Anybody say “Shrimp Fondue”?

Our relationship with Ruby Tuesday has been well documented. …and for several years, we no longer patronized this overrated restaurant. But for convenience’s sake we gave in awhile back and returned to the scene of the crime. Well, sort of. We began patronizing one of the locations that had been ok in terms of service.

This location is convenient to our home and church so we would often go on Sunday afternoons with our friends. However, I wonder how much longer these people are going to remain our friends after Sunday’s experience.

We had already had a crazy day at church. Everything had started out routinely…wake up, get dressed, head out. Then, after the music portion of the service, the power went out. You must understand that there were probably 900+ people there and the building went dark. Our pastor (who happens to be the transitional pastor as we are in search of a new one) handled it like a champ. …..then the fire alarm goes off in the highest of highest pitches you can imagine. Think Fran Drescher annoying. Sunday school (or ife Connection, as we call it) was cancelled and we headed off to lunch early.

Since the Methodists and Presbyterians had not let out yet, we were able to get seated right away. A party of thirteen. A young lady who was probably 19-22 years old came by to take our drink orders. She offered a perfunctory “Does anybody want any appetizers?” and left when no one answered in the affirmative.

Drinks were delivered and she began taking our order. In the meantime, my husband had discovered a little promotional gem that guaranteed a free shrimp fondue appetizer if it wasn’t specifically offered. Sure enough, he brought it up to the waitress who promptly replied “Yes, I did.” My husband specified “But the sign right here says you have to offer Shrimp Fondue and not just an appetizer.” “Uhhh…yeah, that’s what I offered.” She should not. Have done that.

My husband has many, many great qualities. He is a wonderful provider, awesome dad, hilarious, handsome, intelligent, the list goes on. One thing he is not, though, is a pushover. ….and once that young lady flat out lied to him, that was it. We briefly tried to move on with conversation with our friends but I knew that he was still caught up with what had just happened. It might not seem like a big deal but he was beside himself. In fact, he could not stop talking about it. He began to get more and more upset. Well, mad, really. Not even angry. Just mad.

By this point, the waitress was also really angry. She wouldn’t acknowledge him when she refilled glasses, brought out other appetizers, cleared off plates, and by default, she ignored me. I asked for ketchup three times for my daughter’s meal which had been brought out early. She had stepped around to the other side of table to refill someone’s glass and she was facing him. I could tell she was seething and was getting up enough nerve to say something. She said “I’m sorry you don’t recall me offering you the shrimp fondue but I have one coming out to you.” Now, this was not said in an apologetic tone. It was said in a bratty, entitled, I-just-got-in-trouble-because-I-didn’t-offer-you-the-fondue sort of way. It was a spectacle. …and that was the proverbial straw. You know, the one that broke the camel’s back. That straw.

He said, “That’s fine, but I still want to see your manager.” In a few minutes a very gracious man came out to talk to my husband. He was told of the situation and handled it beautifully. The only problem now was that my husband was worked up that all of the restaurant could hear what was going on including the table next to us who piped in with their own experience. “Oh by the way, she didn’t ask us about the fondue either.” It was validation in some strange sort of way. I had to leave early but as I understand it, the rest of the meal was uneventful except for the waitress ignoring my husband. By the way, he did leave her a tip.

Sadly, there are no more Ruby Tuesday restaurants in our vicinity that we can patronize. They’re all gone. The Galleria refused to seat our friend in a wheelchair (twice), the Alabaster location ignored us (twice) and we had to leave, the Moody location’s food was inedible, and now the Pelham location has had its day.

I wouldn’t call this particular experience part of the Barnett Curse…or maybe it was. After all is said and done, I think we could’ve handled the situation a little bit better but I do think my husband was in the right. I just hope our friends will continue to put up with us. If they’re still our friends after yesterday.

 

New Year’s Eve

My goodness!  What a warm welcome back!  My site statistics were the highest they’ve ever been and for that, I’m thankful and humbled.  I’m not sure what it says about you, though, dear reader(s, both of you).  I mean, the fact that you’re enjoying hearing/reading about mine and my family’s misfortunes…well, that’s just plain weird. Nevertheless, I’m here to feed the beast.

It’s 9:45pm on December 31st which means that there are only a couple of hours left in this year.  It has been a year of great sorrow for some dear friends and family.  They lost loved ones to the monster called cancer.  Tragically, one was only 17 years old and the other two were a family man and woman who both leave behind spouses and children.  2011 has not been the best of years and I’m optimistic about what 2012 holds.

My husband and I don’t typically go all out celebrating on New Year’s Eve.  In fact, we don’t go out at all.  ..even when we were dating. Now, of course, we have a preschooler which prevents us from going out so we do our celebrating at home. Well, I wouldn’t exactly call it celebrating.  Several years ago, we were awaiting the countdown and started playing Uno.  Yes.  THAT Uno.  The card game that you grew up with.  We were so involved in this game that we totally missed the countdown and didn’t look up until it was well into the new year. We. Are. Old.  If I used hashtags…which I don’t…I would say #toooldtostayawake.  I wonder how long it took you to decipher that hashtag.  …and now you see why I think they’re dumb, useless, and downright stupid.  Dang it.  I’m digressing again.  #mustdobetter

One thing that I always do, though, is eat twelve grapes.  It’s a tradition in Hispanic cultures to eat the twelve grapes.  ..and let’s face it, they taste much better than those old mushy, nasty black eyed peas y’all southerners eat.  (See what I did there?  You didn’t?  See, I wrote “y’all” while making fun of southerners because I’m a southerner by virtue of having grown up in Alabama & Georgia.  It’s irony.)

Each grape represents one month of the year and we eat them when the clock strikes midnight.  I live in the deep south, I’m married to a life-long Alabamian who banjo-talks when he gets together with his college roommate, my daughter refuses to speak Spanish (even though she understands me), and I rarely get to be in touch with Cuban traditions other than when the holidays roll around and I’m with my family.  So, I’m determined to at least keep this one tradition alive.

As far as resolutions…well…no thanks.  Ok.  I’ll make a couple:

• Blog regularly.  Possibly video blog.  Don’t you want to see my pretty face.  ….ok, just my face?
• Play Just Dance 3 and call it exercising.
• Attempt a restaurant meal in which everything goes well and report back to you, dear reader(s).  Both of you.  Wait.  You’ll be so bored if I do that.  If it accidentally happens that it is a good experience, I’ll embellish and try really hard to find something wrong.  For your sake(s)…both of you.

