Fun fact.

Plus.

1.

Does not equal two when discussing reservations.

Our bar was booked tonight.

Saturday in August booked.

Fairly tight turns. Everything needing to move.

There was no room for error tonight.

So.

When Beverley walked in for her 1 top reservation at 5:45 saying she was 2 people I panicked.

Uh. Oh.

I explained that she only booked 1.

She says she booked 1. Her friend booked 1. What was the problem?

Anyone want to guess?

Yes. Not a problem. I had both reservations.

It was only a problem if they wanted to sit together.

She seemed perplexed.

I said, Give me a second.

I Looked. And looked.

And realized I could seat them together if they were up in 60 minutes.

I tell her this.

She agrees.

I clarify.

She seems confused.

I explain that I said the same thing a week ago and the two ladies stayed five hours.

She promises.

I seat her.

Her friend arrives ten minutes later.

I tell him what we’ve agreed to.

He agrees. He’s a regular.

He actually left before her.

She left two minutes late.

Whew!

Crisis averted.

Fun fact.

On Thursday’s there is sports balls on tv.

How do I know this?

Because Joe watches said sports balls while cooking. He also talks about said sports balls. And something about fantasizing about quarterbacks and tight ends.

Joe is our executive sous chef. He’s also the guy who got me the job. We used to work together elsewhere.

Also our kitchen is set up so all the chefs have a clear view of three large screen TVs. They always know the score.

So.

Tonight I asked Joe a vague question about the game tonight. I was interested because the bar was crazy booked.

He said yes it was expected to be a good game.

So I took his ambiguous answer to my ambiguous question and ran with it.

I proceeded to tell people all night the bar was booked because everyone was coming in to watch the expected great game tonight being played by The Patriots.

I probably said this 15 times.

This is a long way of saying that if the people didn’t know I was gay…

they do now.

Well. Well. Well.

Guess who walked through the front door tonight.

Remember the bad review I get three or so weeks ago.

Remember the guy who publicly claimed he’d never be back.

Remember how he said I was an asshole.

Yeap.

Rolled in promptly for the 730 reservation at 7:55.

Pretended not to know me. Tried to engage the bartender about the less than friendly host at the door. The host who actually went out of the way to make sure you and your friends were able to sit together. The host who only said hello when you entered.

Yeah.

That guy. Sporting his reddest of red hats. On backwards of course. Guess what was written on the front of the hat?

It clearly told us everything we needed to know about him.

And of course.

Nothing was right.

Somehow, my stellar bar staff who waits on more people than any other persons in the building made not 1, not 2, but 3 mistakes.

I don’t buy it.

They also stayed forever when we should have been on our way home at 9:30.

We’ll see if he writes another review.

PS. He didn’t touch me tonight. But he did rub his hand down the shoulder of the server who sat him. She was not amused.

My posts have become very popular with the team at work. They get very excited when they make the evening news. They also like to share the wealth. Twice tonight someone came up to tell me the insanity that was their table.

And by the end of the night I had a yellow pad sheet full of notes.

I just needed to choose tonight’s topic.

When what to my wondering eye should appear?

I should say…who?

Remember everyone’s favorite post from last week about the two girls and the gent who stayed for five hours after promising to leave?

Yes.

Not the girls.

But the gent. We’ll call him Stan.

He arrived for his 6:15 reservation with his brothers. He didn’t have on his hat but it was definitely him.

I didn’t know till later but for both of his last visits he was difficult.

He starts off the same.

They didn’t like the stools they were assigned to. After last week there is no way they’re getting moved. Stool 1,2,3 by the men’s room.

Perfect.

In the following hour he goes out twice to smoke. Only it wasn’t cigarettes. He came back in with a more skunky smell.

He also refuses to order. It’s now 7:30. We’ve sat all but two tables and he tells the bartender he’s going to wait another hour since we don’t close till 8:30.

David, the bartender lets me know this. I tell him to let them know they have till 7:45. Then it will be too late.

It was soon after that the last table comes in. Two attractive men, two outrageously stunning women. I’m waiting for their table to be bussed so I can seat them.

When guess who should appear? Stan.

He see’s the girls.

And if I directed what happened next in a play you’d say this is ridiculous.

He appears in the doorway.

Sees the girls.

He locks his gaze on the taller of the two girls. He never looks away. He takes about 90 seconds longer than he needs to, never looking away even as he exits to smoke again.

About three minutes later he returns.

The whole thing is repeated. Creepily so.

He goes back in.

