Latest Restaurant Trend: Bad Service?

February 24, 2009 10:45 am

I'm sure that the word "stressful" barely describes the New York restaurant industry right now. Even the giants of fine dining have noticed thinning crowds on Saturday night. All over the city, managers sit behind the closed doors of their offices, trying to devise schemes to keep patrons flowing. Complimentary foie gras amuse bouche with any lunch item purchased? Two for one bottles of wine on Tuesdays? A (gasp) $35 dinner prix fixe menu at Le Cirque? Just thinking about it gives me acid reflux.

Despite the anxiety, servers,bartenders and restauranteurs do not have the right to abuse their guests. I say this with my friends and family in mind, but also with the best interests of the restaurants at heart--being a jerk is really bad for business.

I first encountered terrible service a few weeks ago at an East Village tearoom (of all places). The offending locale is beloved by a sect of New York City diners who consider themselves insiders, people who read Time Out NYC to "discover" the most authentic Thai food in Queens.

Tucked into a tiny storefront down a random stretch of 6th street, it's the type of place that you have to seek out in order to find. But, once you're in, it's a Brigadoon of coziness on a street that has little to recommend it besides an understocked food co-op and an experimental theater. I went to Podunk on a gloomy Saturday afternoon with friends to sip tea and possibly eat a scone.

We squeezed into flea-market chic chairs and began to leaf through our menus. Each page listed three or four tea services--savory ones with crustless cucumber sandwiches and miniature cheese biscuits, ones with little cakes, clotted cream, baby-scones, others with Norwegian flatbreads, smoked fish and soft cheeses. There was just one problem--I only wanted a scone. I flipped to the back of the menu, assuming there would be a la carte items. Nothing.

So, my friends and I ventured to the back of the house to see if we could, in fact, order a la carte pastry. The woman at the counter wore little wire-rimmed glasses pushed all the way down to the tip of her nose, a vaguely Amish headdress, and a gingham pinafore. Judging by her costume, I felt like we were going to get along.

I smiled at her in the way you might smile at the old woman who lived in a shoe and began to explain that I wasn't hungry enough to order a whole tea service. At some point during my spiel, I noticed that she snatched the menu out of my hand. Yet, it was only after I had made my case for single cupcakes that I started to realize what was going on. One of my friend's jaw pulsed like she was resisting a violent urge. Another rolled her eyes.

"If you don't want a full tea", she huffed, "then maybe this isn't the right place for you." I was confused and agreed to decide on a tea service if she'd give me the menu back. She stood firm. The last time a restaurant kicked me out, I was sixteen and smoking a cigarette in a diner that was clearly non-smoking.

Again, I know the going's rough right now. I imagine that it's especially hard if you dress like a Mother Goose character and run an inexcusably expensive tearoom in a neighborhood that used to be famous for its flophouses. But, I can't stretch my sympathy far enough to understand that kind of rudeness. This next story is equally mind blowing.

Last weekend, my roommate and her boyfriend went to dinner at a Canaille, a Brooklyn bistro that came very highly recommended. Like so many other places in the neighborhood, the restaurant was the size of a broom closet. Luckily, both my roommate and her boyfriend are natives and weren't astounded by the lack of space.

They expected to cram into a table near the wall, order a bottle of wine and forget that their elbows were practically in the adjacent table's cassoulet. Instead, the owner seated them at a table directly in the only walkway from the kitchen to the dining room. They politely inquired about the other table by the wall, but the owner coldly informed them that it was unavailable.

After tripping the waitress and getting knocked in the head with trays, plates and bottles, they couldn't take it anymore. And, with the waitress' consent, they moved. At this point, the enraged owner began shouting expletives in their direction (um, naturally). He only stopped once his partner came over to calm him and apologize for his behavior. Later, they rightfully wrote a scathing review of the restaurant somewhere on the Internet.

Am I wrong to be shocked? Has anyone else noticed this shift towards rudeness bordering on mania? I want to finish this post with a word of caution to any restaurant that has a loose-cannon employee: there is nothing--not killer steak frites, moist scones, $35 dollar prix fixe menus or complimentary cocktails (well maybe complimentary cocktails)--that can rescue a restaurant from bad service.

Cecilia Estreich