Those all seem semi-doable.  Don’t they?  What are your resolutions?

 

The Return

My business is seasonal.  As such, I spent the better part of October through December working in my little home studio trying to make sure that everyone’s Christmas gifts were ready to go.  ….and while I absolutely love what I do, this year I over extended myself and it came at the expense of the enjoyment of such a beautiful holiday.  I’m just thankful that my daughter is too young to really understand that the Christmas tree really should go up well before six days prior to December 25th and that Mommy & Daddy typically do buy each other gifts but just couldn’t get to it this year.

During this time of year, it’s also rare that I get to the grocery store to purchase food for sustenance.  We survive on winging it.  …and eating out.  You see where I’m going here, right?  So the next two or three posts will chronicle a couple of those experiences because as you know, eating out for us is always an experience. So here we go….(hey…that rhymes.)
______________________________________________________________________________________________

A couple of years ago, Chuy’s Tex Mex restaurant opened at The Summit. The only thing I knew about Chuy’s was that the Bush twins had been cited there for drinking while underage at an Austin location.  Other than that, all I knew was that it was Tex-Mex and it’s well documented how I feel about Mexican food.  It’s various dishes all made with meat, cheese, corn, and flour tortillas.  Period.  If I may be so bold….BORING!  My apologies to my Mexican friends.  I love you all dearly but sadly, your food leaves a lot to be desired.  …and even though I don’t like your food and have written posts about how I dislike your food, please don’t say anything about Cuban food or it might hurt my feelings.  Ok?  K.

So it’s the day before Thanksgiving and for whatever reason, I selected Chuy’s for our dinner that night.  Walking into Chuy’s is an assault on the senses.  Think what something would look like if Fiesta Ware dishes had dozens and dozens of babies then they all threw up at the same time.  Add to that a collection of Christmas lights hanging everywhere along with some crazy wall art and some mind numbing music.  That’s the environment at Chuy’s.  In all fairness, I just turned 40 so that might have something to do with the perception of this place.  This is me now:

Given that it’s the night before a holiday, I ‘m thinking things might go smoothly since it’s probably not going to be too busy.  Sure enough, we were seated right away at a booth right next to a giant party.  No biggie except the table at the booth had a wobble that measured 6.2 on the Richter scale.  It took all of two seconds to ask to be re-seated.  “I guess.” said the hostess who then seated us at a square table right underneath the neon metal palm tree.  I kid you not.  Oh, and the wobble on this table was slightly less.  Perhaps a 4.2 on the Richter scale.  Small enough that 8 packets of Sweet n Low were able to tame it.

I have a confession.  I had been to Chuy’s once before this time.  It was with a group of colleagues after a meeting.  We were engrossed in conversation and all I had was chips & salsa, and dessert.  I do remember that it was a neutral experience but that the salsa was outstanding.  They make this white jalapeño salsa that is delicious.  …and that’s what I had on the brain when I said “Let’s go to Chuy’s!”

So our new server comes by to take drink orders and we asked him about the salsa.  He looked at me like I had just asked him how exactly quantum physics work.  When I clarified that I wanted him to tell my husband about the various salsas they had to offer, he did tell us. …but it reminded of when Chris Farley used to answer questions and then pull out his hair when he did it because he realized what an idiot he had been.

So then I opened my menu to peruse my options.  Imagine how fortunate I felt when I found a large blob of dried up cheese dip on the right side!  Yea!!  A preview!  Which indeed was fortunate because we had two giant baskets of chips at our postage stamp sized table.  One that came with us from the booth and the other that the server brought out as habit.  I won’t complain about that.  Better too much than too little, I always say.

We ordered our food….I’d give it a 5 out of 10 although I’ll give the tortillas a 10.  They’re homemade and yummy!  Much better than the standard old partially hydrogenated tortillas at every other Mexican restaurant.  Although, when the food came out, there was no silverware in sight.  …even though we’d been there a good 45 minutes.

P.S....Tortillas is pronounced: Tor-Tee-Yas NOT Tor-Ti-las.

 

Finally dinner was done and we got out of there.  …and I had my sights set on the new Pinkberry a few doors down.   I’ll summarize:   It was loud, full of teenagers, and loud. …and loud.  Oh, and the yogurt was not good.  We’re Red Mango fans.  It’s a bazillion times better.

In the end, it was another dissatisfying night of eating out.  …and it doesn’t get any better throughout the month of December.  Just wait until I update you on our newest Cheesecake Factory visit.

 

I Spoke Too Soon

Ok….so remember a day or two ago when I said I was out of stories?  Well, that was before we went to Michael’s for lunch today.  Today was a doozy.

I’ll backtrack a moment.  Last week, my husband, my daughter, and I went to Michael’s for dinner.  Eating out has been the exception rather than the rule for us lately so we were looking forward to a nice evening out.

We were seated right away at a table that allowed the evening sun to poke through the window and right into my eyes.  I sucked it up because, after all, the earth will eventually rotate out of the way.  ….or is it the sun that rotates.  I’m an artist not a scientist, people.  In any case, I didn’t say anything and instead we all placed our order.  It was all relatively uneventful save the slowness of the kitchen and the dimwittedness of our server.    We agreed it wasn’t the finest meal we’ve ever had (the “cup of gumbo” may as well be called a “condiment cup of gumbo” as the serving size literally about that much.)

Fast forward to today.  It is my parent’s 40th wedding anniversary and they came to Birmingham along with one of my sisters and her family to visit and celebrate.  Michael’s was our chosen place to lunch and B-Rad made reservations for us at 12:30.   As it turns out, we probably wouldn’t have needed reservations and that should’ve been our first clue that the restaurant in which we were about to dine was not perhaps the best choice.  You see, around these parts, if a restaurant isn’t jam packed full of customers on a Sunday after church, then something is wrong. ….and this was the case with Michael’s.  Nary a soul in the house.

Because they were expecting us, we were immediately seated by a friendly hostess and immediately helped by a very friendly manager (I think he was a manager.)  Things went down hill from there.  I’ll admit that we, as a group, can be a handle.  We all try to talk over each other, we’re indecisive, and then there’s the fact that our waiter made zero effort to understand my parent’s accents.