The table waiting is seated.

About 30 minutes later I notice that Stan isn’t at the bar and I see him coming from the dining room.

Hmmm.

Mental note to watch him.

A few minutes later. He’s gone again.

A few minutes later he appears from the dining room again.

Hmmm.

A server comes looking for me to give me his checkout.

He lets me know that Stan is hanging out at the wait stand.

Talking to the female staff.

I head over to the wait stand and find out he’s talking to them but seems innocent enough.

In my opinion, 45 year old men don’t hang out at wait stands if they are innocent enough.

That changes in about 30 minutes.

He singles out one server and is having a hard time getting her subtle hints to leave her alone.

By now it’s approaching 9:00. Stan is still here. We are waiting on a table to leave.

The server comes over to give me her checkout and I invite her to sit down with me. There are now four of us at the table.

As soon as the server sits down, guess who is at the table.

Stan.

He is having trouble talking.

She asks if she can help him.

He asks if he can get a ____. He couldn’t finish and begins to mime a box with his hands.

The server looks at him and dryly says, do you need a to to go box?

We all snicker.

He finally gets out that he wants a slip of paper. I fetch him one.

It’s clear he wants her number but is being blocked by six staff members.

He’s not happy that he’s talking to me and not the server.

He’s really unhappy when she, without a word excuses herself.

Now it’s me and two servers and two bartenders looking at him like what do you want now?

He stutters.

He fumbles.

He’s lost.

Finally he walks away.

The whole thing was creepy.

He leaves.

Finally.

One of our servers leaves immediately and phones to let us know he’s still in the parking lot.

I go out but don’t see him. Only employee cars out there.

We all finish up.

I make the remaining staff exit together.

So here’s the thing.

Stan’s first visit. Normal.

Second visit he stayed for five hours and tried to pick up a woman at the bar.

Tonight he’s creepy. Rapey.

BUT.

He never really crossed the line.

It’s like when you know an employee is stealing.

You can’t fire them until you catch them.

I feel like I can’t ban him until he crosses a line. But it also scares me that he’ll get handsy or cross a big line.

That being said.

I know who he is. I know his first and last name. I know to watch him. I know to alert the staff to his behavior.

Hopefully things will never come to a more serious situation.

Hopefully.

No one.

I mean no one.

No one is impressed when a server doesn’t write down the order.

There.

I said it.

Tonight I joined four of my all time favorite co-workers to toast one of them who is moving to South Carolina.

These women made my life tolerable during my first bout of New England resort employment.

Rachel and Brenda were my marketing geniuses who kept me in line when it came to all things marketing. I was the best Facebook admin when I worked there. Booking my posts weeks in advance.

Sonja booked and organized all of our 50k buyout weddings and made them a success even when we pushed back.

And when I screwed up the checkbook or used my company credit card to pay for my dry cleaning because my card and the company card were both blue I called Alyssa Swenson.

These fabulous people kept me sane.

And unfortunately, Sonja has decided to take a job in the south.

Tonight I coached her in how to tell someone to fuck off by perfecting her very sweet Bless Your Heart.

Long set up.

So we arrive at the restaurant and are greeted by a very competent, very nice server.

And she takes our drink order.

And doesn’t write it down.

And she brings back everything correctly.

And she takes our food order. And with how confused she seemed we had no idea what we’d get.

But it was all correct.

Then another drink order.

Again correct.

But it caused me sooooo much anxiety because servers aren’t always that good at it.

As a GM I have a steadfast rule that you MUST write down your orders. Or at least pretend to.

When I served I wrote everything. If it wasn’t on my pad you weren’t getting it.

I still function that way.

If you need a day off or a reservation you better make sure it’s written down because I’m not going to remember it.

We all discussed our servers lack of a pen tonight and the stress it caused. We all agreed she was doing great. We didn’t test her though by asking for separate checks.

So remember.

No one is impressed.

Write the order down.

And Sonja we’ll all miss you.

We’ve talked about reservations before.

This is a refresher course.

About three weeks ago I had a message on the machine requesting a large party reservation.

I called them back.

Turns out they were a local car dealership looking for a place to host an employee gathering.

Great. I’d be glad to help.

They’ll be 14 people.

We have a steadfast policy that the most people we can do in one seating is 12 people.

Every restaurant has their maximum.

For us it’s 12. For several reasons.

We’ve established that any more than 12 slows down the kitchen way too much.

When your average restaurant plans a menu they make sure their items are spread between multiple cooking stations.

