

When the party order – whether it’s 12 people or 120 people – comes in, the entire kitchen stops making food for the rest of the restaurant and kicks into overdrive to punch out the party order. What this means is that if you happen to put in your order right after a party, instead of waiting the normal 15 minutes for your food, you might find yourself waiting 30-40 minutes. Of course by then, you’ve already pretty much committed to dining at that restaurant, having ordered drinks and appetizers. So, what does this mean? You’re thrown on the back burner and unfortunately, the back burner is not some hidden kitchen in the back.

Since you’ve come to expect me to deliver insider information, I will tell you how to avoid this. Should you happen to notice large parties around the dining room, ask your waiter how far along they are in their meal. A waiter should be able to tell you the status of a large party, as they generally will be keeping tabs on it so they can judge the timing of their own tables. If they just sat down, it would be a good idea to order quickly, lest you find yourself behind their ticket. If they’ve already ordered, then you’re in the clear and should be able to enjoy your time at your leisure.

It’s just a little difficult to gauge the timing of your tables when a large ticket is about to fly into the kitchen. We do our best to time our tables’ food so that it comes out in a timely fashion, but those large parties throw a wrench into the works. As it has always been an recurring theme in my previous posts, don’t be afraid to ask your waiter what is taking your food so long. If you should happen to find yourself behind a large party ticket, be ready to wait a bit. Go ahead and ask for a bit more bread, salad, or drinks. But as always, be mindful and pay attention to your surroundings. You won’t find yourself complaining about how long the food is taking, and your waiter will appreciate not having to explain how parties work.

By the way, does anyone know of any good parties this weekend? No medical conferences, please.

I’m starting a new segment I’m going to call – if you couldn’t have guessed it already – “Restaurant Nightmares”. I want to hear about those crazy customers that come into your restaurant, the angry cooks behind the line, and the overall craziness that happens in a restaurant.

I encourage all my cousins in the restaurant industry to submit your restaurant-related horror stories to Servernotslave@gmail.com, and every week I will compile the best three stories I’ve received and put them into a new post for thousands of people to read.

Each submission must comply with the following terms:

• 250 words or less
• One paragraph
• They must be events that happened to you, not a co-worker.
• Cannot contain foul language, unless it is quoted and essential to the story.
• You must include your initials and where you are from.
• Please no stories from customers about poor service, etc.
• I don’t mean dreams you had, just your stories from the restaurant.

I look forward to reading your emails and relaying your horror stories for the rest of the world to read. Good luck, and have fun!

I wanted to first say that I really enjoy my job. It’s a great social setting, and I get to interact with a lot of people and I love the odd schedule.  Being a waiter certainly has changed my confidence level over the years, as I get comfortable talking to people and solving a lot of little problems. It has taught me a keen ability to micromanage under pressure, which is essential to being a successful professional, as well as a successful waiter.

Readers need to realize that what I write on this blog is not groundbreaking. This blog started out as just a place for me to vent, but it eventually molded into something that people really needed: a look in the mirror. There are very little legitimate places where people can speak their mind and be heard. It’s unprofessional to say exactly what you’re thinking to a customer of any kind. The problem is that people won’t change their habits unless someone mentions them. If I have helped just one person see how the way they act in a restaurant affects someone else and change that act, then this blog is successful in my eyes.

Many waiters all across the country think exactly the same way I do, although I have never spoken a single word with them. We can often think as a collective and unless you’ve worked in the restaurant industry, you probably won’t get it. However, if you do, I congratulate you.

Now for the walk down memory lane. For those new readers coming to “You’re My Shadow Today”, I thought I might go ahead and give you easy navigation around to my favorite blog posts of the past two years.

Parents, the restaurant is not your child’s playground – A message to parents who let their children run around a restaurant, making a mess because they dont have to clean it up.

Why is it rude to want to enjoy your night out? – Discussing the double standard that it’s rude to tell someone that they are being rude when you dine out.

It’s restaurant Q&A, boys and girls! – I discuss common questions servers get about the restaurant industry.

Happy Birthday. Here’s your cake. Now, choke on it! – I posted this one since I found that so many people were searching for “The Ryan’s Steakhouse birthday song” and finding my site.

What?! You’re Broke!? – I like this one because the Broncos reference.

I hope you enjoy these archived posts and continue to enjoy future ones as well.

In honor of my new Reader’s Digest devotees, I’ve decided to do my own “secrets your waiter won’t tell you”. I didn’t exactly look through the entire article, I just found myself as most people would do. To stay consistent with my writing style, and to make the post worth while, I’m going to not only tell you some of our secrets, but I’m going to teach you how to avoid them. Aren’t you lucky? Anyway, lets begin:

Ring Around The Rosie

If you ask for coffee and you question whether or not it’s a fresh pot, your waiter will – 9 times out of 10 – tell you that it is, indeed a fresh pot. He or she may not know if that is true, or they could just be lying straight to your face. So, I’m going to give you an easy way to tell. Most coffee mugs are that off-white color of porcelain. So, when you are given your mug of coffee, look at the edge of the coffee that touches the mug. The center of the coffee should be a very dark brown or even close to black. However, the ring of coffee that actually touches the mug should be a much lighter brown. You really should be able to see a difference in color between the coffee touching the mug and the coffee in the center. If you can’t see a difference, then the coffee has most likely been sitting out for a while. Besides, you may not even get that “regular” coffee you ordered if there isn’t any prepared in the back. I’ll buy your dinner if you can taste the difference.

No Sugar Tonight in My Tea

We, as waitstaff, hate when customers order hot tea. Really? Hot Tea? Are we in England? Do you want some chips with your fish, Guv’nah? We in the states drink coffee. I can’t tell you how annoying it is to make hot tea. Every restaurant presents their hot tea differently, but every way to do it is much more annoying than putting coffee in a mug and putting it on a saucer. You’re not pretentious, are you? Order coffee like the rest of the country.

O, Sole Alfredo

Like I mentioned in the RD article, if you order chicken alfredo, it tells me two things: one, you aren’t adventurous and two, you don’t eat out often. Restaurants put chicken alfredo on the menu because it’s a recognizable flavor, it’s easy to make and cheap, and we can charge you an arm and a leg for it. Hell, my fine dining restaurant serves chicken alfredo and our main protein is seafood. You know how much we charge for pasta, grilled chicken, cream and cheese? $19. In fact, please order the alfredo. the restaurant will love you for increasing their profit margin and I’ll thank you for increasing mine, instead of you ordering a caesar salad.

Fry Me To The Moon

Since so many people enjoyed reading my previous post, “‘Beaten and Bloody’ or ‘Burnt to a Crisp‘”, I’ll give you another secret about steak. Should you happen to be one of those annoying folk that like to come into a restaurant 30 minutes before closing, don’t order a steak. In previous restaurants I’ve worked at, I’ve seen chefs be so angry that they have stick around 20 minutes longer to cook your steak that they’ve actually dropped the steak in the deep fryer so it will cook faster and they don’t have to clean the grill again. But if you insist on ordering steak that late, if your steak comes out quickly and with a reddish tinge to it, you’ve been deep fried.

Frozen “Fresh” Fish

The fish is always fresh, and we got it delivered this morning, so stop asking.

I hope you enjoyed these few secrets. I love your comments, so continue to leave them. In fact, if I continue to get such great response, I might just compile these stories into book form and quote some of the best comments! What do you guys think of that?