In an effort to not bore you with the details, I’ll give you the highlights:

• The kitchen (just as in our previous visit) was s-l-o-w.  Slower than dirt.  Slower than Christmas.  Slower than (YOU_FILL_IN_THE_BLANK.)
• Meals arrived except for mine.  I ordered an appetizer as my meal along with two side items.  Got my herb and parmesan crusted artichoke hearts which sound like they would be super yummy and tangy and zesty but alas, were about as mushy as the mud at the bottom of the Coosa River and about as tangy as boiled potatoes.  I didn’t, however, get the two side items I had ordered:  Angel hair pasta with marinara sauce (specifically asked what kind of sauce it was….marinara, I was assured.) and a baked sweet potato.
• Eventually got my pasta which had a load of grated parmesan cheese on it and was tossed in some sort of cheesy orange sauce.  It tasted like pure parmesan.  Gross.  I told the waiter that my noodles didn’t have marinara sauce and he countered with “That’s what they call marinara sauce.”  to which I replied “Marinara sauce is tomato sauce.”  Seriously, people.  I can call my morning green smoothie (seen below and to be blogged about at my new blog, “The Unlikely Hippie” later on) a caramel frappuccino but that doesn’t change the fact that I’m actually drinking a green smoothie.  I said “No big deal, just take it off my check and bring me my potato” which had not arrived, yet.  The waiter got in one last zing:  “You have to remember they’re Southern chefs.”    I think he was using the term “chef” loosely.

My morning "green smoothie"...looks like it would be gross but tastes like fruity goodness.

• Upon receiving his meal, my husband discovered that his steak and shrimp dish only had three shrimp on it.  He showed the menu to the server.  The menu clearly stated four shrimp come with this particular dish.  The waiter took the plate back to his manager who argued that it only comes with three shrimp.  He relented after being shown the more than clear description of how many shrimp you are supposed to get.  In summary:  It appears as if neither the waiter nor the manager were very familiar with their steak and seafood offerings.  Oh…did you know Michael’s is a steak & seafood restaurant?
• After the meal was over, my sister, B-Rad, my mom, and my dad ordered dessert.  Creme brulee, bread pudding, and chocolate cake respectively.  One of the creme brulees arrived overcooked and tasted like a gummy instant powdered dessert.  The other creme brulee arrived UNCOOKED.   Except for the sugar crust on top, the dessert was fully uncooked.   The mix looked like egg yolks when you put your spoon in it.  And to no one’s surprise, my mother’s dessert (the bread pudding) also came out halfway cooked.  The outside was fine, the inside was still in liquid form.
• In the midst of all of this, our waiter was getting flummoxed and was less than cordial and simply perfunctory.  I suppose I would have been, too.  We seemed to be high maintenance but in reality, we were reacting to the service and quality of food.
• Our checks arrived and we were erroneously charged for all the food we had returned so we had to complain about on our check.  He had to re-calculate them.  Our checks also arrived with an 18% gratuity automatically charged.  B-Rad refused it and demanded it be removed.  It was and he left a 10% tip instead.

Thus is the life of an outing with my family.  It makes me happy that I’m cooking more and being healthier (15 pounds so far!) so I don’t have to suffer fools.  …and I say that without the least amount of irony.

 

All Out Of Stories

I don’t go out to eat all that often anymore so I’m all out of bad experiences.  Who knew that all it took was to just to revolutionize how my family and I eat.  Gone is McDonald’s (forever!), gone is Mountain Dew (for the most part), and gone is high fructose corn syrup.

The bad news is that my entries to this blog will be few and far between.  The good news is that I’m hoping to start blogging about what I’ve learned over the last three or four months regarding our food and my effort to get my very carnivorous husband and finicky daughter to eat what I’m cooking.

We’ll see how it goes.  Perhaps you can keep me accountable.   I’ll register a new address for those entries in a bit and post here.  In case my reader(s) wish to follow my efforts.

 

3 Restaurants, 2 States, 1 Blog Entry

Restaurant #1: Urban Cookhouse, Homewood, AL

I tell ya, people who live in Homewood, LOVE themselves some Homewood.  That community is a little too left leaning and hippie for me (and I use the term hippie with the utmost of respect for my hippie friends.  Really.)  but it is a lovely area with lots of great restaurants and retail to offer.  The newest addition is Urban Cookhouse.  It’s a small restaurant right in the middle of downtown Homewood.  I had heard about it from some Facebook friends and had seen an article on AL.com.  When I heard that they were planning on using local ingredients, I decided I had to try it.  As you may or may not remember, I’ve recently become a semi-vegetarian (a flexitarian, if you will) and have embraced shopping at local farmer’s markets.  Also, I’m a small business owner myself and I know the need to support local business.   Coincidentally, I discovered Urban Cookhouse on their first day of business.

The menu is short but seems to have something for everybody.  The servers were very friendly and excited to be there.  I have heard that they have some awesome orange rolls but they didn’t come with my meal so didn’t get the chance to try them.  The owners are on-site which is a bonus.  The bad news is that it appears as if the owners might have underestimated the popularity of their new restaurant.  It only seats 50 people according to the article and those 50 people are jam packed into a very small space.  I suppose that’s a good problem to have, right?

Homewood is a little further than I would like to drive for a meal so I will probably not be a regular here.  However, I do recommend it and you should try it.  If anything, just to support local business.

Restaurant #2:  Salad Sensations, Atlanta, GA

So I’m with my sister, my niece, and my daughter at Perimeter Mall in Dunwoody yesterday and my daughter tells me she’s hungry and wants a salad.  I know that it’s weird for a three year old to say that but I’ve been teaching her to eat healthy foods and she has started to develop a taste for them.  She also goes on daddy dates with my husband and they love the salad bar at Ruby Tuesday.  Yes, we got back together with Ruby Tuesday.  ….but only the one at Hwy 119.  The one at the Galleria doesn’t accommodate guests in wheelchairs or with strollers and even though we don’t use either, we can’t support such a place of business.

In any case, there is a restaurant (and I use the term loosely) called “Salad Sensations” in Perimeter Mall in the food court.  I walked over to order a side salad for my little girl and the young lady behind the glass looked at me and grunted something.  She barely spoke English….I’ll call her Lin.  I deduced that she grunted that I couldn’t order a side salad but rather, I had to order a full sized salad.  Knowing that I would be choosing between a $10 fast food salad or a screaming three year old who was hungry, I chose the former.  She began to make my salad without verifying what I wanted on it.  I had to stop her from putting all the “fixins” on it that I knew a three year old would be loathe to eat.