Ovens get 6 items. Sauté gets 6 items. Salads get 6 items. Fry 6 items. No one person cooks it all.

When you are a steakhouse. The grill has 16,452 items. Salad has 3.

There truly is a limit to how many steaks we can cook at one time.

And for us. With the rest of the restaurant cranking, 12 is our max table.

The other reason we restrict seating, is that our semi private dining rooms max out at 12. So we can only put 12 people at one table. If I seat 14 we are seating two 7 tops and it’s better for revenue to seat two 12’s not two
7’s.

Long way of saying I told him we couldn’t accommodate him.

He asked what the most we could do was.

I said 12.

He decided to make the reservation for 12 and said he’d figure it out.

And how did he figure it out?

Last night when the party arrived we didn’t count them. There were just a lot of people in our lobby

So we get their table ready. I send them off.

And 30 seconds later the food runner who sat them is back to inform me that they don’t have enough chairs.

Because how many people showed up?

14.

I’m annoyed.

I follow her back to the table.

Where I explain that the table can only comfortably seat 12. No they can’t spread to the table next to them.

The food runner gets two chairs.

I leave.

They end up squishing.

13 of them were annoyed. The only person who was remotely nice about it was the guy who made the reservation.

He also paid the check which was good for the server.

But seriously. Who does that?

Hi.

Can I get you something to drink other than water?

Thus began dinner tonight for table 25 waited on by a server we’ll call Lexie. Because, that’s her name.

The mother and father ordered wine, the daughter a paloma.

And this is where things went astray.

Lexie, ever the excellent server, asked for the daughter’s ID.

Lexie was informed that the daughter didn’t have an ID but did have her vaccination card which had her birthday on it.

Her mother piped up, and said plus we are her parents.

To which Lexie, ever the professional, explains that being her parents doesn’t help, and a vaccine card is not a state or federally issued photo ID.

And that was the end of table 25’s good time.

They became angry, refused to engage, and basically shut down.

So here’s some information for those in the know. I can’t speak for every state, but in Maine you must have an ID to drink.

End of story.

Even if you are 102 and older than Moses if I ask for your ID and you don’t have one legally I can’t serve you.

Also, it is illegal to serve anyone in Maine under the age of 27 without first seeing an ID.

So once this young lady admitted that she did not have a legal ID she could not be served.

Also, the Idea that dining with her parents somehow makes it legal is fucking stupid. Can she rob a bank in the company of her parents? Can she do meth in the company of her parents?

And stop taking the law out on your server. She is not a legislator. She is not making state policy.

She literally just wants to pay her bills.

Table 25 became visibly angry because of the law.

And then very graciously tipped 13 bucks on a 130 dollar check because of the law.

And essentially let their daughter’s inability to get a drink ruin their evening.

I spent the time from 7:30 to around 11:00 tonight trying to find a topic for tonight’s post.

It was a quiet night. A mundane night. Nothing out of the ordinary. No one upset. Only one recook right at the end of the night. We cook steaks there’s always one or two a night.

I carry a piece of paper around with me. I take notes on things I see that need to be addressed with the staff. Stack your dishes neatly in the dish area. Use a tray for drinks. Remember to let the host know when your tables are reset. Don’t pull the candles off the table until everyone is gone.

I also take notes on the crazy things our guests do. If I don’t, I never remember to write about them.

I have a folder with these papers in them. Probably 60+ pages. With organized notes. With scribbles.

Some don’t even make sense anymore.

Tonight’s paper had three notes on it. All about servers. Nothing about guests.

And I was contemplating this, when a server walks up to give me his check out. This server, we’ll call him Bob, because that’s his name, was the last to leave. His 6 top had the full experience. Apps, entrees, drinks, wine, and the subject of my post tonight: after dinner coffee and tea.

Specifically tea.

In the history of restaurants, both past and present, no one, and I mean no one has invented a way to execute hot tea in a streamlined, easy manner.

And I do mean no one!

Tonight’s 6 top ordered 3 hot teas.

One hot tea takes forever. 3 is an eternity.

So here is what happens when you say you want a hot tea.

First you have to get them to select a flavor, which often means bringing over the tea box.

And in the history of the world the restaurant never has the flavor they want.

Then the server has to find a tea pot.

No restaurant in the history of restaurants has enough. There is always a struggle to find them.

If you find a tea pot, you can’t find a lid, you can’t find a creamer, there aren’t lemons cut, there are no spoons.

Next they’ll only drink the tea if you have Splenda but all you have is sweet n low and equal.

