Demanding Guest as a Hope
Comfortable shoes, extended-service lamps producing pleasant light, champagne, produced by descendants of wine-makers from the grapes gathered in Champagne, chocolate made of cacao beans, sunglasses protecting eyes from the sun... The list of function-determined products is endless.
If I get it right, the main function of restaurants is to cook and serve dishes: safe, tasty and healthy. The market offers plenty of toothpastes that don’t not clean teeth, soups cooked of monosodium glutamate, magazines that nobody ever reads and radio stations, that nobody cares about. There are tons of books that get to shops after publication and then utilised, and textbooks written by politicians, and politicians that used to sell petroleum, and finally officials that care only for their businesses. All this generates mistrust and chaos.
Most restaurants remind me of a fruit tree with plastic leaves and nylon apples, and a great number of Ukrainians try to pick and eat them, moreover they pay for this. Everyone has long put up with tea bags instead of tea, with powder instead of coffee, with starch in a bottle named ketchup instead of tomatoes, with a mask instead of a smile. Only customers can become judges and refuse to pay for plastic books, tea, policy and finally for outright forgery in restaurants. Only guests can refuse to pay, if instead of a fresh fish they discover defrosted one on their plate, while greens mix is substituted with wilted lettuce. Only guests can take the role of referees in the match between true experienced chefs and thieves dressed in white uniform and living on kickbacks and frauds. Only guests can choose places without fanfare, but with genuine hospitality — the one which is aimed solely at a demanding customer.
It would be great if chefs in restaurants sincerely enjoyed food and had proper knowledge of products. It would be great to visit restaurants that apart from marketing and interiors with a chandelier could also offer something to eat. It would be great if restaurant guests knew only names of the chefs, who could cook. And it would be also great if those numerous lazybones without any show of talent, calling themselves waitstaff, chefs and restaurateurs, became unemployed at last.
All hopes are pinned on guests.
Specially for 100 Best Ukrainian Restaurants
26. http://savva-libkin.com/2009-06-30/kak-poluchit-udovolstvie-v-restorane
How to Enjoy Your Visit to a Restaurant
15 Ways to enjoy a restaurant:
1. It is advisable to go to decent and subsequently popular restaurants on a working day. In this case, you are more likely to enjoy your visit in full. Empty restaurants are good for negotiations, meetings, saving money, sense of self-worth and self-importance and many other things that have nothing to do with good restaurants.
2. At the weekend, book your favourite table and ask about availability of your favourite dishes in advance. It will increase your chances to have a great time.
3. Respect to personnel and restaurant rules is a precondition for enjoying your visit in full.
4. Do you remember how in films waiters and cooks add something improper to dishes or even spit? That will never happen if you show respect to personnel and rules.
5. I would not recommend ordering something artsy-craftsy. If you insist on ordering something that the menu doesn't contain, you are at risk to get an indigestible dish, since the menu primarily demonstrates what a chef and his or her team are best at.
6. Never say you know the restaurant owner. As soon as you cross the threshold of your friend's restaurant, he or she automatically transforms into the owner of the place. Even if you know each other, rules are the same for everyone, and in case the owner decides to please you with a special treatment, it will be his/her own decision.
7. It's bad manners to snap your fingers to call a waiter. Raise your hand instead: this is more polite. It is even better to come up to your waiter to ask a question.
8. If you prefer water with lemon, inform about this at once. Waiters don't like guests, who do not know their own mind. Besides, waiters can't guess what you want (they might remember your preferences, but they are not aware of your expectations for sure).
9. If you are satisfied with the level of services provided by a waiter/waitress then always ask for a table in his/her part of the hall. Recommend this waiter to your friends. As a result, this person will get more money, owner's gratitude and will provide even better services to you.
10. It is better to eat at home, if you do not want to tip. By the way, waiters usually shares around 20-40% of tips with other personnel members.
11. Always check your bill. This is especially relevant for those who like to party in a big company. Sometimes it can be just a mistake, but in most cases it is done on purpose: this is how waitstaff tries to get more money from inattentive customers. Never pay without a bill, or if there are items added in handwriting. Don't pay if the bill is unclear and there are discrepancies with what you have actually ordered.
12. If there are no free places in a restaurant, try to offer bigger tips to a waiter. Perhaps, there will be a free table after all.
13. If the waiter is not able to resolve the situation, talk to an administrator or manager. But do not phone the owner. It is also a bad idea to keep silence, because to err is human, and one mistake will not spoil a good restaurant.
14. Decide on the food you are into at the moment — in this case you will choose the right place. If you do not care about food much and just need a place to talk or drink tea or coffee, then choose a place with a good waitstaff: the chances you will not leave hungry increase.
15. If you are not familiar with the menu, ask a waiter, if they have fresh fish. This is how you can, on the one hand, get great meals without running the risk of choosing unfamiliar dishes, and on the other — make sure you have chosen a decent restaurant.