She then slid the salad over to another lady who I can only assume is the owner.  Her English was also not so good but I couldn’t quite place the accent.  Perhaps Russian?  Slavic?  Not Hispanic.  I’d know that accent.  I’ll just call her Oksana for the sake of argument.   These two ladies were so rude, that all my sister and I could do was laugh.  Admittedly, that wasn’t the nicest thing to do.

After a minute or two, we realized we needed a couple of extra napkins so my sister went up to ask for them.  Oksana rolled her eyes, stepped away and through the back door, and let Lin give her the napkins.

At that moment, I realized I would be writing about this experience.  My sister and I were laughing and I took a picture of the front of the restaurant to include in this entry.  Sadly,  I can’t load it because I’m not on my computer.  When we looked up, Oksana and Lin were taking pictures of my sister and I on their cell phones.  They must’ve thought we were trying to get pictures of them?  I don’t know.  I wasn’t.  I decided to let them know that they would be featured right here at Where Shall We Eat and wrote the URL on a spare napkin for them to read.

As I approached them with a smile on my face, I told them that I was a restaurant blogger and that they would be featured on my blog and Lin asked me, “Is this why you wanted the extra napkin?”  BUSTED.  It turns out we had one extra napkin.  Sorry.  Didn’t mean to use your one extra napkin.  Here is your half a cent.  Oh wait.  You should have plenty of money because you charged me $10 for a bowl of lettuce.

Oksana then asked me if I was my sister’s mother.  Really?  I know I’m no spring chicken but her mother?  That would make me my 7 year old niece’s grandmother.  Hmm.  Maybe they age differently in her part of the world.   She said she was asking because when my sister went up to retrieve the napkins in question, she SCRATCHED Lin on the hand.  Yes, friends.  This beats all I’ve ever seen. We could do nothing but laugh at the situation.  So now Oksana has a cell phone picture of us that I bet she turns into the police to charge my sister with assault and battery with a fingernail.

So the next time you’re in Perimeter Mall, avoid Salad Sensations like the plague and maybe try the Cuban place.  I wish I had.

PS….my sister didn’t scratch her.  She doesn’t have fingernails.  Never has.

Restaurant #3:  Costa’s, Hoover, AL

I’m kinda tired of writing so I’ll give you the short on this one.  It was our Tweet Meet locale for today.  Small group yet always fun.  I never think to go to Costa’s even though it’s close and nothing horrible has ever happened there.  The food is meh…not bad but not the greatest so that’s usually good enough for us.  Today, the service was exceptionally slow.  Our server was pleasant enough but my glass of water wasn’t refilled even once.  We only saw him three times…order, delivery, and checks.  Perhaps the kitchen was slow and it wasn’t our server but our meal took a good 30-35 minutes to arrive after ordering.  It didn’t matter because we were with good friends having good conversation.  The food arrived in enormous quantities and it was edible.  Not bad.  Not the greatest but good enough for us.

While we were waiting on our meal, my daughter looked under the table and started saying something about a bug.  I ignored her because to her, anything is a bug and she’s freaked out by all of them and after a minute or two she had gotten distracted and moved on.  Just as we were leaving, she freaked out about “A bug! a bug!” and she kept pointing at her shoe.  I looked and sure enough, there was a squished ROACH in her sandal.  I can’t tell if she stepped on it and it got in her shoe or if it got in her shoe and she stepped on it.  What I do know is that it wasn’t in her shoe when I left my house to go eat.

I called the manager who was very embarrassed and said “Oh wow.  We don’t see this all that often.”  True Story.

I think I’ve had enough of Costa’s to last me a little while, now.

 

I Be Trippin’

The year was 1985.  The place was my high school cafeteria.  I was walking across the caf in the late afternoon as I headed somewhere and there were a group of upper classmen seated around one of the tables.  My shoes were clinking as I walked.  One second I was walking and in the next I was on the floor.   The girls at the table saw me and began to howl with laughter.   I was the picture of Freaks and Geeks at that moment.

My history of falling in public began at a very young age.  My mother says she doesn’t remember but I can remember as a small child falling and hurting my ankle.  Fast forward to the sixth grade (1982/83) when I was outside playing with the neighborhood kids.  You know…before video games.  Yes.  I used to play outside.  That was a long time ago.  Could we just keep going, please?  Anyway…so I was playing outside with the neighborhood kids when I took a tumble down a couple of steps.  It was summer vacation and I spent about six weeks of it with a cast on my right ankle.  At least I think it was my right ankle.

My youngest sister likes to say that if we’re walking and talking, she doesn’t ever know if I’ll be there when it’s her turn to talk.  The reason being that I will oftentimes just fall without notice and for almost no reason.  I fall all. the time.

About two years ago, I was in a hurry to get to an appointment for my shop and was running across a lawn to get to my car when….you guessed it….I fell.  It was severe pain and I went to Urgent Care immediately where they assured me nothing was broken (although the size and color of my ankle would beg to differ.)  Instead, all I had was a sprain.  Man it hurt.  Bad!  Really bad.  So bad that I just sat and cried and cried and cried.  (insert poor-pitiful-me pout.)

Last spring, I went to an outdoor wedding.  I saw a long lost friend and ran to greet him and his family.  On the way, I had  slight delay.  I fell.  At a wedding.  In front of everybody.  My ankle swelled and hurt for days after that.

I tell you all of that to get to today’s story.  I walked into Chipotle today for lunch around 12:00.  You know.  Right when it’s the busiest.  I like Chipotle not for its speedy and friendly service because that is certainly hit or miss; I like Chipotle because they use fresh,  natural, and organic ingredients in their food.  And since I’m a “hippie” (as my husband calls me), I refuse any other fast food.

I found myself with a little bit of time between camp sessions and I wanted a vegetarian burrito.  I parked my car, grabbed my phone, book, and of course, keys.  Did a little hustle up the sidewalk step and opened the door.  I tried to walk in but my sandal caught the rug and in a split second my iPhone went flying, my book went flying, my keys went flying, and I went diving.   In a moment that seemed to last forever and in slow motion, I had fallen prostrate.  That’s prostrate, not the other word you’re thinking of because if it were the other word you’re thinking of, well that would be just plain silly, don’t you think?

That’s not the worst part.