Before you protest, that this is a supply issue, I promise it’s not. I could bring in 12 cases of tea pots tomorrow and when table 36 orders tea tomorrow there will be 2 pots, no lids, only earl grey, not 1 spoon, and no trays to be found anywhere.

At my last restaurant we used loose leaf tea. But the tape always came off the container so no one ever knew what flavor was what.

Two restaurants ago we used fancy China tea pots, but the heat from the dishwasher would crack them.

Another restaurant had a million pots but absolutely no lids.

Even when I did corporate restaurants with super casual service there were never any of the silver hot water pots.

If you ask a server what the worst thing someone can order is they are going to say hot tea.

Seriously folks ask your server friends.

My server friends on here please confirm what I’m saying.

HOT TEA IS THE FUCKING WORST.

That is all.

PS. I’m thankful for mundane days, but I know that if they were all mundane you wouldn’t be reading this.

Some days are a three post day.

Today we received the following comment:

This was the second time I’ve been to your restaurant and I really am impressed with the entire experience. That said my daughter ordered the Salmon and I have to say it was a disappointment. I had the Shrimp which was fantastic and my husband ordered the Swordfish which he said was delicious. The Salmon was very boring, I’m surprised it passed the taste test to be placed on the menu, it just was NOT up to the standards of the other dishes we enjoyed. May I suggest a Cedar Plank Salmon?? We have Cedar plank salmon at least three times a month and I can tell you everyone we serve it to says it’s the best Salmon they have ever eaten. The marinade is: 1/3 cup oil, 1/3 soy sauce, 1Tb Ginger minced, 1 garlic clove minced and two scallions chopped. Soak the board for an hour before placing on grill. Once the board cracks which takes 20 mins or so put the fish on and cook. Takes about 25/30 min. Do yourself a favor and try this recipe. I guarantee the chef will love it! If nothing else then whoever is reading this will now have the worlds best Salmon Recipe! If I were the owner of Lost Fire I would take the current Salmon recipe OFF the menu, it doesn’t Doesn’t deserve be there. If I have anything else negative to say it would be about the deserts. I had the Bread pudding and previously had the Tre Leches cake, while both were good, neither made me want to order them again. A restaurant of this quality with prices this high should “wow” with every dish. Now, would I recommend your restaurant?? Absolutely! But with the disclaimer that the dishes were quite inconsistent.

WOW.

So let’s start with the salmon.

Our salmon is fucking delicious.

But.

Even if it weren’t, it’s very presumptuous to offer your own recipe.

Did you create this recipe? Or are we stealing it from Cooks Illustrated? Actually I googled it and yes it’s from a famous magazine.

Do we put an asterisk on the menu to say your salmon takes more than 30 minutes to prepare?

Do you get a cut of our salmon sales?

Will you pay more when we add a single serve wood plank to the price of the salmon?

Isn’t over kill to cook the salmon on a wood grill with a wood plank?

Is this cedar plank salmon an Argentinian dish? Or is it common to North Carolina where your area code suggests you are from?

As a chef friend likes to say, it sounds like you want to open your own restaurant. It’s not for the light of heart.

As for the desserts.

Both the bread pudding and tres leches are chef’s grandmother’s recipe. Together we’ve sold about 5,000 of them.

No one.

No one.

No one complains about them.

They are fucking delicious.

We also have an amazing pastry chef who is from where? You guessed it Buenos Aires. She’s amazing.

I might point out that you chose a restaurant that specializes in grilled beef and then ordered seafood.

All of you.

We do seafood excellently but we do grilled beef better.

You did this in a town where every other restaurant serves nothing but seafood. Nothing. But. Seafood.

So perhaps you might check out one of those restaurants. Or. Order a 2” cowboy cut ribeye and dive into what we do best

Some days are a two post day!

We are an Argentinian steakhouse.

The menu is divided into sections.

One of the sections is street food.

These are items you’d buy from a street vendor in Buenos Aires.

They include a burger. Corn. Empanadas.

Today we got a review that said:

Ordering a $21 TLF Burger off ,” The Street Menu” was insulting to be referenced to as if we came from “the street” or can only afford “Street food” Why such a demeaning and degrading reference.

WTF?

We’ve sold almost 2,500 burgers this year and not one other person has complained that we have shamed them for ordering a less expensive item.

I don’t even know to respond to the comment.

Perhaps we should call the category unnecessarily expensive and charge $46 for the burger? Would that make you feel more worthy?