As I stood up to assess the damage, I realized I had fallen right in front of a table full of young professionals who were suppressing their laughter but were kind, nevertheless.    All I can say is I’m so grateful for my Otter Box.  Without it, I’d be talking on this little beauty:

Remember this? It was state of the art in 1998. It was the first phone I ever had that could vibrate and maintain an address book.

This would be the only phone that would be safe to have around given that my phone tends to fly the furthest when I fall.  Way to go, Otter Box.  Keep up the good work but could you lower the price a little?  ….and for heaven’s sake, do something about the color/design selection!

So I got up, smiled, said thank you, and then mumbled something about “ta da!” and “Well, this is a little embarrassing.”  I dusted myself off and went to order that veggie burrito I had been craving.  Except when I got up to the order window, I was being laughed at.   Really, people?  It’s funny, but let’s remember here that I am still the customer.

And that’s all I have to say about that.

 

CPK=Epic Fail

Just the other day I was telling someone that it had been awhile since we’ve had anything happen when we go out to eat. Now, that could be a function of reduced outings because I’ve eliminated fast food and have become a bit of a vegetarian. Ok. I consider myself more of a flexitarian. I’m turning into a bit of a hippie lately. When you take into account the organic food I’ve been purchasing, the reusable bags at the grocery store I’ve been using, and the documentaries I’ve been watching: Food, Inc., Killer At Large, and King Corn, I might almost seem like a Democrat. Bwaahahaaaaa. No chance.

In any case, I do have a little ditty to share about an incident that occurred at California Pizza Kitchen not long ago. Not surprisingly, it involves my friend B-Rad (whom you met here) and my cousin Maddie (whom you met here). These are two of the strongest personalities you will ever meet and when the two of them happen to be together and share in an experience like the one I’m about to tell you, well…there were indeed fireworks.

My family was in town for the day and that happened to include Maddie, Bradley, my sister LM, my mom, and my cousin Hope. So we all go out to lunch to CPK at my suggestion. It’s one of the few places that I knew would be the great equalizer among us. Food that could satisfy everyone, in other words. Good service. Good foods. A bit overpriced but relatively affordable. There is a specific exception to good service at this particular location of CPK. And her name is B. No. Not that B. Her name actually starts with B but I was afraid she might Google herself and somehow end up on this page and then find my house and then find me and well, then I wouldn’t ever be able to eat at CPK again.

What I can tell you about B is this: She is consistent. Consistently slow. Consistently rude. Consistently lazy. Consistently horrible at what she does. She is the sole exception to a stellar crew at CPK. It’s just that more often than not (due to the Barnett Curse, I’m sure) our table is assigned to B. And without exception, she is horrible. I should have complained but up until this point, I had always been with a group of church friends who have had it up to here (I’m holding my hand above my head because I’m only 5’2″) with our Barnett Curse shenanigans.

This time, however, I wasn’t with them. Good for me….bad for B. I was with my family. And I was with members of my family who have no patience for rudeness in the service industry and who will push back when pushed to a limit. This was one of those days.

We placed our drink order and as expected, B was eternally slow in bringing out our drinks. I have no idea if she goes back to the fountain to have a drink herself but she may as well have. We were her only table and it still took so so so long to get our drinks. Upon receiving our drinks, we placed our orders which had a few minor special instructions:

1. Bring my daughter’s food out as soon as it’s ready. (Refer to my 11 Restaurant Rules for an explanation)
2. Extra pepperoni on her pizza
3. Maddie & Hope’s pizza was to be half onions & meat and half cheese.

Hope happens to be a very picky eater even though she’s a JUNIOR in college. (Yes, I’m talking to you, LHP. I’m encouraging you to expand your palate. Would it kill you to eat an onion occasionally?) But I digress.

Predictably, we waited for an unreasonable amount of time for our food. My daughter’s food never came out early. You see, what B likes to do is wait for everything to be done at once so she doesn’t have to make multiple trips to the kitchen or to her customer’s tables. It’s something that I determined one Sunday afternoon as I watched her. She would go from table to table in attempt to be more efficient (or lazy.) That system doesn’t work for me. Work it one table at a time, B. (I would be FIRED in one minute as a waitress, by the way so I’m speaking from a zero experience perspective on this subject)

At long last, our food arrived and not surprisingly, my daughter’s pizza was not served with extra pepperoni. What’s worse was that Maddie & Hope’s pizza was served with some onions (GASP!) on the other half which is the opposite of what they asked for. When they questioned B about it, she became angry. “Whatchu want me to do about that? We can’t make it perfect every time. There’s going to be ingredients cross over.” Her attitude caught everyone at the table off guard and the argument went on.

It was about three or four minutes into this “customer is not always right” scenario that Bradley snapped. I can’t even begin to describe the tone of voice that he used but let’s just say it was very effective. Imagine, if you will, the very angriest you’ve ever become at a restaurant. Now multiply times three. Bradley said “I’ll tell you what I want you to do. I want you to go get us another server, get your manager, and never come back to this table again.” She continued arguing about the darn pizza and Bradley repeated himself.

She disappeared into the back behind the pizza oven along with every. single. CPK employee on hand except for the bartender who was helping himself to reading a book mid-shift. He was oblivious.

The manager finally emerged and was artificially apologetic and offered to comp the pizzas and issued a couple of free meal cards. Big whoop.

This waitress is also the one who left my friends with words in their mouths as they were trying to decide on

their order because they were taking too long. So she left them talking out the menu and came back a minute or two later. I mean she literally left the talking to her because they weren’t at the ready on her time table.

It’s exceptional, I tell you. With gladness in my heart, however, I tell you that we have not had a bad experience since this one which was about four to six weeks ago. ….but let his be fair warning…avoid B at CPK. She’s not nice.

 

I Got Nothing

Just a quick note to let my faithful reader(s) know that I haven’t forgotten about posting but rather I’ve been going through a dry spell of bad service.  Weird, eh?  No worries.  I’m sure things will get back to normal soon.

Truth be told, I have had a couple of Barnett Curse happenings over the last few weeks but none bad enough to blog about.  Maybe I’ll make up some of the details (a la Bob the Byrd) and make it interesting.

But that’s cheating.  I’m sure something will happen soon enough.  But for now, I got nothing.

 

Fine Dining In The Big Apple

Today’s entry is brought to you courtesy of my friend Bob.  How shall I describe Bob?  Hmm.  Well…I’ll put it this way:  He’s the antithesis of me.  We avoid talking politics or we might not be friends.  …and yet I love spending time with Bob.  He gets himself into the craziest situations and is flat out shameless.  He likes to travel by himself primarily so he can create a character and play the part.

He has been known as a narcoleptic, a fortune teller, a foreigner with an accent to match and some other roles that are not quite appropriate for this page.  This past week, Bob has been on vacation again.  This time he went to New York and is in fact, still there until sometime tomorrow.

He posted this story that reminded me of the very reason I maintain this blog.  So with a minor alteration here or there in order to keep it family friendly, I present to you the following first hand account of fine dining in New York by Bob.

For the last four days I’ve been eating at delis and diners for about $7 per meal. Tonight is my last night in New York so I decided to treat myself to a fancy pants dinner. I went into some Mediterranean joint after checking out their specials in the windows. Alas, the pants were a little TOO fancy. The chap at the door only let me in after fetching a loaner jacket and tie for me to wear. The tie barely came halfway down my chest and the jacket was about 5 sizes too big. I looked like one of the Bowery Boys.

When I was seated the waitress brought a basket of bread and a large bowl of assorted olives. I grabbed a slice of bread but gave the olives a pass. Nasty things. I ordered a Diet Coke, a bowl of French Onion Soup and the buccatini, described as fat spaghetti, peas, rendered prosciutto and cream parmesan sauce.

After a few minutes, the soup arrived.  Apparently there is a cheese shortage in New York. I’m used to my French onion soup overflowing with cheese that is crusted and caramelized, dripping down the side of the bowl. There was maybe a tablespoon of cheese floating in the broth. The broth itself had a separated look, similar to oil on water. I figured they drizzled olive oil or something over the bowl.

I took out my book (ignoring the haughty looks of the nearby high brows) and started on the soup. About the third bite I bit down on something way too had to be an onion. I spit it back into the spoon and gagged. The waitress came hurrying over and asked if everything was all right.

“What in the world is that?” [ed. note:  expletives deleted] I said, pointing to the blackish seashell looking thing in the bowl.

“It’s a mussel,” she said, as if I were two years old.

“Mussel? I didn’t order the Mussel Soup!”

“Yes sir. That’s the French Onion soup.”

I admit I was getting a little loud at this point. “What kind of idiot puts mussels in French Onion soup?”

By now the manager or maitre d’ or someone had joined the waitress. He tried to shush me and assured me that Chef Russo’s French Onion Soup took second place at the James Beard Foundation Awards in 2008.

“Second place, eh?” I said. “Chef Russo [ed. note: expletive deleted] near won first place in the Make Bob Vomit Contest.” He took the offending bowl away and told me in a nasty tone that I wouldn’t be charged for it since it wasn’t to my liking.

I downed my soda, trying to wash the mussely taste from my mouth. The waitress asked if I’d like another glass and I said I would. She brought it and the spaghetti at the same time. The pasta wasn’t too bad. It was still cooking and I had to follow each bite with a swig of soda which soon necessitated another refill. I behaved myself and declined dessert.

When the bill came I nearly had a heart attack. I wasn’t charged for the soup but the [ed. note: expletive deleted] charged me $6.50 for EACH glass of Diet Coke! I called the waitress over to protest but she told me that there was nothing she could do.

“The olives are complimentary, right?” I asked.

“Yes,” she said.

“Fine. Bring me twenty dollars worth of olives.” She laughed nervously but soon saw I was serious. She brought 3 more bowls which meant I now had 4 bowls of assorted olives. Big ones, little ones, green ones, black ones, even purple ones. I ate every last one of them, gagging and hacking after each one, and swallowing the pits of the first two (the least they could have done was pitted them). To help get them down, I requested water instead of soda, but only after making sure the water was gratis.

I sit here typing this in my hotel room, burping the most disgusting burps, while my stomach tries to see how many different ways it can cramp up.

Fine Dining, indeed.

Come to think of it, Bob and I really aren’t that different.

 

Bizarre Foods

One of my favorite shows on television is Bizarre Foods on the Travel Channel.  It’s hosted by Andrew Zimmern whose ability to describe the flavor and texture of a food makes you feel as if you’re inside the tv screen dining on the same dish with him.

This guy will eat ANYTHING. Anything, I tell ya.

Watching this show is like watching Fear Factor except he really enjoys his meals.  He eats things like live ants, crickets, brains, eyeballs, moose nose jelly, moose nose jelly (that one was worth repeating), blood pudding, etc. and he likes them!  He talks about them being “nutty”, “briney”, “sweet”, etc.  It’s very disturbing.

My favorite is when he eats something that he doesn’t like.  How bad does something have to be in order for Andrew Zimmern not to like it?  One time he ate these:

Thousand Year Old Eggs are a Chinese food. Y to the U to the CK.

The Chinese have contributed many things to various world cultures and to America itself but “thousand year old eggs” is among the things they should keep to themselves.  Here’s what Wikipedia has to say about it:

Century egg, also known as preserved egg, hundred-year egg, thousand-year egg, thousand-year-old egg, and millennium egg, is a Chinese cuisine ingredient made by preserving duck, chicken or quail eggs in a mixture of clay, ash, salt, lime, and rice hulls for several weeks to several months, depending on the method of processing. Through the process, the yolk becomes a dark green, cream-like substance with a strong odor of sulphur and ammonia, while the white becomes a dark brown, transparent jelly with little flavor. The transforming agent in the century egg is its alkaline material, which gradually raises the pH of the egg from around 9 to 12 or more.^[1] This chemical process breaks down some of the complex, flavorless proteins and fats, which produces a variety of smaller flavourful compounds.

All that to say this:  My friends Randy & Lisa went to Chinatown in San Francisco a couple of weeks ago and had an Andrew Zimmern experience although they weren’t as adventurous or courageous as he is.   They asked around for the best Chinese restaurant and the concierge at their hotel suggested the R&G Lounge.  That should’ve been the first sign of trouble.   I would have first questioned how high the quality of food could be at a place called “R&G Lounge” but they’re not professionals like I am.

In Birmingham, the closest we get to authentic Asian food is the little Chinese food store on 7th Ave S. & 11th St.  and even that guy is Thai so true blue Chinese food is nowhere to be had around here.   So when Randy & Lisa began to look through the menu at the R&G Lounge, they were surprised to see that the menus were not numbered but were in Chinese.  They couldn’t order #13 (sesame chicken) and #32 (sweet & sour pork) with fried rice.  Instead, they had to point at pictures of what looked the most appetizing.  …and point they did.

When their food arrived they did not know what had been ordered and hoped for the best.  Randy ordered what appeared to be some kind of seafood and Lisa hoped for chicken.   They tasted it and apparently, that’s not what it was.  The flavor was horrible and they couldn’t ask a server because no one spoke English.  They decided to cut their losses and escape and look for the closest Wendy’s.  (I just made up that last part.  I don’t know where they went after they left.)

They couldn’t get anyone to deliver the check due to the language gap and due to the fact that they had not eaten a bite.  The server must have thought they were still eating and didn’t want to rush them.  Finally Randy went to talk in sign language to the server but the check never came.

In the end, they left three twenty dollar bills and hoped that was enough.  If you ask me, Randy & Lisa should’ve billed the restaurant for that hour plus that they spent in there and would never get back.  The good news is, if they had not gone in there, then you would not have had anything to read on this blog today.  So to them I say,  “Thank you!”

 

Stix is ALMOST always good

You may or may not have noted that we eat out A LOT.   It’s that fact that skews the ratio of bad experiences to good experiences that an average person may have.  In other words, the sheer volume of restaurant meals we have lends itself to us having to go through some….well, let’s just call them challenges.  What follows is one of those challenges.

I spent the day at church preparing for an event celebrating missions and missionaries tomorrow night.  World Reach is among the highlights of the year in the life of our church.   So my friend D and I have been busy!  Beyond that, I had the nice surprise of catching up with an old friend and his family for a few hours.  After a long day,  we were hungry and only one thing could satisfy that hunger:  teppanyaki.

We love all things teppanyaki.  Almost.  See:  Mizu Alabaster. In choosing between Sumo and Stix in Hoover, we settled upon Stix because they’re always so nice and the service is so great.  Well, friends…..that shouldn’t have been the reason tonight.

We were seated with a couple and another gentleman with his cute “I’ll-be-3 in April” little boy.    We all became fast friends as we spent the better part of two hours together.

Here are the highlights:

• Arrive approximately 7:15
• Seated approximately 7:45
• Placed drink order approximately 8:00
• Placed food order approximately 8:10
• Ate approximately 8:40

(Note the gap in time from the first bullet point to the last bullet point.  It’s not a weekend.  There’s no reason for it.  Who knows?  Maybe there’s a teppanyaki chef shortage in Birmingham.  Aha!  There’s an idea for all of you looking for a job.  You not only get employed, you get to deal with customers like me who will blog whether or not you do a good job.)

In all that time, we saw our waiter twice out of his own volition.  Twice.  In an hour and a half.  Twice.  He only came by without prompting twice.  It was basically self-service night at Stix.  We got our own booster chair, to-go boxes, and fortune cookies.  Drinks were refilled only after my husband  actually got up from the table in search of our waiter.  He wasn’t even sure what he looked like since it had been so long that we had seen his face.  And he found him.  ….chatting with the manager at the kitchen door rather than coming to check on us.

Pop quiz:  How many times did the waiter visit our table without being prompted?  DING DING DING!  Good job!

The piece de resistance happened after we waited and waited and waited for our server to bring us our checks at the end of our very long meal.  The man seated directly across from us (a football coach for a big local high school in the metro Birmingham area, by the way) picked up his cell phone from the table and actually telephoned Stix.  He told the young lady who answered that the table in the back corner needed their checks.    How awesome is that?  And why haven’t we thought of that before?   What a great solution to a problem we seem to have everywhere we go!

In all fairness, our waiter happened to be working his first shift by himself.   What luck!   It does not explain why he never stopped by our table for refills or to pick up soup bowls and salad plates or ever.   I hope he gets better because I’m almost positive he won’t be able to pay the bills delivering the kind of service he delivered tonight.   The good news?  The gentleman who cooked was great….the food is always fantastic and plenty at Stix.

Stix is generally a really great place for a meal and we’ll definitely be back.  We’ll just request prior approval of who will be serving us.

 

Spaghetti, My Style (Not Joe’s Style)

Is there a migration of Italians into the Birmingham area that I don’t know about?  In the last year, three Italian restaurants have opened within five miles of each other.  That’s not even including Olive Garden.  Which is Italian-ish.

My husband and I have discovered something surprising:  We do not care for authentic Italian food.  The following is my recipe for spaghetti sauce which might explain why we do not care for the real stuff:

• 1-2 tbs olive oil
• Two lbs of ground round
• Two 8oz cans of tomato sauce
• 1 4oz can of tomato paste
• 4 cloves of garlic (minced)
• 1 small onion (finely chopped)
• Italian seasoning
• Salt & pepper
• AND NOW MY SECRET INGREDIENT:  brown sugar

1. Heat olive oil in a deep pan and saute garlic for a few minutes
2. Add onion and cook for approximately 3 minutes
3. Add meat until fully cooked
4. Drain cooked meat and return to heat
5. Add Italian seasoning, tomato sauce, and tomato paste.  Stir
6. Add brown sugar to taste.  Approximately 2 tbsp.
7. OPTIONAL:  Add 2-3 tbsp of cream cheese for a creamy tomato sauce.

Voila!  Yummy, yummy spaghetti sauce with very little resemblance to the real thing.  We’ve attempted dinner at Joe’s Italian where I hear the food is as if  it came straight from the Mediterranean but I would argue that their sauce is not as good as mine.

Although the restaurant was a nice and quaint little place,  we did not care for the food at all.  Perhaps that makes us very unsophisticated but we are unashamed to be bourgeoisie….if that’s what you wanna call it.  Although, I think anyone who uses the word “bourgeoisie” is anything but.

Joe’s almost doesn’t seem real.  When you walk in, Joe himself greets you.  He told us that Mamma was in the back making desserts.  It’s almost as if I’m watching a tv show called “Joe’s Italian.”  They were super nice….the atmosphere was great…and if I liked Italian food, I would eat there.  Apparently, we’re the only ones who don’t like it.  All of our friends are aghast when we tell them how much we disliked it.  It’s almost unAmerican to not like Italian food.  How’s that for irony?  (take a lesson Alannis…coincidence is not irony) We much prefer the Americanization of Italian food that Olive Garden serves.

As a small business owner, myself, I’m a big fan of the 3/50 Project and I feel bad for liking the OG better.  …but it’s true.  Sorry Joe.  Sorry Nino.  …and a pre-emptive sorry to Lucia. We’re staying in tonight.

 

Feeling Reminiscent

I’ve been (w)racking by brain for stories to tell.  I’m not in short supply of them, it’s just a matter of how to put them in context of this blog.  I think I’ve decided to not bother with putting them in context but rather to just tell my stories.  If they fit, great…if not…well, you’ll be better for having heard it anyway.

And since I’m in a bit of a reflective mood this evening, I’ve decided that tonight’s entry will take on a more serious tone.  There.

Although I was born in Atlanta, I don’t consider myself as being from there.  I consider myself an Alabama girl.  Sort of.  As much an Alabama girl as I can be for having not lived in one place for longer than a year until I was nine.  …and as much of an Alabama girl as I can be given that I’m the daughter two immigrants whose first language isn’t redneck.  Oh, calm down.  It’s not meant as an insult.  It’s meant to be witty.  Laugh.

When I was nine years old, my dad relocated all of us to small town Alabama in order to complete his residency.  “It will only be for two years” he promised as that’s how long his residency would take.  After that, we could pack up again and go back to the ATL with the rest of our family.

That was 1982.  It wasn’t until 2004 that my mom and dad finally made it back to Atlanta.  Between that first sentence and that second sentence of this paragraph, there is a world….and I mean a WORLD…of back story but that’s for the book that I’ve promised myself I will one day write.

During those years of living in that small town, there were some wonderful friendships that blossomed and some not-so-wonderful experiences with the culture that comes with small-town Alabama.  Somehow, a foreigner with a thick accent who could never quite make the culture gap leap was at times at odds with the Good Ole Boy Club.  …and yet, my father is twice the man they ever would be.  I digress.

Among the people we came across who are friends to this day were kids from our school, employees of my dad’s, church friends, and most of all, my dad’s patients.  They loved their doctor!  Each year at Christmas, we could count on a beautiful poinsettia plant sent by Mrs. Dean.  Myriad of home baked goodies….hams….quilts…..fresh fruits and vegetables…the list goes on.

My dad’s method of practicing medicine is simple…take care of the person.  Do you know of any physician who makes house calls?  My dad will.  How many physicians do you know who will cry with you when delivering sad news?  My dad will.   Do you know of any physician who will give you his cell number should you have a question?  My dad will.   I can remember when I lived at home that my dad would never allow our phone number to be unpublished because he wanted to be accessible to his patients.  Those caregivers are few and far between.

When we were kids and my dad was in his residency, my mom would take us to the hospital cafeteria on Sunday afternoons after church.  It was our family lunch time.   Isn’t it funny how we realize as adults that hospital food is so gross but when my sisters and I were children, it was such a treat to get to go eat there.  Green jello and all.  We loved it.

So you can see that I am, indeed, feeling a little reflective and reminiscent today.  …and since I’m feeling that way, I’m going to pass it on to you and re-post one of my favorite entries of last year:  Sunday Afternoons.  Now that you’ve read what my dad is like in the patient room, read the old entry and you’ll see what kind of man he is otherwise.

Oh, and don’t think I’ve forgotten about my mother.  I’ll be talking about her soon enough.

 

Two Lies And A Truth

Have you ever played “Two Lies And A Truth?”  Let’s play now.  Two of the following statements are lies.  One is a truth.

1. I’ve backpacked through the Appalachian mountains with Governor Sanford of South Carolina.
2. I voted for Obama.
3. All the stories in this blog.

If you guessed #3 is the truth, then you win all the fame and glory that you can muster in your brain.  Break out the alcohol free champagne!  You’re right!

For the sake of analysis:   There’s no chance in the world that #1 is correct since the Appalachian mountains are outside. …and everyone knows I much prefer the great indoors.  Just ask Donna Howell.   And I’m Cuban not Argentinian.  Also, I’m not his soul mate.   Number 2 isn’t a truth because I don’t vote for Democrats.  Ever.  No matter what end of the spectrum they fall.  ….and this one fell on the very wrong end of the spectrum.  I am a proudly partisan and believe that gridlock is good.  At some point, www.IfRhettWerePresident.WordPress.com will come online and you’ll be pleased to read more entries along these lines.  Until then, I’ll just shift and talk about the one point on the list that is true.  Number three.

Today was our bi-weekly Tweet Meet.  If you’re not part of the Twitter crowd yet, you should get yourself an account and join the fun.  Read here for a previous entry on the subject.  In any case, it was the usual suspects attending today sans B-Rad and plus PNola.  I happened to arrive at Full Moon BBQ in Hoover, AL about ten minutes behind everyone because I had to get my shop covered before I could leave.  So when I arrived and ordered mine and my daughter’s lunch, everyone was already seated and some even had their food.  No biggie.  We’ll wait and catch up in a few minutes.

In the meantime, The Left-Brained Artist tells us that he doesn’t see how our stories can be true.  He thinks that we’re just looking for something to go wrong.  In other words, he would not have selected number three as the truth in this game.

I’m still waiting for my food when J.T. gets hers.  And she arrived at the same time I did and actually ordered just after I did.

So I’m trying to tell Dekker that yes….this stuff does happen to us and I’m not making it up.  I can simply order my food and let the festivities begin.

My daughter’s food arrives but mine does not.  I remind the server that I had an open faced bbq chicken sandwich and she assures me it’s on the way.

No way these things happen.  We’re just too picky.

Five to ten minutes later, the server comes up and we remind her of my order which has still not been delivered.  She looks at me puzzled but goes to check.

Paraphrasing here…”When these things happen to me, I just let them go.  They happen to everybody…yada yada yada….”

The server can be seen talking to the manager and pointing in our direction.  The manager asks me what I ordered and I answer (for the fourth time, by now) an open faced bbq chicken sandwich.

To which we reply that it would normally roll off our backs, too if it only happened occasionally.    …but it doesn’t happen occasionally.  It happens consistently.  …and without provocation.

Alas!  My open faced bbq chicken sandwich arrives after PNola went to go get a dozen cookies for dessert since everyone was finished by then.

I typically order and may ask for a slight modification like no pickles or extra sauce.  At that point, it’s out of my hands.

I finally get to take a bite out of my long-expected open faced bbq chicken sandwich only to find out that I had been served what I suspect is turkey and not chicken.

It is at that point that my fellow Tweeps have experienced the magic of eating out with the Barnetts.  You’re welcome.